A/N: Hello all! I'm back!
I had to work 11 days straight since the last chapter and make an emergency trip to DC for my job again. Apparently, because I did so well the last time I went, I was the choice to go back, go figure. I also did my final interview for the Texas job I'd be switching to in the near future, so hopefully, I didn't bungle it up.
Anyway, I'm going to try to finish up this story this weekend, so get ready for some fast-paced uploads.
.~.~.~.
"You three did good work this time, so I will recognize you as part of my executives. From now onwards, you may use the titles; 'Killer Lord' Testarossa, 'Pain Lord' Ultima, 'Menace Lord' Carrera." Rimuru declared. /1\
The demoness trio bowed deeply and with respect as they acknowledged their new titles, swearing to serve Rimuru dutifully forevermore.
"You aren't going to stop them?" I asked Gu who was sitting beside me in the crowd, completely hidden from view.
"Normally I would, but this benefits the game, so I'll allow it for a little while longer," Guy responded haughtily.
"Oh? Hedging your bets on him are we?" I goaded a bit.
Guy frowned slightly. "That slime is dangerous, but with everything that is likely going on, eliminating him would prove worse for the coming conflict," Guy said after a moment.
"Is this about Zelanus' betrayal?" I asked.
Guy nodded. "Yeah, I can't believe that bug has thrown his hat in with Rudra of all people... how annoying."
I chuckled. "Well, at least you have my daughter on your side now," I said, giving Guy a firm pat on the back, much to his annoyance.
Guy gave me an uncomfortable glare at me before sighing and giving up. "Yes. Milim is a game-changer. She'd be perfect to counter that bug too, considering how much her forces have grown since Carrion and Frey's awakenings." Guy commented.
"Victory is in sight, huh?" I commented while nodding sagely.
"I suppose..." Guy said, his tone sounding somewhat disappointed.
I looked at Guy for a moment before turning to Rain and Misery who were talking with Velzard behind us. "So... you two want to become True Demon Lords as well?" I asked.
Rain smiled wryly at that question. "That Rimuru guy is crazy dangerous for being able to awaken people like that. Not even Guy-sama could do it!"
"Oy!" Guy interjected, but Rain ignored it, as acknowledging it would make her as good as dead.
"Still, as long as those three don't awaken, I guess it's not that bad" Rain continued.
"I would like to awaken personally." Misery commented. "Having more strength would make me more useful to Guy-sama"
"Well it would be nice if they weren't so weak," Guy said smugly.
"No no no no..." I said waving my hand back and forth. "Guy, you are literally the only being alive who'd consider a fellow primordial weak."
'Well they really are weak' I thought.
"Your argument doesn't work if you also think it, dear" Velzard replied, having read my mind.
"Come on! I'm trying to cheer them up!" I said, looking at Misery and rain, who looked depressed.
Guy laughed heartily. "Hahahaha! See! You're not that different from me, Alaster!" Guy laughed while Velzard chuckled.
I sighed heavily, becoming depressed myself for a second at what Guy said before Rain, Misery, and I shared a silent look between us. I don't know why, but at that moment, I felt like the three of us became friends in our suffering and I silently decided to be a bit nicer to the Blue and Green Primordials in the future.
"Well it was good seeing you again, Alaster, but I have to go and bully a slime for a bit," Guy commented.
"I get what you mean, bullying Rimuru is a good way to pass the time," I said, giving Guy a smile and a big thumbs up.
"Dear, are you really a Hero?" Velzard asked.
"Technically I'm a god, being a Divine Human and all that!" I said to her.
"..."
I tried not to worry too much about the painful look my lovely snow globe was giving me.
...
Velzard and I spent the rest of the day partying with the various monsters of the Tempest Federation. We weren't exactly invited, but since Guy was in the city, all of the executives who would have noticed us and informed Rimuru were on high alert near their lord and weren't participating, so we could have a nice time partying without it being a big ordeal.
I used [Clairvoyance] to watch as Rimuru awakened Rain and Misery while also scamming Guy out of Souls. I copied his technique without him noticing so I could replicate something similar if I wished to.
The technique effectively drains the soul energy of a target and converts it into a more usable energy source which can be used to awaken an individual who hasn't already been awakened. In theory, it doesn't even require souls to do this, and the process isn't inherently efficient, but the energy that makes up a soul is immense. Even if there was an effective way to convert the energy from one medium to another, it would still take about a quarter of Veldora's total reserves to awaken someone with this method.
Of course, I had an unlimited reserve of energy and direct access to the World System, so I didn't have to go through the same process as they did. I could effectively 'change some numbers in the files' to awaken someone, though the whole process DID remind me that although Yumina and Milim were Ultimate Skill holders and were stronger than most awakened beings, they technically still weren't awakened, so after the party, I decided to pay a visit to both and awaken them.
Milim was excited to get so much stronger suddenly and I fooled her into thinking it was her Birthday present. I got to enjoy an evening watching over her while she slept peacefully which soothed my heart.
Yumina, on the other hand, was rather annoyed that I'd awakened her. Apparently bursting into her office first thing in the morning and yelling 'Time to awaken, Snowflake!' loud enough for the entire Guild to hear and while she was on a call with the Guild Branch Members wasn't a good idea. /2\
Anyway, after she woke up from her nap, I was forced to make lunch for her as she pouted, though I could tell she was still happy to spend some time with me. We had a nice relaxing afternoon after that, which was nice.
(3rd POV)
"Is everything in place?" The voice asked.
"Yes, Master." The old man said, his head lowered as he kneeled before the ethereal visage of his royal master.
"Good. I would've liked to have that Slime brought into my ranks, but securing someone who can fight against Alaster comes as a priority." The visage commented. "How goes things on your end?"
"Very Well, master. I have had your envoy meet with the Luminaries and they too will follow my lead. Aria is away on her crusade against the Succubus and Hinata remains the only obstacle to our plans." The man commented.
"Good, and what of your granddaughter?" The visage asked.
"She has used her Unique Skill to empower the otherworlders. Even if their souls themselves will be used up in this fight, it is of no consequence." The man continued.
The visage pondered for a moment, seemingly receiving silent counsel from his side before resuming the conversation. "Very well, however, if that Saint should call for support from the Slime, you are to allow it. It would be best for the plan if he wasn't in his nation, after all."
"It will be done, master. Hinata will surely call for her lover if she is in distress and that naive slime will no doubt arrive to attempt to save her. Especially because she is the favored student of his wife" The man commented. /3\
"Good, try to kill her if you can. I doubt you'd be able to defeat the slime as you are now, so we shall have the weapon do it. Even if he does escape, hopefully, the grief of losing his lover will keep him too distracted to return home long enough for the plan to commence." The Visage commanded.
"It will be done." The man said, bowing more deeply.
The visage nodded in satisfaction at this before turning and the light of his form began to fade away as the magical projection was cut. The man, still on his knee, sighed after a moment before standing up and turning to the people gathered behind him. He removed his hood revealing the face of a young again Luminary of Sun Gran.
"So this is it, eh?" Luminary of the Moon Dina commented.
"Never thought we'd end up betraying our god, but alas, she's forsaken us first." Luminary of Saturn, Zaus sighed defeated.
"It can't be helped. She is a Vampire, and a Demon Lord as well. Our faith was merely a game to her and our devotion was abandoned long ago." Luminary of Mars, Ars commented. "Still, to think our wonderful god had such a treasure hidden away all this time." He said, looking over the glimmering casket of the sleeping body of Chronoa.
"Well, she is beautiful. I can understand wanting to use it as an art piece. It is going to be a shame to use it as a weapon." Luminary of Venus, Vina muttered in a disappointing tone as she ran her finger along the glowing casket, allowing its magic to slightly burn her fingers.
"Enough speculation. Luminous will notice our intrusion soon enough, and none of you are yet strong enough to withstand her wrath." Gran said, silencing his entourage while gazing over the corpses of dozens of Vampiric Protectors the group had slaughtered to enter this chamber.
"Begin the spell to release her," Gran ordered.
The other Luminaries nodded and began gathering their magic, preparing the delicate process of unsealing the Hero Chronoa from her glittering cage. Granbell, seeing this, nodded his head in approval before turning and walking away. He was sure his subordinates would succeed. This plan was meticulous and needed years to come to fruition. Stealing Luminous' most precious treasure was of the utmost importance, as without it, they wouldn't have any way of defeating the First Hero Alaster.
Only another True Hero, the once-called Ultimate Hero, could stand a chance against his might, and even then, it was uncertain who would truly come out on top. Granbell had witnessed Alaster on numerous occasions when he was younger, and to say he held doubts about Chronoa's ability to defeat him would be an understatement.
Still, with her being his apprentice, hopefully, he wouldn't outright kill Chronoa and would try to save her. Hopefully, this time, the assassination attempt would work on him. It would be difficult to move freely with his Clairvoyance spoiling all of their moves, after all. Especially after the plan succeeded, the Mighty Storm Dragon was on their side, and his elvish lover betrayed him. All pretenses of 'neutrality' would go out the window, so they needed Chronoa as insurance.
'Not even Alaster could win against Velgrynd, Veldora, and Chronoa at the same time.' Gran concluded with a sigh before straightening his back and continuing his march through the Holy Palace atop the Sacred Mountain.
"I never thought the head of the Luminaries would betray us." A cold voice came from behind him.
Granbell smirked and let out an amused huff before turning to his most powerful pupil. "Hinata, surely you must understand the need for humanity to be free of the domination of the Demon Lords." He argued back, amusedly.
Hinata opened her eyes wide in shock for a brief moment before hardening her resolve once again. "You've gotten younger." She stated.
"A gift from my old master," Granbell commented wryly as he unsheathed his blade.
"Is he also ordering you to betray Luminous-sama?" Hinata asked.
"You won't survive this encounter. Call for your goddess, I have business with her." Granbell ordered, ignoring Hinata's query.
"You can explain yourself to her in the afterlife!" Hinata commented as she dashed forward toward Granbell at shocking speeds.
Even the old soul was startled briefly at how fast her movement was, though he had known of her brief and presumably hellish training under Alaster, if her intense and public dislike but begrudging respect for the man afterward was anything to go by. He would never admit it, but he did quite like the man he was plotting to kill. A human which fought off monsters and established the Guild to protect humans was surely not an evil man, just an obstacle for his master. Especially because of his pro-monster policy in recent years, probably due to having Demi-Human Daughters.
All of these thoughts raced through Granbells head in the time it took for Hinata to close the gap. 'Indeed. If I were still in my old and decrepit body, she would be my opponent, but now...' He thought as he allowed Hinata's sword, which was locked with his own to slide off as he raised his arm to elbow her in the face.
To his surprise, however, she parried his attack with her own. His shocked expression must have been clear as day, as she smirked defiantly. "Insectars have multiple arms and their exoskeletons are hard enough that my strikes would always slide off. If I didn't learn to adapt, they'd hit me when I was overextended with their other arms. Something like a human's trick moves will not work on me!" Hinata declared, pushing Granbell back several steps as he was forced to retreat from her retaliatory strike.
Hinata silently thanked her 'Disappointing Master' for teaching her to not just rely on her sword skills by having her fight against enemies that couldn't be defeated with a blade for so long. If not, she'd probably have taken that elbow blow to the face just then and been too disoriented to fight properly.
Granbell did his best, but the smile on his face just wouldn't go away. It had been such a long time since he had fought someone who could match him, and he needed a good opponent to test his new, younger body against before facing off against Luminous afterward.
"Excellent! Hinata, if you were to awaken, you'd be my most promising student of all time, perhaps even matching Chronoa or Alaster!" He declared before his excitement faded. "It truly is a shame. I'd like to have tested my power against you, but we are short of time. You are more useful to the plan dead than alive... do it." Granbell spoke
Hinata looked confused before her senses screamed at her to move, alas, her flesh did not move as fast as her brain, and the feeling of a bullet ripping through her body from behind and coming out the other side was all that she could feel.
Hinata fell forward, unable to life so much as a finger and barely clinging onto life as she lay, bleeding out on the floor. Her breathing was haggard and her body was feeling cold.
"I was worried you'd kill her instantly," Granbell spoke to the figure who emerged from the shadows, though Hinata's hearing had already begun to fail her, and all she heard were distant, incoherent mumblings.
"Then she wouldn't call for the Slime. I made sure to use a [Spirit Bullet] which damaged her spiritual body. She shouldn't be able to think very clearly, but the survival instinct seems to come from the Astral Body, so she'll be calling out for help any moment now." Kondou replied.
"Why not just dominate her?" Granbell asked, curiously.
"It's best not to rely too heavily on that level of Domination. Luminous has a power that directly influences the soul, so she might discover it, and if she does, then all of my other Dominations would be in jeopardy. It would be a different story if it was Rudra-sama's Domination though." Kondou explained.
Granbell sighed, looking down at Hinata. "I do hope that you are reborn here again. I shall make it up to you, in the next life." He said before turning back to Kondou. "You're role is done here. Master will need you for dominating Veldora. I doubt with your power slashed by using a [Parallel Body] will be enough. I can deal with Luminous myself and the others are nearly done.
Kondou nodded his head and a magic circle appeared below his feet. "Don't get too entangled. What's important is that you and the Luminaries escape and that we sic Chronoa on the Slime and Alaster."
Hinata, her eyes dull, couldn't understand what the men were saying, but she could understand that if she did nothing, she was going to die, and she didn't want that. Not here. Not like this, bleeding out from a single attack. Falling to a sneak attack too...
Her thoughts went out to Luminous. She hadn't been a very good vassal to her, nor would she be able to keep their promise. She thought of her 'Disappointing Master'. He was, in fact, a very nice man, even if he didn't always show it. She knew her death would sadden him and he would probably blame himself for not properly training her.
Shizue.
Shizue was definitely going to cry when she heard of Hinata's death. The thought of her beloved sensei so distraught brought HInata to the brink of despair.
She thought to that slime.
Rimuru.
Someone like that. So reliable and clever, but at the same time goofy and loveable. She had just started getting to know him better and even though she would never admit to it, she saw a bit of the father she wished she'd had in him.
'Please... Shizue Sensei, Rimuru,
...
The celebrations were over and Guy, Misery, and Rain had left their domain. Rimuru sat back in his chair, slumped over in his human form. The only reason he did so was that Shizue was giving him a small massage after he'd finished reading all of the reports from the festival. Otherwise, he'd already have transformed himself into his slime form.
Rimuru gave out a long and satisfied sigh. "Now that the Empire's invasion is over, hopefully, things will go back to being nice and peaceful." He said.
"Yes, peace is best," Shizue said with a bright smile.
Rimuru nodded his head and closed his eyes in contentment. "Though everyone loves partying so much my workload has really started to pile up."
Shizue chuckled. "That's fine, isn't it? So long as everyone is happy."
Rimuru huffed. "Well that's true, but I wish Alaster and his wife didn't cause such a big fuss. I didn't even realize they were here until we found the Veldora statue." Rimuru lamented.
Veldora had gotten drunk during the festivities and ended up saying something stupid and being frozen solid by Velzard who was in the crowd. It seems Luminous was here too, as her uproarious laughter at the sight is what first alerted Rimuru before even Veldora could send a message for help through [Thought Transmission]. She was here under-cover in a magic disguise enjoying the musical going on in town, but didn't want to cause a disturbance or have all the 'bothers' of an official visit either, though Rimuru had his doubts about that.
<
Rimuru said nothing but slouched a bit more in response with a troubled look on his face which seemed to confuse Shizue for a moment.
By the way, Veldora was fine after a while. Alaster thawed him out at Rimuru's request, though he returned to the Labyrinth for an 'at home date' with Ramiris afterward to try and avoid his sister's punishments and Luminous' mockery.
He really was a cowardly dragon.
Rimuru sighed again as he thought of it before turning to the couch in his office. There he saw the young Chloe slumped over with an open book in her lap. Shuna was draping a blanket over the slumbering beauty as she cleaned up the dishes she'd left behind. Chloe had wanted to stay with Rimuru and Shizue for the day, even though he told her he was only doing paperwork, so he accepted.
He was using a [Parallel Body] to read a story together with her while working on the paperwork, though after she fell asleep, he recovered that body and let her rest. It was only mid-day, and he was finished, so he decided to patrol around town and see how everything was doing. He stood and stretched a bit as Shizue picked up his teacup and walked to Shuna to help clean.
Rimuru froze, halfway through his stretch. A teacup fell to the floor and shattered, startling Shuna and awakening the slumbering Chloe.
"Hinata..." Shizue said in shock aloud. She turned to Rimuru in a seeming panic.
"I know, I heard it too," Rimuru said.
<
Rimuru didn't question it. "Shuna, something is wrong in Ruberios and I need to go there immediately. Tell Luminous to meet us ther-" He began to say the order.
"No need," Luminous said, appearing out of seemingly nowhere in the room in front of him. /4\
In his hyper-accelerated mindstate, he quietly asked [Raphael] to remind him to investigate how she did that, considering the manor he was in was warded against teleportation-based entry and exit by unauthorized users, but he'll worry about that later. For now...
"I'll teleport you there. You won't be able to get past the barrier to Ruberios otherwise" Luminous said to him with an almost commanding tone.
Rimuru and Shizue agreed without hesitation and walked over to her, ready to teleport out.
"Shuna, please inform everyone. This is likely a trap." Rimuru stated.
Shuna nodded her head. This was no problem. Ranga was in Rimuru's shadow and he was bringing Shizue, who was as strong as her brother, even after his evolution into a True Demon Lord. Plus, there was a [Parallel Body] in the Labyrinth currently. Just because they had decided to celebrate, doesn't mean Rimuru and Tempest was off-guard for another attack from the Empire. It was unlikely, but they still had a contingency plan for it, so even if they were all wiped out, Rimuru would still survive.
As the light began engulfing Shizue, Rimuru, and Luminous, a third, smaller actor made her move. Chloe ran over to Rimuru and hugged his leg, just as the teleportation technique was going off and before anyone could stop her, vanishing with the four of them before anyone could stop her.
.~.~.~.
/1\:
Kurama was awakened here instead of Kumara, being named 'Zodiac Lord', and all of the Evergreen monsters received a boon from her Harvest Festival
/2\:
Pretty much every adventurer gained some small bonus from Yumina's Harvest Festival. It wasn't something absurd like they all gained Unique Skills like with Rimuru, but they DID mostly get a power boost, making them all a bit stronger and better with magic.
/3\:
In canon, it was assumed Hinata and Rimuru were lovers or in some kind of relationship due to how close they were, here it is no different except for the fact Shizue and Rimuru are married. There are rumors of Rimuru having a harem too, considering Shion and Shuna's beauty and devotion to him, so people think they are his mistresses.
The only reason people don't think that Milim is also a mistress is that Alaster is famously overprotective of his daughters and since Milim is his daughter, it is assumed that he would never allow her to be with Rimuru.
/4\:
Luminous was spying on Chloe, as she was actually there to make sure she was safe during the war and was just pretending to be there in secret for the band. If Tempest were to fall, she'd kidnap Chloe and bring her to Ruberios.
Raphael noticed her, but since she wasn't doing anything to harm Rimuru, and after seeing her enjoying the band, assumed she was only there to save the things and people she liked in Tempest if they were to be defeated by the Empire. She also helped to heal some people who were hurt during the fighting secretly, so Raphael didn't bother informing Rimuru, as there were more pressing issues to deal with