Chapter 64 - Chapter 2-The Interviews-Part 1

"So yeah, I was in a real dilly of a pickle for a second there!"

I had just finished hearing the report from Ramiris's team. Sounded like things got way hairier than I expected.

"Is Chloe all right, then?"

"No problems there," Shuna said. "The moment she reverted to her child form, she regained consciousness. We've placed her in the medical center for observation just in case."

That was a relief. I had been told first thing that we had no casualties, but I couldn't really breathe easy until I saw things for myself. She was probably sleeping, so I decided I'd stop in to visit her the next day.

Still… What an enemy we had to deal with. That diversion posing as an invasion, luring us into lightening the guard around Ramiris—and Deeno picked that moment to turn traitor. He was more powerful than Beretta, and not even Beretta and Apito together could stop him. Apparently he was this close to scoring Ramiris, but Zegion popping in just in time had saved the day.

One false move and it would've been a monumental disaster. The thought of what would've happened if Zegion hadn't woken up then made me shudder. I couldn't thank him enough for being on time.

I have to say, though, it was a surprise to see that Velgrynd came back. I'd been told she was working with Masayuki and the Empire's top commanders to discuss their future direction. I'd need to meet and talk with her later, and no doubt she'd want to collect her thoughts before then as well. But if Velgrynd stepped up to protect Masayuki, I guess that pretty much proved it now, huh? It made sense to me, but it also just added to the pile of questions I had.

But we could tackle that stuff later. For now, I was going down my list of people due to brief me.

"Well, Ramiris, I'm glad you're okay, at least!"

"Oh, you don't need to tell me twice. And, ya know, it's not like Deeno tried anything funny with me at all, but if I got trundled out of the labyrinth, I woulda been in a heap of trouble. Right? I mean, if I really tried at it, I could kick that kid's butt six ways to Sunday, but still!"

Good to see this ordeal didn't shake her at all. She was clearly angry about it, but now that she was safe, she was back to issuing idle threats like usual. In fact, she had still been peacefully sleeping when I got back, mumbling along the lines of, "Mmmm, damn you, Deeno, I'm gonna execute all forty-eight of my sure-kill moves on you…," and so on. She always aggrandized her strength in her dreams, and that was apparently just as true when the target of her ire was safely far away from her.

"Yes, Deeno should be grateful that Lady Ramiris didn't break out her forty eight death strikes!"

Treyni, looking after her, wasted no time propping up her ego. "Right? Right? I know!"

Ramiris eagerly nodded back. This was exactly why she got carried away all the time, you see. I asked Treyni in my mind to cut it out a little.

"My sincerest apologies, Sir Rimuru. I was negligent in my directorial duties. I never imagined Deeno would turn against us…"

Vester, meanwhile, was hanging his head low. He had shown up here ahead of everyone else in order to say sorry to me, in fact. He always had a strong sense of duty that way, and this event had shaken him pretty hard. So I smiled back, trying to soothe him.

"Nah, nah, quit worrying about it so much! We all had our doubts about Deeno from the start, so…"

Ramiris, Treyni, even Beretta—they all eagerly agreed with this. "He's a demon lord, you know. I didn't trust him from the start!"

"No. And I did not expect him to try anything this bold, but I always made sure he was kept on careful watch in case he tried something."

"And he was more dedicated to his work than any of us expected. That surprised me more than anything."

They were trashing him pretty badly. I kinda wanted them to trust him a little more, but that was all shot now. Deeno only came here because Guy told him to, besides, and he didn't even try hiding the fact that he was a spy. No wonder we always had our eyes on him.

But the way I saw it…

"There's no need to dwell on it, Vester. I don't think Deeno did all that out of malice against us."

That was my honest take. I'd expected him to pull something like this the whole time, yes, but in some ways, it felt like he'd all but asked us to keep a constant watch on his behavior. Maybe he thought it'd come to this eventually —I couldn't help but suspect that.

"Yeah, well, he could've picked a less awkward way of dealing with us," said Ramiris. "I would've been happy to talk with him about it…"

"Right? If we were all getting along that well, don't you want to give him another chance? Deeno might've had his own obligations to deal with, too," I offered.

My conjecture seemed to convince Vester.

"Indeed. Well, if you want to continue trusting Deeno, I will as well. I've made mistakes in my career, but thanks to you and King Gazel, I've returned to the right path. Nothing is more reassuring than having an ally on your side."

Vester relaxed his expression a bit. He seemed to be over whatever was bothering him, and I was glad for that.

Besides, I really did want to believe in Deeno—and I had another good reason for that, although I planned to keep it a secret until I had more confirmation. There was a distinct possibility Deeno possessed an angel-type ultimate skill. The reports said he'd evolved an ultimate skill from a unique one during battle,

which sounded a little too convenient to me, but if it was true, it meant he could conjure skills out of nowhere like that.

I firmly agree. Evolution mid-battle like that is normally unheard of.

Ciel, my heartfelt friend and partner, was on my side here. I relied on it more than anyone else.

I had given a name to Raphael in the heat of the moment while I was fending off Velgrynd, and the result was Ciel, this new manus core of intelligence. This was far more than just some simple thinking engine. Much like Chronoa, it performed its calculations independently from its master, kind of like I had a second mind operating in my body. It was clearly sentient, and now it was far more humanlike in its reactions.

That, I suppose, was why I felt so assured after Ciel backed me up just now. It had made plenty of mistakes as well, but no reason to bring that up now. Besides, if it had remained in its unevolved Raphael form, I would've been in serious trouble, right? And looking back, it hadn't been operating too well when I was faced off against Ludora (or Michael, I guess?), apparently because of Ultimate Dominion's effects.

…

That habit of falling silent whenever the conversation wasn't going its way was as strong as ever.

Basically, what I'm saying is that I likely would've lost if it hadn't become Ciel for me. Looking back now, it made me shudder how close to the brink I had been for a moment.

This strikes me as pointless theorizing at this juncture.

Wow, it's more of a sore loser than I am. Force the conversation into a conclusion and leave it at that—a page from my book. I know we both march to the beat of our own drums, but still.

Anyway, it seemed clear to me that Deeno was hiding some kind of special power I'd like to know about.

It is likely he was trying to disguise it. However, given his unnatural behavior, I

am certain he possesses certain other abilities as well.

Mm-hmm. If Ciel says so, it's likely true.

Deeno was probably being controlled by Ultimate Dominion, what with having an angelic-type ultimate skill and all. He and I weren't connected by a soul corridor, so I couldn't just go and remove it from him that very moment, but I might be able to do it if we ever faced off against each other. That being said, there was still a chance Deeno had betrayed us out of his own free will, so I couldn't be too optimistic. Either way, though, I wasn't going to write him off as a hated enemy just yet.

It would've been nice if the topic ended at this point, but Vester wasn't the only person down in the dumps.

"I sincerely apologize, Sir Rimuru, for exposing Lady Ramiris to danger…" Now it was Beretta taking a knee and bowing his head before me. "Whoa there, Beretta!" Ramiris yelled. "You did a real good job for me!"

I think Ramiris was right. Beretta did an excellent job against Deeno, an opponent who far outclassed him. No mistakes were made at all—in fact, I wanted to thank him for buying us so much time. I was concerned that Beretta would blame himself for any setback he'd faced in battle, and it looked like I was right. He and Vester are good reminders that there's such a thing as being too dedicated.

"No, no, you successfully stalled for time like you were trained to do. You did a great job for me!"

"But Lady Ramiris granted me the post of Dungeon Master, the keystone to all our defenses. You, as well, directed me to keep Lady Ramiris guarded. And now look what happened…"

Beretta was still arguing vehemently against himself. I'm sure he was frustrated about this, but Beretta had done all the right things down there. He'd sized up Deeno, decided whether he could beat him, and then carried out his assigned role. If he had made the wrong call and tried charging into a fight he could never win, Ramiris would be well away from Tempest by now, and I wouldn't want to imagine the resulting carnage.

"So look, Beretta, you need to be more proud of yourself."

I think my praise was getting through to him. He seemed calmer finally. And why not? The enemy's strategy had failed miserably in the end, and that meant Beretta and his cohorts had put up a brilliant performance.

"If you say so…"

Beretta was calmer but apparently still unconvinced.

"Still worked up about it? All right. Let's talk about this more later, okay? Come visit me in my chamber."

"…! Y-yes, my lord! Thank you!"

If Ramiris was safe, then all was well—but Beretta refused to accept that. He got preoccupied with things way too much. Regardless, we'd have time to dig deeper into this later, so I moved on for the time being.

Ramiris and Vester were done with their briefings, so I turned toward Geld and Adalmann.

"Great job protecting the city, Geld! You have my sincere thanks."

"I hardly deserve the praise, sir. I love this city, and I'm not about to let all our hard work be torn to pieces that easily. All my companions feel the same way, and I promise we'll improve ourselves so you never have to be worried about us!"

"I'm glad to hear that, but don't push too hard, okay?"

Even now, I felt like Geld was overworking himself. If he went further overboard with it, he'd make everyone look like they were slacking off by comparison. It must put all his underlings on edge, I imagine. Their boss deserves some rest when he needs it.

After I reinforced this with Geld, he moved on to his report. It seemed our enemy was closely involved with Deeno; Geld had dealt with two of them, both women, named Pico and Garasha. As Ramiris also confirmed with me, they were part of the Seven Primordial Angels, serving the dragon Veldanava directly. Before then, they were seraphim, the loftiest and most powerful

echelon of angels, tasked with preserving stability in the world. Deeno once belonged to this group as well, apparently, but we were running on the assumption that the foes who appeared on Floors 50 and 70 were a different force from these Primordials.

"I'm pretty sure the Primordial Angels govern over this other world, monitoring this powerful, unstoppable monster they banished there, y'know? But the way Deeno was talking, there are three of them left here as well."

Those three, I imagine, were Pico, Garasha, and Deeno—former seraphim who became "fallen" and now lived on the surface world. They kept watch over things, but we didn't even know if they were ordered to or just did it because they wanted to. All we could do was use the pieces of information we had to guess at their motivations.

"They were fairly powerful. If I hadn't evolved, I doubt I could've fended them off."

If that's how Geld put it, they must've been pretty damn fierce. Pico was handled by Kumara, but that battle got pretty heated, too, they said. But given how the enemy was also meddling with the labyrinth at the same time as this fight, we could assume they weren't putting their full force into the battle.

"Hmm… Sounds like trouble."

"Yes."

I'd prefer not to antagonize them, but it's too late for that. Let's bet on the assumption that Deeno's being controlled and work out our strategy from there.

Now for the other force we'd run into.

"So what about Zarario, then?"

I listened to Adalmann explain.

"He was a fearsome foe indeed. Sir Charys and Lady Treyni were handling him until I showed up, but they said they were all but helpless against him."

This dude was even scarier, it turned out. I looked into the labyrinth's archives to check out the battle, but he was clearly a different type of creature from the fallen. He called himself part of the Three Mystic Leaders, too, a servant of the

Mystic Lord—and that meant Feldway, that haughty Mystic Lord, was once the leader of the Seven Primordial Angels.

The three Primordials who joined him in the other world were now working with him as the Three Mystic Leaders, I suppose. While they were gone, though, Veldanava disappeared on them, so they had no way to return here. Then, somewhere along the line, they transformed from angel to mystic.

Now it made sense. They must be lending a hand to this effort for reasons apart from Deeno and his friends—maybe a friendly favor or whatever. That was my wishful thinking, at least.

I agree with you.

Well, that was reassuring. If Ciel thought so, too, it had to be the case.

"Either way, the Three Mystic Leaders and their crew are definitely enemies to us. I want all of you to keep that in mind and stay alert!"

With that warning, I related everything I knew to my audience, mostly regarding Michael and the Mystic Lord Feldway. The exact nature of Michael's abilities was a key issue for us, so I revealed it all without hiding anything.

"W-wait! So…so you think Deeno is…?! That's why you said we should trust in him, Rimuru?"

So Ramiris finally noticed. I wasn't going to bring that up until I was surer about it, but this worked.

"Hopefully it's not premature to say that, but there is a possibility he's being manipulated, yes. If that turns out to be the case, Ramiris, let's forgive him, okay?"

"Sure, all right. I hope you're correct!"

Ramiris gave me a cheerful smile. She seemed in brighter spirits than before, so I suppose taking this approach was the best thing for us. Now I'd just have to hope I was right about Deeno.

So as we exchanged this information with one another, the party went into full swing. Rigurd was crying his eyes out, joyous as he was that we were all

safe. Rigur extracted enough funding from Mjöllmile to ensure we had plenty of food to go with all our drinking—and Mjöllmile was an eager participant himself, showing off some parlor tricks for the guests. It's always nice to know I have such well-adjusted people working for me.

With all the major briefings over, we were a bit more relaxed now. Relaxed and having some serious fun.

"I don't know who these Three Mystic Leaders are, but let me at them, and they'll be eating dirt in no time!"

Great to hear, Benimaru. And really, I could barely recognize him compared to before he set off to battle. Wonder what'd happened to him?

"Gwah-ha-ha-ha-ha! And with me on your side, our next war is guaranteed to end in victory for us!"

Gabil was boasting away as well…and much like Benimaru, his boast was backed by a sudden, unexplained boost in his strength.

"Woooo! So cool, Sir Gabil!"

"Indeed."

"You're an even greater man than ever. I'll follow you my whole life!" His forces were as jubilant over him as always.

"My brother, please don't get carried away. You nearly got yourself killed this time, didn't you?! And all of you realize that heaping all this praise on him is exactly why he gets so full of himself, don't you?!"

Soka wasn't as appreciative of this, but I hoped she'd let it slide for today. Gabil did do a lot to worry her, though, so I wasn't gonna step in and stop her. That wasn't just me running away from trouble, either; I want to make that very clear.

A bigger concern was the dude next to me domineering over the entire crowd.

"Kwah-ha-ha-ha! I understand you got your rear end beaten, Charys! I keep telling you that you need more training!"

"I have no defense, my lord."

"Kwah-ha-ha-ha! No, you'd better not make excuses! Be brave enough of a man to admit your defeat!"

He already did, dude. And didn't Veldora lose to Velgrynd, too? Was he in any position to laugh in people's faces about their losses?

"Didn't you lose, too?"

"Huhhh?! Wha…? What are you talking about, Rimuru?! I—I didn't lose at all. I was just a little out of shape!"

And he was making excuses about it, too. For all his lecturing Charys, he was barely one to talk, either.

"B-but, my master, you know… He couldn't help it! The enemy interfered with him in, like, the most cowardly way ever! It doesn't count at all!"

"Y-yes, indeed. Well said there, Ramiris! No, my winning record remains unblemished!"

They haven't forgotten that Velgrynd is right there, have they?

It was such ugly excuse-making, I thought about bringing it up. I wouldn't have needed to worry so much if Veldora didn't lose, but we all knew how that turned out…

"Charys, I know Veldora can be a pain, but I hope you won't abandon him, okay?"

"Ha-ha-ha! Don't worry about that. Sir Veldora is my master now, and I intend to improve myself so I can earn more of his favor."

So serious-minded. Kind of reminds me of Geld, in fact. That sure went to waste serving someone like Veldora…but still, I was really glad Charys had decided to serve Veldora for me.

The party continued on, and with it came a wealth of fine drinks. I was worried we were letting our hair down too much, but I was the only one—my officers, after all, had no problem neutralizing alcohol in their bodies. That made me wonder what the point of drinking was at all, then…but as they put it, they could still enjoy the feeling of inebriation and the way it loosened their

tongues. I was the same way, so I decided not to go too deeply down this rabbit hole.

"All right, Sir Rimuru, allow me to fill you up!"

"Hold on, Diablo! It was my turn next!"

Diablo and Shion were bickering with each other behind me. I really had a lot of trouble figuring out whether they loved or hated each other. They squabbled over the weirdest of things…

"Now, now, quit fighting over pointless matters and have something to drink yourselves, won't you?"

"Keh-heh-heh-heh-heh… I'd be happy to."

"You can't trick me! I fall asleep when I drink, so I'm going to worry about attending to Sir Rimuru first today!"

Diablo was a wine person, it looked like. I can't speak intelligently about how wine tastes, but yeah, that suited his personality well. As for Shion, well, it wasn't that booze put her to sleep so much as it made her blackout drunk— getting tangled up with other people, causing a scene, you name it. Shuna had to keep a sharp eye on her, and the fact that she remembered none of it afterward made it harder to deal with. I'd usually offer her grape juice at times like these, but if she was abstaining today, that was fine.

Actually, looking closer at the two of them, hadn't they gotten stronger, too? In fact, all my top officers had grown in one way or the other, actually. Not just awakened—it was like something else happened to them…

Please stop being suspicious of me.

Oh, sorry.

But… Yeah. Not even Ciel could help people with their evolutions. I just provided a bit of a helping hand.

Wait, you did?!

I really wanted to dive into this, but we were in the middle of a party. If Ciel could do that now, it'd still be able to tomorrow, so let's just enjoy this moment

for all we can. So, procrastinating on all my problems until the next day, I immersed myself in the feast.

All my officers took the next day off.

I felt bad for working Rigurd and the administrative staff, but I asked them to check on the condition of our city's infrastructure and relay to our citizens what was going on. The city was back on the surface now, but we needed to see if things like the water and sewer system were damaged at all. Once our safety checks were complete, we'd allow evacuees to return to their homes. We had just wrapped up a major war, so I wanted our administration to get the rest it needed, but we also had to consider everyone else's lives as well.

Thinking about it, working in government really is like being a slave to the people, isn't it? You have enough problems crop up in normal times, but whenever an emergency comes up, time off is the first thing to go on you. Things had gotten easier now that Testarossa and her pals were pitching in with governing, but we still needed to work on finding more personnel.

Me? I'm an amateur, of course, so my job's more about reading through our documents and stamping my seal of approval on things. If something seemed like too much for us, I either rejected it or sent it back down to the relevant department for further consideration, that kind of thing. It only worked, really, because I had Ciel handle all the detailed explanations for me. If it was only me, this structure would've collapsed long ago.

So while it was the day after a big party, I still had a lot of stuff to check and approve. Rigurd and his team were busy scurrying around the city, so this way, at least I wouldn't feel guilty about being lazy.

But first…

Before I got to work, I decided to see how Chloe was doing. The moment I stepped into her room in our medical quarters, our eyes met.

"Mr. Tempest…um, I mean, Rimuru!"

"Hee-hee! You don't have to try so hard to talk like a grown-up. To me, you're the same Chloe you always are."

"Oh, come on! I know I look like a kid, but I'm every bit as grown up as you are. In fact, Rimuru, I'm even older than you."

I get that, but…I dunno, exteriors do count for a lot. When a total stranger sees me, they apparently think I'm a cute little girl, after all…which was becoming a big hang-up for me. Careless words can really sink ships—that's important to remember.

So I told Chloe how happy I was to see her safe, although she was blushing and pouting at me. She reacted by hiding her face in a pillow.

"Ugh! That's so unfair, Rimuru!"

Um? How should I be interpreting this…?

Unclear. It is too difficult a question to answer.

If Ciel didn't know, I certainly didn't have a chance, either. So I just said, "Now, now, now," to try to assuage Chloe.

After waiting a while for her to calm down, I asked for her story—what had happened in the battle and what had resulted from it.

"Well, I'm perfectly fine, but I can't talk to Chronoa anymore. The ultimate skill Sariel almost went out of control, so she's suppressing it for me."

So Michael's rule was influencing her after all. Trying to take over something this precious was all but picking a fight with me. I'd seen Michael as an enemy before, but I didn't think I needed to show any mercy at this point.

"How do you feel now?"

"Hmm… I dunno. I can't fully handle Yog-Sothoth, and Chronoa isn't around to talk to, so I don't really know what's going on."

Things sounded more serious than at first glance. I hadn't been relying on Chloe's battle skills from the beginning, but I guess I kidded myself into believing she could defend herself well enough. I rued that thought now, but the way things stood, Chloe's safety took first priority.

As I am now, I have the right to interact with data particles, so I can influence Chronoa as a manas. If I go into Chloe's spiritual space and invoke Ability Adjust, I could likely remove Michael's influence.

Oh? So Ciel could act upon her.

"Chloe, I think I can improve things for you if I act upon your skill a little…"

"You can't do that, Rimuru. Back then, right at the end, Chronoa told me she couldn't exist independently if I relied on you any longer. Like, 'If I want to stand hand in hand with that man, I have to get out of this situation by my own power,' and stuff. And I agree with her, too, so I can't have you help me, Mr. Tempest."

Chloe stared me in the eye as she spoke. Her own eyes were sharpened upon me, despite her childish exterior, and I could imagine the beauty they'd have when she was an adult woman. It was more than enough to leave an impression on me. Not that I'm into kids or anything. It's just that Chloe was so incredibly— Ah, better stop there. I was gonna be following in the footsteps of a certain blond-haired demon lord before long, and that'd be a big downgrade in my book, so I turned my mind elsewhere.

"All right. But if anything comes up, tell me, all right? I'll always be happy to talk things over with you."

I patted Chloe on the head. She smiled appreciatively at me and gave a slight nod.

The moment I was back from my visit, Vester asked to speak with me on an urgent issue.

"What's up?"

"Thank you for taking the time to see me. I know you must be exhausted by now…but I've received word from King Gazel."

"Oh!"

"That's right." Vester propped his glasses back up on his nose. "As you likely surmise, he's demanding an explanation for all this."

Great. We staged a gigantic war in the backyard, then unceremoniously left without even bothering to clean up. No wonder he was mad at me. We didn't confine this whole deal to my territory, after all. We got the Dwarven Kingdom

mixed up in it…

"Yeah, um, did he sound angry?"

"I'd surmise he wasn't elated about it, no."

Vester wiped the sweat from his brow. I'll bet he was nervous. He had been partying it up with me over beer last night, after all, so this was kind of his fault, too. I was sure that with all the stuff we'd dealt with, he simply didn't have the time to deal with Dwargon matters, and it'd be mean to press him on that. But I was also sure Vester felt irresponsible for not letting me know sooner. I was the most at fault, but…

"Can you send a reply saying I'll explain matters at a later date?" "I think we'll need to add an acceptable excuse, sir."

That's Vester for you. Sharp as a tack about this stuff. I love how much I can rely on him.

Either way, we needed to organize a lot of things before we could give him or anyone else a coherent explanation. The first thing was to work out a schedule for this meeting. For now, I was leaving King Gazel in Vester's capable hands; once we had everything worked out, then I'd discuss matters with the king.

Now I was on my lunch break. Banishing all troublesome issues from my mind, I focused on enjoying my favorite meal of fried karaage chicken and yakisoba noodles in sauce.

Then the thought occurred to me. What kind of stuff has Ciel been up to behind my back? Ciel had mentioned last night that it "provided a bit of a helping hand," and I thought I needed to work out exactly how much of a hand it was and what exactly it involved. Ciel's "bit of" help could often be far, far more than a bit, after all.

Mm, being treated with such suspicion is quite upsetting to me.

So began Ciel's testimony. Just as I thought, it had been up to all kinds of nonsense.

The first thing it did was upgrade my skills without permission. That was

based on the ultimate skill Shub-Niggurath, Lord of Abundance, and I did receive a report about all that…after the fact. When Velgrynd's Ability Adjust wrapped itself up, her skill Raguel, Lord of Relief was integrated with the remains of Uriel, Lord of Vows, the essence of both being inherited by Shub Niggurath. Ciel had gone over all that with me, but I was too focused on Velgrynd to pay any attention.

So I went back over the documentation we had and listened to Ciel explain Shub-Niggurath for me again. It was, in a real way, the crystallized result of the bonds I shared with the monsters who served me.

Create Skill: craft new skills using information taken with Food Chain or Analysis.

Copy Skill: create a copy of an acquired skill.

Grant Skill: give a copied skill to a qualified target as a gift. (It can also be revoked later.)

Save Skill: digitize an acquired skill and instantly re-create it.

That was the gist of it.

My "soul" had a limited capacity, so I could only memorize so many skills at one time, it seemed. That's why some of my skills were more attached to my physical body than to my soul, but that type could express themselves only weakly. In my case, I had four ultimate skills at once, so I was sure my capacity was pretty close to maxed out.

No, you have actually attained five, not four.

Oh, right. I had taken in and analyzed Velgrynd, so she'd be the same sort of living thing as Veldora was, and that earned me the new ability Velgrynd, Lord of the Flame.

Yeah, I was probably way over capacity, then. I guess Ciel transferred Uriel over to Velgrynd because I was filled up.

Yes, exactly! I had no other choice but to optimize your skills as much as I could!!

This was astoundingly fishy. Was Ciel—actually, I saw this trend back in the

Great Sage era, even—treating skill collection as a hobby? My space was full right now, but I didn't want to drop anything. Was that why you forced this evolution?

…Allow me to continue my explanation.

It changed the subject! Not only did turning into Ciel make it feel much more human—now it was acting even more like a reckless freak, it seemed. But…no. It's all right. It's okay, isn't it? Please be okay, I prayed to myself as I resolved to trust in Ciel.

Anyway, as Ciel put it, all the many skills taking up needless space in my soul had been dismantled, digitized, and streamlined for peak efficiency—and Shub Niggurath had been crafted to oversee this process. With this ability, I could now influence all monsters connected to me via soul corridor—to be exact, I could grant them abilities. I think it goes without saying how insane a power this was.

Now Ciel was using Shub-Niggurath to "help a bit" with Benimaru and the others. It was hard for me to complain about this, given that we stood a much higher chance of losing if this didn't happen. In fact…I decided to thank Ciel.

Not at all. I simply acted upon the wishes of my master.

We had talked a lot, but Ciel really did help me out. Keep up the good work, I said, thanking it one more time.

With that in mind, I now had a better picture of what had happened to everyone.

Considering we had enemies like Michael and the Mystic Lord at hand, we needed to build up our powers—but I couldn't dole out my strongest abilities as gifts to just anyone. Too much power in the wrong hands can destroy a person, after all, and I trusted Ciel in the choices it made. It was addicted to tinkering with people on extreme levels, I knew, but I didn't think it'd try any truly impossible enhancements on anyone.

It didn't seem like Ciel gifted anyone with skills they couldn't fully use, but I still wanted to confirm that. But as I thought about that, Ciel mentioned

something out of nowhere.

By the way, my master, we had talked earlier about running Ability Adjust on you. Would you like me to execute that?

I had totally forgotten. And I could tell Ciel was practically dancing around, incredibly eager to push the button. Guess it had come up with even more incredible improvements after much fumbling around.

If I recall correctly, it talked about integrating the ultimate skill Veldora, Lord of the Storm with Uriel to create the new ultimate skill Hastur, Lord of Starwind. But Ciel had given Uriel to Velgrynd in the meantime, so I suppose this "Ability Adjust" would turn out different now. Knowing Ciel, it certainly wouldn't be a downgrade.

On that topic, I had heard nothing about it, and Ciel didn't mention anything, but I was willing to bet it had fully analyzed Raguel for me by now, right?

Of course.

Thought so.

So I basically had six ultimate skills, then? That, and my evolved officers were providing me with power via Food Chain. No wonder Ciel needed Shub Niggurath to manage all this stuff. Integrating and combining skills certainly seemed like the right thing to do—no point juggling a bunch of skills and not being able to fully exercise them.

It looked to me like it'd try to integrate Velgrynd, Lord of the Flame with Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony to create something new. I was also wondering what happened to Raphael, Lord of Wisdom, now that Ciel had decoupled itself from it. If Ciel said it could optimize this extensive collection of skills I'd amassed, I had no reason to say no. We weren't at war right then anyway; I didn't see the problem.

Okay, let's go through with it— Ah!

Acknowledged! Executing with haste!!

I was just about to say, Wait, but it was already too late.

Looking back, I'd committed a lot of mistakes in life. I'd regret them, but then

I'd go commit more, never considering the consequences…and here I went again, huh? Why did I give out permission so carelessly like that? I never even checked exactly what kind of fearsome modifications Ciel would perform on me. I never should've given it carte blanche like that…but Ciel already had all its preparations in place, and it pressed the figurative Ability Adjust button instead of letting me hem and haw over it.

It's too late to stop it now, Ciel bragged, whistling a tune as it went.

I think I'm safe in saying that Ciel expected all this—the way I'd casually give permission, then immediately try to walk it back in a panic. It had accepted my request with dizzying speed, and now it was happily at work on it, like a dog with a biscuit on its snout who'd been waiting an eternity for the "go" signal…

So, without offering another reply, Ciel was immersed in its work. I was all but resigned to my fate. I mean, I was sure it'd pull some kind of crazy-ass new results for me, but…

…well, if Ciel was busy, I wasn't gonna get anywhere with my government paperwork. Best to turn the page for now and concentrate on my other duties.

While Ciel was beavering away, I wanted to engage my top-ranking officers in personal, one-on-one discussions. I sent Shion and Diablo out of my room for privacy reasons, and so I was alone for a little while.

Shion needed to check on her own troops, so she left without complaint, but Diablo was a brat about it, talking about the need for a guard and whatnot. Finally, I told him, "You know, depending on how these conferences turn out, I might relieve you of your secretary duties. Wouldn't Testarossa be much more qualified anyway? She's strong and beautiful, and any secretary/bodyguard of mine needs to be strong—you see what I mean?" That seemed to get the point across to him, and he left my office in a hurry.

Heh-heh-heh… I had no intention of that at all, but he was so susceptible to this kind of talk. I was sure he was desperately staging practice combat with Testarossa and the other evolved demons right now. I doubted he would lose, but it could be a pretty good fight, actually. Losing would be a good lesson for him anyway—he needed to feel in danger some of the time.

Now I was going to use this moment to interview my officials. I called Shuna and had her work out the schedule. That evening, I would have them visit this office in order, starting with those freest of obligations.

First up was Beretta. I'd promised we'd have more time to talk later, so I invited him in first. With interviews like these, the first and last ones up tended to be the most nervous, but apparently in Tempest, people saw being picked first as the greatest of honors. I didn't really understand that, but that's apparently how it worked, and Beretta was in a really chipper mood over it.

"So about your concerns—you really have nothing to answer to about being defeated this time. Like, it's not even a defeat. You prevented the enemy from achieving their objectives, and I'd call that a victory."

A great victory, really, seeing how nobody died. I tried to drive that point into Beretta, but he was still unpersuaded.

"I understand that, my lord, but a loss is a loss. To those of us in the black tribe, any loss is a hard pill to swallow."

So he recognized we won, but he himself felt like a loser? He was so serious about this. So was Charys. If it were me, I'd be telling everyone I knew about how I sealed the victory. Maybe it's quibbling, but if I'm convinced I won, then I did. Even a moral victory is fine by me.

The "black tribe," by the way, was a family tree in the demon race. I learned this only recently, but it turned out Beretta was a member, with Diablo (back when he was simply known as Noir) at the top. They did resemble each other in areas, especially in what sore losers they were. It made sense.

Thus, I could certainly appreciate Beretta's frustration over this…but he really couldn't help how this turned out. I "awakened" my troops as an award for victory in this war, but the recipients had to be both demon-lord seeds and connected to me via soul corridor. And Beretta wasn't—

He satisfies these conditions.

Whoa! You scared me!

Ciel was busy with its own work, but I guess it was lending an ear to our conversation. So maybe it could help with my paperwork, then—

I happen to have enough souls gathered here to awaken just one person. What is your decision?

…Are you dodging my questions again? Maybe I shouldn't have evolved that ability of Ciel's…

Negative. No fact like that has been detected.

No, Ciel, stop acting like you've suddenly been downgraded back to Raphael. But in that case…

It looked like we'd gained some more souls in our fight against the imperial force. Using those, I could make all of Beretta's dreams come true. He worked real hard, after all, and I gave him no reward for it. I mean, he was technically serving Ramiris, not me, but I still saw him as a cherished friend. Protecting Ramiris was a tremendous job, and I wanted to keep counting on him for it. How about I show him how much I care—and ease one of his concerns while I'm at it?

"Well, I can understand if you're despondent about your lack of power. Let me give you further powers, then!"

I stood up, mustered the most demon-lordliest pose I could, and extended a hand toward Beretta.

"Remember, all I can do is offer you assistance. What happens next is up to you."

So I used my 100,000-souls trick on Beretta and carried out the evolution ceremony. Since I was the one who named him, he no longer could evolve by himself, and maybe this was necessary to karmically make up for that.

"Wha—?! You wouldn't…!!"

"Beretta, you are likely to evolve now. May Ramiris continue to enjoy your protection!"

He was pretty surprised, but the evolution completed without a hitch—and much like the rest of Diablo's tribe, he wasn't put to sleep by it.

As for how this evolution turned out…

Name: Beretta (EP: 1,978,743)

Race: High-level chaos elemental Chaos Metalloid

Protection: Labyrinth protection

Title: Guardian of Ramiris

Magic: Dark magic

Ability: Ultimate skill Deus Ex Machina, Lord of Machine Divinity

Tolerances: Cancel Melee Attack, Cancel Ailments, Cancel Spiritual Attack, Cancel Natural Elements, Resist Chaos Attack

…There it is.

Beretta's body had also transformed into Crimson Steel, the divine metal, equivalent to God-class equipment. That explained the huge leap in EP, and it resulted from his adamantite body absorbing the massive number of magicules pouring out of him. ("EP," by the way, stood for "existence points," not "energy points," for reasons I wasn't let in on.)

Beyond that, the biggest shift was giving up the unique skill Reverser for the ultimate skill Deus Ex Machina. This skill encompassed the abilities Hasten Thought, Universal Detect, Lord's Ambition, Mineral Domination, Control Earth Attribute, Inverse Fusion, Control Space, and Multilayer Barrier.

I worked hard on that!

Yes, I'm sure you did. Good job.

You certainly don't hold back when someone grabs your interest, do you? My skills are important and all, but your hobby's never far from your mind, I suppose. You've been messing around with this skill set, too, I see… It's very like Ciel, I suppose.

But enough about that. Look at Beretta! Combining Mineral Domination with Control Earth Attribute let him freely control and manipulate any kind of mineral. He'd need some materials to work with, but there was a storehouse of magisteel in the labyrinth that was also connected to the surface world, so we should be able to spot him some. This ability was a side effect of evolving his body into Crimson Steel, it seemed.

So it was kind of like control over the earth element, then? It let him transform metal into any shape he wanted, no matter how tough it was. Any weapons that hadn't been enhanced with magic or an aura hardly mattered to Beretta any longer.

But even more vicious than that was how it allowed Beretta to freely make his body any shape he wanted. He could give himself an invincible body of liquid metal, like the bad guy in a classic action movie, impervious to pretty much any type of weapon. Sneaking up on foes like a slime, enveloping them, suffocating them to death… Just thinking of the possibilities made me shudder. He'd

normally keep his usual form—that moving work of art, ball joints and all—but that was no longer what he looked like, so you had to be careful.

Thus, Beretta was now a kind of derivative spiritual life-form. Call it a metallic life-form, if you want.

It was actually a pretty moving moment, wasn't it? Seeing this doll I made on a whim evolve to this level. Looking at him, letting my emotions swell, I realized Beretta was now kneeling before me.

"I will never forget the great gift you have given me, Sir Rimuru. By my very life, I promise I will carry out the mission you have granted me!"

He was ready to go. I wanted to tell him not to push it too much, but with the dangers facing Ramiris, he may not have a choice. He'd have some tough battles ahead of him, no doubt, but I was sure he'd live up to my expectations. His protection, after all, was what let me sleep at night.

"Thank you," I said, nodding at Beretta. Now he was no longer troubled. My job was done, so I told him to return to his station and concentrate on recuperating for the time being.

As I waited for my next interviewee, I thought about skills for a moment. Between the evolution festival I'd held earlier and the information I gained fighting the Empire's best, a couple of questions had formed in my mind.

Skills were a type of power that took root in one's soul, following the rules this world worked under. One could also receive them from the World Language after training hard enough or performing an impressive feat. I never gave them much deep thought, but really, it was an odd phenomenon. I'd just written it off as "that sort of thing" before…but during all this, I now had a question I couldn't ignore any longer.

Basically:

What was the true nature of skills?

I'd had possession of a unique skill from virtually the moment I came to this world. In fact, I heard the World Language in my mind just before I died in my old world, which showed that skills weren't exclusive to this one. That

supposition only added to the questions…but now I couldn't stop wondering if people over in my other world could use skills, too.

Unique skills were something that only heroes, or champions, could ever obtain. As "unique" as they were, their effects ran the gamut, but they were all extremely powerful. They were physical manifestations of the user's desires, unleashing their effects based on what the caster wanted. In my case, I started out with Predator and Great Sage, the latter of which I never even asked for, which was funny.

How rude. I very much was desired by you, Sir Rimuru!

Huh…?

No, I think it was mainly because I was a virgin who wanted— Ah, never mind. Out of my mind with it! If that's what Ciel claimed, maybe that's what I hoped for, deep in my subconscious. Any further investigation would be dangerous, so let's leave it at that.

But back to the topic.

Skills latched on to people's souls, but that hadn't always been the case. Those obtained by pushing the physical envelope with your body could be etched into your body, not your soul. That's often what happened when a skill was obtained from monsters—sometimes you gained a skill just by consuming them. These were called race-intrinsic skills, possessed by all members of a race and passed down across generations.

If you wanted to earn a skill through hard training, the best you could hope for was an "extra" one. What mattered more came after acquiring it. If you could boost your mastery of that skill, or perhaps combine it with your sword talents to create original moves, you could have a powerful force in your hands. Magic, too, was a kind of skill, as proven by all the spells I had consumed and learned.

So there were many things that the term skill could cover, but the most important among them were unique skills. These were abilities created strictly within individual people, and each one was different. Some unique-skill families were like each other, but it's believed that no two unique skills were exactly alike.

They would sometimes be repeated over great lengths of time, but that was a special exception. Ravenous, the unique skill possessed by the orc lord that had attacked us, was one of those. It's a race-intrinsic skill passed to awakened members of the race, something that existed only within certain bloodlines. Ravenous was also attached to its owner's physical body, so other races likely could not handle it. I had combined it with Predator immediately upon ingesting it, so I never had to worry about any of those issues.

Shizu's unique skill Deviant was believed to be derived from her soul. She'd entrusted it to me, and that's why I became able to use it, but otherwise I wasn't sure I would've been able to get it at all. I had the impression by now that soul-derived skills were the stronger kind.

By the way, the ultimate enchantment Alternative that Ludora gave me was, as you'd expect, rooted in the body. You needed to be at least a Saint to have the energy required to work it, so unless you created that ability yourself, it'd be pretty inefficient to use. Maybe that's what gave you a chance to defend against even powerful unique skills.

Jiwu and Bernie had ultimate skills, but Diablo had defeated them anyway, which was normally unheard of. Unique skills didn't work on ultimate skills; only other ultimate skills did. There were exceptions—Chloe's Unlimited Imprisonment and Absolute Severance, along with Masayuki's Chosen One— but trying to beat an ultimate skill–wielder with just a unique was insanely reckless. Even uniques could vary widely in power, but when stacked up against an ultimate, the difference was like heaven and earth.

Someone who gained an ultimate had gained a new insight into the world. It therefore existed on a higher plane than magic based on the world's rules. Resisting it would require something like Disintegration, the most powerful of all holy magic, or the kinds of ultimates the Primal Demons threw around.

That's why I thought Diablo might've beaten them with an ultimate of his own, but something told me that was wrong. I mean, he probably could've just steamrollered straight through all that and won anyway. It proves there are no absolute locks in the world, I suppose…but regardless, under the right conditions, it was possible for someone without an ultimate skill to defeat an ultimate user. Someone with completely mastered Arts could do it—maybe

holy-level sword moves were stronger than your average skill in the end. Still, if you wanted to take on ultimate force, the best way was definitely to have an ultimate force of your own.

To sum up:

• Skills may be etched into your soul or stored in your body. Unique skills, based on my experience, could be awarded when you have a strong desire or craving for one. This process is more about compatibility than talent; no matter how much you want one, you won't earn it if your EP count isn't high enough. Wishing really hard wouldn't work alone; only when overcoming challenges and obstacles in your way could you earn one. Skills are stronger when you earn them for yourself, rather than being awarded them by someone else. Skills that manifest themselves within one's soul also outclass ones that take residence in the body.

• No two skills are identical. Even skills with the same name are likely to be different in terms of capability or rules of operation. They evolve based on the user's wishes, so they may change in many unpredictable ways depending on that.

• The difference between unique and ultimate skills isn't necessarily insurmountable. The strength of a skill is easily swayed by the owner's mind; it likely took a stronger will to extract better effects from them. Skills are, at the core, the ability to affect the laws of the world simply by wishing it were so. Activating such power, the kind that impacts the very root of the world, is impossible without a steel will.

It's clear how important the power of one's will is. That, and the ability to size up a skill and work out how to use it correctly.

I'd had Raphael with me, always ready to explain how to use a skill the best way. Other people may use their skill incorrectly and fail to get the most from it, even if the skill was born from their own wishes.

Hee-hee-hee! Among more recent examples, Deeno certainly made some amusing mistakes with his.

Oh?

I asked for more details, and Ciel was excited to offer some.

...…

...

…

Deeno's skill evolved itself mid-battle, as I stated earlier. Sloth, the sin-based skill that's among the strongest of uniques, had turned into the ultimate skill Belphegor, Lord of Sloth. This would normally be a truly fearsome force to reckon with, but Zegion still thoroughly thrashed him. Zegion's overwhelming strength was one reason, I'm sure, but there was another, more fundamental issue at hand: Deeno wasn't using Belphegor correctly. (He was using it for disguise purposes, though, so maybe he didn't try to fully examine it at all.)

Belphegor—evolved from Sloth, itself the result of Deeno's lazy personality— had the trait of growing weaker the more its owner moved around. It was thus meant more for supporting the user's friends and underlings. It was a skill that could've granted the power Deeno stored inside himself to his companions, and that would've been the most useful way to use Belphegor.

...…

...

…

This all happened while we were gone, but video from the entire battle was stored in the labyrinth archives. Analyzing it was part of Ciel's hobby, and now it was kind enough to report the results to me.

Guy definitely wouldn't have made that mistake. He'd grasp the essence of the skill and use it correctly each time. But someone as lazy as Deeno would judge the book by its cover and never notice what was really lurking inside.

If anything, the biggest mistake our enemy made this time was making Deeno do actual work. If they had let him goof off all day like usual and made his friends Pico and Garasha do all the work instead, Geld and Kumara might've gotten into real trouble.

Maybe we were lucky that way. My giving Deeno work and helping him see

that labor can be satisfying might've been the break that led to our victory in a way. But if he got a rep for screwing up more often as he worked, it'd be awful for his future, so if we ever bury the hatchet, I better explain all of this to him.

So gaining a correct grasp of your skills can be far from straightforward. Sometimes they triggered without your even wanting them to, like with Masayuki. Skills like that were frustratingly difficult to control and even harder to fully master. Understanding and mastering the essence of a skill was really the same thing as grasping your own mind. It was tricky, something you had to dedicate yourself to your whole life.

If you just saw a skill as a handy weapon, you'd never extract the true worth from it.

You are exactly right. So face up to me more and treat me nicer, please. Hmm…

I felt like this was the wrong interpretation, but I decided not to dwell on it.

Right when I was reaching this conclusion, I heard a knock on the door. Benimaru came in, guided by Shuna.

"You called for me? I understand this is a one-on-one interview, but what did you want to ask me?"

He spoke up the moment he sat down on the sofa facing me. Perhaps he thought this was some sort of classified conversation, but it wasn't.

"Oh, I apologize; this is just kind of a whim on my part."

"A whim?"

"Yeah. All of us gained a lot more power in this war, didn't we? We can measure people's existence points in the labyrinth, so I thought we'd take a moment to grasp exactly how much war power all of us have."

"I see. Yes, that is important!"

Benimaru's face brightened up. I guess he was prepared for a grilling about life as a newlywed.

"Well, no, I mean, I am curious about that stuff, too, but it'd be abusing my authority if I asked you point-blank, wouldn't it?"

"It would? Because Soei is all like, 'Ha-ha, if you evolved that well, you must be taking care of business at home; you're such a late bloomer that I thought I'd need to give you some help' and so on—"

"Big brother?"

Shuna interrupted us with a smile and a tray with some slices of cake. The sheer impact sent shivers down my spine.

"Are you speaking untowardly to Sir Rimuru?"

"S-sorry…"

Even the tough-as-nails Benimaru couldn't beat Shuna.

"And look at you, too, Sir Rimuru. You need to rebuke my brother, not play along with his silly talk."

"Y-yeah, uh, okay. I'll be sure to."

Firing back would achieve nothing. Understanding that, I waited for Shuna to get in a better mood.

The cake was nice and all, but thanks to how anxious we were, I could barely taste it. The moment Shuna took the tray away and left, Benimaru and I both let out a mighty sigh.

"Phew… That was a mistake."

"Yeah. Next time we talk about things like that, let's make sure it's the right time and place."

"Roger that. I was trying to say that I didn't like that talk, either. Why'd it turn out like this…?"

True. Although the way he was phrasing it, it was sounding dangerously close to bragging. But we could go in-depth on that later. For now, as we planned, I wanted to examine Benimaru's current state.

Name: Benimaru (EP: 4,397,778 + 1.14 million for Guren)

Race: God-ogre; high-level chaos elemental Flamesoul Ogre

Protection: Rimuru's protection

Title: Flare Lord

Magic: Flamesoul magic

Ability: Ultimate skill Amaterasu, Lord of Shimmering Flame

Tolerances: Cancel Melee Attack, Cancel Natural Elements, Cancel Ailments, Resist Spiritual Attack, Resist Chaos Attack

…That's how things turned out.

Damn, he's strong! The ultimate skill Amaterasu was obtained in exchange for giving up the unique skill Born Leader. It included the abilities Hasten Thought, Universal Detect, Lord's Ambition, Regulate Thought, Dominate Heat, Dominate Space, Multilayer Barrier, and more. Some of Velgrynd's abilities were reflected in this list, Ciel told me, but Benimaru was also very close to getting an ultimate skill by his own power. Ciel just gave him a little nudge in that direction, it claimed.

Still, if Benimaru's EP count was more than four million, and that got bumped up another million when he had Guren out, wouldn't that make him stronger than Luminus by now…?

I should note here that you (probably) couldn't fake your EP. Or, to put it more accurately, the existence points of someone in the labyrinth could be measured to a high level of accuracy. If you wanted to try faking it, you'd need to do something like carry a concealed God-class weapon on you or keep a Separate Body elsewhere like Velgrynd. A mere Replication would produce much smaller EP counts, so it'd be spotted as a fake pretty quickly. Outside the labyrinth, there were lots of ways you could fake EP, but trying to bring that game into the Dungeon was like trying to sneak up on someone in a swimming pool by keeping your head underwater. Ramiris's appraisal skills would easily spot it.

She was good at detail-oriented work like that, despite all her many other shortcomings. Unfortunately, she didn't really understand what she could and couldn't do. We could only perform these exact measurements because someone had mentioned in idle conversation, "Boy, it'd be nice if we could get

more accurate with people's EP counts." I think it was Shinji, but anyway, Ramiris replied, "Oh, we can!" The scene was pretty awkward after that, I was told. I'm sure everyone was like, Why didn't she tell us sooner? Then we would've been able to measure Luminus, and Guy and Velzard, too.

Hell, if we'd gotten stats for Deeno instead of skipping them because he was a trusted guest, we would've realized just how much stronger he was than he looked. Of course, even if we knew, it wouldn't mean much unless we were sure he'd betray us. We should've been more on alert overall, but I don't think we could've avoided how this turned out.

Anyway, although they were just reference figures, EP was a useful yardstick for measuring someone's strength.

I was now certain that Benimaru, at least, could hold his own against Deeno or the Three Mystic Leaders. He was near the top of the Million Class, and I couldn't be gladder to have him at my side. But there was one thing bothering me.

"Hey, so don't monsters get weaker when they conceive children?" "That's right. Your magicule count goes down, generally."

"So why did you get stronger?"

"Ha-ha-ha! That is strange, isn't it?"

Huh. What a breezy smile on him. He might've been trying to laugh it off, but I wasn't about to let him.

"No, man, what's going on with you?!"

"I don't know, either! Soei's been hounding me about it, too, asking why all the time. It's a real pain."

So I wasn't the only one interested. If we could find an answer to this question, it'd be great news for monsters. I mean, a lot of hobgoblins get married and none of them complain about getting weaker…but the impact's bigger the more high-level you are, so I wanted to search for a solution eventually.

"Well, if you see something, let me know, okay?"

"All right. I'll go call Soei in, then."

With that last doubt, I wrapped up the interview.

Soei came in right after Benimaru left. The moment he sat in front of me, I voiced my complaint to him.

"Okay, first off, can you not pick on Benimaru so much, please?"

"Heh… Well, he's always been such a late bloomer in so many ways. You have to light a fire under him or he'll just sit on his hands forever, I thought."

Hmmmm, he might have a point. Benimaru had said something about having to conceive a successor before he could evolve, so I could understand Soei's concern.

"All right. Let's leave it at that. Now, about your evolution…" Soei had been affected by Benimaru's own evolution.

Name: Soei (EP: 1,281,162)

Race: God-ogre; mid-level chaos elemental Darksoul Ogre

Protection: Flare Lord's shadow

Title: Dark Shadow

Magic: Darksoul magic

Ability: Ultimate skill Tsukuyomi, Lord of Moonshade

Tolerances: Cancel Melee Attack, Cancel Natural Elements, Cancel Ailments, Cancel Spiritual Attack

Mmmm. Pretty strong. And pretty resistant, too. Defeating Soei would require some sort of ultimate-level attack, maybe chaotic-or sword-based in nature.

Ciel had awarded him the ultimate skill Tsukuyomi, and it came with quite a list of abilities: Hasten Thought, Universal Detect, Eye of the Moon, Insta-Kill, Ultraspeed Action, Spiritual Control, Parallel Existence, Control Space, Multilayer Barrier, and so on.

"Whoa! You can use Parallel Existence now?"

I blurted out the question, much to my surprise.

"Yes," Soei casually replied. "I cannot control multiple selves simultaneously like Lady Velgrynd, but even if it's just one existence, I'm certain that it's still a useful skill."

Yeah, I'd be pretty certain, too. Now Soei was another step closer to de facto immortality…but maybe Eye of the Moon was even more worth diving into. It let him control shadows in any way he wanted, allowing him to do many things without being spotted by a target. It was notable for its broad effective range— it could cover an entire town, even. Nothing was better for intelligence gathering, not to mention assassination missions.

Soei's skill is quite an achievement. I packed it full of things he wanted in order to re-create the ninja in my master's memories.

I thought it was a pretty big heap of abilities. That was the reason, huh?

One impressive aspect of Eye of the Moon is that Soei's Replication can use it as well. He could send Replications across the land, share information among them with Eye of the Moon, then use Thought Communication to spread this intelligence worldwide!

I could tell Ciel was proud of it. The more I heard about this skill, the more amazing it sounded.

Basically, it was an upgraded version of Argos, my surveillance magic. He could monitor the situation in locations worldwide, then capture it in video (with sound, even). Now I could rely on Soei for just about anything, and he definitely had a job leading our intelligence for as long as he wanted it.

"Okay! I'm going to give you a new title while I'm at it—you will now be known as the Darkness Seer. I hope you'll continue to lead Team Kurayami and serve our nation!"

"Yes, my lord! I'll do everything I can for you, Sir Rimuru!"

No, do it for my nation, not me. But whatever.

"Great. I appreciate it."

I offered Soei my heartfelt thanks.

We spent the next hour or two discussing an assortment of things—his grievances, how Soka and the gang were doing, that kind of thing. He told me that his team of five, Soka included, had grown to attain an average EP of just under 200,000. Soka herself was at 261,898—quite high. Once upon a time, that'd make you the adjutant to a demon lord; even now, you could fight off some pretty high-level foes.

She must have grown her force a lot in this war. "There is no better training than war," Soei told me, a line I thought I'd heard somewhere before. But I wanted to remind him not to assume someone could do something just because he could. Everyone is different, with their own talents and things they're not so good at. I knew all about Soei's talents, but I didn't want him putting a similar workload on his troops. Do that, and we risked losing some real talented personnel.

"But isn't it natural for us all to make every effort possible for you, Sir Rimuru?"

…Well, no, it's not.

"I mean, if you stick to that way of thinking, you're gonna lose followers eventually, you know? You need to value your troops more than that. Consider ways they can find their work more fun and stick to it for longer. That's the job of a boss, after all."

I always think people will follow you if you give them real motivation to. This is work, of course, so just having it be fun won't be enough—but I think offering some sense of achievement is important. If you're constantly struggling under an impossible workload, you'll never get the joy of achievement. And when someone achieves something, giving them even more work after that is a definite no-no. I know that'd piss me off. You do it, I'd say…but with Soei, he'd actually do it all, which would lead to self-loathing and a lot of mental stress. That was my concern.

"You need to treat your tools well, in other words?"

"Stop calling your coworkers 'tools.' Look, it's great to take pride in your work, but it's nothing that's forced on you, okay? As their boss, you gotta recognize

people for their achievements. They'll be happier that way!"

"…I see. Indeed, receiving praise from you provides me the ultimate in joy, Sir Rimuru."

Hmm. He's pretty serious-minded, too. Or maybe just tiresome.

"Anyway, why don't you take this opportunity to hold a little get-together with your troops?"

"Understood. As the boss, it's my job to grasp my staff's mental state. I will endeavor to provide more care for them."

"Don't go overboard."

Well, I'd expressed my concern to him, at least.

A few days later, Soka and the gang sent me a letter of thanks. It was literally stained with tears of joy, so I patted myself on the back for that. Job well done!

My next interview was with Gabil, who arrived after dinner.

"Gwah-ha-ha-ha-ha! I, Gabil, have come at the bidding of my master, Sir Rimuru!"

Today (or tonight), as always, Gabil was in high spirits. I invited him to sit, reminding him to keep it down in the evening like this. Once Shuna provided some tea, I got straight to business.

"You certainly performed well this time. Everyone got back alive because of your hard work. Great job holding out until the end! I wanted to personally thank you for that!"

I was grateful to Gabil on a personal level, not as leader of Tempest. If he had given up at any point, we definitely would've lost some people.

"S-Sir Rimuru! Even those words are enough to move me to great heights!!" Gabil sobbed. I waited for him to calm down, not wanting to ruin his reverie.

"The fact that we survived this war, much less emerged victorious, is all because of you, Sir Rimuru. That voice—I was sure of it when I heard Lord Gadora's whispering, but that was your voice, wasn't it?"

Oh, did he pick up on Ciel's voice?

"Mm? Uh, kind of."

It'd be a long story to explain to him, but really, Ciel was my joker card. I didn't want to use it for no reason, so I played along with Gabil's confusion.

"Aha! I knew it! And if that wasn't around to give me the strength to soldier on, I know the battle would've been impossible to win. I am constantly told by my peers not to get carried away, so I absolutely refuse to lay exclusive claim to this victory!"

Now Gabil was composed. It showed me he meant what he said. "You've sure grown."

"Yes, my lord! Hearing those words from you, Sir Rimuru, I'm just so thankful, so inspired…"

He broke down in tears again, just like before. His handkerchief wasn't going to cut it, so I handed him a towel.

But his stats really did impress me.

Name: Gabil (EP: 1,263,824)

Race: Dragonewt; mid-level chaos elemental Waterspirit Dragon Protection: Rimuru's protection

Title: Dracolord

Ability: Ultimate gift Moodmaker

Intrinsic skills: Magic Sense, Keen Sense, Dragonskin, Flame Breath, Thunder Breath

Tolerances: Cancel Pain, Resist Ailments, Resist Natural Elements, Resist Melee Attack, Resist Spiritual Attack, Resist Chaos Attack

While I wasn't paying attention, he had grown about as strong as Soei.

Gabil's ultimate gift Moodmaker was another masterpiece from Ciel. He hadn't earned it by himself, but I wouldn't hate on it for that. He got it only

because it was such a perfect match for him. It included five main abilities— Hasten Thought, Alter Destiny, Control Unforeseen, Control Space, and Multilayer Barrier—but if he could learn how to fully control the aura that leaked out of him, he'd also gain Lord's Ambition in time.

Alter Destiny was the real killer among them; it could be invoked only once per day, but it could completely turn the tables in battle, even against foes who outclassed him. What would've happened if someone besides Gabil got this? If someone like Diablo had Alter Destiny, he could've been the strongest dude on the planet.

Gabil really was an amazing person that way. What impresses me the most, however, is his performance in battle. He bragged about this to me for a bit after he finally wiped away all his tears.

"Yes, the enemy's spear was coming at me with screaming force. But I just grinned a little and used my lance to deflect it!"

That's the thing. Gabil wielded the Vortex Spear, a Unique-class magical weapon. It was once the secret treasure of the lizardman race, he told me, and while it was strictly Unique in quality, it had deflected away the God-class Azure Dragon Spear, which I thought must have been a joke.

"It's not just difference in ability that decides the fate of a battle, eh? Gwah ha-ha-ha!"

He was laughing about it, but I thought that decided a lot of it, no? If Gabil deflected a Legend-class weapon, I'd concede that maybe, one in a thousand times or something, that would be possible. But God-class? Impossible.

The only real explanation I could think of was:

Gabil likely has full unconscious control of his skill, effectively upgrading the Vortex Spear. Being protected by an Ultimate-level ability is believed to be why the spear survived without being shattered.

I suppose so, yeah. Another reason Gabil really impressed me sometimes. He was dedicated to hard work, too, something that his usual behavior didn't make very clear. Between research and battle, he was capable of just about everything. I bet we could expect a lot from him in the future.

"Hey, speaking of that, do you mind if I keep your Vortex Spear for a bit? I wanted to ask Kurobe to give it a new birth, so to speak."

"What?!"

"Right, he'd craft it again and transfer the old weapon's experience into the new one. I'm planning to provide some Crimson Steel for the materials, so I bet he could evolve it into a God-class weapon, y'know?"

Crimson Steel was still a rare commodity, but I wasn't gonna cheap out with Gabil. I really did want to upgrade his weapon, too—as a reward and to prepare for the grueling battles of an age to come. If he was reluctant to let go of a weapon passed down by his family, I'd do something else for him instead.

"Yes! Yes, please, I beg you to do that for me!!"

He was bawling yet again as he handed the spear over to me.

With this God-class weapon in hand, I was sure Gabil would grow even stronger in time. If it recognized and accepted Gabil as its master, that would boost his existence points as well. He could even become a half-spiritual life form, which would do a lot for his resistances. Also, the Heaven Fliers that had served under Gabil in the previous battle boasted an average EP of over 120,000, with the best of them surpassing 200,000. I sincerely hoped that they continued giving Gabil their support.

So our interview came to a close, although Gabil practically cried the entire way through it.

Late that night, I was in a private room within a certain exclusive, members only club. Normally, a beautiful elf would share a seat with me, but I turned them all down this time. Tonight, it was just Geld and me, sitting face-to-face.

"How are you feeling?"

"Just fine. I've grown used to this power, so I shouldn't be breaking any more glasses."

Geld smiled and nimbly emptied his drink. A normal-size glass looked like a child's paper cup in his hands.

"Now, I wanted to see you so we could drink the night away—and also to formally recognize you for your services."

"I'm honored, Sir Rimuru. Simply hearing those words from you couldn't make me happier."

He usually acted so cool and unaffected, but I could tell he meant those words from the heart. I nodded back and shared a toast with him. We then spent a little bit talking about Geld's work and life issues before tackling serious business.

"So I wanted to talk about something that I'm afraid might offend you a little —is that okay?" I asked him.

"Go right ahead. I would consider nothing you do offensive."

No, like, I can be pretty insensitive to people sometimes, so I wanted him to cut me off if he didn't like it. I'm the sort who gets pretty cutting with his joking around without meaning anything by it, so if I went too far, I hoped he'd stop me.

I'd always had the gift of gab like that. This one time in grade school, I went to this girl and— Actually, never mind. It's beyond embarrassing, and we've both long since moved on. I'm aware that I'm lacking in tact even now, but I'm trying to improve on that, avoiding any witty rejoinders that bring people down. Whether I'm succeeding or not is another thing, but if Geld's all for it, let's press on.

"All right. I'll say it, then, but if it doesn't sound like something you like, don't be afraid to say no, okay?"

With that preface, I made the proposal. It was, of course, an offer to accept a round of Ciel's Ability Adjust—but I was hiding Ciel from everyone, so I framed it with Geld more like, "Mind if I futz around with your skills a bit?"

But Geld immediately told me to go ahead. "Perhaps," he said, "my weakness has caused some concern? If this will strengthen me, there is no need to ask permission. I look forward to it."

He stressed his point by emptying his drink. He didn't seem too resigned about this; rather, he was showing his resolve in his own way, like it was natural

to accept this whether or not he liked it. I gave him an approving nod as I refilled his glass.

Name: Geld (EP: 2,378,749)

Race: Boar-god; high-level chaos elemental Earthsoul Boar

Protection: Rimuru's protection

Title: Barrier Lord

Magic: Recovery magic

Ability: Ultimate gift Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony

Tolerances: Cancel Pain, Cancel Ailments, Resist Natural Elements, Resist Melee Attack, Resist Spiritual Attack, Resist Chaos Attack

The moment Geld accepted my offer, Ciel swooped into action, going crazy without waiting another moment.

Geld had obtained the ultimate skill Belzebuth, which included a wide variety of abilities—Hasten Thought, Magic Sense, Lord's Ambition, Ultraspeed Regeneration, Predation, Stomach, Isolate, Demand, Provide, Rot, Iron Wall, Grant Protection, Standin, Control Space, Multilayer Barrier, Keen Smell, and Armorize Body. It was a slightly inferior version of my Belzebuth with a lot of other stuff thrown in.

Using Grant Protection on his troops would provide a full layer of defense for them, and Geld himself could use Iron Wall and Standin to take damage in place of his companions. Rot was both offense and defense; it wasn't just a straight up wall but could put up a much-appreciated attack as well. Perfect for someone as defense-oriented as Geld, and I was sure he'd master it shortly.

What's worth noting here is that Geld himself is an amazing fighter; it's definitely not just his skills at work. His armor was now God-class, practically a part of his physical body; it worked the same as the clothing on demons, summonable whenever he willed it. His Meat Cleaver was similar as well; he could create a new one whenever it broke, and the next time we had Kurobe work on it, it'd stay in that condition whenever summoned. It honestly felt like

cheating a little.

Either way, Geld's EP went up with this gear on, but his core stats were just fine as well. With Belzebuth now in the picture, his strength could easily overwhelm Soei or Gabil. He should be able to hold his own against those Three Mystic Leaders, even, or stall for time at least. Defeating Geld when he was 100 percent devoted to defense would be tough without one serious attack.

"Now I can rely on you more than ever, huh?"

"I am glad to hear that. I swear to you I'll exert myself as best I can to protect everyone!"

We smiled at each other. He'd be an integral part of my scheme for a while to come.

I was at my private residence, in my usual chambers, thinking over the interviews I had planned for tomorrow.

I didn't begin this day's round until evening, so I only got to five people. We were all busy at the moment, so I couldn't devote whole days to this. We had nine out of the Twelve Lordly Guardians to go, not to mention a few other people I hoped to talk to. At the very least, Dr. Ciel wanted an audience with Apito; I guess it was eager to tinker with her skills, too. I wasn't sure if being so devoted to its own desires was such a good thing, but I couldn't deny that it'd probably help us all out.

There was no reason to say no, so I'd be pretty occupied tomorrow. Ciel wanted to do the same with Shuna, so we arranged for that. I told Diablo and Shion that I'd see them later, so hopefully I could be efficient with things the next day.

Masayuki and his friends were a concern of mine, but it sounded like they were kind of caught up in lengthy meetings as well. I received a terse report from them, and honestly, I wasn't sure if I should intervene. Until Masayuki and the Empire officials talked things over, at least, I would merely observe instead of butting in.

Of course, I was also having trouble relaxing because Velgrynd was still

around. Floor 70 was a little hard for most people to set foot in these days. Veldora had quickly fled into his own chambers, too, which made me nervous. She and I hadn't been separate for that long, yet I couldn't help but wonder what kind of experience she was getting down there…but I'd have to wait for her to reach out.

In the meantime, I had to do what I was capable of.

Suddenly, I felt someone's presence. Ranga was watching me, his head fully popped out from my shadow.

"Whoa! You scared me! Great to see you woke up, Ranga!"

I was happy enough that I switched to human form and gave him some scratches on his head and ears. He responded with a happy, yet saddened sort of look, ears kept down.

"What's up? Not feeling well?"

I worried that the evolution had gone awry somehow. But it wasn't that. "My master, I fear I have overslept and missed the entire war…" Ah. He was just moping, then.

"Oh, is that it? It's no big deal!"

"You say that, master, but thanks to me, Gobta and the others lost their chance to contribute as well, did they not?"

He was right, but what do you want? If he was safely through his evolution, he could kick ass for us later on and it'd all be good.

"Gobta and his team were helping serve tables and entertain people at the parties. Nobody voiced a word of complaint about you, Ranga. So don't worry about it!"

"It is deeply touching to hear that from you, my master."

With a whine, Ranga extracted himself fully from my shadow and rubbed up against me. I gave him some more scratches; it was my first chance to experience all his fluff in a while, and I was happy for it.

But back to business. Since he's here, let's check him out.

Name: Ranga (EP: 4,340,084)

Race: God-wolf; high-level chaos elemental Windsoul Wolf

Protection: Rimuru's protection

Title: Star Lord

Magic: Windsoul magic

Ability: Ultimate skill Hastur, Lord of Starwind

Tolerances: Cancel Melee Attack, Cancel Natural Elements, Cancel Ailments, Resist Spiritual Attack, Resist Chaos Attack

Oh, Ranga's race went all divine, too, huh? And, like, he looked a lot stronger than, say, a local god worshipped by some tiny backwater. This wasn't a problem, was it? I suppose Soei would be treated as a kind of supporting god to Benimaru, but I guess once your EP passes two million, you take on divine properties. I couldn't be sure of it, but that's what it felt like.

*

We will need to collect more sample data, but it seems like a valid assumption.

Right. You become a Saint upon reaching one million, so maybe two million was the magic number for demigod-hood? Taking on divinity didn't make you a de facto "god," really. You weren't omnipotent or anything, but you'd be seen as a symbol of strength, at least.

And, sheesh, Ranga was past four million. That was, like, equivalent to a swordless Benimaru. What a fearsome evolution he'd had.

"Wow, Ranga! Great job!"

"Ha-ha-ha! It is all thanks to you, my master!"

He chalked it up to constantly being in the presence of my aura. Staying in my shadow and absorbing all those magicules must have streamlined the evolution one heck of a lot.

And look at all the amazing abilities he got out of nowhere! The ultimate skill Hastur wound up being scored by Ranga in the end, not Veldora. And if I had to guess…

Correct. I lent a little bit of a hand.

I knew it.

It wasn't a "gift," so I understood that Ranga had earned it himself, but there was no way Ciel didn't offer a helping hand. The ability suited him fine, at least, so I had no complaints.

This skill included seven abilities: Hasten Thought, Universal Detect, Lord's Ambition, Dominate Weather, Dominate Sound & Wind, Dominate Space, and Multilayer Barrier. Being able to control weather itself said everything you needed to know about how amazing this was, I thought. Truly a skill befitting Ranga. Now my only worry was whether Gobta could make full use out of the guy.

It was time to go back to work. I spent the night hanging out and playing with Ranga, but I was feeling just fine.

My first visitor was Kumara, and these were her first words after we said hello:

"I heard you were making adjustments to our skills? Sir Ranga was bragging about it to me earlier. If you have new abilities to provide me, I'd love to have them!"

She was in her little-girl form, looking as cute as possible while wheedling me. Ranga had earned his skill himself, but I guess he was aggrandizing my role in it. I really thought he should be more proud of himself than me, but for reasons I didn't quite understand, Ranga emphasized my involvement in it most of all. It was all Ciel, actually, but that was a secret, so I just gave Kumara a vague nod.

So now what?

I'll allow it.

I thought it'd say that. Ciel had no interest in holding back, I knew, and I hated to leave everything to it…but I knew we still had enemies in this world, and we needed to get as prepared as we could.

"All right. A lot of it will depend on you, but let's see what we have here."

Ciel couldn't make the impossible possible, after all. If there wasn't a skill compatible with her, I'd have nothing to provide. Once I made that clear with her and she agreed to it, I passed the baton over to Ciel.

Name: Kumara (EP: 1,899,944)

Race: Nine-tail; high-level chaos elemental Earthsoul Beast

Protection: Rimuru's protection

Title: Chimera Lord

Magic: Earthsoul magic

Ability: Ultimate gift Bahamut, Lord of Fantastic Beasts

Intrinsic skills: Dominate Beast, Unite Beast

Tolerances: Cancel Melee Attack, Cancel Ailments, Resist Natural Elements, Resist Spiritual Attack, Resist Chaos Attack

It took some time, but we were successful.

Kumara obtained the ultimate gift Bahamut, Lord of Fantastic Beasts. This includes six abilities: Hasten Thought, Universal Detect, Lord's Ambition, Dominate Gravity, Dominate Space, and Multilayer Barrier. That let her interact with the planets themselves, giving her control of gravity over a wide range.

And Kumara herself had changed races from Nine-Head to nine-tail. It sounded kind of like a downgrade, but it wasn't. She previously held sway over eight magical beasts, but now there was only one head controlling them—she held complete command over the menagerie. As before, eight out of her nine tails contained the will of a beast, so Kumara could also order them to act freely as well.

Once she did, they would separate from her. Each of them had an EP count of around 200,000, but Kumara still kept her count at more than a million afterward. This wasn't a miscalculation; it just kind of worked this way. They were more than doubling their EP once they separated from her, which was clearly a pretty beefy upgrade.

Kumara's new race didn't have divine elements to it, but her EP was close to two million with no extra gear, so I bet she could make the leap before too long. Her element was earth, like Geld, and she was a half-spiritual Earthsoul Beast, so gravity was a good match for her.

Looking solely at the stats, Kumara—when combined with all her beasts—was close to the upper echelon of the Twelve Lordly Guardians. Sadly, however, she continued to lack experience. Soei would still beat her, but maybe she stood a chance against Adalmann or Gabil? She clearly had some disturbing potential, though, making her one of our best prospects. She was still young, after all. Let's see how she grows.

My next visitors were Apito and Zegion, arriving as a pair. Apito came into my chamber first, leaving Zegion waiting in the hallway. I didn't mind having both of them in at once, but they were all about sticking to the "one-on-one interview" script, so I respected Zegion's wishes.

The moment we were seated, Apito gave me a small gift-wrapped box. "I have some freshly harvested honey for you, Sir Rimuru."

"Oh, how kind! Thanks!"

I smiled warmly. Her honey was a panacea, and even better, it tasted astonishingly good. The way I had immediately brought Milim under my thumb with just one taste was now a famous story among my companions. Real popular stuff. I was laughing heartily over the memory as I put the box in my pocket. I can't be bought with a bribe, mind you, but I did want to pay Apito back for the favor.

Speaking of Apito, here was her current status:

Name: Apito (EP: 775,537)

Race: Star wasp; mid-level chaos elemental Windsoul Wasp

Protection: Zegion's protection

Title: Insect Queen

Ability: Unique skill Motherly Queen

Tolerances: Cancel Pain, Resist Melee Attack, Resist Natural Elements, Resist Ailments, Resist Spiritual Attack

If you asked a typical adventurer to take down a bug like this, they'd think you were stark raving mad.

Apito's on-the-field strength was well beyond that of the old-school demon lords. She couldn't quite reach the Special S ranking we defined here in Tempest, but she seemed stronger than the pseudo-awakened Clayman I saw. What's more, Apito claimed that Motherly Queen allowed her to give birth to a total of nine insectors. They were still in pupae form at the moment, but it looked like they'd be pretty powerful magic-born once they matured.

"Well, we should hold a celebration for them, then!"

"I would be happy to attend! And I hope you will bestow names upon them as well."

Names, huh? Hmm.

"Mm, yes…"

I tried to change the subject, not wanting to commit myself to anything yet. A

name could be a dangerous thing for me to give…

That will not be a problem. I have gained the ability to fully control the procedure with no danger to you.

You "gained" it…? Well, I guess that was how it worked with Charys, so whatever. I was hoping to avoid having to name nine at once, but if that's the way it is…

"Okay, how about…Zero-One, Reiji, Remi, Reyon, Rego, Remu, Rena, Reppa, and Rekku?"

Please don't accuse me of laziness here. I knew this was little more than starting with "re," then going down the Japanese names for numbers, but she'd have to be satisfied with that. I didn't even know what gender they'd be yet. Once they were born, I'd pass out the names as appropriate, I suppose.

"Goodness! My children can feel the affection you have for them already. They're all delighted!"

"Um, they are?"

"Yes, of course. My children and I are linked in our minds by powerful bonds."

This was Dominate Insect in action, the skill that let Apito give orders to the children she produced, and the speed of these transmissions was apparently instantaneous. Unlike the more general-purpose Thought Communication, the links also made it clear who was giving the orders and who was taking them.

That sounded neat to me…but Ciel sure had been griping at me a lot the past few moments. What was up with that?

How upsetting. All I'm asking for is permission to run Ability Adjust.

You guessed it—Ciel was itching to dive into Apito's skill set, too. I was sure it could just do it anyway without my or Apito's permission, though. If I was connected to someone via a soul corridor, I kept the right to as leader, after all. But this wasn't some kind of urgent crisis. We were at peace, and Dr. Ciel was kind enough not to act out of line without my okay. (Apito was also in Zegion's family line, which made me more of a distant relation by comparison. I figured getting her position would make things easier, given our weaker link.)

So, knowing full well what the answer would be, I posed the question.

"By the way, Apito, if you're interested, I'd like to readjust the future direction of your skills, but what do you think?"

"How do you mean?"

"Well, I was told that—er, I mean, I can see that your skill set has the potential to be further evolved. You could become a commander type, leading the insects as you do now and directing your clan in battle…or you could become a champion type, leading them yourself into the fray. The difference between the two is simply that you can continue spawning new follower insects as a commander, but not as a champion. On the other hand, being a champion would boost your physical abilities, and your skills would be geared more toward battle as well."

I parroted out everything Dr. Ciel had told me. That's when I realized why Ciel didn't just do it—there were two distinct possibilities to choose from, and Apito had the choice. If it wasn't her call, her skills would never unlock their full potential.

"That," I added, "and you have the option to stay as you are, of course."

"If I chose champion-type," Apito immediately responded, "that means I would never bear children again?"

Does it?

The Birth Insect ability of Motherly Queen would be lost, but her non-skill based reproductive ability would be retained. She could still give birth to successors.

"No, I think you'd be able to have kids like normal. You'll just have to do it the traditional, no-skill way."

"I see… In that case, I have nothing to worry about. My children have obtained the Birth Kinfolk skill, so as queen of my army, I can have them create as many troops as I desire."

Ah, so Apito's already given part of her skills to her kin? In that case… "Therefore, I think I would like to stand on the front lines myself!"

She made exactly the declaration I'd thought she would. And Ciel, eagerly awaiting this moment, sprang into action.

Apito's Ability Adjust is successful. Her unique skill Motherly Queen is being evolved into the ultimate skill Proserpine.

It was over in a moment. The whole thing didn't take a second—I guess Ciel had everything analyzed in advance.

"Okay, it's fine. Now your job's to check over everything and make sure you can use it to the hilt."

The ultimate skill Proserpine featured abilities like Hasten Thought, Magic Sense, Keen Sense, Dominate Insect, Army Command, Ultraspeed Action, Lethal Attack, Control Space, and Multilayer Barrier. These were just boosted versions of powers she already had, so I was sure Apito was comfortable with them. I was sure she'd train all of them without my ordering her to, but I gave her that piece of advice anyway.

"I am filled with elation and gratitude. With this sheer joy in my heart, I once again declare my exclusive loyalty to you, Sir Rimuru."

Apito kneeled on the floor. I gave her the most fatherly nod I could, and our interview came to a close.