by Fuse
“…King Edmaris?” whispered Shuna into her ear. Thanks for that. But really, Shion? You couldn’t even come up with the king’s name? I know it’s kind of a weird one, but…
“King Edmaris had apparently made contact with a merchant, one who brought him silken fabrics from our nation and whetted his appetite for conquest. The king also feared that trade would drift over to our nation in the future, which also led to those moves on his part…”
Shion’s rundown continued, the content of which didn’t surprise me much. The only thing it made me wonder about was whether that merchant deliberately spurred Edmaris to action.
“Do we know who this merchant is? Some black-market dealer?”
“I apologize, my lord. That much we do not know.”
She looked so sad about it that I felt the need to hurriedly console her. The question wasn’t that important anyway. Let’s switch subjects to Archbishop Reyhiem.
“That’s fine. What about the Church?”
“Ah yes! He revealed who was pushing him behind the scenes. The name was—”
It’s a long one, Shion. You think you got that one remembered at all?
“…The core of it all was Cardinal Nicolaus Speltus,” Mjurran said after Shion shot her a pleading look. Shion was great at extracting information from people, but anything else? Forget it. She had some kind of mental block keeping her from remembering proper names. Better give her some other assignment next time. Good thing Mjurran was around. I can’t really expect much in the critical-analysis department from Yohm, either, so she no doubt provided some handy backup.
According to her, Nicolaus stated that they planned to take us all down, as a nation clearly against the will of their god. Planned to anyway.
“I see,” Fuze muttered. “So Archbishop Reyhiem wanted all the glory of defeating a godless enemy, so he could earn extra clout with the central authorities?”
Everyone seemed to agree with this.
“Either way, we still have some wiggle room. The Western Holy Church hasn’t made a definitive decision yet. Perhaps there’s a way to negotiate ourselves out of being designated hostile.”
“In that case,” Fuze said, “let me handle that.”
His approach involved taking advantage of the Council’s presence. They would release a statement declaring that the nation of Tempest should be recognized, putting pressure on the Church to act. Appealing to the Council would also place the spotlight further on Tempest as a waypoint along a series of new trade routes. The fact that monsters lived there was an issue, but they were all both kind to strangers and fully capable of speech. If anything, they’d gladly be your friend.
That much, of course, we had already proven. Or really, we’d made it happen through all this astonishing evolution. In so many words, our aim was to earn treatment from the humans similar to what dwarves, elves, and other demi-human races enjoyed. King Gazel would back us up as well, keeping up a lively trade relationship with us and advertising the benefits of Tempest with more energy than ever.
This, I imagined, would likely not be enough to make the Western Holy Church abandon their core tenets. But Dwargon and Blumund already had formal trade relations with Tempest. Not even the Church had the kind of power to annul those agreements. And with us having such deep ties with a small group of human nations like this, other countries were bound to grow curious soon. Plus, we now had the Sorcerous Dynasty of Thalion declaring their allegiance. That put even more pressure on the Church to settle matters.
“Not that this is for me to say,” Fuze added, “but recognizing Tempest is a double-edged sword. We all need to be careful to make sure we don’t accidentally stab ourselves in the process.”
He was right. Blumund was in the tightest spot out of them all. Dwargon and Thalion were essentially beyond the range of Holy Church influence. Both were powerful enough that they could give the united Western Nations a run for their money. Blumund, meanwhile, was a blip, all too susceptible to pressure from outside its borders.
—Except all that was a thing of the past.
“Heh-heh… Fuze, was it? No need to fret. We dwarves can make runs through Tempest to access your markets as well. And with the stronger position that will put your nation in, the Council will find it prudent to tread lightly with you.”
Gazel’s right, I thought. Two nations, Dwargon and Thalion, both with different cultures and technical expertise, were interacting with each other through Tempest. This town was going to grow exponentially, I was sure of it—and then, a new culture would bloom. Culture and technology. The sorcerous science Thalion boasted and the spirit engineering Dwargon cultivated would connect on our doorstep, two different families of tech rolled into one. It could create an industrial revolution straight out of fantasy, and the kingdom of Blumund would have dibs on enjoying it first. Even in terms of pure accounting numbers, the potential profits were enormous.
Meanwhile, the new kingdom of Farmus created by Yohm would be reborn as a breadbasket to the entire region, filling the people’s stomachs and planting the seeds for an entirely new food culture. We’d need to spread the wealth around, to make sure none of us was competing with another member of the alliance in each specialty—but I was planning to attend to that anyway, on the sly. Raphael, Lord of Wisdom, had calculation skills that went beyond what even quantum computing could manage. Calculating global economic effects was no sweat—and at accuracies far greater than even the Earth Simulator supercomputer in Japan could manage. That kind of made me sound like the “man behind the curtain” ruling the world, but I am a demon lord, so at least it’d be in character.
I could understand Fuze’s concern, too. Blumund was so tiny, it might wind up being exploited by its bigger neighbors without any recourse to turn to. That’s why it was so hard for them turn away from the Council, as friendly as that alliance was to smaller nations like theirs. Of course he’s worried.
Maybe, in the short term, it would’ve been better for them to keep dealing with the Council. Pool all their intelligence skills together, and Blumund might’ve even been able to force the Western Holy Church into all-out war against us. If that was the choice they made when they first met us, I might’ve been slain by now. But the Blumundians didn’t opt for that. They trusted me and decided to walk down the same path.
You do the deed, and then you get rewarded for it.
Blumund had already picked me. I didn’t see any reason not to take the hint. Living together in harmony was right at the crux of my ideal, besides.
“Fuze, when you return home, I want you to tell the king that I have a favor to ask.”
“A favor? Not another painful one, I trust?”
“Kinda rude, wouldn’t you say? It’ll take a while to explain, and I’ll probably fail to get the point across to you, so I’ll visit later to go over it in detail with him.”
“Hoh! And I’m the rude one? You make me sound like some kind of dullard!”
“No, no, I didn’t mean it like that. I just mean, you know, do you know much of anything about economics, Fuze?”
“I… All right. I will give word to the king and arrange a time.”
“Great.” I nodded.
Blumund’s role here would be to keep statistics on the amount of trade in all the main manufactured goods of the region. I’d have them examine the products imported and exported from each nation, then make sure that the necessary items were shipped to the necessary place. To put it another way, I would have Blumund become the first large-scale trading company in the world. Get it right, and there’d be nothing “small” about this nation any longer. They’d be a financial superpower, wielding influence beyond comprehension.
Considering Blumund’s geographical location, I wanted them to be a trade hub going forward. But that would wait until everything else wrapped up. I needed to defeat Clayman. Yohm needed to build a new nation; Fuze and Blumund needed to use their information access to check on the movements of the Western Council and Church—until w
e won, at least.
My main concern was the Church. I didn’t think they’d make any sudden moves, but they still needed to be kept in place. Neither they nor the Holy Empire of Lubelius were willing to recognize our nation. I wanted to postpone any conflict for as long as I could, giving us time to prove our effectiveness and devotion to common harmony. If we had to fight, I’d like to keep it peaceful…but judging by Hinata’s reaction to me, that might be tough.
None of these problems would be wiped up that easily. Everything depended on what we did from here on out.
So about those three prisoners—hmm? There’s King Edmaris, Archbishop Reyhiem, and…who was the other guy? Oh, right! The dude who survived my attack. Were we safe letting him go?
“Shion, we had three POWs, right? The one who survived all the killing? That guy has to be pretty bad news, right?”
“Huh? Oh, um, yes. That terribly frightened man.”
Frightened? Hmm. Maybe he was just some wimp who managed to survive through sheer luck.
“Hoh? The final survivor? If I had to guess, perhaps Folgen, captain of their knights?”
If Gazel knew someone on that force by name, he must’ve been at least a half-decent military officer. So maybe it’d be risky to free him? I turned to Diablo.
“What kind of guy was he like? Pretty strong, right? You think it’d be all right to let him off the hook?”
“No, Sir Rimuru,” he replied, smile still on his face. “He is a minnow, incapable of being a problem at all. By human standards, however, he does seem rather well-versed in magic.”
He’s a magician? Maybe not a knight captain like Folgen, then.
“Do you know the name, Shion?”
“Yes! It’s Ramen, sir!”
Ramen. Hmm. I haven’t had ramen in years, actually. Nothing like a steaming cup of instant noodles during an all-night deadline crunch at work. I miss that. Maybe I’ll try to fashion some later.
“Ramen?” Fuze asked as I basked in fond memories of my past life. “Was there someone named that in Farmus?”
“It does not ring a bell,” replied Erald. “And a magician, you say? I am aware of a magic-born named Razen who should still live there…”
“Razen the champion? Mm, a man who should never be omitted from the story.”
“I know that name,” Phobio chimed in. “It is well-known even within the Beast Kingdom. The guardian of the great land of Farmus and among the most intelligent of magic-born!”
“Yeah, I know him, too. A human who’s mastered magic up to the wizard level and beyond. I’ve always wanted a chance to challenge him!”
“I’m sure we’d win in close-quarter combat, but he is not one to trifle with, no…”
All the Lycanthropeers knew him, which surprised me. There was someone like that still left in Farmus? This Ramen guy didn’t matter to me, but Razen certainly needed some attending to.
“You’re sure the man we have is named Ramen, Shion?”
“Y-yes, er… Probably. But he’s just a young man! One of the people who attacked this town. Certainly not the master magician you all are talking about!”
She sounded a lot more assertive on the second half of that statement than the first. But hang on, didn’t Diablo just describe our prisoner Ramen as a magic-user? Curious, I decided to get the story from a few more witnesses.
What we knew for sure is that our captive was a young man, an otherworlder, who had participated in the attack. Everyone was in agreement on that.
“Diablo, are you making up stories in an attempt to earn Sir Rimuru’s praise?” Shion goaded him.
“Not at all. I would hardly expect to be heaped with adulation for having defeated someone of such low caliber. I simply seek recognition that I have carried out the work provided by the master I serve.”
That’s true. Diablo wanted me to know he was a good servant, but he didn’t say anything about his opponent being tough at all. He was dissing the guy every chance he had. So…
“…Come to think of it,” Hakuro mused, “when Geld and I cornered that otherworlder, a fairly powerful magic wielder interfered. I believe that man was named Razen, actually. He had prepared a type of nuclear magic he was ready to unleash at any moment. So we let the otherworlder go, since this wizard was much more of an imminent threat.”
So it is Razen, not Ramen? Razen, this guy I wanted to keep an eye on, was involved in the battle after all?
Report. Using certain secret rituals in the realm of spiritual magic would allow one to leap between physical bodies.
Oh, right. That.
“D’you think maybe that Razen guy took over the body of the younger dude?”
“Wha?!”
Shion was floored. She never seemed all that sure about our prisoner’s name. I was fairly certain my theory was correct.
“Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh… And I am sure we will discover our ward’s true name shortly.”
Diablo pounded the final nail into Shion’s coffin. It almost drove her to tears.
Our man turned out to be Razen, in the end. Nobody named Ramen out there after all. All right? So enough bullying Shion over this. What do you want from her? She’s Shion. Asking any kind of brainwork out of Shion is a mistake in the first place.
But:
“You dispatched Razen himself that easily?!”
“I cannot believe it. The champion who supported Farmus for centuries…”
“He was one of the rare humans who was equal to me as a wizard. Superior, even…”
All the shocked eyes in the room turned to Diablo. If you think about it, he is kind of a mystery. Why’s he so keen on being my servant? He claimed to be willing to work for free, so I had no real reason to turn him down. The guy describing this amazing wizard as a “minnow” kind of confirms how strong he is. And this was before I named him, too…
And right now, this guy was choosing to lord it over Shion. She gritted her teeth, no doubt frustrated over how she brought this fight to him and lost big. Ah well. Nothing should come of it, as long as Shion doesn’t go and start acting like they’re bitter rivals. Having both a talented secretary and a ditzy one on board is going to lead to a lot of jealousy, I’m sure.
Right! So let’s do this:
“Yohm, I want you to take the three prisoners and do something with them for me. Diablo, I want you to join him.”
Now Diablo was looking panicked at me. I could see Shion sneer back at him, but that order wasn’t for her sake. This was the result of more serious thought. I was just thinking about who I could have help out Yohm’s team, assuming I left Veldora to keep the town safe. Someone who was reasonably intelligent, strong enough to handle anything that came his way, and could move fast if needed.
Soei would’ve been the best choice, but I needed him on the battlefield. Benimaru was my general field commander. Shion was out of the question. Hakuro couldn’t use Shadow or Spatial Motion, so it’d take time for him to travel anywhere. Geld and Gabil would stand out too much in human society.
Meaning Diablo fulfilled all my conditions. He said he’d lend a hand when it came time to take Farmus down, so I doubted he’d have any complaints. He’d have no problem guarding someone as potentially harmful as Razen, either.
“I will leave this to you, Diablo!”
“Ah, I understand, Sir Rimuru!”
He gave me a delighted smile. Something didn’t seem quite right about it to me, but if he said yes, then no complaints. Right now, Diablo was probably third in strength after Veldora and me. No matter what happened, he’d have it handled in a flash.
“This job might take several years, so I hope you’ll be patient with it. Contact me with Thought Communication if anything comes up.”
“Not a problem, sir. I will be happy to handle this mission well before the allotted time.”
He sure had a lot of confidence. This was an entire nation I was asking ’em to take down…but again, that’s another reason I felt safe giving him this assignment. Now, with all the
plans settled, we could end this summit between nations—and now I could focus my full attention on all-out war with Clayman without any regrets.
To finish off, I asked if anyone else had something to say.
A hand shot up. It belonged to Erald, who was looking expectantly at me.
“Yes?” I asked.
Erald had been waiting for this. “Our nation and yours are separated from each other by extremely treacherous forests and mountains. If we could connect ourselves directly through that region, that would allow us to cut the travel distance by quite a margin. A highway, in particular, would make the trek far easier…”
He shot me a glance. Ah-ha. I knew what he was getting at. If we were gonna be building a formal relationship with Thalion, of course we’d want a direct link between us. We’d have to do that, of course. Products that used to require long detours to deliver would naturally be more attractive once we had a better road. That was a part of my plan from the start.
Of course, it’d also mean we’d have a lot of civil engineering to do—cutting down trees, building tunnels, paving the roads. The budget would be huge, and maybe they were a superpower, but it wouldn’t be that easy to procure a budget like that. No doubt Erald already had some ballpark figures he composed himself, in hopes of forcing the whole job upon us.
“Erald,” Gazel commented, “you are asking for too much. Not even Rimuru can accept such a massive undertaking so lightly.”
Well, hang on. I’m pretty sure we covered all the work and expenses for the highway to the Dwarven Kingdom, didn’t we?!
“Don’t be ridiculous, Gazel! If it was Sir Rimuru saying that, I would accept it, but not from you of all people!”
Ah. Guess Erald knew, too.
So if I’d already accepted the job from Gazel, would it be wrong to say no to Thalion? In my honest opinion, I had no problem being left to the task. A highway was a small price to pay for their recognition, really. But if I kept taking these low-paying jobs, so to speak, every country we ran into going forward might expect a similar handout. Humans are sly like that, something I was sure reminded of by my experience in Blumund. They had me right where they wanted me.