Capítulo 43: Declaration of War

After a long and arduous journey, team Foresight finally made it to their designated point. The airship descended slowly upon an opening in a grove of trees. In the clearing was one of the four imperial knights, several dozen of the Empire's most talented engineers and mages. They were visibly aghast. None of them knew exactly how such a large ship was able to be moved through the air as though it was using the {Fly} spell, but all of them were eager to learn.

Fluder Paradyne also looked on in amusement. He was currently on the payroll of the Kingdom of Tempest so he knew that all the information he wanted regarding magic would be his so long as he accomplished his goal. Who cares about the small discoveries in magic he could learn from this battered and beat-up ship. If he wanted to know, he'd simply have to ask for it once everything would be over.

And it would be over very soon.

He put on a fake smile and look of astonishment a minute after that. He approached his former Protégé and began to smile warmly towards her. He may be ashamed that she didn't continue her studies under him and help him understand the depths of magic, but that didn't mean he wasn't slightly happy she didn't meet a horrific fate.

"Arche! This is..." He said.

"Maste- I mean, Sir Paradyne, this is one of the airships from the Tempest Kingdom. We have completed our job, though..." She said sadly.

"Your group is the only ones left. Isn't it?" He said, feigning concern.

Arche simply nodded her head. Fluder looked at the other members of the Worker group and saw that they looked like they were all were missing something. That crucial element that makes one take up dangerous work for money. That unnamed thing had left them and Fluder nodded his head to himself. His nod was taken as approval for the team to begin scouring the ship.

One of the knights stationed guard walked up to Hakkuren with a bag of Platinum coins and plopped it into his hand before helping the other knights unload the team's loot. Anything extra they obtained would be appraised and the group would be reimbursed for them.

Foresight sighed and began to walk towards the nearby town. They would recuperate there for a few days before heading back to the capital.

...

(Rimuru POV)

I simply sighed while watching the drama with the airship play out, with the help of [Akasha], while riding the carriage into Re-Estize City. I looked out the window of the carriage and sighed again. 'This is taking WAY TOO LONG! Normally, I would have teleported there, but I at least needed to pretend to be respectful and arrive officially.'

'To be honest, it was a lot more fun scheme out these plans of manipulation than to actually have to go through with them.' I thought as we arrived at the center of the Royal District.

I looked around and noticed hundreds of knights and mages lined the streets. I sensed a few hundred adventurers also hiding in the shadows or pretending to be servants when I arrived. It was nice that they were taking me seriously, but their disguises were very poorly put together as maids don't usually wear enchanted armor under their clothes and street vendors don't normally use battle axes to cut their meat.

I almost laugh to myself as I realized that it must be Barbro who planned this. Renner is far too smart to let such details go unnoticed.

I smirked as I exited the Carriage. After me was Shalltear and Yue. In the Carriage behind us came out Shuna, Shion, and Esdeath. Yue and Shuna were here as my advisors while Shalltear, Shion, and Esdeath were here as our guards.

I smirked to myself as I heard all the men in the area awe at the beauty of my entourage while the women gasped at my own handsome face. I shuttered for a moment as I saw one adventurer group look at me with lust as well. Yes while there were plenty of female-only groups that stared as me, the group male-only team known as Cursed Pico was what was giving me the shivers.

I quickly made my way out of the square and into the gatehouse of the castle. I pretty much ignored my guide, a young knight named Voice, and quickly disappeared from the sight of Cursed Pico.

Only then did I notice my women all looking at me with worry. "Rimuru-sama, are you alright?" Shuna asked concerned.

"Y-yeah, I'll be fine. For some reason one of those adventurer groups out there seemed dangerous." I said while continuing our walk.

"HU? What could be so dangerous to Rimuru-sama?" Shalltear asked with disbelief.

"Well, it's not so much physical damage I'm afraid of as it is damage to my soul... never again..."

The girls simply looked at each other and shrugged, not knowing what to do about that. They simply decided to kill that group later.

Little did they know, when they arrived to do the deed later that day, they would immediately understand what he was talking about when they walked in on a gay shota lemon scene and would themselves be traumatized.

...

After a few more minutes of walking, we arrived in the throne room. I quickly scanned the crowd and noticed that al of the nobles who were stationed around the room were the corrupt ones who fled the city and all of them had my Shadow Soldiers hiding in their shadow.

They looked at my women with lustful eyes while looking at me with disgust or disdain. I simply grit my teeth and smiled. I'll allow them to daydream for a few minutes since they are all about to spend the rest of their lives in a torture chamber anyway.

After waiting for a minute, Prince Barbro entered the room, followed by his sister who looked like she was worn out. It was clear that dealing with the stress of her brother's return had taken a toll on her.

He immediately started to screw everything up and even invited the coward nobles back into the capital, much to the rioting of the everyday citizens. He halted the Princess's policies and raised taxes to an absurd level while running around telling everyone that he was the king now.

The utterly corrupt man walked over to the throne and sat atop it. He then motioned for everyone to bow and the wave of corrupt nobles who were only there to manipulate the fool of a 'king' for their own gain gave face.

When my companions and I remained standing, his face contorted to that of confusion before looking as though he had an epiphany. "Ah... my bad. I forgot you monsters wouldn't know your proper place. When I waved my hand earlier, you were supposed to bow." He said, much to the shock of everyone there.

'There is NO WAY this bug can be such an idiot!' Renner thought.

Shion and Shuna were stunned and unable to move while Shalltear was trying not to burst into laughter.

'There is no way, right? This guy must be joking! He's such a good comedian!' She thought. In her mind, there was absolutely no way someone could be so dumb, dense, and heretical that he would actually say that, so she assumed he was joking.

Esdeath wasn't so calm. She had recently begun training Gobuta as one of the 'promising individuals' Rimuru had instructed her to look out for and learned the true depth of how stupid and unaware a person could be. She immediately grabbed her weapon and was about to strike him down but was stopped by Rimuru putting his hand on her shoulder.

"I'm afraid that won't be happening. I originally came here as a courtesy to Momon, who was my subordinate. I wanted to treat you as an equal as someone of the same social class, but it seems I was a fool-" I didn't get to continue as I was interrupted.

"Ah, no it is fine. We have more important things to discuss than your lack of respect! First, for the destruction your subordinate has caused, I require compensation of 100,000 gold coins and for your rudeness, I shall be taking the beauties behind you. I need to discipline them after all." He said in a casual way.

Even I was baffled by this. I was so stunned that I didn't notice the entire crowd of people who were around me trying to sneak out of the room and all the knights sighing while looking at the ceiling, having already realized they were going to die.

While I was too busy being stunned, A lance, katana, magic arrow, and Odachi all pierced the body of Barbro. My subordinates had gotten to him in the split second I was too stunned to stop them.

Barbro was currently bleeding and coughing up blood. His lungs and heart were all pierced and his gut was burst open by Shuna's magic missile. He couldn't speak, breathe, or even talk, all he did was despair as he slumped over, losing the light in his eyes.

I turned my head and used my Shadow Soldiers on the nobles to restrain them roughly. Each one held the noble on the floor with their hands bent back behind their torso and their heads being held on the floor by their boots.

I gave a tired sigh and looked at Renner briefly who held her head in one of her hands in disbelief while the other was for the guards to hold still. They were secretly thankful to the 'Golden Princess' that she wasn't ordering to their deaths to defend the idiot.

I looked at all the nobles and smirked before opening my mouth to speak. "Well, this makes a good a time as any. I, the Demon Lord Rimuru Tempest, ruler of the Jura Tempest Kingdom, Dwargon, Fulbrosia, and Eurazania hereby declare war a war of conquest against the Re-Estize Kingdom. When I win, and I will win, I shall punish the nobility of this kingdom that has failed to uphold its duty to protect its citizens and fell into decadence and corruption."

I said as I turned around. I revived Barbro but left him as a cripple. I wasn't going to let him die an easy death. Being skewered alive was too good for him. I think constantly drowning in an acid bath while being forced to regenerate for the rest of his life will be a good punishment.

My party and I all walked through a {Gate} I created in the middle of the hall and left the aftermath for Renner to handle. After all, that's what I pay her for. Wait. Do I even pay her?

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A/N: Hey guys. Sorry for the slow updates. To be honest, I'm not really happy with how the story is playing out so far and it's killing my motivation. I think I know the reason for that, since writing a story with a nearly omnipotent MC isn't great for pacing since I feel like I have to insert artificial drama. I kinda see why the authors of other omnipotent MC fics fizzle out and drop their works after a while.

I originally wanted this to be a more lighthearted series where the MC blows through the plot of the various canons and 'gets all da wamans' while writing jokes and cheeky references along the way but its becoming harder and harder to not just write, "Then Rimuru invaded everyone with his massively overpowered military, conquered the world, and turned it into a paradise while getting all the women" since he totally could and nothing is stopping him.

The gist of it is that I think either I'm going to pick up the pace of the story and get towards the ending or I'm going to have to completely rewrite it.

Either way, if you see this story having a dramatic change of pace in the next few chapters, then you know why.

Thanks for listening to my ramblings and see you next time.