by Fuse
“Sir Rimuru,” she asked, “isn’t that far too few people? And I didn’t hear my name called, either. What is the meaning of this?”
The meaning? Well…you know. As a princess and all, I hesitated to expose Shuna to a life-and-death situation—that was one reason. But I had another, even more valid one. This whole operation was focused on speed. We’d only have a hundred and change on our side, although Ranga could probably command a few more. I wanted speed, and that meant the infantry would stay home. Shuna and her lack of skill as a tempest wolfsman would be a liability.
Plus, I was still only working with around six hundred hobgoblins, evenly divided by gender. Around a third were assigned to Rigur’s security force, another third devoted to the construction effort, and the rest were women and children unsuited for physical labor. My force was small, yes, but how much could we spare, really?
“Yeahhh, well… You know, Shuna, I’ll need someone to lead the rest of the people here. If we have to negotiate with treants and dryads later, Rigurd’s gonna have a hell of a lot on his plate, right? Your presence would do a lot to give the women and children some peace of mind, too.”
It sounded plausible enough, as I tried to convince her with it, and it basically seemed to work. “In that case, I will live up to the role,” she said, which was a relief. She did have a fan base around town, and I thought it was a good role for her.
Shuna was still giving me and Shion glances, so I’m sure she still had a few questions, but she seemed accepting enough now. Which was fine by me. No need to go out searching for land mines to step on.
“Sir Rimuru,” Rigur said, raising a hand, “why did you not call upon me?”
That question was a lot easier.
“Rigur, I want you to command the remaining security forces and beef up your patrols outside town. You know how crazy this forest is right now. If something happens after we head off, I’m leaving you responsible for them all. Make me proud!”
I had both Rigur and Rigurd nodding at my reply. A number of powerful magic beasts, the kind that usually dwelled deeper in the forest, had started showing up here and there closer by. With that in mind, it was pretty easy to have them see things my way.
So with everyone on my side, we all began to prepare.
After the speech, I received word from Soei. Sir Rimuru, do you have a moment? he asked via Thought Communication.
I had asked him to help us get an alliance going, but what happened? Did he, like, not know where they were, or something? After his flashy exit, if that was all he had for me, I might have to drop the “gentle” act a little…
It worried me a bit, but I should’ve known that wasn’t the reality. Unlike me, Soei was actually somewhat capable.
I was able to meet with the lizardman chief. He seemed willing to accept the alliance, but he asked for you to personally come see him, my lord…
Hmm. That was surprising. It wasn’t even half a day since our conference ended, and he had already extracted a promise from the guy. Talk about capable! And handsome, to boot. I almost resented him.
As I tried to get that under control, I replied, Sounds good. We’re gonna fight this out in the marshes anyway. Like, you’re already there?
Oh, um, yes, my lord. Shadow Motion made the voyage to the marshes rather smooth sailing. It allows me to immediately travel to any individual I personally know, but tracking down the chief’s exact location took me some time…
As he put it, Soei used Shadow Motion to reach the marshes, then deployed his army of Replicants to scope out the area. Gobta could only travel via Shadow Motion for as long as he could hold his breath, so Soei outpaced him. It appeared that his physical corpus was already back.
I wondered if having a Replicant contact the lizardman chief was really the best thing. The mere fact he could control multiples at once still astonished me. It was nothing I could pull off. Well done.
So when would you like to hold the discussions, sir? he asked, shrugging off my compliments in a way Shuna or Shion never would.
Hmm… We’ll probably need time to prepare, and the goblin riders will need a few days for the journey. A week from now, maybe?
It’d be more like two weeks if we were going on foot, but a goblin rider wouldn’t need five days. I reckoned we’d take around two days to prepare, so a week should be fine.
Gabil had his own transport beast, but it didn’t look nearly as fast as a tempest wolf. If we arrived at the lizardman caverns before he and his men returned, we might wind up getting caught in…whatever he was planning. I wasn’t completely sure it was a coup yet, but it always paid to watch your back at times like these. We needed to stay on top of the situation if we wanted to keep the initiative on our side.
A little late, in this case, would be just right. So seven days.
Very well. I will work to make it happen.
He ended the link.
I wanted this alliance to be firm, in writing, as soon as possible, but I knew it’d be hard to trust someone you’d never met before. But if we waited to prepare until after we shook hands and declared the alliance done, the orcs would be knocking on our collective doors in an instant.
If the whole thing fell through, I was planning to pull back our forces at once. If they weren’t willing to work with us, we’d wait for the orcs to swarm them, then hustle off to the treants’ sanctuary. It sucked for them, but I wasn’t here to give them lip service. This was war, and I had people counting on me. There had to be a line in the sand.
They sounded open to the idea, though, so maybe I was just catastrophizing again…
Either way, though, I had to hope it’d work out.
Kaijin already had my next order—a hundred sets of goblin rider weapons and armor, as soon as possible. Benimaru and Hakuro needed some, too, not to mention Shion, but they could wait. Soei would be home soon anyway; they could get it arranged then, together. Kurobe was taking care of our weapons, Shuna and Garm our armor, and they’d be done with it soon enough.
So while I waited for Soei, I decided to organize our goblin riders. Their leader, to start with. I inadvertently locked eyes with Gobta. He was second-in-command with the security forces. It seemed suitable enough.
“Hey, Gobta, are you free?”
“Nhh?! Whenever you say that, I have a feeling it never works out too well for me…”
“Ah, you’re just imagining things. You’re going, too, right?”
Gobta stopped short of replying. I smiled at him. He froze. “Of course!” he shouted nervously.
I didn’t appreciate the weirdness of that act, but I chalked it up to the ominous aura I could feel behind me. Well, huh. Guess a smile from Shion was more effective than anything I could cook up in slime form. She nodded at Gobta’s reply, looking down at me as I mulled over the power she wielded.
So Gobta was our goblin rider leader. No one had any complaints—despite his occasional wobbles, they recognized how capable a hobgob he was. Rigur was just as enthusiastic about the decision, so I didn’t foresee any problems.
“By the way, have you asked Kurobe about the weapon you promised me yet?”
Boy, I sure didn’t, huh?
“Oh yeah, of course.”
“Really? ’Cause you look kind of like you forgot.”
Damn, he’s sharp.
“Ha-ha-ha! You’re such a worrywart, Gobta, my boy! I’ve got the most wonderful shortsword coming your way, so be patient!”
“R-really?! Ooh, I will be!”
Nice. Dodged that bullet. Good thing Gobta is so easy to work with. Better tell Kurobe before I forget again, I thought as he merrily skipped away.
That left a hundred members to select. It was a pretty simple process—I just selected the original goblins who were already paired with their rides as opposed to the relief members in the security force. I handed their names over to Kaijin, asking him to get their equipment ready.
Just as I was done wrapping this up, Soei came back. “I apologize for t
he delay,” he said as he appeared from Benimaru’s shadow like some master ninja. You could just fall in love with him, the way he moved.
So let’s get started, then.
We headed over to the production workshop, the nerve center of all our manufacturing. It was a wooden structure, about the size of a small gymnasium. We were planning to reinforce the walls with mortar later, but we lacked the free hands for it right now. It was still one of the largest buildings in town, and it certainly stood out as such.
When we went inside, we were greeted by several people loudly working on something—the hundred-man battle gear order, no doubt. The security force’s equipment would have to wait for now, sadly.
We moved deeper inside. There was a room devoted to sewing work, but at the moment it was a private office of sorts for Shuna. Her skills were so masterful, it’d take a while for the goblinas to catch up, so she was alone for now. They were gung ho about learning, don’t get me wrong, but at the moment I had them making hemp fabric and other clothing materials under the watchful eye of Garm. Once everyone had more equipment, I was sure Shuna would recruit some of the more talented seamstresses to help with the silk. We needed clothing before we needed armor, after all.
I was now headed for this sewing room, greeting Shuna as I stepped inside. She smiled back at me, now wearing a beautiful, kimono-like dress she must’ve sewn herself at some point. It looked meant for a priestess, but designed to be as easy to move in as possible. The top was pure white in color, but the skirt part was a light-pink, like Shuna’s own hair, and it made for a cute-looking picture. One look and you could see what kind of techniques she had at her fingertips. I was expecting great things.
Shuna took out several outfits and lined them up on her worktable. “Thank you for being patient,” she said. “I’ve prepared your clothing, Sir Rimuru, along with a little something for my brother, I guess.”
“You guess…?”
This made Benimaru laugh. “Hoh-hoh-hoh! Can you blame her?”
“Your silk fabric is so exquisitely made,” Hakuro added, “having even a scrap of it is a great honor. Do you have an outfit for me, too, perhaps?”
Soei was wholly uninterested in the banter. Shion was probably the one with the biggest emotional stake in it. She was a bit more boorish than the others, but she was still a woman.
“Here you are!” Shuna said, completely ignoring the others as she presented some clothing to me. Afterward, she distributed outfits to everyone else, which was just the sort of thing she’d do.
Once we all had our respective gifts, she guided me to a small changing room.
She had given me two outfits, along with a set of armor from Garm. “He gave that to me,” she explained, “and I made sure the clothes would be comfortable underneath.” I didn’t see Garm around. I’d have to thank him later.
So there I was, in the changing room. My first outfit was a base layer—a shirt and some short pants. She had done a great job reproducing the crude illustration I gave her. It felt great for everyday wear, I thought, and she had created three sets for me, so I didn’t have to go naked while having the laundry done.
The second set of clothes, meanwhile, was for battle. A real tour de force from Shuna. Transforming into my child version, I immediately set to strapping it on. It felt so glossy and slick on my fingers—more wonderful than even the highest-quality silk I knew—and the pants and shirt were done up just as I had designed them.
It was an incredibly pleasant surprise. The cut, and the fabric, were better than anything I wore back home. Some of my Sticky Steel Thread was woven in, too, so it’d protect me more than well enough. I had the Sage analyze it for me, so I knew.
This outfit, though… The moment I had it all on, it was like I was born to wear it. Perfectly sized. A sort of magic item, I supposed. I had absolutely nothing to complain about, as I felt its magicules intermingle with my own. It already felt like another part of me. Just to test it out, I morphed into my adult version—and just as I thought, the clothes adjusted themselves to match. A perfect piece of work.
I moved on to the armor Garm had provided. He said he’d given it some extra attention, and it fit me just as well as the clothes. There was a dark jacket made from tanned leather, tied together with string in front instead of sporting buttons. It looked like a plain old jacket, but it was also magical, and a perfect match for my aura. Maybe it was because I had the original pelts stored in my stomach before handing them over to Garm. That must’ve turned it black in color, matching well with my aura.
Once again, no complaints. All I had left was the coat to wear over the clothing. This was a long jet-black coat made from the original direwolf boss’s fur. Another Shuna special, and since it lacked any sleeves, it was light as a feather. The front was open, but that didn’t make it annoying to wear at all, oddly.
Putting it on, I wound up wearing it sort of like a robe. The rear had a high part like a collar to protect my neck, and I could remove this if I wanted or use it as a scarf. A scarf that, apparently, would keep me warm in winter and cool in summer, somehow.
I didn’t think it mattered much with my Cancel Temperature, but I had to give it a shot regardless. And thanks to that Sticky Steel Thread in there, it really did have some resistance to cold and heat. The coat also came standard with Self-Repair, which went way beyond basic seam fixes. Enough magic force, and I could basically regenerate it from scratch. Keep it clean, too. Ultraspeed Regeneration at work, I supposed. It made sense. This fantasy world, man—it was a treasure trove of fun stuff to play with.
So I put it all on and stepped outside. Shuna stared at me spellbound, clearly blushing, as the rest of the ogre mages tried their own clothes on. It turned out everything she sewed had the same magical properties of my outfit, absorbing the wearer’s aura to match their body perfectly. Thus, they were all natural fits.
Benimaru’s kimono-like robe was bright red, almost like velvet. On a normal person, it would’ve looked unnecessarily gaudy, almost clownish, but he had the natural good looks to pull it off. Hakuro, meanwhile, had an outfit of pure white, like a mountain hermit—no excessive decoration to get in the way of battle here. Between that and his sharp eyes, nothing could’ve suited him better.
Soei’s robe and pants were both a dark shade of blue—light, airy, and no doubt hiding an arsenal of covert weaponry inside. Shion went with a Western-style dark suit of purplish-blue, exactly what I had drawn up, and framed her as the capable executive assistant she was.
All these outfits, mine included, became magical by nature the moment they contacted our skin. Really fantastic results, I thought, and apparently we were free to customize or transform them as we liked. That was thanks to the “magic thread” used, the mixture of hellmoth cocoons and my own Sticky Steel Thread; their magicules could be freely remixed and adjusted, much like how weapons of magisteel morphed to meet the needs of the carrier.
This meant the clothing would grow with the wearer’s body, but I thought it made for some neat fashion applications, too. I doubted there was much else like this in the world. I didn’t know what sort of magic items humans used in their day-to-day lives, but I had to assume Shuna was among the best in her field. Weaving clothing that magically merged itself onto people’s bodies had to outclass whatever they bought off the rack in their realms. I wondered how much my outfit would go for on the open market.
“Oh, I have this for you, too,” Shuna said as she handed me a pair of shoes made of leather and resin. “I think they’ll go wonderfully with your cute little legs, Sir Rimuru.”
I tried them on. They fit and offered supreme comfort.
“Ooh, these’re nice!”
“Dold made these for me,” she said, smiling. Apparently, both he and Garm were too nervous about how I’d react to hand them over directly. So why weren’t they too embarrassed to ask Shuna? They probably just wanted an excuse to talk to her…
She had pairs for everyone—shoes for me, Soei, and Shion; sand
als for Benimaru and Hakuro. Even the sandals were top-notch pieces of work. I was sure enough of that, given how well my own everyday sandals felt.
So we had our new clothes, sort of reinventing ourselves in the process. We left the workshop in a state of near bliss, waved off by Shuna’s gentle smile.
Next up was Kurobe’s forge.
I hadn’t seen our smith lately, busy as he was with the creative process. He hadn’t even appeared at the deployment speech I gave earlier. I knew he was doing fine; he was just the type to get totally absorbed in whatever he tackled. I did ask him to make weapon production his top priority, too, and he had apparently been spending well near every waking hour on the effort. Kaijin told me as much before our conference.
The door to the forge was open when we showed up. It was fully equipped with tools he brought over from Kaijin’s workshop, with the raw materials for his work kept in an adjacent storage room. I had granted him a pretty decent supply of magisteel; he had everything he needed along those lines, but he was a little nervous about the lack of other metals on hand. We needed to examine the nearby mountains for a permanent ore supply, but our lack of time and resources meant that had to wait. Until the construction frenzy died down a little, staff shortages were going to be a chronic issue.
I could hear banging from inside the forge, waves of heat wafting out from the door. This was the only high-temperature forge in town, run by a furnace made from clay blocks heated with Control Flame. It turned out better than I anticipated. We were planning to build more once we got to grips with this one. Lots of things in the works, not enough time to tackle them. A real pain.
So we went inside and grabbed Kurobe’s attention. Once he noticed, he greeted us with a smile. “I was expecting you!” he said. “There’s somethin’ I’d really like to show you all.”
I could tell he was eager to show off his latest work. A little too eager, in fact. He spent the next two hours talking about everything he had crafted, my eyes glazing over along the way. Yes, I know, it’s all great, can I get out of here, please? I almost said it out loud a few times before stopping myself—he just looked too happy.
