28th Move | Matrioshka Brain

I called Rimuru into the Citadel two days before his diplomatic visit to Ingrassia. We were inside a lounge that wouldn't look out of place in a really fancy restaurant, what with the floor covered in black and brown patterned carpet, walls of polished dark wood, black ceiling, and multiple different lights that were placed near the edge of the room. There were two sofas that sat parallel to each other, and between them was a table with a full teacup and a glass of water on it.

The whole place was designed to make the person who resides within it feel comfy, though I think all it made Rimuru feel was that everything was too gaudy.

I had explained to the slime who sat on the opposite sofa of the room exactly what the Endbringer Initiative is and its purpose.

Rimuru had this indecipherable look on his face, then he asked, "are you going to build anymore?

That sentence halted my thoughts as I looked into the eyes of Rimuru's human form.

Rimuru had received words that Ingrassia has accepted his offer of a diplomatic visit, and apparently was ready whenever we were, so long as we give them a six-hour heads-up.

I decided to ask right now partially because I know he's also busy preparing for his own visit to Ingrassia, so he'll be forced to make a decision really quickly without fully thinking it through.

Realistically, I don't doubt I could build it in secret but that would undermine the authority that the government and the people have. Such an act would erode institutions, and institutions serve as an important pillar of democracy and rules of law.

Only in a dictatorship is the leader above the law.

On the surface level, I'm very similar to Area 51. Research and Development is a semi-independent entity outside of the jurisdiction of the Legislative power of Congress but falls under the command of the Executive branch of government. Effectively, I'm beholden only to the authority of the President, and even then Rimuru mostly let me do whatever I want. There does exist a National Agency called the Ministry of Inspection dedicated to making sure there's no corruption or fraud, but that's mostly for auditing all levels of government instead of mine since even if every single Tempest Citizen were to become a part of the Ministry of Inspection, they wouldn't even be able to go through a fraction of the log of my activities even after a century of non-stop inspection.

"No," My reply was sharp, "those are the only ones I have plans for as of right this instant."

My fingers went through the handle to pick up the tea cup and I took a sip of the warm, sweet drink. I stared at the cup after finishing the sip.

Too sweet. Note to self: don't put so much sugar into the drink.

The sofa quietly groaned as Rimuru leaned backward and sighed. The slime then placed his head onto his left hand for support as though it was too heavy for the neck alone.

"Scientia... something's clearly up. I've known you for the longest time ever since you reincarnated in this world, but just please tell me what's wrong. Why are you so... why do you put me at arm's length?"

Huh? My face changed into one that screamed 'what are you talking about?'. This confused look continued for several seconds before Rimuru got the hint and further explained his point.

"I know we haven't... been close ever since I took the role of the President of a budding nation. But please, I— you can trust me on whatever is bothering you."

What...? My mouth was hanging slightly open at what he was implying. Is he serious?

"I really don't know what you mean.

"Scientia." There was an unusual sense of seriousness in his voice, "you're my friend. I know when something is up— well I guess [Great Sage] knows. My Unique Skill said that it was due to past trauma, so I think it's due to reincarnation. I should know myself just how hard reincarnation is..."

[Silenced Emotion: 70%]

Rimuru trailed off and waited for a response. It took several moments for him to realize that I'm still not talking and drop this line of questioning. A look of sadness appeared on his face, like a friend who was sad at how far they and another have drifted apart.

"Alright. Just— just know that my door is always open should you need someone to talk to. Let me help alleviate some of your burdens."

What the hell is he talking about? I ignore [Psychology]'s reply, I get that I may get a bit homesick at times but is it really that bad? Even looking back, it wasn't that bad, was it? I don't think it's that bad that Rimuru's become concern over it—

Ah, a light bulb lit up inside my mind. Of course, if it wasn't that bad, then it must mean something else.

"Did you think that all the time I isolated myself from everyone else was due to me feeling sad over the whole reincarnation thing?" I asked incredulously. What gave him that idea?

"Are... you not?"

This time it was for Rimuru to be confused. I have the slightest gut feeling that maybe even now, we're still both thinking of different things that merely overlap by a slight bit.

"Of course not! This is ME you're talking about, I—" was merely visiting dead planets and other alien worlds during those times.

Huh... perhaps I should've told him about my ambitions in space, shouldn't I?

Realizing I've stopped talking, I cleared my throat before continuing, "when I was out of reach, I was paying attention to building my technology and visiting other worlds out there in space."

"Other worlds..." the slime's eyes suddenly lit up like a child who realized they've just got an X-Box for Christmas, "wait, you mean you traveled to other planets?!"

"Of course—"

Rimuru suddenly launched himself at me. His body outstretched, the slime grabbed my shoulder while I merely reactively bundled my hands together in front of me as if they were sticks and leaned into the couch. His sudden movement caused my tea and his water to get knocked over and spilled.

Needless to say, Rimuru's action surprised me greatly. There was an awkward smile on my face, "um, Rimuru...?"

"You went into space... without telling me?!" He started off low before increasing his voice. The slime's tone had an edge of rightful accusation.

My awkward smile dropped alongside my jaw, "ah? I mean, yes?"

I blinked several times.

I felt Rimuru's hands tighten, not enough that it hurts but enough that it starts to become uncomfortable.

Then it suddenly loosened. "Uh," the slime's attention was on the spilled liquid, "I'll clean this up."

Rimuru's hand transformed into its slime form and ate the spill. Afterward, if one didn't see the tipped-over cup and glass, one would've never realized anything was wrong.

"I'll authorize it."

"Authorize what?"

"The Endbringer Initiative." Rimuru repeated, then added, "We can always use more defenses against other less friendly Demon Lords. Though the name is a bit on the edge..."

I let out a breath and all the tenseness from my shoulders were released as they slacked. So I was worried about nothing.

There was a grateful smile on my face as I shrugged, "The name is meant to be foreboding. Our very military doctrine demands such foreboding names as a psychological weapon. Do you think the Soviets would've been as scared of the nuclear bomb if America named their first test something ridiculous like 'Barbie Did an Oopsie'?"

Rimuru let out a few chuckles at my joke. My eyes sharpened as even without any specialties of [Inspired Inventor], I could tell he wanted something.

After years of being in the corporate world, my intuition is refined to a point that I can tell a person want something more with almost 100% accuracy.

[Psychology] is telling me he wants to go to space as well, but fears actually asking me would be seen as him being rude. The specialty gave me a clear pathway toward an opportunity to reassure him and bond over the experience.

Unlike last time, I decided to listen to that specialty.

"Hey, Rimuru, after you return from Ingrassia do you want to go to space?"

His eyes lit up like a kid who's just been given the LEGO Death Star for Christmas. Rimuru's mouth turned into a bright radiant smile that just makes you want to instinctively protect it. I could almost swear his eyes were sparkling like stars.

"Mmmh mmh!" Rimuru nodded rapidly like a kid who's been asked whether or not they wanted a bag of chips, causing me to chuckle at his childlike behavior.

Then a sudden realization hit me.

"..." Man, how much did I, for the lack of a better word, 'mellow' out thanks to my position finally being secured? If this was me when I just decided to start leading the goblins, I was sure I would be much more paranoid and less trusting.

I clapped my hands together, "Alright, so it's been decided: we'll go after your return from Ingrassia."

"Oh." That seems to temper his glee at the prospect of visiting other worlds.

Seeing how quickly he's changed from happiness and sadness caused me to try and change the conversation.

"Hey Rimuru, how soon can Veldora be freed?"

There was a brief pause before the humanoid slime answered, presumably to consult [Great Sage].

"Around 99 years left, why do you ask?" He said in an innocent tone, like one that a person would use to answer a question asked out of the blue.

I did some quick math. 99 years translates to 36,135 days, which then is divided further into 867,240 hours, 52,034,400 minutes, and a bit over three billion seconds.

With a single swiping gesture, I pulled up information concerning the capacity of the Matrioshka Brain in construction around a Class-A main sequence star thousands of lights away, in what's known as this world's Velda constellation.

Around a tenth of the surface area of the first shell nearest to the surface of the star is completed in the first week. Colossal moon-sized conversion facilities dot the surface of the shell, all of them collectively converting a quarter of an Earth's worth of mass every minute by feeding off of the intense Hawking radiation of millions of micro-black holes and turning those energies back into matter.

The main bottleneck right now that's throttling the Matrioshka Brain's construction speed isn't actually how long it takes to extract the mass from those micro-black holes as one might imagine, instead, it's just how slow the nanites move. Even with titanic highways that crisscross the entire star, capturing it like the web of a spider, it's still taking a while for the proper nanite to get into place before the next one is slotted in.

So how do I make it even quicker?

[Spatial Transportation], [Megastructure], and [Interlocking Design] suggest a prefab solution: set up facilities in the orbit of the star that's specialized in the creation of prefabricated sections of the stellar megastructure. Then, once a prefabricated section is done, those can be teleported in with a Subspace Diver.

In essence, I've turned the construction of the Matrioshka Brain into a fucking star-sized LEGO set.

What has this world come to?

"What is that?"

Still, even if the Matrioshka Brain isn't anywhere near complete, I don't doubt it'll speed up the freeing of Veldora by a factor of many millions at the very least.

"This is the stats for a supercomputer that I made to help your [Great Sage] to free Veldora." I confidently explained while closing my eyes with a waiting smile on my face. I waited for the applause and compliment.

"Are you sure that this computer of yours is better than Great Sage?"

"Guh!"

My bravado evaporated as I flinched as if an anvil had crashed loudly into the ground next to me.

I was met with doubts instead of the expected acceptance!

Clearing my throat again, "of course! This is ME you're talking about. Have you heard what they're calling me on the Internet? I'm the Miracle Maker! I make miracles like how a person makes a sandwich."

Rimuru continued to look at me with an eye of skepticism, still doubting my words but knowing I would never lie about my abilities... as mythicized by the Internet as they were.

[Social Engineering] then suggested to me that Rimuru is not doubting my ability, merely whether or not I have something that can even interface with Great Sage. "if you're wondering how I'm going to connect with your ability, it's easy! I'll just have you devour a biomechanical scanner that'll have a two-way data transmitter which—"

He's lost, isn't he? I stopped once I saw how Rimuru didn't understand what I was talking about.

"Sorry, I have a tendency to explain my technology to people."

[Psychology] was about to speak up before I squished it, I don't need to know why I do that!

Rimuru did a placating gesture with his hands as if telling me 'it's okay' before I extended my arm to the sides and reached into my pocket dimension.

I pulled out an orb about the size of my palm, "Now, although the supercomputer is a star-sized—"

"STAR-SIZED?!"

I stilled, my eyes blinking several times before it hit me that I really haven't explained the supercomputer I'm talking about. In hindsight, Rimuru must've thought that the 'supercomputer' I talked about was just those run-of-mills supercomputers you'd find in my old world, not a stellar megastructure dedicated to the sole purpose of calculations.

"The supercomputer I'm referring to is a stellar megastructure known as a 'Matrioshka Brain'. Imagine a Russian matrioshka doll, or rather, an onion," I chose another one since I don't know if Rimuru knew what a matrioshka doll is. The slime nodded while I placed the orb on the table.

Tapping on my clothes, a grey sphere materialized into reality in front of me.

A miniature version of a Matrioshka Brain.

"Normally, having a hard shell is impossible since not even Neutronium, a stabilized version of Nuclear Pasta, the strongest matter possible under conventional physics, can support such a large structure. Hence, instead of being a Dyson Sphere, it's often referred to in more academic areas as a 'Dyson Swarm'."

The diagram of a new element appeared next to me, it was completely unlike any model of a Bohr-Rutherford diagram.

There was a large grin on my face, and pride seeped in my very being, "but I don't need to play by conventional physics. My technology is advanced enough that the very manipulation of universal constants related to the atom is possible. Allow me to introduce you to 'Atomium'. Created by changing the value of the Electromagnetic Force, and the two Nuclear Forces thanks to a certain forge, this matter will serve as the 'branches' and 'trunks' of my Matrioshka Brain, supporting the whole stellar structure as the foundation of a fixed shell."

Though, I'm currently only limited to constants that are related to the atom. Control over spacetime constants that are independent like the speed of light is beyond me.

I plucked out a small section of the Matrioshka Brain before throwing the rest away. Next, I enlarged the thing with the slime watching in awe.

"The Matrioshka Brain uses computronium: molecular electronics dedicated to the sole purpose of computing and uses the output of an entire star to do so. This is something that approaches the Bremmermann Limit."

"But wouldn't that overheat it? Like I get that you're using some super material but the surface of a star is thousands of degrees!"

With two fingers, I zoomed in on that thin shell of the Matrioshka Brain until you could see that it's actually composed of several individual layers, like the layers of a matrioshka doll or an onion. In reality, these would be colossal fillets of computronium that serve as a single layer that's connected to other layers via almost innumerable titanic pillars which are responsible for transmitting data. These pillars combined with active support aid with Atomium to ensure the shell of the Matrioshka Brain won't collapse due to the gravitational pull of the star.

It would be an almost unimaginable sight, being in the space between two computronium fillets. The ground and sky above you are all like the circuit board of a computer while in the distance there are incredible pillars that stretch from the ground to the sky, holding everything together like how Atlas holds up the world. There will be drones that fly about in the space between fillets, fulfilling their purpose of performing maintenance on the computronium.

It would be unlike anything anyone's ever seen before.

"Yes, it would be quite hot, but remember: heat is energy, and I'm a master at manipulating energy. The lowest layer of the Matrioshka Brain uses the heat from the star to perform some computations. It then radiates away an enormous amount of waste heat toward the layer above it, which would then use those waste heat to perform more calculations." I saw Rimuru's eyes widen as he realized the brilliance of my megastructure, "this process of calculation using waste heat will continue until there is next to no energy left. What you're left with is a region of space that's about as cold as the baseline temperature of outer space."

I then gestured to him, "come on, play with it. Play with the hologram."

Immediately, Rimuru started playing around and looking at the hologram of the Matrioshka Brain. His manipulation of the hologram wasn't as smooth and efficient as mine since he clearly was copying my movements from before like how a person learns by looking at how other people do.

The slime was currently inspecting Layer-12339, 12340, and 12341.

"Where did you get the material to make this?" Rimuru wondered in a quiet tone one would use when they saw something amazing.

As if talking about where I got the parts for carving a statue, I answered, "Obviously from stars and uninhabitable planets. Those are simply collections of mass just waiting to be harvested."

Rimuru's eyes shifted to me before sighing in defeat, muttering, "only you could say using planets as resources so casually..."

"Heh," there was a sheepish smile on my face as I scratched the back of my head, knowing full well that I have no rebuttal for his statement. The sheepish smile quickly turned into a passive one, "so what do you say?"

I dismissed the hologram and picked up the orb.

To be frank, this is Soul Interfacer attached to a Hyperspace Link. Souls are truly the most difficult thing to interact with, arguably even more than Dark Matter since whatever makes up the Soul, whatever is responsible for it becoming quantifiable, only interacts with photons and gravitons.

According to [Spiritual Engineering], it should be possible to interact with Skills if one touches the soul, but I haven't got a clue since it's never been tested before.

"Eat this, and have [Great Sage] temporarily integrate with it to gain access to the Matrioshka Brain."

"I..." Rimuru looked apprehensive, before sighing and agreeing with my proposal, "fine, but we should free Veldora in a safer place—"

"Pfft! There is no safer place in the universe than where we are right now (other than perhaps deep space). The material that made up the outside is called 'Siberium' and it's a hole in reality, capable of blocking any attack." I waved off his concern before turning to the side, "door me."

A black Doorway with a purple outline appeared near the entrance to this lounge, "let's go."

Rimuru held up a hand, "wait, should— shouldn't we tell Citrinitas and Shizue about where we're going?"

The slime gazed at the actual door to the outside before turning to me with an expectant look.

I thought about it for a moment before coming to a decision.

"Bah, we're not going off-world, merely into a safer room."

"But—"

I placed a hand on his shoulder. As a President, Rimuru usually wore a three-piece suit and a name tag on his left breast, but since he's not acting as a President right this instance, the slime wore a casual T-shirt and shorts, which is somewhat out of place given how it's in Autumn now.

"Rimuru, you wanna free Veldora or not?"

Though I put a front of wanting to free Veldora, I was also entirely fine with him remaining sealed. After all, the appearance of the Storm Dragon would surely attract the attention of the entire world. That's not what I'm worried about. What I am really worried about is attracting the attention of the elusive Velzard and maybe even that fourth True Dragon.

"... fine..." Rimuru relented to my wishes and got up, "let's go."

Doormaker transported us into the middle of a massive testing room. The walls were made out of dull metal walls that smoothly connected with the ceiling and floor instead of anything sharp. The atmosphere was completely different from the lounge. Whereas the lounge may feel gaudy, here it's like an attic that hasn't been intruded upon for years: emptiness is all there is.

This was the room where I tested interdimensional phenomena or the place where I summoned Arcueid. This room remained inactive after I shut down any testing involved with other Worlds and recycled the advanced electronics and machines for other uses.

Placing the orb down on the ground while walking toward the edge of the room.

"Um, Scientia? Where are you going?"

I spoke once I'm at the edge of the room, "Consume the orb."

A holographic panel appeared next to me, showing the status of the orb.

Returning my focus back to the slime, I saw how he had a deadpan look on his face.

"Why are you so far away?!"

I return his deadpan look with one of my own as if he's asking about something that's extremely obvious, "Rimuru, I don't know if you realize this but Veldora is gigantic, and unlike you, I can't be safely squished."

"... fair point."

"[Predator]!" Rimuru's right arm changed into something that resembled a vortex before said vortex collapsed onto the orb and consumed it.

I waited for a few more seconds before—

<—Link with 'Star Computer' is successful>

"Wah!" Rimuru jumped in surprise when he heard the digitalized female voice coming from my nanite clothing.

I smirked at his reaction and at the result. Fascinating, I wonder what other Skills could Rimuru get if he consumed other technologies?

"Why hello there [Great Sage], finally I hear you talk with another medium," I said, "how does it feel to talk to someone else for a change?"

<It feels no different apart from being able to communicate with another being beyond my master> The Unique Skill replied passively as if speaking to someone else wasn't an amazing achievement.

It annoyed me more than I could've thought, causing my eyelids to twitch at the dismissal. Again, I cleared my throat and soldiered on, "well, either way, Rimuru, get ready because I'm going to open the metaphorical floodgate and activate the Matrioshka Brain."

There was anticipation in my voice. After all, who wouldn't? A completed Matrioshka Brain would be the dream of any civilization since it signals their entrance into a Type-II Civilization, and with it, comes unparalleled energy collection capability.

Rimuru nodded and entered the proverbial keys to freedom. I tapped on the surface of a newly materialized hologram, sending an 'On' signal at superluminal speeds towards outer space.

_____________________________________________

30,000 light-years away, the Velda constellation, the star known as 'Great Horn'.

A bright, bluish, Class-A star burned silently in the void of space. The ball of nuclear fusion plasma radiated away incredible amounts of light while spewing forth stellar winds that sometimes heat its surroundings to upwards of four million Kelvins.

At least, that's how it's supposed to go. Those stellar winds are immediately intercepted and stopped in place by powerful magnetic fields created to protect a titanic black webbing that is slowly covering— ensnaring— entangling— trapping the star akin to some spider of god that had just found its new prey.

By now, little over a tenth of the surface area of the star has been blocked out, thanks to the 'leaves' that spread out from the 'branches' of the web.

Due to how bright the enraptured star is, an observer wouldn't notice how the barely completed Matrioshka Brain began its operation. However, if sound could be transmitted across space, one would hear the terrible rumbling of computers that dwarfed entire planets roaring to life, utilizing the star held within as the source of power.

_____________________________________________

In the first microsecond of that connection, Rimuru instantly collapsed into his slime form. The strain of suddenly connecting to a vast sea of raw unfiltered information was almost too much.

What is happening? Rimuru asked, to no one in particular.

Yet an answer came from the void, from that connection with that vast sea of pure calculation.

<—NeurologicalEffectOfASuddenIncreaseInComputationalAndCalculationCapacityCanOverwhelmAPerson—>

"Woah~" Rimuru felt weird like he had just drunk five bottles of beer back in his old world and then immediately became sober.

Instinctually, he knew that this Matrioshka Brain can solve any problem he asks.

Rimuru heard something from Scientia, but the slime was too distracted to pay any attention to the Perfect Homunculus.

<—EstimationOfCalculation—

Picking himself up, Rimuru felt [Great Sage] say something really quickly. It was so fast that the slime can't even comprehend what's been said until he used [Thought Acceleration] to its full 1000 times potential, resulting in him seeing Scientia frozen— or at least moving in extremely slow motion.

His mind drudged up the memory of his first time seeing the Matrix and that scene involving Bullet Time.

<—amplified by 50,000,000 times, estimated completion date moved to: 62.441 seconds, commencing processing utilizing connected Star Computer... now>

Rimuru felt a drain on his magicule as [Great Sage] connects itself fully to the not-even-close-to-finished star-sized computer called... what again? a Matrioshka Brain? Yeah, that thing.

<Computronium... analyzed complete, replication through magicule... unsuccessful>

The slime silently cursed his past self of Satoru Mikami for not being more of a hardcore sci-fi fan. If Satoru was then Rimuru was sure he would be at least familiar with what Scientia's talking about— her passion for the stars.

Using that avenue, Rimuru could've then bonded together with the Perfect Homunculus.

<Alert, computronium unable to replicate through Creation Magic, Interdimensional Beacon...analysis complete, unable to replicate through Creation Magic, Soul Interfacer...analysis complete, unable to replicate through Creation Magic>

Due to the effect of a fully powered [Thought Acceleration], what should've been only one minute will be 1000 minutes for him, so Rimuru eases off on the Skill, and time returns to normal.

"—did it work?"

It took a bit for Rimuru to fully catch up. Once he did, however, the slime nodded and affirmed Scientia's notion, "yes, it'll be another minute before Veldora's freed."

The edge of Scientia's mouth tilted downward ever so slightly in an expression of displeasure. It would've been unnoticeable had Rimuru remained a human.

"Huh, I calculated it to be at least 100,000,000... but I guess the slow down can be attributed to the distance between here and there..."

This time, it was the slime who sighed exasperatedly. In his mind, he thought that only Scientia could think 50,000,000 was a small number.

"Listen Scientia. 50 million is a lot, and frankly, the fact that you managed to build a star-sized computer is just insane to me."

And it really is. What little tidbit of science fiction knowledge the slime does know about mostly came from watching Star Wars and Gundam and those mostly dealt with things at the planetary level.

Stuff like 'planet busters' are 'superweapons' and stars are unmovable background objects like the sea or an island that the characters must maneuver around.

The Perfect Homunculus chuckled a little bit at Rimuru's words, realizing that there was a gigantic difference in perspective between the two.

*Thooom*

The door to the reinforced testing chamber was suddenly thrown open. In one swift motion, Scientia turned towards the door and a portal opened up right next to her while the clothing the Perfect Homunculus had worn changed and seemed to almost harden given how it gained a reflective sheen.

From that portal next to her came the handle of a gun which Scientia pulled out and was just about to level the sci-fi looking at the door before realizing exactly who had opened it.

"A—Arcueid?" Scientia lowered her gun until it was pointed at the floor, "what are you doing here?"

Since Scientia was turned away from Rimuru, the slime couldn't see her reaction. However, he could easily imagine how shocked and dumbfounded she must've been given how Arcueid came out of nowhere.

As always, there was a bright and innocent smile on the True Ancestor's face. The smile was one that wouldn't look out of place on that of a bright-eyed child untouched by the real world.

"I was bored. I just finished my latest series of detective novels, so I thought why don't I check to see what you're doing? And it turns out you are doing something really interesting!" Arcueid then pointed at Rimuru, "I sense a connection going way out into space that originated from within him, what's that about anyway?"

Finally, when it seems like Scientia has collected herself, "Arcueid, I'll play with you later but right now, I'm busy."

The way Scientia spoke to Arcueid reminds Rimuru of how a parent would speak to a rebellious teenager.

In truth, Rimuru has always found Arcueid interesting. Needless to say, this fascination is mostly due to how the super vampire (as Scientia would say 'emphasis on the super') came from a world that uses an entirely different system of magic. Although Rimuru was less than happy when he learned of just how inhuman the mages were.

If possible, Rimuru would like to go to her world and introduce technologies that would render their system of magic inert, since apparently if humanity discovers more about the world, the weaker magic becomes.

Arcueid pouted as she crossed her arms. The True Ancestor glared at Scientia as if she expected the latter to apologize the next second. A calculating look flashed across Scientia's uncannily perfect face.

Like a spoiled princess! Rimuru noted when he saw the exchange.

'Hey, Great Sage how soon can Veldora be freed?'

<Estimation time to completion: 30 seconds>

The glare that Arcueid had trained on Scientia was strong enough that the latter's shoulder slumped in defeat, before turning to give Rimuru one last look, "I'll deal with Arcueid, this room should insulate any Magicule Leakage, try not die when dealing with a True Dragon, alright?"

It was only then that Rimuru realized that the calculating look from before was her making the decision to leave him to deal with one of the most powerful beings in this world alone.

'DAMN YOU SCIENTIAAAAA!' Rimuru screamed at her through their rarely used [Soul Corridor].

In response, Scientia gave him an apologetic grin before taking Arcueid's hands and leading her out of the chamber, abandoning Rimuru to his fate.

<[Unlimited Imprisonment] has been analyzed, recreating of [Unlimited Imprisonment]... Successful, replication of Skill... Successful. Ability to free the individual known as 'Veldora' Y/N?>

Seeing no other options, Rimuru mentally selected 'Yes'.

A feeling of immense nausea descended upon his body as if he were still human and had just eaten something that was way past its expiry date.

He felt something come up to his 'throat', something from his stomach.

"Huurg!" Rimuru vomited out enough magicule that spots began to form in his vision. He felt his reserve almost dip below the threshold of keeping him conscious.

Once the slime recovered, Rimuru saw a sight he hasn't seen in four months.

There, standing directly above him, was a towering dragon with scales of obsidian black and a lighter-toned stomach. The enormous dragon was large enough that it was forced to keep its wings close to its body lest it touches the wall of the chamber.

The dragon blotted out all light in the room like the moon during a solar eclipse.

He has been freed.

Veldora has returned.

_____________________________________________

AN: Scientia has stopped questioning how Arcueid was able to just come in.