Conquering The Labyrinth 2

-'I see...' Rimuru said as he looked at her. He and the kids began following her down a side corridor she had opened for them; as they walked, he asked 'Do you get many of those? Heroes I mean?'

-'Ah, not as often as I'd like...the last was like two hundred years ago and he was a HUGE disappointment!'

-'Disappointment?' he asked in confusion. She then launched on a tirade about how some summoned kid who had been deemed the Hero came to her looking for specific spells. Even after passing the trials meant for Heroes, he kept coming back, eventually asking for a help with summoning spells, which she couldn't help with. Apparently, he broke down crying, then stole some high elementals from her. The crazy part was that, apparently, the Hero was Leon Cromwell...who later became a Demon Lord, and was the one who had summoned Shizu to this world; Ifrit was one of the spirits stolen from Ramiris. He was miffed to say the least to hear the great Demon Lord he was planing to slug was not just a Hero once, but a giant crybaby.

In any case, Ramiris lead them to a large chamber with a huge column in the middle from which extended several walkways that looked to be made of nothing but magicules. An eerie beam of light shone upon the top of the column, which Ramiris explained to be the most important spiritual shrine in the world. If one prayed at it, they were certain to at least attract a spirit's attention- even if they didn't descent to them, the spirits energy would be siphoned off and one could, technically, even create a pseudo-spirit with them (the last bit he was informed of by the Great Sage).

Starting with the oldest, Gail, they headed for the altar.

-'Just think something!' Ramiris instructed 'It can be anything, like a 'please help me!' or a 'come out at play!'' she dramatically said 'as long as it attracts their attention, it's fine!'

An so Gail knelled down on the platform and began praying. No spirit came at first, but numerous 'flakes' of spiritual energy began descending down like snow. Thinking about what Great Sage said, Rimuru quickly gobbled them up, ignoring Ramiris' protests and instructed Great Sage to form a higher spirit with the absorbed energy; infusing the resulting pseudo-spirit with a pseud-personality, he then had the think fused with Gail. After a quick analysis, he was extremely happy to announce that it had worked. Gail was no longer going to die.

After a quick cheer, he began taking turns with the other kids. He didn't quite knew what to say when Kenta summoned some high level light spirit that happily fused with him, but decided to think on it later. More problems came with Chloe

As the black haired girl was kneeling down, she looked at Rimuru shyly and stuttered an 'I love you..' at him. He was really caught off guard but quickly regained his composure, scratching his cheek he said

-'Ah, he he, thank you but...erm...see, I already have someone...' he told her. He also wanted to tell her she was his student and her age was barley even in the double digits, but refrained from it. Chloe had a weird look on her face but seemed to accept the answer and continued praying. What happend next, he wasn't sure at all. Another spirit, a mature looking woman in a white dress, appeared and looked rather angry at him for some reason... she lunged at him, grabbed his face and tried to kiss him, but being a spirit passed right through, then headed for Chloe with a dejected looking face. Ramiris was quite freaked out for some reason, trying to stop her, but it was useless. She fused with Chloe and was gone. On the plus side, Chloe too was cured. Ramiris wasn't much help describing what the spirit was, saying something about the Great Time Spirit; he got none of it so decided to ignore it.

Thus his mission came to an end; he had saved the Shizu's students and could already feel a sense of relief wash over him. Before he left, he made Ramiris a new guardian to replace the one he destroyed. He made a puppet body and summoned a higher demon to inhabit it, named it Beretta and called it a day.

Before leaving, he decided to have a quick conversation with Ramiris

-'Hey, by the way, how was Milim doing when she came around here?'

Ramiris turned from gushing about Beretta and looked a bit confused 'Eh? Milim?' she asked as she began thinking 'She looked the usual to me! Loud, annoying, clueless about stuff most people call common sense!' she laughed again, so he suppressed the desire to swatt her; and she had no right to call anyone 'loud' or 'annoying'. He wondered about the other thing though...

-'Common sense? Like what?' he was a bit confused when Ramiris suddenly stopped laughing and looked embarrasses. '

-'Ah, errm, nothing really! Ha ha...' 'Why is she red?' Rimuru wanted but also did not wanted to know. So he just shrugged and left.

A long distance away, a certain Demon Lord shattered a glass of wine in her hand. 'Oops, really sorry about that!' Milim sheepishly said. Across from her, Demon Lord Fret looked unperturbed. They were sitting in her room, having lunch

-'Everything okay?' the harpy asked concerned 'Is the plan...'

Milim quickly waved dismissively 'Everything is going along just fine, don't worry!' she added 'I'm almost there with my assessment, just a few more days.'

-'Then what was that about?' Frey motioned to the broken glass; Milim sheepishly laughed

-' I felt a sudden urge to smash something.' the red haired girl said casually 'like someone was talking smack about me, somewhere...' she looked off into the distance, specifically to the west...

Frey just sipped her wine.

A few weeks had passed since Rimuru and the summoned children returned to Ingrassia from the Dwelling of Spirits. While their condition was theoretically solved, he wanted to stay a little longer to make sure there were no unforeseen side effects, as well as to ensure they would get a good sense on handling the spirits that now dwell within them. He wasn't sure what kind of powers they would now get- such as Shizu, who was able to control fire and summon Ifrit- but he could already feel their magicule level go up drastically, even if they weren't children. He was certain they would easily be categorized as D- at least, which would be no mean feet even for an adventurer. More than instructing them, however, he wanted to keep on hanging out with them;

Basically, he didn't want to say goodbye, not yet. And so he had spent the next month or so making as much of the time they had left; after making sure a suitable teacher would replace him, he began planing a camping trip to a nearby forest as a big final bonding experience.

They had already spent several days on the trip, fishing, playing in the river or simply wandering around the forests, admiring nature. On the last night they had gathered around a large fire for dinner, which was when...

As they were sitting around the fire in a circle, they were taking among each other about various things. Suddenly, he could hear the two girls, Alice and Chloe, whispering to each other. He had a bad feeling about but tried to ignore it. As he was sipping his tea, the two's seemed to get into a heated debate and

-'Hey, Teach, is it true you have a girlfriend?!' Alice asked all of a sudden. Caught off guard, he spilled everything he was drinking, right in the face on an unfortunate Ranga.

-'Eh, huuuh?! Wha...whe?' he quickly sputtered as everyone turned their attention to the blond girl

-'Well, Chloe said...' she tried to quickly add but Chloe interrupted

-'That's not what I said, Alice...' she said in her usual timid voice, sounding embarrassed to be mentioned

-'Well, what else dose it mean, huuuh?!' Alice grumbled.

Gale, meanwhile, shook his head and sighed 'Alice, it's not nice to pry into people's life like that' he said as he looked over at Rimuru apologetically

-'Pfff, who cares if he dose, anyway?' Kenya added, bored. Alice shot him a dirty look

-'Ha, just what a brat might say!' she said trying to sound far more mature than she actually was. Kenya, for his part, didn't bite her trap, only smirked

-'That's funny coming from you.' he said dismissively 'You're the youngest here, and thus the brattiest.' he told her.

Alice's face turned red as she stood up 'WHAT did you say, punk?!'

Kenta got up too 'Reed my lips!' and was about to say something rude but Rimuru quickly jumped in before things got out of hand, as it usually happened with the two.

-'Alright, alright, sit down and calm down!' he got between them and placed his hands on their shoulders, gently pushing them down. After he was sure they calmed down, he sat back in his place with a heavy sigh. Looking at the questioning look on everyone's faces, though, he realized he wasn't gonna get away from the original question; even Kenya, who said he didn't car, was shooting curious glances out of the corner of his eyes. He sighed...

-'Fine, fine.' he eventually relented 'Yes, Alice, I DO have a girlfriend...'

-'I knew it!' she immediately said, looking proud of herself. She and everyone else quickly began throwing questions at him, like 'Is she pretty?' or 'how long?' or 'how strong is she?' (you can guess who asked the last one)

He just held his hands up to stop the barrage of questions, then began giving them some- vague- answers. They continued talking about it for several more hours.

-'Whoa, a Demon Lord?!' Kenya gasped; the others too had somewhat concerned expressions

-'Hey, it's not as bad as it sounds...' he tried to defend himself 'You met Ramiris; she's also a Demon Lord, and she wasn't that bad, was she?' he said, leaving out how he found her both annoying and far too weak to be considered a Demon Lord. 'And Milim, well...she can be a handful, at times, but she was never malicious or anything like that...in fact, she's was a real life saver when my city was being threatened by a huge monster that even I could do nothing against.' he told them. The kids perked up at that, looking awed

-'She's that strong?' Ryota asked '

-'Yeah, she is. But that's not all she is...she's friendly, cheerful...would rather goof off, have fun and enjoy some sweets than do anything you hear Demon Lords supposedly do...' as he said that, the others noticed he had a somewhat distant and sad expression on and exchanged glances 'Ah, but also, she always seemed...' he said as he looked up at the night sky 'really lonely...'

-'Maybe she doesn't have many friends?' Chloe said 'Being a Demon Lord sounds scary, so...maybe people are too afraid of her to become her friends?' she said in a surprisingly wise tone. Rimuru looked at her

-'Yeah, maybe...' he muttered as he considered her words. She seemed a bit...different than when they first met, but he couldn't put his hand on it

-'Hey, could we meet her one day?' Alice asked suddenly 'I really kinda want to meet her and...maybe we could be friends too?' she said

-'Any friend of Teacher is a friend of mine, too!' Kenya added. Rimuru heard that and though

-'You know, that actually sounds like a good idea...' he told them 'He he, you guys and her would get along, I think. She can be pretty...childish...' he smiled fondly 'but, then again, I can too...'

-'Yeah, we know, Teach!' Alice replied with a smirk

-'Heh, don't think we didn't notice you putting more sweeteners in your coffee than a five year old in his mouth at a candy store!' Kenya laughed

-'Or how you hold on to Ranga like a teddy bear when you sleep outside!' Alice said. Kenya was about to say more when Rimuru grabbed both their heads and ruffled their hair violently, ignoring their protests

-'You cheeky brats...' he grumbled 'Don't make fun of adults!' the others laughed at the two as they got their 'punishment', but then Rimuru let go and turned to them, a dangerous glint in his eyes 'Heh, don't think the rest of you lot will be spared!' he said as he menacingly twitched his fingers at them.

Immediately, the kids bolted out of their seats, Rimuru hot on their heals. No one's hair was shown any mercy that night.

A few days later, it was finally time. He had to leave and return to Tempest.