The Summit 3

-'Rimuruuuuu!' she shouted 'Listen up! Your nation is doomed!' she shouted, panicked. However, all Rimuru could do was stare, dumbfounded.

-'Wha...' was all he could make out before Ramiris was snatched from the air. Diablo held the fairly by the winds, looking very annoyed.

-'How should I dispose of this annoying insect, My Lord?' he asked, casually. Behind him, Rimuru could see Beretta only now emerging from the door, apologizing profusely to the guards she had to hold down for Ramiris to get in.

-'Ah, no, no, don't dispose of her...' he told the demon. He ignored the fairy's screams as he though what to do...

-'Erm, Rimuru Sir, that fairy...' Fuze said as he looked at her, just as dumbfounded as he was of the sudden situation.

-'Yeah, she's... a friend.' he had to stretch the definition, though 'She may not look it, but this is Ramiris, one of the Ten Demon Lords (allegedly)...' he told him

-'Whadda ya mean ALLEGEDLY?!' the fairy in question screamed at him, then started struggling in Diablo's grasp to no avail 'I come all the way here with IMPORTANT INFORMATION and this is how you treat me?!' she said. Rimuru decided to deal with her later, so he snatched her from Diablo and walked over to Veldora.

-'Hey, Veldora, could you deal with her for a second?' he said, holding her up to him

-'Not now, man...' the dragon otaku said, not even looking up 'I'm almost to the end of this thrilling mystery!'

Rimuru was not having it 'Ah, the culprit is...' and so he mercilessly spoiled the manga.

Veldora suddenly had the look of a man dead inside; he was muttering while crying 'How could you?'

Meanwhile, Ramiris fainted after taking one good look at Veldora and realizing he was the real deal. Rimuru casually gave her to Veldora, who robotically took her in his hand while still crying. Feeling very much bad about what he did, Rimuru turned to continue the summit.

-'Alright, sorry for the interruption.' he told them 'Now, let's get to the final point of this meeting. First of, I would like to talk about keeping the Western Church in check; although for now I have no intention of starting a war on two fronts, we will respond in force if they do anything...'

-'Sorry, Sir Rimuru...' Fuze interrupted 'War on two fronts?'

-'Yes, that's the second part of what I wanted to talk about: namely, from now on Tempest is officially at war with Demon Lord Clayman.' he declared, then took a moment to gauge their reactions. 'Our reasons are simple: I believe him to be behind, at least partially, Falmuth attacking us. Our guest here, Mjulan...' he motioned to the majin 'can vouch for his intentions, as she worked for him until recently.' hearing that, the woman stood up. For the next few minutes, she retold those who were not in the know about her relation to Clayman and his orders to infiltrate the city.

-'And there you have it.' Rimuru said as she finished, nodding for her to sit down 'Clayman is the true culprit behind this. I also believe he was responsible for Milim attacking Eurazania a few days ago.' he looked over at the Beatskateers, who stood up and nodded in agreement as Albis steped forward

-'I am Albis, of the Three Beastkateers of Demon Lord Carrior. What Sir Rimuru says, we support it wholeheartedly.' was all she said.

-'With this in mind, I intend to go to war with Clayman's forces and, eventually...kill him.' Rimuru declared. 'For that, I requested the assistance of the beastment under these three...'

-'Of course, Sir Rimuru.' Albis said 'Our forces are at your disposal. We await your command.'

Rimuru nodded in gratitude. 'For that, we need to figure out the exact movements of Clayman's army. Soei, please fill everyone in on his army's movements.' he said to the ogre. Again, Soei quickly and efficiently retold all the information he had acquired.

-'I see..' Gazel said as Soei finished 'If they are marching on you, it seems very unusual to go through Demon Lord Milim's territory...'

-'Perhaps...' one of Gazel's aids spoke up. The king gave him the go ahead to say what was on his mind 'Perhaps his aim isn't you after all?' he said. Rimuru had to give that a bit of though. However, Benimaru was quicker than him

-'Maybe...his goal is Eurazania?' he said. The three Beastketeers perked up hearing that. That's when Rimuru had a realization

-'Eurazania...maybe...if he wanted to ascend as a True Demon Lord, he would need to kill a lot of people. Without Carrion to defend them...' he said, a bit absentmindedly

-'There are still tens of thousands of beastmen in Eurazania!' Suphia said as she stood up, panicked 'Most of them are defenseless! He wouldn't...'

-'He would.' Mjulan interrupted 'He would have no qualms about it at all.'

-'I see...' Rimuru said 'The reason Clayman had Milim attack was to take out Carrion so that he would be out of the way, unable to defend against his invading armies. And Tempest...' he said looking around to his subordinates 'As we had a treaty with Eurazania, we had to be incapacitated, immediately.'

-'That bastard...' Phobio said through clenched teeth

-'This is a serious problem, assuming it's true.' Gazel said as he stroked his chin 'There is no conceivable way for you to get your forces to Eurazania before he starts the invasion. He just may win this round...'

-'No.' Rimuru said with conviction 'I have something up my sleeved...' actually, it was something he had Raphael work at for a few minutes when he realized where this was going. What he needed was a quick way to move thousands of troops to a distant battlefields, and so 'It's a mass teleportation spell I had been working on for some time.' he said as he ignored the bewildered stares of everyone 'Until now, it was simply unfeasible as it required to much magicules to work...but now I have the needed amount, and then some. Basically...' he looked around and grinned 'we can move all our forces to where they are needed in no time!' he declared.

Everyone in the room stared at him in disbelief. Gazel was the first to recover 'Ha ha ha! I should stop being surprised by you, Rimuru!' he billowed 'Alight then. I believe you can handle that on your end. If you require extra men, just ask..'

-'That won't be necessary, but thank you. Now, on to other matters.'

The topic of discussion shifted to the information pried (tortured) from the prisoners. It turned out, along with the king they had captured a famous mage from Falmuth, Razen. After some back and forth (and the realization that letting Shion in charge of interrogation was a massive mistake), they eventually settled on sending the three prisoners with Yohm back to Falmuth, with Diablo assisting as he had promised. And so, the summit was about to come to an end when Fuze raised his hand to speak

-'Ah, sorry, Rimuru...what about that fairy, Ramiris?' he asked pointing at Ramiris. At some point, she had woke up and began talking with Veldora. Now, she was deeply invested in one of Veldora's manga. Beretta was desperately trying to have her pay attention, but to no avail. Rimuru got up and walked over to her

-'Hey, Ramiris...' she ignored him. 'Oi, Ramiris!' still she ignored him. Getting angry, he decided to play dirty 'If you don't pay attention, I will spoil who the heroine ends up with!'

-'Noooo!' she quickly spurned around and flew at him 'I'm here, okay!' she said as she tried to put on a dignified air, and said 'Like I wanted to say, Tempest is doomed!'

-'...speak plainly, you..' he told her, running out of patince.

-'Listen...' Ramiris said with a more serious air 'all your friends too...' she said as she turned to everyone else in the room. 'At the behest of Demon lord Clayman, the Demon Lord Banquet, Walpurgis, has been invoked!' a cold air seemed to taken over the room. Looking at the other higher ups in the room, Rimuru felt something big was revealed, but unfortunate he was a bit out of the loop.

-'Walpurgis?' he asked she could answer, Gazel spoke up

-'A meeting of the Demon Lords...' he said, just slightly shaken 'It forebears war and disaster. It is never a good sign...'

-'Ah, he's exaggerating.' Ramiris dismissed, ignoring Gazel's stare. 'Walpurgis has been held many times in the past and the humans never knew because nothing big was talked about. However, there have been times when big things were decided, like during the last Tenma War, so people mostly associated it with bad things...' was what she said, but Rimuru still didn't quite get it.

-'If it's no big deal, what's the problem?' he asked her.

-'It's not the Walpurgis itself that's the problem!' she said exasperated 'It's what it was called for that's the problem! Clayman called it to deal with you, to have you punished for calling yourself a Demon Lord!' she revealed. Again, everyone in the room looked a bit shaken by that. 'And what's more, he was backed up by Frey and Milim!' at that, he really had to perk up.

-'Really?' he asked her with anger. Hearing that Milim was backing Clayman in the meeting woke some feeling in him that he didn't quite knew he had. It felt a bit like...betrayer. However, he quickly and mercilessly buried that feeling away 'No, I refuse to believe Milim would turn on me...' he told himself 'It's that bastard Clayman! He made her, somehow! I swear, he will suffer for this!' unconsciously, his anger began to boil over, causing his aura to flare up a bit. Hearing Ramiris yelp as she was pushed back, he quickly put a lid on it. As he looked around, he could clearly see everyone- especially those who knew of him and Milim- looking in concern. However, he decided the best thing to do was to ignore it. 'So, the bastard finally reveals his true intentions, huh? Alright then. I can work with that...'

Ramiris looked over at him in concern and asked 'Hey, did you really call yourself a Demon Lord?'

-'Yeah, I have.' he told her 'so what?' he asked dismisivley.

-'Listen, Rimuru...' she began in as serious a tone as she could 'It's an unwritten rule among the Demon Lords that if you want someone killed or punished, you do it yourself. If someone declares themselves a Demon Lord and you don't like it, you kill them yourself. And if you die instead, the new guy takes your place...It's unusual for anyone to agree on this kind of meeting...' she explained

-'I see.' Rimuru calmly stated 'So he's trying to rile up the other Demon Lords against me...well, that works for me.' ignoring Ramiris' confused stare, he continued 'Why do you care, though?'

-'Ah, I mean, I like you and we're friends, right? Right?' she asked; he didn't answer 'and besides, if you die the what happens to my Beretta?!' she eventually said, panicked 'So, I have decided to take your side! Be grateful! You only need one more Demon Lord to side with you and you'll be mostly good!'

-'Mostly good?' he asked her

-'Yeah, then the Council will probably refuse Clayman's dumb request. He will definitely have to take you on himself then...as you are now, you can take him out no problemo!' she emphasized with some kicks. Rimuru finally understood where she was coming from. He wasn't sure who else would side with him, but he would cross that bridge when he got there.

-'In that case, if you're going there could you take me with you to defend myself?' he asked her; she looked at him and though for a second

-'Ah, yeah, of course!' she excitedly said 'Someone should be coming for me, so you can come along. I can notify Guy that I'm bringing you along.'

-'Guy?' he asked; he assumed that was another Demon Lord

-'Demon Lord Guy Crimson!' Elalude shouted from where he was standing, looking whiter than he was before 'The Lord of Darkness, the first Demon Lord...' his name seemed to be quite the big deal as many in the room looked equally pale at the mere mention of the name

-'Among the Demon Lords, he and the Destroyer, Milim Nava, are the most powerful and feared...' Fuze said, looking about to faint 'Heck, at least I know the Destroyer can be reasoned with and placated...buy Guy Crimson? The only times he has ever showed himself is when he destroys entire nations...'

Ramiris looked unperturbed 'Ah, don't worry, he's cool!' she declared 'Most of the time...' she added to the side 'He's also a reasonable person who'll definitely not object. Heck, I bet he'll take a liking to you and side with you, Rimuru!' she said, but he wasn't so convinced, based on the looks of abject terror the name inspired. Still, he figured he would cross that bridge too, eventually.

-'Okay then, Ramiris...' he said as he looked her in the eyes 'Please get the word out. Let's get ready for Walpurgis...'

With all the pieces in place, Rimuru was determined to see that he, not Clayman, would come out victorious. And if a single hair on Milim was out of place...then Clayman's fate would be a pitiable one indeed.