I am back. And I am looking for a "Decent" Beta Reader to help me fix my stories, the last I had apparently was not good enough while the one before, while Perfect, had his own life schedules so unfortunately, we had to part ways.
I am back as a "Thank you" to my very few Fans and as a "GO FUCK YOURSELF!" to my not-beloved haters.
For you others, that had always accepted my stories no matter the IMMENSE quantity of flaws they have (I KNOW ABOUT THEM, BUT FOR THE LIFE OF ME I CAN'T SEEM TO BE ABLE TO FIX THEM…) I thank you for the kind and nice words you leave behind and all the support you give me.
You help the last weak sparks of Hope for Humanity I have to not die.
Also, just in case some of those Human Failures do manage to find an Admin still alive in that barren "Valley of Death" that is this place's "User Support", I have started to post my own original work elsewhere under a different Alias, that, of course, I am not divulging just in case the Human Shit-stains decide to go the extra mile to be as much hideously garbage as they already are and come bothering me even there.
It's a Chinese-style 'Wuxia Novel': Reincarnation, Cultivation, Martial Arts...You know, the Works.
It surely is less 'constricting' than writing a Fanfiction since I create my own Characters instead of using 'famous' ones, less of a hassle about Canon too! It's Amazing. *. *
So, as you can see, I do have contingency plans! If I can't write here, I will write elsewhere and simply leave you Sub-humans (AKA 'Haters') behind.
Have a Good Day!
" You bastard" - demon talking / jutsu
"Let's finish this" - dialogue
" Can it get any worse? " - during flashback/thoughts
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or whatever I will use here in this fic.
A certain blond in an RPG World Chapter 6: Meeting the holder of the [Hero] title sure is leaving a sour taste in our mouths! Should we tell him he won't be the real Hero in this mess or should we spare him the agony of being simply a "Side Character" with a nice title attached to it and keep quiet?
Far away from Serena City – Path towards the mountains -
Galloping at high speed through the dusty streets leaving behind them the capital city of the Devan kingdom, the four members of the 'Monster Star' Guild Main Attack Team chatted bored to pass the time before their arrival while riding a giant lizard each, the animals had bright-yellow scaled skin and long barbs under their chins that were slightly dragging on the floor leaving behind faint scratch marks.
[Current Team Formation:]
Naruto
Rimuru
Tanya
Mi
"So, why only us four?" Rimuru asked curiously.
"Somebody had to stay behind to help Olaf keep Andre in check, and no matter how smart he is compared to other Trolls, I preferred to leave Lars too behind to help Fist." Naruto answered sighing.
Andre the Legendary Blacksmith: Naruto has been told by Olaf and other people tales of the man whose talent as a blacksmith was rumored to be envied even among the Gods in Heaven and the Demons in Hell; the very last remaining survivor of the destruction of an entire kingdom when his king went mad and used himself and his personal guards for a ritual that backfired and burned the whole land to a crisp, and considering that he had taken part in the initial preparations for that ritual, it was no surprise that the guilt still followed him to this day as he kept drinking himself into a drunken stupor hoping to silence the voices of the victims.
He had made clear, once sobered-up, that he wasn't joining the Guild but just hanging around long enough to forge a weapon for Naruto using the fang Malvas gifted him along teaching a thing or two to Olaf, the latter because apparently the dwarf was so 'Ignorant' about the True Way of the Forge for Andre's tastes to leave the man appalled at the sorry state of the current knowledge of the Dwarf Race in this field when compared to him.
And even if greatly insulted at the beginning, Olaf had been forced to eat his words when Andre produced armors and equipment for everybody in the Guild in such a short time and with such high level of quality (considering the quality of the raw materials they had at hand as a starting Guild) to leave the dwarf weeping in shame before focusing only on creating Naruto's new weapon.
That was a month ago, and still, the man had not finished! He had kept working 24/7 without a single pause since day 1 and was still producing a light and heat so intense from the forge that people outside had started to wonder if he was instead creating a second sun, so much that guards had been stationed there by King Leodas to ease the population's increasing anxiety about catastrophic world-ending explosions.
Still, the equipment was very nice, and Olaf promised that thanks to Andre's teachings he will personally 'update them' to always be Top-of-the-line whenever better materials were supplied to him; but although Rimuru thought his new clothes and the ones of everybody else were cool, he still found Tanya's own uniform, hat and furred-neck long coat to be still a bit too much 'Nazi-looking' for his tastes, even if kinda slightly different in look and with their Guild symbol instead of a swastika on them, but the girl seemed so unfazed by it that he simply minded his own businesses.
And so, here they were in their twentieth Mission so to build funds to enlarge their Guild and its influence enough to try to understand under what rock the King of Barad-Se had hidden himself to plan his conquest of the whole planet.
Rimuru was still wearing his furred coat over a kimono-like before, but with a clear increase in quality and stats, Naruto wore a perfect replica of his old shinobi attire sandals comprised and Mi...Eh! What about her…
Andre described it as: [ "A dress made with dark magic and bound together with Mithril-like threads from my personal reserves. It will evolve with her following her Leveling-up and chosen Evolution. Zero need for maintenance, cleaning or spare parts! It's Pierce-Resistant, Blunt Resistant, Cut Resistant, and Slash Resistant. It can't be burnt, dissolved or frozen...And it breaths like Fengyptian Cotton! Very classy." ]
Even if nobody fully understood what all of that was about, the thing was still a very nice white and blue attire that did wonders to her natural beauty causing the envy of every girl that looked at her, young or noble, especially for the 'daring' top that was cut short to show her midriff.
So while all of them seemingly wore normal clothes, in truth those garments offered ten times more protection than a full set of knight class heavy steel armor, but without being any heavier than normal clothes.
"You and Naruto can eat literally everything and get stronger from that, Mi needs this to level-up and I am still in probation even if I officially joined this Guild some time ago. We had no choice since we still lack more members." Tanya added annoyed.
"And Albedo with Alice?" Mi asked.
"I sent them to run a little errand for us, apparently Albedo's father has asked his niece to join us so to help those two girls and 'Pay us back' for them forcing their stay in the Guild. So I sent them to organize the lab and library that girl will need to become our 'Researcher' and 'Potion Mistress'." Rimuru answered shrugging.
"Cool." Naruto answered nodding.
"So! This should be easy: a colony of crystal-eating scorpions has taken residence in one of the mines in Olga Town down south, right in the middle of the giant 'Iron Sand Desert', and we need to exterminate them if we want Serena City and surrounding places to not lose a lot of materials for forges, Magicians and Alchemists alike...So be ready to sweat a lot between those dunes, luckily the King alerted their mayor that a Guild of Monsters was coming to help." Tanya said sighing once finished reading once again the details of their new mission.
"Do you want to store that coat in our Inventory Chest?" Rimuru offered to smile.
"Please do, until we find that [everlasting ice] for the cooling runes, that thing will be too hot to wear in a desert."
"How far is that place even?" Mi asked bored.
"At this speed, we'll need two weeks to go there and other two to return. We can't use horses or they will die in a day or two from the heat once we get there." Tanya answered.
"Two weeks?!" Naruto shrieked.
"Yeah, we'll need to find another method of transportation if we want to travel the world, let's just hope that by the time we get there they won't have already fixed the problem, or we will throw away money instead of making some." Rimuru answered deflating a little.
"In that case, the Guild Association will cover our expenses following the modified contract we signed with them; at best we'll go even, instead of losing money." Tanya corrected him with a feral smile.
"Yep! Leaving you in charge of the bureaucratic stuff was a nice choice, they never found those hidden clauses you added until it was too late."
"I know." she answered in cruel satisfaction.
"We need a flying ship! Do they exist?" Mi said excited.
"Only in fairy-tales, to my knowledge."
"Aaaw!"
- Two weeks later – Olga Town -
Having traversed jungles, swamps and mountain ranges alike, with several stops in and around various outposts between Serena City and their destination, the three Chosen Ones (plus Mi) finally arrived at the entrance of Olga town just a day later than anticipated, and while still panting from the absurd heat pervading the air, they rapidly neared the tall doors signaling the entrance of the small heavily-fortified mining town hidden between the tall dunes of dull-gray sand in the middle of the giant Iron Desert.
"This is literally iron dust, how?" Rimuru asked in surprise.
"Beats me. But that guy must be the Mayor." Naruto answered as a man with wide flowing robes exited the tall door accompanied by a dozen guards.
"And you are?" the tall man with heavily-tanned skin asked with narrowed eyes while preparing an arrow on his own bow to accompany his guards doing the same behind him.
"Greetings. We are the members of the 'Monster Star' Guild of Serena City, I hope his Majesty King Leodas alerted you that we were coming as he was the one you personally asked help too." Tanya answered nonplussed as she dismounted from her ride to walk towards the Mayor and show him her ID, the business card she prepared with the symbol of her Guild and a copy of the Mission request.
"Yes, I was told that a Guild with Monster members would have come, so it is you then?" the old man replied scanning the documents.
"Yes, here is the others IDs, as the only human in this formation, I knew that you would feel better talking with me compared to them." Tanya answered while behind her Rimuru turned into his true form (a ball of translucent slime the size of a watermelon) for an instant before taking back his human appearances.
"I-I am not racist!" the Mayor said immediately.
"Nobody says you are." Naruto replied smirking.
"Hey...Isn't she 'Tanya the Argent'?" one of the guards muttered unsure to his companions.
Sigh! "Yes, I am. But I switched alliance to King Leodas and this Guild once me and my previous employers had a divergence of opinions." the small girl answered sighing annoyed.
"Divergence..."
"They wanted me to die while I wanted to live, Mayor. VERY contrasting opinions." she replied simply.
"I see, well, if King Leodas accepted your Guild as a proper one, then I guess we can trust you. Follow me, I'll show you the mines we need you to clean-up." the tanned man finally said motioning the rest of the group to dismount and follow him inside.
- Inside the small town -
"Our main source of income are the mines where we dig-out enough crystals and ores to satisfy almost 45% of the needs of half the continent, compared to other zones, our small town has been built on one of the richest segments of the underground. Unfortunately, the new galleries we have recently created happened to connect to a nest of giant scorpions we discovered being particularly addicted to eating them." the Mayor explained as he brought them to a squared fortress built in the outskirts of the town.
"It's strange to see a mine right in the middle of the desert, Mister..."
"Daneb."
"Mister Daneb." Rimuru admitted in confusion.
"Hehehe! That would be thanks to that genius of my Grandfather! He used to work in some dwarf-owned mines as a slave to repay a few debts he amassed in his youth and while there he learned, by chance, that those midgets had a special instrument able to detect where ore and crystals could be harvested.
Once stolen that he broke free and ran away chased by those angry dwarves, and during his escape, he passed by here to hide where he felt that magical gadget of his almost break-down as it found a huge mass resource to be mined...Long story short, once escaped and as soon as things calmed down, he gathered few desperate bastards like him and created Olga Town.
Every once in a while few Dwarf Kings throw a stint because we used their sacred divining rod to find this treasure, but other than pretend the staff back, they can't pretend ownership of this place." Daneb answered smirking.
"So you dig downward?"
"Pretty much, it's more like a giant hole drilling straight down with several smaller horizontal tunnels spreading out wherever there is a good concentration of stuff to find."
"And now you have Crystal-Eating Scorpions roaming around." Mi said.
"Yes. They are eating our stock, our money! Luckily we managed to seal off the tunnel leading to their nest, otherwise, they would have invaded the whole facility." the man replied looking depressed.
"Any idea how to do this?" Naruto asked.
"We have prepared some bombs, the plan is to kill them and use those explosives to have the whole cave collapse, just in case there are other nests near them. Our expert in Monsters says that we should hurry as those [Crystal Scorpions] are getting ready for their breeding period, if we don't hurry up their numbers will grow tenfold in a month and we will be overrun."
"...You waited before calling for help, isn't it? The situation can't be this bad out of the blue, without any build-up." Rimuru asked with narrowed eyes.
"...Ehm...Eeeh..." the Mayor muttered ashamed as the group of heroes glared fiercely at him.
"The time needed to come here from Serena city is simply too long, and yet you asked for help to the King himself instead of asking one of the many branches of the Guild Organization closer to this place, and holding up for all this time against something like an entire colony of monsters instead of just a few wandering ones popping-up without a warning either means you were expecting this to happen or that you are so paranoid to actually waste resources to create counter-measures for every situation, and that is hard to believe considering the sheer expenses for doing something like that and keep it running."
"Unless you were secretly looking for those scorpions' nest and underestimated their numbers." Naruto added with crossed arms.
"That too is a possibility."
"..."
"..."
"...OKAY! OKAY! I admit it! We discovered the nest of those scorpions two years ago and have been using them to sniff-out new sources of crystals and ores since they are always hungry and can find them easily. But we were careful! We used selective breeding and always kept their numbers in check by making their eggs disappear without them knowing when they laid too many..." the old man admitted with a tired and yet angry growl.
"Let me guess, you missed few eggs and now, two years later, you have lost control of the whole colony as instead of a dozen or so, you have few hundreds of them running around and you are at wit's end and desperately need help."
"...Yes! And now even our best countermeasures are failing! We have been holding-up ever since we sent the Mission request, but the doors we set-up keep being smashed through and we lose guards by the dozens to change them!" the Mayor answered breaking-down into desperate sobs.
"Kurama told you he was a liar, isn't it?" Rimuru whispered to Naruto.
"Yep! Just like [Great Sage] did with you, they detected his lies and holding secrets straight away." the reborn shinobi confirmed.
"Cheat Abilities sure are nice to have."
"Yep!"
Sigh! "Okay, we will clean up your mess. But since this comes from your ineptitude, other than the promised pay, we want free reign on the carcasses of those scorpions." Tanya offered, completely uninterested in the man's grief.
"Ugh! Fine! But we will get the content of their stomach! Just in case the crystals they eat turn into something else once digested!" the Mayor countered immediately.
"You mean their poo?" Naruto asked making Mi grimace.
"Before the stuff reaches that stage, of course." the tanned man said with a dead-pan tone.
"No, we will take that as well. We are dealing with bigger trouble than advertised, so the price for our services will change accordingly." Tanya said sneering.
"Too much! You can have a third!"
"Half of it. Take it or we get back to Serena City and you and this small bunch of barracks get submerged in giant scorpions." she countered unmovably.
"ARGH! Fine! Half the total content of their stomach and free reign on their corpses along the normal pay! You win!" the Mayor roared in rage.
"Very well, now show us the place and let us do our job." Tanya ordered simply as she marched forward.
"It's nice to have a cut-throat businesswoman in the Team." Naruto admitted snickering as they followed her and the weeping Mayor inside the fortress.
"That girl can be scary, you know? I saw fangs in her mouth." Mi admitted shivering.
"Hey! There is a telepathic message coming from 'Loli Satan', she is sending it with her medallion, want to hear it?" Kurama asked while using his own nickname for Tanya.
"Okay, send it in! I guess Rimuru too and Mi will hear it." he answered as he saw the slime and Hobgoblin girl develop for an instant a far-away look in their eyes.
"Can you hear me? Good! I say we also plunder as many crystals we can while fighting those things since we are risking our lives, I think we can take a few liberties. At worst we'll say the scorpions ate more than they expected. Okay?" the echoing voice of the small girl came as soon as Kurama accepted the transmission, holding in those words cold logic more than the greed one might expect.
"I don't like this." Naruto replied.
"Please, dear ninja. You mean this is the first time you were asked to steal something? I thought you others were mercenaries. You are not a Shonen Hero, but a REAL, living and breathing human with all the good and bad sides that come with it...I know that in reality your life and 'Job' were fairly different from what could appear in a Manga." she replied with an amused smirk surfacing on her face as she walked.
"...Okay, fine! Just because we may need those resources someday in the future." he conceded with a suffering sigh.
"Glad to see that you do possess common sense. What about the Slime?"
"The Slime has a name, and I agree. Even if I don't like this myself, but for now, we are in dire need of funds and resources, especially if I want my side-project for a Monster Village to work." Rimuru answered annoyed.
"Good! Then it's decided, we'll add some rare crystal to our collection as soon as those men are not watching." Tanya declared in satisfaction just as the group reached a tall iron gate.
"Beyond here there is the main tunnel, we evacuated the place completely so you won't have hindrances while me and my men will guard this side of the gate. Go to the giant elevator in the middle and use the lever labeled '14 E', it will bring you right in front of the sealed tunnel, then use this key to enter and PLEASE, close it behind you. Just in case." the Mayor explained while giving a hexagonal rod-shaped key to Rimuru.
"We will fix this in a flash, have no fear!" Mi said with a determined smile.
"I really hope so." the man answered deflating a little as he watched the four enter and close the gate behind themselves.
"...I have some doubts they will manage, but if we are lucky they will still cut the number of scorpions down to a level that the next group we call will finish the job." he then said as soon as he saw them go down with the giant elevator covering the main tunnel of the mines.
"Should I prepare the Mission Request once again?" a guard asked.
"Yes, but let's wait a couple days before sending it out, just in case."
"Yes, sir!"
"The eggs?"
"The batch is in a safe storage, Mayor! The healthiest ones of the bunch, as you ordered."
"Good! let's remember to not screw-up next time."
Meanwhile – With the Monster Star Party Members -
The elevator the group was riding was a giant round platform acting as the lid of the main tunnel that could then be lowered or raised to bring outside the filled carts, the only light in there and the smaller tunnels came from the sparse tiny bundles of light-emitting clear crystals left untouched above the entrance of each hole and along the walls in a mockery of crude chandeliers.
"[Light Crystals]: special crystals able to absorb Magic particles in the air and use them produce a faint light. Normally used as a source of light. No other uses exist." Kurama explained once prompted.
"This thing is too slow if we need to escape they will catch us." Mi said, looking worried as the giant platform kept descending at a snail pace.
"I wouldn't worry about that if I were you, girl. Your beloved mate-" Tanya started answering with a bored tone.
"Boyfriend, not mate. Just because we are not Humans it doesn't mean we are animals." the Hobgoblin girl interrupted her huffing childishly.
"Whatever. As I was saying, your Boyfriend can easily run on the wall while carrying you, me and Rimuru will simply fly upward, we are using this thing just for the sake of appearances. I don't trust that man." the loli soldier finished saying while her medallion started shining in bright crimson light as soon as her body started floating at a foot from the ground.
"Andre fixed it well, eh?" Naruto asked smirking while pointing at the new faceted glass panel on the front of the tiny girl's pendant.
"He fixed that and half a dozen of other kinks it had, now I see why Barad-Se has a whole department dedicated to hunting that man down! How can a drunkard surpass the assets of an entire kingdom that every day combs the land to employ/coerce the greatest minds alive to work for them? And while working completely ALONE at that?"
"Ancient teachings, it seems that just like in works of fantasy of our old worlds ancient teachings and forgiven techniques still surpass modern knowledge on some degree." Rimuru answered shrugging and unsheathing his sword.
"We have arrived, and those must be the bombs the Mayor talked about." he then said when the platform stopped moving and a dozen barrels came into view next to a sturdy-looking metallic door.
"Will that hatchet last this time?" Tanya asked amused while loading her rifle and taking aim.
"Andre said he was taking extra care to make my weapon last for millenniums, just to counter my bad luck with them." the reborn shinobi answered rolling his eyes as he and the Slime walked forward with the two girls remaining slightly behind to offer long-range support and covering fire.
"We are ready." Mi muttered as she loaded an arrow with a wicked-looking jagged head on her new hunting bow.
"Do you hear anything?" Naruto asked whispering.
"...Nothing at all, it's either that the door is too thick for me to hear anything, or that those things still have to venture out here." the Slime answered while still trying to hear what was happening behind the door.
"Let's go, wasting time here won't help." Tanya issued while eyeing the abandoned carts around them still overflowing in materials.
"How nice of them, they already prepared our loot for us." she whispered amused.
* Tcha-Clang! Trarararararararang! *
The dull and loud sound of the metallic door swinging open echoed in the entire mine for several seconds making the four take in a sharp breath.
* Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! Tak! *
With a sound similar to raindrops hammering on steel, the ground trembled a little for a stampede of thin claws as a horde of horse-sized scorpions with shiny grey carapaces came out from the darkness and completely covering the tunnel, even walking over each other in their haste to run outside.
"SHIT!" Naruto yelled with wide eyes.
"INCOMING!" Rimuru added paling considerably.
"Do not destroy the bodies! We need their corpses!" Tanya ordered as her rifle got covered in a golden aura.
"[Concussive Bullets!]" she yelled as every shot of her weapon produced a bullet exploding by itself once at an inch from her target's head to produce an explosion of sound and compressed air blowing the scorpions back.
"Survival first! Profit second!" Mi shrieked in an answer as she started shooting arrows as fast as she could to pierce their brains before they could reach her.
"Yaaaah! Naruto yelled as he kept attacking, and even if the monsters' skin was too tough for his hatchet to cut through, using it as a hammer still produced results, even if the blade was soon reduced to a stump under the brutal treatment.
"[Flame Bullet!] [Ice Bullet!] [Lightning Bullet!]" Rimuru in the meantime kept pelting the living wall of poisoned stingers and sharp claws in front of him with dozens of bullets of condensed elemental magic.
"They don't seem to be weak to any particular element!" he then said as soon as he ran out of Elements while he still kept launching magical bullets.
"[Graviga!]" Naruto intoned summoning a dome of gravitational force on the incoming new wave of monsters making their whole bodies develop deep cracks from where short bursts of purple blood flowed out as soon as they went slammed on the floor.
"H-How many?!" Mi asked in dread as her fourth quiver ran out of arrows forcing her to use poisoned ones, that while unable to poison the beasts, could at least still pierce their bodies.
"We reached two hundred." Tanya answered nonplussed as she kept summoning barriers in front of her and the hobgoblin girl to stop the scorpions' charge and carefully take aim.
"No, I mean how many before they stop coming!" the other replied faintly as the mountain of corpses in front of them didn't deter the monsters that instead steamrolled forward pushing their dead brethren aside uncaring.
"Ah, that! I have no clue." the loli soldier replied laughing as if greatly entertained by the situation.
"This is not anger, this is blind hunger! They must have run out of crystals down there and now are ready to eat everything in their path to fill their stomach! Even living things!" Rimuru guessed as his body rippled to swallow a scorpion whole as soon as this tried to pierce his stomach with its stinger.
"How does it taste?" Naruto asked curious while head-butting one of those beasts making its head cave-in in a perfect imprint of his forehead.
"...Strangely fruity, with a hint of ginger. And Glass, it's like munching on a piece of glass." the Slime replied grimacing.
"Weeell, beggars ain't choosers! And I need to replenish my Mana..." the reborn shinobi answered unsure before biting down hard on the scorpion he was wrestling with and adding a feral bite-mark to the blow on its head.
"Shit...The consistency is shit, but the taste is nice." he admitted impressed.
"Are they really that good?" Mi asked curious.
"Sorry, but I have more pressing matters to worry about!" Tanya answered unconcernedly.
"...Hey! It seems like the flood is diminishing, maybe they are pulling back?" Rimuru asked hopeful.
"[Shadow Fire]! I really hope so!" Naruto answered as he watched the shadow-like fire he summoned burn the life-force of the monsters in front of him into nothingness while leaving behind the bodies completely unscathed.
"Okay, we will file that spell under 'Creepily Evil' and use it only when you feel particularly rotten inside." Kurama admitted, unnerved by the effect of that Spell.
Jokes aside, it was only one hour later than the scorpions finished coming, leaving the four panting exhausted and resting on the lifting platform since the arrival point and the tunnel beyond the door were completely packed in dead monsters acting as a nice wall of dead meat reaching half the tunnel and almost overflowing down the main chute if not for the lift completely sealing the lower floors.
"Okay, I say we first collect those while we recover our strength and then we explore inside just in case other scorpions are still there, especially if they already started laying eggs." Tanya offered with a tired sigh while using the corpse of one of said monsters to lie on.
"Approved!" the other three answered breathing heavily.
"You think they know things were this bad?" Naruto asked.
"This many? No, I don't think so. Materials gathered from [Crystal Scorpions] are very valuable, even if they come from 'baby ones', so I guess they have no idea it was this many in that nest, otherwise they would have never accepted to let us take as much as we want." she replied.
"Unless they think we will die here. No need to pay us if we die." Rimuru added.
"That too is possible."
"Well, we'll worry about it later, come on! Let's start taking our prize."
"I'll help you, Naruto!" Mi offered with a gentle smile.
"Thank you, Mi-chan!"
One hour later – Innermost gallery - "Birthing Chamber" -
Acting curiously like a colony of ants, instead of normal scorpions, the monsters inhabiting the deepest part of the mines kept patrolling the area, while other four exemplars, twice bigger in sizes and with two poisoned tails on their backs instead of one, stood in guard around a giant nest filled by eggs and with an enormous scorpion sleeping right in its middle.
Stranger still, right on top of the 'Queen Scorpion' there was the body of a human-looking woman fused up to her thighs with the monster; all this, of course, happening under the worried gaze of the four mercenaries spying on them from a hidden alcove above the nest.
"[WARNING! WARNING! Lord Class Monster Detected: Adeine Zora-Nas!]" Great Sage and Kurama alerted at the same time.
"Adeine, what?" Naruto muttered confused.
"Adeine Zora-Nas?" Tanya said.
"Yes?"
"Shit. That is a Lord Class Monster! An extremely-high evolution, and in case of the scorpions, their highest one. It would explain why there are forming a nest instead of wandering around." the little girl explained with narrowed eyes.
"She is controlling them?" Mi asked.
"Yes, through an innate Skill called [Sovereign]." Rimuru answered.
"Can we kill that thing?"
"Should we fight her head-on alone? Damn difficult, but possible. But with the whole hive backing her? Absolutely not." the loli soldier answered.
"...Rimuru? Hows your Stealth Stat?" Naruto finally asked after a long silence.
"If I go as a ball of Slime instead of looking like a human? [Stealth LV 8] and [Camouflage LV 2]."
"I hope it will be enough."
"What are you planning?"
"Me and you will bring the bombs in key points and especially behind that thing's nest and then we blow everything to dust. IF something survives we will fight it, at least it will be weakened by a giant boom!"
"And that 'Queen' seems to have just finished laying eggs, she will be at her weakest, so maybe the explosion will kill her too."
"And how do you two plan to take human-sized bombs that close?" Tanya asked.
"Rimuru can swallow them and I will use my [Bag of Holding]. Just pray they won't see us before we have done."
"Be careful." Mi begged him.
Said that the two reborn mercenaries slowly walked back to recover the bombs and then make their ways down to the nest, crouching down to hide behind the various rocks littering the place.
"Bunch of morons! Greed or not, using those things without checking if they would evolve once eaten enough is a decision worthy of a brain-dead idiot!" Naruto mentally cursed as threw himself flat on the ground as soon as one of the scorpions walked by him, making him thank his high-level Camouflage Skill making his skin change slightly in color to match the ground around him.
"Naruto! That way!" Rimuru whispered with a stumpy arm of his slime body towards an indent right under the nest.
"If I survive this, I will sue!"
"Me too, our life insurance does not cover giant scorpions!"
"Elrune does not have Health Care."
"Unfortunately."
Taking a deep breath the Hobgoblin rolled on the floor to return to his feet, and still standing as low as possible he made his way towards the nest, stopping right next to one of the two-tailed scorpions.
"Ready?" Rimuru mouthed with the mouth-like cavity on his body.
"Yes."
Nodding at each other the two threw a handful of rocks to rattle on the floor making the four guards of the nest perk-up and immediately move to attack the nuisance, and as soon as the giant monsters left, Naruto and Rimuru made a last desperate sprint to enter the nest.
"...Holy...Those things are huge..." the reborn Shinobi muttered in awe while looking at the shear size of the eggs around them, all forty of them.
"Naruto...The eggs are hatching..." Rimuru said in alarm as he saw the first cracks appear on all of them.
"Rimuru...We have a bigger problem..." Naruto countered as he saw the elephant-sized female body on top of the even bigger scorpion half look straight at him in the eye and at the very last explosive barrel in his hands.
"Is the ignition ready?" The Slime asked as both inched away from the Queen Scorpion as she rose to her full height.
"Yes, the fuses are in place, but I think we'll need Tanya's grenades instead." Naruto answered paling as the snarls of the Queen had now attracted the attention of the rest of the hive that was now slowly approaching them.
"Grenades ready! RUN!" Tanya yelled throwing the whole bandoleer she had prepared towards the two fleeing boys once pulled away from the pins from every grenade.
"RUUUUN!" Both Slime and Hobgoblin yelled as soon as they reached the two girls.
"[Fly]!" Tanya yelled covering her body in a golden aura as she flew away.
"[Mimic: Poison Bat's Wings]!" Rimuru intoned turning human and growing a pair of giant bat wings covered in thin purple fur to fly away.
"Hold tight!" Naruto ordered taking Mi on a bridal carry and running vertically on the wall.
"Hold tight?"
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
A planet-shattering explosion shook the whole mine as a sea of fire flew upward like the eruption of a furious volcano.
"I AM HOLDING TIGHT!" Mi shrieked once seen their flaming doom close rapidly on them,
"FASTER!" the four of them screamed with bulged-out eyes as soon as they exited the main tunnel to run towards the gate.
"OPEN THE GATE! OPEN IT!" Tanya bellowed.
"CLOSE THE GATE! CLOSE IT!" the Mayor countered scared as he saw Hell itself coming to greet him behind those four mercenaries.
"LIKE HELL YOU WILL! [RASENGAN!]" Naruto roared letting go of Mi to summon the sphere of chakra and demolish the gate, along blowing away Mayor and guards.
FWOOOOOOOOOM!
A last, intense tongue of flames blew-out of the entrance before setting down.
"YOU DIDN'T TELL USE THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN THIS POWERFUL, YOU MISERABLE IDIOT!" Tanya roared shoving the tip of her rifle in the Mayor's mouth.
"LEFHT ME ESHPLAIN!" the man begged in tears.
"Let him go!" one of the guards tried saying.
"ROOOOOOOAR!" a loud, ferocious roar pierced the sky as the half-dead Queen Scorpion exited the mines demolishing the door and dragging behind her the two bloody stumps that used to be her tail along most of her broken legs, even one of her human arms were missing and losing blood by the bucketful.
"Screw the Mayor! Kill that thing first!" the same guard yelled in fear.
"Come with me!" Tanya hissed, grabbing the Mayor's head and, surprisingly, dragging him screaming and kicking towards the Queen Scorpion.
"NO! Please no!" the poor man begged, shrieking when the only sane hand of the Queen grabbed his whole body ready to behead him with a bite.
"So?" she asked again.
"The bombs were our last resort! I knew they were powerful! And we knew the liquid of the eggs was flammable! We just didn't expect the two things to react like that, I swear!" the Mayor answered just as the Queen's long tongue licked his whole face to savor him.
"We lost the bodies and the crystals that were already inside the mine carts were all destroyed by your bombs! Who's going to pay the extra for our almost death, eh?!" Tanya asked as she saw the Monster enjoy the Mayor's squeals of fear as it took its time to slowly put his head in her mouth.
"I'LL PAY! I'LL PAY! JUST KILL THIS THING!" the Mayor begged.
"Speak louder, I want to record it." the girl said smirking as she held a small transparent glass sphere next to his face.
"I SWEAR I WILL PAY THE EXTRA! I WILL PERSONALLY PAY THE EXTRA FOR THE UNFORESEEN CIRCUMSTANCES IN THIS MISSION! I SWEAR AS THE MAYOR OF OLGA TOWN! NOW HELP MEEEEEEEEE!" the man yelled in tears.
"Sounds good to me." Rimuru said from the Queen's right shoulder.
"Yep!" Naruto confirmed from the left shoulder.
"Then...OFF WITH HER HEAD!" Tanya ordered in glee just as the monster was about to bite down.
"Okay!" Mi said shooting an arrow at the base of the Queen's neck making the Monster roar in pain.
"Together!" Naruto yelled grabbing her head.
"Together!" Rimuru answered doing the same, and with a duo of war-cries, the duo started pulling.
"[Piercing Shot]!" Tanya said shooting an over-charged bullet at the Queen severing her spine and opening a huge hole in her neck.
"Yaaaaaaah!" the screaming duo finally got what they wanted from the already almost-dead Queen Scorpion when the entire head went severed from the neck in a giant burst of blood.
Bang!
With a loud thundering noise the Queen Scorpion, already at Death's door after the explosion, couldn't take any more damage to her body and collapse on the floor with weak spasms still sporadically shocking her massive body.
"This thing sure has a damn strong Vitality." Naruto said impressed as the thing's scorpion eyes were the ones still holding a last spark of life as she watched him in curiosity while weakly clicking her pincers.
"Lord Class Monster. Those are damn rare to find and even harder to kill. Today we have been lucky, she was weakened by giving birth to her eggs and after we blew her up, along burying her under who knows how many tonnes of rock.
Should there be a next time, we'll have to fight it properly and it won't be easy." Tanya answered pointing her rifle between the thing's eyes and pulling the trigger to blow the whole head to dust, finally killing the Queen.
"Well, I say that the more-or-less whole corpse of a Lord Class Monster should cover nicely for your incompetence. But, are there any more eggs?" Tanya asked pointing the riffle on the Mayor's forehead.
"That way!" the man shrieked and immediately pointed towards an isolated warehouse isolated from the rest of the small houses.
"[Shadow Fire]!" Naruto chanted burning the whole complex down until nothing remained.
"Not anymore. I guess you will keep mining the old way, right? No more Monsters."
"Of Course!" the Mayor answered nodding as fast as he could.
"Then we'll take our leave! Any idea how to carry this thing?" Mi asked curious as she watched the giant corpse in front of her.
"Your Bag?" Rimuru asked.
"Too big, the thing is a low-rank one, it can't contain something this massive." Naruto answered sadly.
"Okay! I'll try to swallow it and then spit it out once back to Serena City." the other said sighing and turning into a featureless silhouette of translucent slime.
"[Innate Skill: Predate]!" with a simple exclamation the body grew to huge sizes to swallow the dead Queen whole and then compressing back to his original size and human appearances.
"I hope you will manage to spit it out, that is our extra." Tanya hissed as she mounted back on the lizard they used to reach the town.
"I will, I will." the Slime answered as the four rode away without turning back.
"Okay then! Farewell!"
"Goodbye!" Mi yelled waving at the Mayor while the giant doors of Olga Town closed behind them.
"..."
"..."
"The other eggs?" The Mayor asked faintly once he saw them turn into tiny dots in the horizon.
"Untouched and safely hidden in the second warehouse, sir."
"Good! Luckily they don't know about those!"
Far Away -
"...They have more eggs, isn't it? That's why he wasn't angry at your telling him to stop using scorpions." Mi said sighing.
"Exactly, and it doesn't take a super Appraising Ability like those two to guess why he did that. In the name of profit and margins, turning a blind eye to things like Safety and Decency is a tactic as old as the World itself. And having seen the sheer level of incompetence they are plagued with, things will only repeat themselves." Tanya answered.
"Should we take the mission again if that happens?"
"I would say no, but I guess it is not solely up to me."
"We will cross that bridge when the time comes." Naruto answered.
"Oh-Ooooh! What a nice answer! I didn't expect you to be able!" Tanya said smirking.
"Again, you and Rimuru-kun have some misconception about me! You are talking with the real deal, a living being, not a Manga character!" he answered smirking and making her chuckle.
"That is why nobody expected me to take few souvenirs." he then said showing his [Bag of Holding] with a feral smirk on his face.
"Don't tell me! You really emptied their carts!" Rimuru said with wide eyes.
"Yup! I did it when I went to recover the bombs. Between Crystal Scorpions' parts and several hundreds of units of mined crystals, my little bag is ready to burst! I even got a piece of [Everlasting Ice], like that you will be able to wear that coat of yours in every climate, Tanya." Naruto admitted smirking.
"At least they blew-up the mine by mistake, like that we won't have to hear them moan about it!"
"Perfect alibi and a 200% increase in our payment, this is music to my ears, I love it when profits surpass expectations!" Tanya answered looking extremely happy.
A Month Later – Serena City – Monster Star Guild HQ -
Having long returned from their mission in Olga Town, the group had settled-down for an easier and calmer job while waiting for Andre to finish producing the new weapon he promised Naruto.
"Honestly, those work ethics would be considered insane even by our most fanatical brethren, and yet a human is doing it." Olaf admitted impressed as they kept hearing the furry of clanging noises Andre's hammer was producing nonstop at ludicrous speed.
"I guess you learned a lot from him?" Naruto asked.
"Of course! There are things he knows that are both extremely taboo and simply crazy!"
"But you learned them all the same!" the shinobi said laughing.
"You can bet on it!... Hey! Did he stop?" the Dwarf answered, and growing surprised when the noise stopped and the blinding light shining behind the forge's closed door died down abruptly.
"Finished! Finally!" Andre, looking completely drenched in sweat and dead tired, said happily as he kicked open the door.
"And the weapon?" Mi asked curious.
"Here! She only lacks a name! So give her a cute one, she is a shy little thing and deserves some love." Andre answered throwing a giant iron club on the floor producing a WHAM! The sound that rattled the windows.
"Little?" Tanya asked in disbelief as the thing was even taller than her whole body.
"Aye! Considering that Naruto is more on the brawler side of things and likes to smash through everything stupid enough to stand between him and his Target, I decided to make a club instead of a sword.
I first created the rough shape of the weapon from that fang and then kept heating and hammering it into its current size by compressing the fang. The now super-dense material is even harder than Mithril! If he breaks this too I swear I will tear off my dick and eat it, because I won't be able to survive the shame as a man, let alone a Master of the Forge!" Andre answered proudly.
"Wow! It weighs a ton!" Naruto said impressed.
"Hahahaha! Let me introduce her to you! Your new weapon is a huge club 2 meters and 60 centimeters long and only weighing around a hundred kilograms, all the power of a God's Wrath condensed in a more manageable pocket version! The whole weapon has an octagonal shape, with smaller diagonal edges adorned with a series of spikes alternated to broader ones.
A small gift, those are [Ancient Wyvern] fangs, second only to Dragons teeth, don't underestimate them.
The handle is covered in bandages made from Devil Frog Skin, best grip material doesn't exist in this world, and as you can see the weapon grows larger from the handle onwards, in a vague cone shape; it helps the swings and screws with enemies depth perception. There's a squared ring attached to the pommel of the weapon, I have put your Guild Mark on it, as a tasteful decoration. Do you like it?" the man asked.
"She is amazing. Sure I will need to get used to the weight, but I love it!" Naruto answered with a wide smile as he lifted the iron club to admire its sublime appearances.
"And her name?" Andre asked with crossed arms.
"Her name?...Uhm...Kokusosou?" he tried saying.
"A name in Lunar Language...Black Clawed Comb? Yes, I think it fits." Andre admitted looking pleased.
"And with that, you revised/created weapons and armors for all of us...Does this mean it's time for you to leave?" Lars asked sadly.
"For now, but if you need, blow on this horn and a friend of mine will come to take you to me wherever I am staying at the moment, just use it for emergencies only, I prefer being on the move and by myself. I am more at ease in the forge than with people." Andre answered giving to Olaf an ornate horn with a brass mouth-piece.
"Thank you." the dwarf answered with a touching expression.
"You three are the Chosen of the Sleeping Guardians, your Fate is tangled deeply with the Fate of Elrune, helping you was the very least I could do as a way to pay for part of my past Sins. Be careful, I gave you the best weapons I can create, and when the time comes, proper armors too will follow, but for that, it is still too soon."
"How do you..." Naruto asked with wide eyes.
"Little Naruto, I may prefer to spend my days wasted drunk, but I am no fool. One doesn't live as long as me and with the 'Luggage' I have on my soul and doesn't learn a thing or two. The holder of the [Hero] Title will be your cover, Fate will focus its eyes mostly on him and his pals, so you three will have a bit less weight on your shoulders, but still, be always on guard. When you all will be ready, I will come looking for you and will give you the right gadget to fulfill your Mission, then I too will finally find peace." Andre answered.
"Thank you, Andre. For everything." Rimuru said grateful.
"Rimuru, your Durandal sword will serve you well, just like Tanya's Nimrod riffle will. I have great Faith in you using those three Masterpieces well, a sense of faith the likes of which I have not felt in a long while.
Farewell, my friends! Now, I am out to drink, since for all my great words, I still hide behind alcohol to not hear the voices of the people I could not protect from my King's madness." Andre said sighing as he opened the door to find a kid ready to knock on that same door.
He was a bright-eyed teenager with amber eyes and platinum-blond hair and wearing a simple leather armor with a silver rapier sheathed to his waist.
"May I help you?" Naruto asked curious.
"Andre the Legendary Blacksmith!" the bright-eyed boy gasped with a wide smile.
"Yes?" the man asked clearly in dread.
"Nice to meet you! My name is Tim and me and my friends need your help to save the World!" the boy said grabbing the man's hand in both of his while the rest of his group walked forward.
"Ugh..." the Blacksmith uttered with a pained sigh while he looked at Naruto's Guild behind him as if asking for help.
"Guests?" Fist the mountain Troll asked with a dumb expression.
"Yes, Fist." Olaf answered sighing.
"Should Fist prepare tea for guests?"
"If you don't mind." the dwarf answered shrugging.
"Fist will go take a kettle. Milk? Sugar? Honey?"
"Bring a bit of everything, just in case."
"Fist will." the Troll answered with a nod while walking towards the kitchen.
"They even got a Mountain Troll! And the legendary former Captain Lars Bluelette is a member too!" the young girl in pristine white Cleric robes muttered awed.
"Yes, please remind me of my unjust disgrace, who cares for my misery, eh?" Lars said groaning.
"Tch!" the broody boy in chain-mail and with a plain lance strapped to his back answered disinterested at that.
"I am sorry if we came to disturb! But it's about the fate of the world!" another boy in shining plated armor said looking sorry.
"Oh, joy! A too idealistic Hero, a broody friend/side-kick boy, a warrior boy with delusions about 'True Justice', a naive Cleric Girl and I bet you have a pessimist Black Mage girl too! I am amazed such a group survived until now with how 'cliche' all of you are!" a new voice said in disbelief.
"Shit! A Flügel?!" the dark-haired boy with the lance gasped while fumbling a little to take out his lance just like the warrior boy next to him did with his own claymore sword.
"Oh, Goddess Elrune give me strength! There isn't a single thing right in their form or poise! Who trained them!? A dead dog?!" Lars was heard muttering horrified at a long time it took them to prepare their weapons, even if they took just a few seconds from an outsider's point of view.
"Just new guests, Jibril-chan! All okay on your side?" Naruto answered smiling wide.
The new arrival was a girl with her midriff exposed and wearing a long skirt; she had long purple-pink hair that reached down to her knees and two white wings protruding near her hips, her pupils were purple surrounded by a gold iris and even her ears were wing-shaped.
She also had a halo over her head, surprisingly.
She was the help the Dark Lord Ainz had sent Naruto in exchange for him basically playing 'Babysitter' to Albedo and Alice while they trained to become great warriors; Jibril was a great historian and all-around knowledge-enthusiast that accepted immediately as soon as her beloved 'Uncle Ainz' was coerced into giving her enough funds to organize the Guild Library the way she wanted.
"Yes. I finally got everything we need, pretty much, they could not give me the original diaries of 'Ohgma the Wise', so we had to copy it by hand though." the girl replied with an annoyed huff worthy of a little kid.
"Yes, that was exceptionally boring." Alice added as she and Albedo too arrived, once not-too-gently moved the [Hero] Group aside, to enter the Guild Building.
"An Echidna and a Succubus as well?!" the Cleric girl hissed in contempt.
"Wait! You are...You are the Princess! Alice!" the young boy with the Hero Title gasped in shock.
"Yes, what about it?" the snake girl asked with narrowed eyes.
"Can you help me get an audience with your father, His Majesty the King? We need to speak with him!" the boy asked trying to get closer only for Albedo's new halberd to appear in front of his face to stop him, along every other Guild member preparing their weapons as well.
"I don't like the spikes on that Troll's giant hammer." the warrior muttered.
"Why? The jagged club of the Hobgoblin instead looks friendly to you?" the Lancer countered in dread.
"That too, both are a bit too merciless-looking for my tastes."
"The Argent..." the Black Mage in the meantime hissed grabbing her staff until her knuckles turned white.
"Uh? Do I know you?" Tanya asked back with childish curiosity.
"You killed my father!"
"I killed a lot of people when I was working for Barad-Se. You'll need to be a bit more specific." she replied turning her simple smile into a fanged grin.
"The Fortress of Mistdome, you were at the head of the flying squadron that broke the siege and caused that sacred land for Mages to fall." the Black Mage answered with tears already escaping her.
"For all that is worth, I had nothing personal against him or the others, just like every soldier that was there with me, I just killed the people on the side my HQ labeled as 'Enemies'. Soldiers on the front-lines barely fight for personal reasons, it's just our job.
Learn this, little girl had roles been reversed HE would have put a bullet in my head, and instead of calling him a murderer you would have praised him as a hero. Hypocrisy at its finest!" Tanya said with an icy detachment that had the other girl stumble back in disbelief.
"Soulless! You have no soul! You are even worse than the Monsters out there!" the Cleric answered shocked.
"Can we please calm down and talk like civilized people? Before somebody does something stupid and things escalate." Naruto begged groaning.
"I never thought that one day a dirty Hobgoblin would have been the voice of reason!" the Black Mage girl said shaking her head.
Thunk!
"KYAH!" she screamed in fear though when an arrow managed to hit the head of her staff forcefully tearing it away from her hands.
"Naruto is not dirty! We are not inferior because Hobgoblins, so insult us again and I will hit your head!" Mi hissed angrily as she prepared a new arrow.
"Fist thinks Little Sister Mi is learning Human words nice!" Fist admitted impressed.
"She is tired to have me translate for her, so she is studying hard thanks to Jibril." Rimuru confirmed proud.
"Everybody calm down!" Andre said loudly snapping the others out of their war of glares.
"I am going to get a drink, you do what you want, just don't fight."
"WAIT! Tim needs a weapon able to vanquish the Forces of Evil! He was born with the [Hero] Title just like the Church of Elrune foretold and that means that his fate is to save the world! And He will need everybody's help!" the Cleric said with a tone bordering on the fanaticism only Andre and the Monster Star Guild Members seemed to catch, making all of them momentarily gain a worried look on their faces.
"Fist doesn't like her, she talks like mad people." the Troll admitted with a low voice.
"Me too, my friend, me too." Lars confirmed.
"Listen, kiddo. You are not ready yet." Andre answered with a serious tone.
"Not ready yet? Why?" Tim asked with an extremely worried tone.
"We have a world to save, we do not have enough time to play around!" the Lancer added grunting.
"Has the Uchiha been reborn too?"
"No, Kurama. He still has not talked about killing a family member for revenge nor about nobody on the whole frigging planet understanding his pain. So that's not Sasuke." Naruto answered making his Biju companion snort in amusement.
"Please tell us then, Master Andre! What does the Chosen One need to do to wield the Final Weapon to defeat Evil only a supreme Master like you can create?" the Cleric girl asked, unashamed to turn the flattery up to eleven thousand just to reach her goal.
"His spirit has not been refined, nor his body has been put through the real flames of battle. When the day comes and this small iron dagger has become a glorious Sword of Light, THEN he will be ready to wield the Light of Justice and save the land. And that will be the moment in which I will forge...T-T-The Master Sword for him! Yeah, the Master Sword." Andre said sounding profound and enlightened and lightly stumbling on his words only towards the end.
"Bullshit! You just threw few random wise-sounding words around just to save yourself the trouble!" Now that they really knew him, Naruto and the others immediately understood what the blacksmith was trying to do, but for the sake of their benefactor and friend, they kept quiet. Even Fist.
"Master Sword?" Olaf silently mouthed to him, unseen.
"The first name I came up with!" the blacksmith mouthed back with a sorry expression.
"The Master Sword...We'll do it! We will work hard to save the world, and I will do everything in my power to be worthy of bringing light to this land! Don't worry Princess, I will protect your father!" the young Hero promised in pure hot-blooded innocence.
"Yeah...I am rooting for you." Alice answered with a forced smile.
"Yes, keep telling the creep what he wants to hear and keep some safe distance." Albedo prompted her with a worried look.
"Let's go! We need to see if there are more Missions! I bet that we will be able to see the real reason why the monsters are becoming restless soon if we continue!" the Cleric said pulling on Tim's hand to drag him away.
"A new Dark Lord maybe?" the Warrior asked following them.
"Probably, it would explain why he was born with the Title, to be its perfect antithesis." the Lancer confirmed as the small group rapidly moved away.
Slam!
As soon as the door to their Guild slammed close, the entire Guild left-out a sigh of relief at having escaped the new development.
"..."
"..."
"Ten CZ say that the Church itself not only is Championing him but filling his head in bullshit to maneuver him like they want." Naruto proposed out of the blue and producing said copper coins from a pocket.
"Looking at how that Cleric talked? No bet, she is clearly there to guide him and probably get his kids once old enough, just to be sure that the Hero Bloodline will be firmly in their control." Tanya answered with a sigh.
"Let's hope then that the others instead are with him out of real friendship, otherwise I fear his world will be shattered should the worse happen." Andre added.
"Why all that cryptic stuff though?" Rimuru asked.
"Honestly? I am having beer withdrawals and he was standing in the way between me and the pub, so I told him and his crazed friends what they needed to hear.
He is not the first [Hero] to need the services of a Legendary-Grade Blacksmith! It's Standard Procedure: once reached the rank, we Blacksmiths get from our Master's instructions about what to do with them and how to act the part.
When the time comes I will make him a sword that looks particularly shining and 'Epic' and simply slap a [Smite Evil LV10] and [Unbreakable] Perk to it, all stuff we usually keep aside just for this occasions. Probably I will ask him to find some obscure materials as well and look very troubled while forging it...You know…'Believing makes it Real' and all that shit." the man answered shrugging uncaring.
"Way to smash the Trope of the hard-to-get Ultima Weapon..." Rimuru muttered with a miserable expression.
"So my father..." Alice asked.
"We both know what happened in your father's case, Princess." Andre answered with a knowing look.
"Yeah, we do." she admitted blushing embarrassed.
"And our weapons?" Naruto asked.
"Oh! Yours are the real deal, Certified Masterpieces and sum of everything I know and SHOULD NOT know, I want you others to win and save the world after all! Bwahahahaha!...Just do not tell this to anybody, I will get in trouble if this comes out." the blacksmith answered laughing proudly.
"We will keep our lips sealed, Master Andre." Lars promised.
"Good, you all are the true heroes that will save this world, you just let those brats get under the limelight and you won't get harassed. Now, if you excuse me, I will go getting sloshed and then return to my endless wandering through Elrune as a whole. Ah! Before I forget, as promised, I left in a bowl near your bed the few shavings I took away from the fang I used for your club, Naruto. Eat them, they will give you some nice abilities and do wonders for your future Evolution Stages!"
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, that's a surprise! Bwhahahahahaha!" Andre answered walking away laughing merrily and singing about the joy good alcohol brings to a man.
"What a clever bastard!" the Hobgoblin answered amused.
"But he helped us a lot." Mi added.
"True."
"Hey, should we talk with that boy? If we understand their next course of action, we will be able to make sure we won't cross paths too often!" Lars proposed.
"Yes, I too think you should, I don't trust that church girl," Jibril added nodding.
"...He is not thinking that I will marry him if he saves the world, right?" Alice asked worried.
"If he does, I will personally kick his ass! You should be free to marry whoever the hell you want, world savior or not! It's your choice!" Naruto answered immediately.
"Huhuhu! Thank you! My Hobgoblin Prince Charming!" the Princess answered with an amused tone.
"I will help him too." Mi added frowning.
"Bleeeh!" the snake girl countered by sticking out her tongue.
"Very mature, Alice. It really shows your royal blood." Albedo commented rolling her eyes.
"Okay! The show's over! Let's wrap things up with our new equipment and then we will go spying a little on the Hero's Party! New Mission: stay away from trouble so to not be dragged into unnecessary messes!" Lars ordered clapping his hands to get everybody's attention.
"Fist thinks the name's too long."
"It was meant to be a joke."
"Then Fist doesn't find the joke funny."
"Oh, stuff it!"
"Fist did it with your mom already."
"OOOOOOH!"
"Okay! Who taught 'Your Mom' jokes to the Mountain Troll?!"
"..."
"Answer me, Dammit!"
"Hahahahaha!"
And so, finally the holder of the [Hero] Title and his group of friends finally entered the scenes, Naruto only hoped that the bright-eyed boy won't get burned once things will start going downhill for him too, but as usual, only Time will tell how things will evolve.
End of the chapter, expect me to take few pot-shots at the Cliche of the "Teenage Hero" genre.
So! I am finally back on the Fanfiction scene, I did miss it a little, truth be told.
Now: EVOLUTION. Should I make Naruto evolve into Ogre next chapter or should I wait for another chapter? In the original "RE: MONSTER" the MC Evolved pretty rapidly (among other 'issues' I found with the whole thing) so I would prefer to not fall into the same mistakes, not willingly at least. Mistakes and incidents do happen.
Please help me.
Just to reiterate the last time, this is not my "Safe Space" (and honestly, it never was since I don't need one.)
But I am not angry.
I WILL POST HERE UNTIL I GET BORED AND SWITCH HOBBY, I AM NOT GOING AWAY.
Ta-Ta!
Tr230.