「 ✦ Rimuru Tempest ✦ 」
I dreamt of home this time.
The sky was too blue.
Not the fake blue you see in dungeons where ancient magic tries to trick you into thinking you're outside.
Not the cold blue of mountain peaks that cut your eyes when you look too long.
This was real blue.
The one you remember from summer days when you were a kid and thought the world was good.
Like you could fall up into it and never stop falling.
Clouds drifted by like they had all the time in the world. Fat and lazy and white as fresh sheets. I stood barefoot in grass so soft it felt like snow. The breeze touched my face gentle as a mother's hand. Sunlight warmed my shoulders through my clothes.
"Rimuru-samaaa! Stop spacing out over there!"
Shion's voice cut through the peace. But it was a good cut—something that reminded you that you were loved, even when you were being an idiot.
She came running across the field with her arms full of what looked like enough food to feed a small army. Two massive bento boxes stacked high with rice balls. The whole mess swayed back and forth as she ran, threatening to fall off at any second. Classic Shion—too much enthusiasm, not enough physics.
"She wouldn't let anyone else touch the lunch," Benimaru said as he followed behind her. His voice carried that special tone of a man who'd seen this disaster before and knew exactly how it was going to end. "Just... be ready."
I laughed. It came easy here, natural as breathing. When was the last time laughing had felt that simple?
"Oi, my lord! Think fast!"
Gobta's voice rang out from the trees. Something came flying at me—looked like a piece of wood carved into a circle. A frisbee, maybe? It spun through the air, veered hard left, and smacked Ranga right in the head.
The poor wolf didn't even flinch. Just cracked one eye open and let out the most long-suffering sigh I'd ever heard.
"Forgive him, master," Ranga said in that dignified way of his. "I am conserving energy for more important matters."
"Like sleeping all day?" I called back.
"Exactly."
I turned around and saw them.
All of them.
And I was smiling so damn hard I couldn't stop.
Souei leaning against a tree, pretending he was nonchalant. Hakurou showing some of the city's goblin kids proper sword forms under the warm sun. Milim standing on top of a boulder like she was conquering it, waving a spoon around and shouting something about pudding that I couldn't quite make out.
Beyond the meadow, I could see Tempest. My city. Our city. It glistened in the distance like something out of a fairy tale, all clean lines and smooth architecture, life happening in all its messy, beautiful glory.
I didn't question any of it.
Didn't ask why the grass was always this green or why everyone was here and whole and happy.
Didn't wonder why the sky looked like someone had painted it just for me.
The details felt slippery, like trying to hold water.
None of that mattered.
This wasn't about making sense, this was about feeling safe.
And safety—real safety—was rarer than gold. Rarer than anything I'd ever found in all my living.
I sat down on the hill and leaned back on my favorite sycamore tree, letting it all wash over me. The breeze carrying the smell of grass and flowers. The laughter mixing with the noise of the city. The warmth of the sun on my face like a blessing I didn't deserve but was getting anyway.
Even if I knew it couldn't last—and somewhere deep down, I did know—I stayed.
I stayed because sometimes even monsters need to long for home.
A small something settled in my lap. I looked down and saw a little girl with dark hair and eyes that seemed older than they should be.
Chloe. One of Shizu's students.
She looked up at me and asked, "Do you ever miss it? The beginning?"
"Yeah," I said. "Yeah, I do."
"It's okay if you forget sometimes," she said, settling her head against my chest like she belonged there. "You always come back."
Do I? Do I really come back, or do I just pretend I do?
I didn't say it out loud. Just looked up at that impossible blue sky and tried to memorize the way the clouds moved.
Maybe it was the way the light distorted, or the way the air suddenly felt thinner, but something changed. The world gleamed like a candle in the wind.
The breeze stopped.
The laughter got quieter.
For just a second—barely there, gone before I could really see it—everything looked wrong.
And I knew.
This was a memory.
Or maybe it was mercy.
Some kind of gift my mind was giving me before... before what?
Part of me was screaming that it was time to wake up. Time to face whatever was waiting in the real world. But I stayed just a moment longer.
Because if this was the last time I'd see home—really see it, feel it, believe in it—I wanted to remember every damn detail.
The warmth of the sun on my skin.
The weight of Chloe in my lap.
The sound of my friends' voices calling my name.
"Rimuru."
My name was whispered softly as a prayer.
"Rimuru!"
Louder now. More urgent.
"Rimuru—"
The voice changed. Got harsh. Got wrong.
My world cracked like glass. The blue sky bled black. The soft grass under my hands turned cold and hard. The warm weight in my lap disappeared. Just like that, the dream shattered.
I was back.
And something was very, very wrong.
···—–—⚜—–—···
「 ✦ Iu ✦ 」
The cat was shaking.
Daisy pressed herself against my arm, her white fur standing on end. Those beautiful blue eyes—so much like her owner's—were wide with terror. She could sense something I couldn't yet. Animals always knew when danger was coming.
"Rimuru!" I shouted, shaking his shoulder. "Wake up."
He didn't respond. His face looked peaceful, almost happy. Like he was somewhere far away from here. Somewhere better. I hated to pull him back, but—
A shadow fell across the window.
I looked up just in time to see a boulder the size of a house flying straight at us.
"Shit!" I threw up my hands, spatial magic crackling to life around us. The barrier formed just as the boulder smashed through the window. Glass exploded everywhere. The whole hotel shook, then started falling apart.
Rimuru's eyes snapped open.
The falling debris stopped mid-air around us. His power held us steady while everything else crashed down. We floated there in the wreckage, dust swirling around my barrier.
"What the hell—" Rimuru started to say.
Then he saw the city below us. His expression changed completely.
Fuhren was burning. Monsters bigger than buildings were hurling flaming rocks at the walls. An army of demons blanketed the outskirts of the city. Soldiers and adventurers fought desperately in the streets, but they were losing.
Rimuru made a disgusted sound with his tongue. "What happened?"
"This happened," I said, waving at the chaos. "Every major human territory is under attack. The Heiligh Kingdom, the Hoelscher Empire—everywhere."
We talked quickly about what to do next. The plan was simple. Rimuru would handle Fuhren. I'd go to the Heiligh capital and find the hero party. He folded real quick the moment I said it was probably the safest place for me and Daisy for now.
"How are you getting there?" he asked.
I smiled and opened a portal. "Did you forget?"
"Cheeky woman," he said, but he was smiling too. "Good luck."
I stepped through the gate and let my full power loose for the first time in years.
The royal coliseum spread out before me. Heroes pinned to the ground. A girl with glasses standing over them with crazy eyes. Blood everywhere.
Everyone froze when they felt my presence.
I summoned my staff from subspace and moved faster than their eyes could follow. One second I was at the portal, the next I was lifting a dark-haired girl off the ground. She had multiple stab wounds but she was alive.
"I heard a lot about you from Rimuru," I told her, placing Daisy in her arms. "Keep her safe, would you?"
Some brown-haired boy with a sword came screaming at me. He was saying something stupid about being better than someone named Nagumo. His blade shattered the moment it touched my staff.
His body split in half.
I moved through the undead knights like they were made of paper. The students got back on their feet and started fighting properly. The dark-haired girl—Shizuku—carried Daisy toward a bleeding healer girl on the ground.
The crazy necromancer girl retreated deeper into her army of puppets. But she wasn't done. She raised her hands and was ordering her army.
More undead poured into the coliseum. Not just knights this time. Monsters, too. Things that had been dead for centuries, now walking again.
"You think you can stop me?" the glasses girl screamed. "I am Eri Nakamura! I control death itself!"
I spun my staff and created a barrier around the students. "As if. Dream on."
The battle got serious then. Eri's magic was stronger than I'd expected. She wasn't just raising the dead—she was binding their souls, forcing them to remember their skills from life. These weren't mindless zombies. They were experienced fighters trapped in rotting flesh.
A dead mage hurled lightning at me. I deflected it. An undead knight with a captain's armor tried to flank me. His sword techniques were flawless, muscle memory preserved even in death.
I fought them off, but more kept coming. And Eri was getting bolder, testing my defenses.
"You're strong," she called out. "But you're alone. And I have an army."
She wasn't wrong. I could've handled them myself, but the heroes were around. I couldn't do anything too big or flashy or it would get them caught in the aftermath. There were hundreds, maybe thousands of undead here, with more arriving every minute.
"Can you fight?" I called to the dark-haired girl—Shizuku.
"I can try," she said. Blood was still seeping through her clothes, but her eyes were determined.
"Then try harder. I can't protect all of you and fight at the same time."
That's when I felt it. A presence that made even the dead knights hesitate.
Something was coming from above.
I looked up and saw a figure descending from the sky like a falling star. Massive wings, a body that radiated power, eyes that burned with divine fury.
A god.
"Nelson," I breathed.
Rimuru had told me about this one. The God of War. Said he'd killed him in the Great Orcus Labyrinth. But gods, apparently, were harder to kill than he'd thought.
Nelson landed in the center of the coliseum with enough force to crack the stone. The undead around him simply... stopped. Even Eri's magic couldn't make them move in the presence of something that divine.
"That horn means you're Nelson, right?" I said, trying to keep my voice steady.
He looked at me with eyes like burning lavender. "Does he care for you?"
I knew what he meant. He wanted to use me to hurt Rimuru. Make him angry. Make him careless.
"Why do you care?" I shot back. "I can't believe you ran away from him and you still have a dick. I'd do you the favor of cutting it off."
Nelson's laugh was like thunder. "Brave words from a dead woman."
The fight started for real then.
Nelson moved faster than anything had a right to move. His scythe came down like judgment itself. I barely got my staff up in time to block it. The impact sent me skidding across the coliseum floor.
I countered with a spatial slash that could cut through mountains. It bounced off his skin like rain.
"Is that all?" he asked, almost disappointed.
I teleported behind him and struck at his spine. He spun around and caught my staff with his bare hand. Then he squeezed.
The metal began to crack.
I poured more power into it, reinforcing the structure with spatial magic. But I could feel it giving way under his grip.
"You're strong for a mortal," he said. "But you're still just mortal."
I abandoned the staff and conjured a dozen spatial portals around him. Each one fired a concentrated beam of magic bullets. He walked through them like they were gentle rain.
"My turn, bitch," he said.
His scythe swept horizontally. I tried to dodge, but it was too fast. The blade caught me across the chest, cutting deep. Pain exploded through my body as divine energy burned through my veins.
I hit the ground hard, blood pooling beneath me.
But I wasn't done yet.
I rolled to my feet and opened a portal directly under Nelson. He fell through it and came out a hundred feet above the coliseum. While he was reorienting himself, I struck with everything I had.
Every spell I knew. Every technique I'd learned in years of fighting. All of it hit him at once. This was my gift. The annulment of casting time and procedures when using magic, and the absurd development of physical capabilities.
Still, a god was too much. The explosion shook the entire capital. When the smoke cleared, Nelson was still floating there, completely unharmed.
"Hey, now," he said—amused. "You actually made me feel that."
He raised his scythe high above his head. Dark and crimson energy gathered around the blade—the kind of power that could level cities.
"Here's what's going to happen," Nelson continued. "I'm going to kill you slowly. Piece by piece. And when that man arrives, he'll see exactly what's left."
The scythe came down.
I tried to block it with another spatial barrier, but his power cut right through. The blade found my shoulder, then my arm, then my leg. Each wound burned like acid, divine energy eating away at my flesh.
I collapsed, my vision blurring from blood loss.
"You're a tenacious one, aren't you? You lasted fairly long," Nelson said, looking down at me.
I managed a smile. "That's what she said."
Around us, the heroes were still fighting Eri Nakamura's undead. A number of the kids had already died, and it was only a matter of time before the rest of them followed suit. Shizuku had reached the healer girl—Kaori, I think—and was trying to tend to her wounds.
But Eri Nakamura was getting ready for another big trump card, gathering power for something that felt like it could kill everyone here.
Hurry up, Rimuru.
I closed my eyes and let my thoughts drift.
It was funny, really. I'd spent so many years after my brother died just drifting along. Going through the motions. Doing whatever I wanted because nothing mattered anymore.
My brother had been everything to me. When he died in that stupid war, fighting for a cause neither of us really believed in, I thought that was it. I thought I'd just wait around until death got bored and came for me too.
Then that damn blue-haired boy showed up.
Rimuru. With his smart mouth and his ridiculously sassy cat.
I'd been interested at first.
Then fascinated.
How did someone so young carry so much hope?
How did he make hope look so easy?
Then something deeper that I didn't have a name for.
He filled the empty space where my brother used to be. Made it hurt less. Made me remember what it felt like to care about someone again.
I loved him. Not the way everyone thinks of the word, but the way you love family. The way you love someone who sees the worst parts of you and decides to stick around anyway.
All those books I'd read over the years. Philosophy, fiction, romance. They all talked about heroes having plot armor, about good people surviving because the story needed them to.
Real life didn't work that way.
Real life was an ugly god standing over you with a scythe while you bled out on stone.
Real life was watching innocent kids get butchered by their crazy classmate while you lay there too broken to help.
I looked over as soon as I could hear Daisy crying. She was scratching at Shizuku, trying to get free. Trying to come to me.
I smiled through my tears. Even when she was scared, she was beautiful. Just like her owner.
I wondered how Rimuru would look when he found me like this.
Would he cry?
Would he get angry?
Would he blame himself for not being here?
He'd be beautiful either way.
He always was when he felt things deeply.
But how beautiful would he be as he grieved for me?
My only regret was that I wouldn't get to see his face when he found me.
Wouldn't get to tell him it wasn't his fault.
Wouldn't get to say goodbye properly.
Sorry I couldn't wait for you, Rimuru. But I tried to keep up. I really did.
I closed my eyes.
The world dimmed.
And I let go.