The girl pulled back slightly. She wore her hair in long twin-tails, and her expression shifted instantly. The concern vanished, replaced by a haughty, icy imperiousness that commanded the room.
She whipped around to face the men in suits, her twin-tails flicking with the motion.
"This is our territory," she said, her voice dropping to absolute zero. "If a colleague is assassinated on our watch and we don't react, we look incompetent."
She glared at the men, her presence dominating them completely.
"Why, within the jurisdiction of the Clock Tower, was Rimuru targeted for assassination?"
"If the Lord's familiars hadn't triggered the alarm, would you idiots still be standing outside chatting about the weather?"
Gulp!
The men swallowed hard, trembling under her gaze.
Rimuru saw the leader of the suit-clad men swallow nervously. The man looked like he was walking on eggshells, his face twisted in a grimace of suppressed panic.
"Miss Archelot, please, calm your anger," the man pleaded, his voice trembling. "The Director is taking this extremely seriously. He has already notified all the Lords to launch a thorough investigation."
"Hmph." The girl narrowed her eyes. She was still clearly irked, but she knew the man was telling the truth. After all, the Director had notified her personally the moment it happened.
To the side, Rimuru watched the exchange, lost in thought.
Looks like I'm actually a big shot in this world.
Hearing people panic over his well-being felt pretty good, honestly. But while his ego was getting a stroke, his brain was working overtime.
Then again, maybe this girl is the real big shot? Her name sounds familiar… Archelot... wait, what did they say just now? Clock Tower? Lords? Archelot... Archelot!
Rimuru scrutinized the girl standing before him. Slowly, her silhouette overlapped with a character from his memory, a tall, seventeen-year-old mage he had seen in the anime.
May Riddell Archelot?!
HOLY SHIT!
Rimuru jolted as if struck by lightning. Ignoring the girl who was still scolding the guards, and ignoring the guards who were bowing in apology, he lunged for the window and threw it open.
He leaned his entire upper body out over the sill.
In an instant, [Magic Perception] pulsed outward like sonar. It swept over the pedestrians, the cars, and the buildings, expanding exponentially in all directions.
"Great Sage, can you construct a map?!"
[Answer: Initiating full-scale virtual structural simulation.]
A wireframe city instantly overlaid Rimuru's vision.
A 3D model of the streets projected itself onto his retinas, with a glowing blue slime icon hovering in the middle of a high-rise building representing his current location.
Rapidly, phantom skyscrapers rose from the ground in the simulation. Anything touched by his Magic Perception was instantly rendered into the virtual map.
"Zoom out. I need the full panorama!"
[Understood.]
The perspective pulled back. At the end of a nearby street, a massive museum and a plaza with a fountain were sketched into vision.
[Notice: Large-scale Bounded Field detected. High-density mana concentration detected. Attempt breach?]
"Will I be spotted?"
[Answer: High-level entities may detect the mana fluctuation. However, threat level is negligible.]
[Notice: Hostile entity markers can be projected onto the map. Enable?]
"Breach it. Turn it on."
Rimuru didn't hesitate. Being reckless in a strange environment might have been poor strategy usually, but he figured he had a pass. His status was high enough that people were terrified of his death, and he had literally just been shot.
If he got scared now, he'd just be standing there in the open while the enemy stayed hidden. Better to make noise and to act bold and not to mention he had a reason, and that was enough.
Why shouldn't I scan the city? I was just assassinated! I'm looking for the shooter! Even if he annoyed some powerful local mages, what were they going to say? 'Excuse me, sir, please stop looking for your murderer so loudly'?
Immediately, the pale blue translucent map expanded violently.
A massive new sector appeared behind the museum. At the same time, dense clusters of red dots lit up the museum and the newly revealed hidden areas.
Even on the streets, red dots appeared among the crowd, marking individuals who possessed magical energy.
The scan expanded further, the perspective rising higher and higher until the Great Sage thoughtfully labeled the hidden area and the tall tower looming over the city.
The Clock Tower.
Ugh!
Rimuru slapped a hand to his forehead, feeling a headache coming on. He gave up on the fine details. "Stop the detailed scan. Just scan the topography. What's my max range?"
[Answer: Utilizing satellite-style scanning requires dispersing magic evenly. If it were raining, I could connect via the raindrops to perform a molecular-level scan of the entire city.]
"And on a clear day?"
Rimuru looked up at the sky. Just his luck, not a cloud in sight.
[Answer: Range indeterminate. Dependent on your raw magical output.]
"Forget it."
Rimuru retracted his Magic Perception. He stared at the map in his mind, focusing on the structures he had already identified and that iconic clock tower looming in the distance.
He didn't need to scan any further. He had confirmed it.
He stopped resisting the truth.
He looked out the window, and his heart sank all the way to his stomach.
This was London.
And worse... it was the London of the Mages' Association.
Fate.
A simple syllable, yet they crashed down on Rimuru's heart with the weight of a collapsing star.
He thought he had just transmigrated. He didn't expect to be playing Inception, a transmigration within a transmigration.
But that wasn't the main issue. The main issue was... man, don't you think the difficulty setting on this world is a little too high?!
If this were really the Slime world, he'd at least be an overpowered protagonist with subordinates and all.
But Fate? This place was the definition of "Hell Mode." It was like leaving the tutorial village and immediately getting dropped into a Level 90 raid dungeon with no gear.
"My luck is trash," Rimuru muttered.
He sighed, pulling himself back from the window and collapsing onto the velvet sofa near the sill. He looked up at May Riddell Archelot.
"The intruder... did you catch them?"