Rimuru and Iruma's Adventures in the Netherworld

Arrow Near The Knee

"I don't just want to impress Master Bachiko... I w-want... I want her to compliment me! I don't want her to call me a moron ever again!"

"Yes, yes, I'm aware of how hopeless you are." Ali palms his face. "Okay, ignore the pigtailed witch for a moment. Tell me what you really want in this world! Tell me your deepest desires. What you want this world to be! What you want to be!"

"I... I... even though I'm human, I want to stay with everyone here, so... um..."

"Stop muttering and speak up!"

I stay silent while staring at the creature from the ring in front of me, thoughts of my friends, Rimuru, Opera, Grandpa... All these people I've wanted to help and wanted to enjoy my time with.

I know one thing though, this world isn't a place for me, a human. It never has been.

But I can change that.

"I want to stay here in the Netherworld with my friends! Even if I have to struggle to get strong enough to defend it, and even if I need to step up and change how things are here, I want to stay here with my friends and live a happy life!"

Ali stares at me blankly for a few moments, shifting around the expression in his single eye. He seems to be trying to make me break.

I stare back, steeling myself for it. I won't be giving up that easily; not after he had already told me to give up earlier.

"Someone who can do that, that's the kind of hero I want to be! That's what I want!"

"Fine. If that's what you want, then say the words! Cast the spell with that thought clear in your mind!"

"Quartz, Quartz!"

Holding out the final feather; my final chance, I pour magic into the object, saying aloud the spell's name, making sure to keep my intent firm. The flash of light is blinding, but I keep letting the magic flow out of me anyway, not concerned if I wear myself out doing this. I need to put my all into this or I'll fail; I know that.

Rimuru POV

I stare down the thugs in front of me, while thinking through my next actions carefully.

I'm, in fact, around three hundred feet in the air, though. So 'in front of me' was a bit of an exaggeration.

"Scared? Come down and fight, Rimuru!" Baal taunts.

My two opponents are staying firmly on the ground, as while they're relatively powerful for Baal's goons, they know that I'm too fast to chase down.

So I open up my wings and reposition myself in the air to come down with a dropkick on the smaller of the two, a spindly rapier-swinging asshole who said my punches were 'weak like a little girl'. It's his fault for making me set my physical limiter so low in order to have an actual challenge.

Ugh... what's this taste in my mouth? It's almost like when you throw up a little, but I know that's not the reason here. It came out of nowhere too.

It kinda reminds me of the taste of an Enlightened human's magicules, but not exactly, and I know it's been ages since I've eaten one of those.

Suddenly, I snap back to my senses as I realize I'm about to fly headlong into the lithe demon's rapier because of this random distraction.

I don't have time to pull out of the dive or maneuver into a proper kick, so I aim just short of him and skid along the ground to sweep his legs out from under underneath.

He's bowled over, but an attack is immediately coming from the larger demon, the minotaur-like beast of a man swinging a massive morning star at me.

I grab the lithe demon by the ankles and swing him like an improvised weapon. The head of the demon meets the head of the morning star, and there's a spray of blood as he's knocked out of my hands.