Looks like updates will now be moved to once every two weeks unless said otherwise.
This particular chapter will contain some rather heavy content. There will be a warning below when it starts.
. . . . .
I was making my way through the brush, back towards the village. All I remembered was that it took several days to get to my initial camping spot, and it was day four in the journey back.
I must be close, right?
I held my shotgun close, in case any threats showed themselves. Last time I talked with Rimuru, the guy said he wanted to get involved with the Orc problem, right?
I swear to god, if something happened and the entire town got bulldozed because of that I am going to wring his neck. That was assuming he wasn't dead yet, but I was pretty sure the slime was tough enough to survive these Orc guys.
I was staying away from open cover, instead opting to travel through the shadows and brush.
My thoughts were interrupted by a cool, masculine voice coming from somewhere... around me.
"You're the Automaton, am I correct?"
I stopped and looked around.
Who was that coming from?
"Your inability to locate me would've given me many opportunities to strike you down."
Someone leapt down from one of the trees. In response, I stepped into the open and held my weapons out, to show that I was visibly armed. Immediately, I took note of the sword my confronter was wielding.
"What're you doing all the way out here?" I asked.
It was one of the Ogres that I had fought alongside Rimuru a few weeks back. He looked a bit different than I remembered.
"I've been ordered to bring you back," he replied. The gray Ogre unsheathed his weapon. "By force, if necessary."
I stepped back at this sudden hostility. "Oi, if I'm going back it's on my own terms. You got that?"
"He did not explicitly state that you were allowed terms."
"'He?' Who do you mean by— "
And, just like that, the bastard appeared right next to me and swung the hilt of his weapon at my head, presumably to knock me out.
Needless to say, it did make contact with my neck. But all that accomplished was knocking me a meter to the side and pissing me off.
"Wanna fuck around? Really wanna find out?" I asked, rubbing the spot that was hit.
"Find out what?" the gray Ogre asked. His face remained emotionless, and his voice remained unwavered.
I began a light jog away. The Ogre was probably anticipating my movements and tried to intercept me.
I veered hard to the left the moment he disappeared from sight. That was the right call, as he had appeared where I would've been if I continued to go straight, his blade ready to strike.
...A blade? Yeah, I now can't doubt if he has killing intent or not.
I brought the shotgun up to my eye and leveled the front and rear sights on the gray Ogre.
"My 'fuck around' phase has ended, now you'll be 'finding out'."
I fired both shots of my double-barreled in rapid succession.
Not only did the two shots kick up a cloud of gunpowder smoke, but they also disturbed a bunch of leaves and dust. I could barely see where he was until I waved the smoke away.
So he was...
I leaped away when I saw the shimmer of a blade through the smoke, just in time for the sword to leave a long but shallow cut across my arm.
I used my free hand to grab my own short sword. The gray Ogre saw this and evaded just as I swung it at him.
In that time, the smoke fully cleared. I could see that both rounds from earlier grazed his arm and hip, respectively.
"So it's true, you don't feel pain," the gray Ogre stated. "A pity."
The blade had cut into my skin, but not into anything important. It certainly didn't hurt, but I grabbed at the damaged area instinctively.
"What's pitiful about that?" I asked.
"Easier to subdue with pain."
Needed to reload my shotgun. I sheathed my short sword and quickly grabbed two extra rounds of ammo from my breast pocket.
While twirling them around in my fingers, I used my other hand to flick open my break-action shotgun.
That was the moment I realized that I was a goddamn idiot.
The shotgun shells that I had grabbed, well, literally exploded in my hand.
Well, they popped more than exploded. But it was more than enough to take several of my fingers off.
"God— fucking, curse this...!"
I was an absolute knucklehead. The silver fulminate primers in the ammo had decayed and were unstable, and it chose now of all times to react explosively.
I'm an idiot.
God, I'm an idiot, I'm an idiot, I'm an idiot.
I wasn't able to assess the damage immediately, but it looked bad. All the feeling in three of my fingers was gone, and the remaining two were looking worse for wear.
The gray Ogre obviously took advantage of that. He flew forwards and used the hilt of his sword to knock the shotgun out of my grip, as I was distracted with my broken hand.
I used that moment of vulnerability on his end to grab at my own short sword, again. Once I gripped ahold of my weapon with my good hand, I swung it out to deter him.
I don't think he saw that coming. My arm swung out too far and his blade caught on my skin.
I'll always reiterate this: The feeling of getting stabbed feels weird.
A good strip of my skin flayed off. Despite that, it managed to get caught on his sword. I used that to my advantage, literally using the strip of my skin that had peeled off to rein in his sword and to throw him off balance.
I think the surprise from what I did helped, he certainly did loosen his grip enough for me to pull that away. It flew through the air before clattering against a rock somewhere.
With the loss of his own weapon, the gray Ogre proceeded to grab the wrist of my shortsword hand. I wrestled with him for a few seconds, before he suddenly flung his arm in another direction.
We both lost grip of my short sword, and it went careening off into the brush.
"So if you don't get a sword, neither do I?" I snarled. "Old fashioned fisticuffs then, let's go."
He didn't hesitate and proceeded to punch me hard on the right side of my face. I stumbled back a meter.
Oddly enough, that was accompanied by the sound of crunching glass.
"S'that all?" I taunted. I raised my fists up, ready to throw my own punch.
But I paused when I felt shards of something falling from my face.
"Wha...?"
I placed a hand over the area to see what it was, realizing almost immediately that I had lost sight in my right eye.
In fact, the pieces of glass were the remains of my right eye...!
"Th... the hell is this?"
That moment of distraction was enough for the gray Ogre to close the distance between both of us and fling a kick at my waist.
I went airborne for a good few seconds, before smashing front-first against the ground.
It wasn't painful... nothing was painful. But I was still trying to get my bearings with what little time I had between attacks.
The gray Ogre, in the meantime, casually stepped up to me and placed his foot on my left working arm.
"Is this really the same person who hurt the princess?" he asked. The guy's voice sounded ominously emotionless.
"Fuck you," I immediately replied.
He kicked me in my side. I rolled over several meters.
I think some of my internal parts were dislodged by that.
"Pitiful, but not unexpected."
I felt several points of pressure around my body, like there were knives or blades being held up against them. A quick look down showed that, yes, my body was sparsely wrapped in the steel wire.
The gray Ogre was holding onto the end of one while looking down at me.
"Don't try struggling any further. If you do, all it takes is one flick from me to slice your body into several pieces."
I slowly focused my vision on the imposing figure above me.
"Willing to do it? Go ahead, no balls."
"No... what?"
He stepped up closer to me. "I've been ordered to bring you back alive, but Lord Rimuru never did state the condition I should bring you back."
I stopped moving.
"What's this about Rimuru?" I asked. "He asked for this?"
"I was ordered to search for you and bring you back. He had not specified explicit instructions on what to do if you were to resist, nor how uninjured you need to be brought back."
I gave a wheeze, an attempt at a laugh as the steel wire constricted my body. "Dude, you're a fuckin' sadist. Is this over the whole deal with the Ogre princess? Seriously, that was at least a week or two ago."
The guy grabbed me by the bangs of my hair and pulled me up, making eye contact with me.
"Truth be told, it somewhat is," he confirmed. "And we're not Ogres anymore. We have evolved into Kijin."
This guy was giving a scary act, and it was working. I was fucking terrified of him.
"Suit yourself," was the only reply I could muster.
The sound of wings flapping soon followed, accompanied by a gush of wind that blew leaves and surrounding branches around.
"Lord Rimuru has arrived," he stated, looking up.
Since when could Rimuru fly?
The gray Ogre— no, Kijin, threw me to the ground. I barely had the energy to get back up, and I didn't dare move at all. Didn't want to lose any more body parts.
"Lord Rimuru, I have subdued—"
"Souei, stop hurting her!"
Large, bat-like wings protruded out of the humanoid slime's back. They quickly melted back into slime and retracted into his body. But that did little to break his running sprint in my direction.
Once Rimuru got to me, he kneeled down to examine the damage. There was a ghastly expression on his face, probably because one of my eyes was shattered.
"What happened to you?" he asked,
The humanoid slime gingerly plucked a few pieces of broken glass out of the socket that was once my eye.
"Does it hurt? Are you in pain anywhere?"
"...No?"
Having this attention and concern on me felt weird.
"Souei... I told you to look for her. You've overdone it," Rimuru stated.
"...I apologize, Lord Rimuru."
The humanoid slime shook his head. "I'm not the one you should be apologizing to."
Souei looked at me. I could tell that his pride made him reluctant.
"Pleasantries later," I replied, waving it off. "I want to get back to the town and get myself fixed up. That alright with you?"
"The town blacksmith is the first place we're stopping once we get back," Rimuru replied.
Grabbing the humanoid slime's hand, I mustered enough strength to get back on my two feet. But that was the moment that the tangled steel thread around my torso snapped shut.
All the feelings in my legs suddenly disappeared, and I collapsed.
The last thing I remember seeing was Rimuru's horrified expression. Was I really going to die again?
Damnit. What a life.
. . . . .
The following section will contain some allusions to real-world American politics, but it will not reference any specific real-life incidents. The political viewpoints mentioned in the story are not necessarily representative of the author's political viewpoints, and should only be taken as expansions to the backstory of the characters.
. . . . .
I blinked.
Where the hell was I? This room felt really familiar.
I was in a very familiar room, in the United States. How did I know I was in the United States?
The room felt familiar as hell. I've been here before.
How was I back on Earth?
I looked at my hands. I was expecting human hands because I was back on Earth somehow, y'know. But my hands were still the same automaton hands I grew accustomed to over the past few weeks.
As for the room itself, I quickly recognized it as a friend's house, but I don't remember who it was exactly. The room seemed familiar, yet far from my immediate memory.
The sound of a doorknob turning caught my attention. I froze.
I braced myself for whatever awkward situation would arise out of the confrontation.
"Hey, I know this looks weird but..."
My words trailed off the moment I saw the person walk in.
It was me, but it wasn't current me. The person who stepped through the door was me from before I died and reincarnated.
It was me from years ago.
"This is exactly the reason I ain't letting you make drastic modifications to your guns, Tally," my younger-self stated. "Look at this, you fucked up half a dozen parts with that drill. Stick with your IT computer job for now. I go to you for computer problems, you go to me for gun problems. Got that?"
The taller guy that stepped in with me, Talhom, replied. "Yeah, but I kinda want to learn how to make my own guns."
Talhom, so it's his house.
"Don't just drill into it willy-nilly! Next time go to me and I'll point out how to do this and that."
Tally, my old friend... It's been years.
This was making me nostalgic.
I stood there for a few seconds before a realization dawned on me: They don't notice me?
Well, of fucking course they didn't notice me. This was the past I was looking at.
But how far in the past was I?
I stayed close to the walls as I stepped towards the two. If there was a calendar in the room, that would help immensely. But there wasn't one.
Let's see...
Talhom was here, which meant that it was sometime before 2026. At the same time, I was talking about gunsmithing shit. That lands it sometime after 2021, the year I began gunsmithing.
A quick peek out the window showed to me light snowfall. It was winter then, sometime around November to February.
So that narrowed it down to five years, and only four months of each of those years met the weather conditions.
Twenty months is not very much narrowed down if you ask me.
The door to outside opened, and a shivering figure walked through. He immediately shut the door to block the snow that was coming from outside.
My mouth was agape the moment I saw his face.
"Got back from a meeting, they sent quite a few representatives," the new arrival stated. "Hunter, what do you wanna know?"
Leshk...
"Well, what do you know?"
I couldn't believe I was seeing him right here, in front of me.
"There's a ton with us," Leshk stated. "From far-left to far-right, and everything in-between. The Fed pissed off a whole lotta people with that bridge checkpoint, and all the political types are converging on this area."
"You've seen 'em?" my younger self asked.
"Met with some of them, even. There's a leftist Black Panther offshoot that'll be supporting us and a nineties-era right-wing militia full'a boomers who want to help. Both strapped and heading to the protest area."
"Goddamn, I'm glad that so many people are supporting this but it makes me worried there'll be infighting."
This... conversation sounded familiar.
My old friends and I have gone to plenty of public demonstrations, and for a variety of reasons. We've done quite a few across the US, from marching armed with a variety of protesters to demonstrations against laws that people didn't like.
But this one, in particular, sounded very familiar. Something about a bridge.
No...
It couldn't be that incident, was it?
"You able to get any info regarding who signed off on this dumb shit law?" young me asked Talhom.
"Almost nothing."
"Really? Tal, aren't you the crypto-anarchist guy around here? Hack into their databases like Anonymous or some shit?"
"It doesn't work like that, and they don't even put the info up in the first place. Remember last year? People were targeting the judges signing off on the police warrants, so they passed an 'internet safety law' faster than you can read it. Now it's illegal to get or post that info online."
"Goddamn Feds never waste a good crisis. Let's move out to the rendezvous point."
"Aye, let's go."
...No, this was definitely it. I remembered this part of the conversation distinctly.
I looked at my younger self in terror. In came flooding the memories of the sleepless nights and incredible amounts of guilt after the incident.
My old group opened up the door and began to step outside, into the cold.
I ran at them, trying fruitlessly to grab at their shoulders or arms. Something, anything, to delay me and my friends from making the stupidest decision of our lives.
"Don't go out there guys, it's going to—!"
I slammed into something invisible when I tried to go through the opened door. Relentlessly, I banged my fists on the invisible barrier that kept me from going outside.
"Listen to me! Goddamn it, it's gonna turn into hell out there!"
In hindsight, it was stupid of me to actually think that I could do anything to change the past or my memories. But there was that small off-chance that it could work.
Besides, what else could I really do here?
"Leshk! Don't go to the bridge!"
It was like I was reliving this moment.
"You're going to die! The storm's gonna turn and you're going to die!"
Wordlessly, the door closed. I was left by myself.
There was an indescribable feeling that churned in my gut, as I stared at the door wordlessly and on my knees. If I could, I would've vomited. Or cried. Or literally anything that a human could do.
But I wasn't a human. Not anymore.
What was I supposed to do?
.
.
"Do you hear me?"
.
.
...Who was that from?
I looked around, trying to pinpoint where the voice came from.
The surroundings faded to white. I felt a hand on my shoulder.
"Hey. It's time to wake up."
I turned around. What met me were striking yellow eyes, and silver-blue hair. He was holding a hand out to me, a smile on his face.
Why did this guy feel familiar?
"C'mon. We're waiting for you."
Home...?
I was going home. Was I?
That was the last thing I could recall. Something about returning to...
"Hurry!"
Rimuru didn't wait for my response. He grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the light.
. . . . .
I've been very, very careful with how I wrote the second half of this chapter. Any Americans reading this right now, you know why.
I really want to include backstory for the main character, as isekai-genre animes generally don't do that too often. At the same time, I don't want to oversaturate and write entire chapters of exposition, as I've read through stuff like that before and it gets annoying.
Whenever I do need to explain some backstory, do you guys think a good 50/50 split between things related to the Slime Datta Ken world and the main character's backstory is a good distribution for those types of chapters?
Additionally, the main character's political leanings in their past life will some degree of impact on what they do and how the story goes. However, I'm not planning to overdo it, nor do I ever want to insinuate that everything they do will be explicitly right or wrong: They're the main character, but not necessarily a protagonist.
Published March 6th, 2021
Revised April 4th, 2021: Added publishing date.