3rd POV
It has been a week since Rimuru collapsed and woke up again. There was still no particular sign of invasion or the sighting of Ivaraj.
It was good that they could get prepared, but at the same time, tension and anxiousness began to grow. The kings and queens of the human countries are trying their best to keep the situation unknown to the public, but it is a matter of time until they notice something is going wrong.
At Ramiris' labyrinth, they increased the number and level of security since they were highly likely to be the primary target.
They were also trying to find out about Rimuru's symptoms but there were no results so far. To make the matters worse, the blackness seemed to spread as it changed his right eye color and was beginning to slowly dye his hair black from the bottom.
It was as if he was getting swallowed by the darkness.
As for Rimuru himself, he didn't show any signs of anxiousness and reassured Kumara with the usual smile instead.
At least Ciel somehow managed to find a way to slow down the erosion, or else his hair would have been pitch-black by now.
Velzard worked restlessly to find out the cure. She took the sample of Rimuru's changed hair and did all kinds of experiments but none of them had succeeded so far, making her more agitated day by day.
Just like yesterday, Velzard visited Rimuru to take another sample. He was sitting inside his room with Kumara who was in the child's form, using his leg as a pillow as she slept soundly.
Upon seeing his sister coming in, Rimuru put his finger on his lips, telling her to be quiet.
'Hi Rimuru. Any changes so far?' Velzard asked him using {Thought communication}.
'No. Ciel and I are succeeding in making the erosion extremely slow, but we still can't completely stop it nor reverse it.' Rimuru replied as he twirled the tip of his hair, which turned black, in his fingers. 'How about you?'
'Nothing, unfortunately. The informations are too limited. I'm considering visiting the library of the dragon castle but the timing isn't good.' Velzard said as she cut the tip of Rimuru's hair and put it inside the container she brought.
'Well, it will work out somehow, so don't worry too much.' Rimuru said as he waved his hand at her as she stood up and walked out of the house.
Once she was out of his sight, Rimuru looked down at Kumara who was still sleeping soundly.
Kumara was the most agitated person in the last week as she didn't leave Rimuru's side for a single second and looked at him anxiously. The fear of losing her family again was steadily crumbling her spirit, making her more anxious and depressed day after day.
It was to the point where Rimuru couldn't watch her like that anymore and put her into a sleep hoping that it will help her recover. However, though she was in a deep sleep, her hand was tightly grabbing his clothes.
Rimuru softly let out a half-frustrated, half-happy chuckle as he patted her head lightly. Her fluffy ears twitched as she relaxed her grip a bit but still didn't let go.
Rimuru then took his left hand off her and brushed it with his right hand as if he was erasing something.
A few seconds later, the illusion that even Velzard didn't notice gave way and disclosed the thing it was hiding.
The exposed skin of the tip of his hand was as dark as the obsidian and seemed to be absorbing the light around him.
Everyone thinks that the symptoms only affected his hair and eyes, but in fact it was starting to reach the other parts of his body too.
2.4mm. It's shorter than tomorrow. I guess we are making a progress here.
<<Yes. At least we were able to stop it from moving to another place. But I still can't completely stop it.>>
Velzard-nee said that I had this in the past, but I don't remember such thing. Do you think something happened to my memory?
<<There are some possibilities. And if it's true, your older brother would be the one who did it.>>
Rimuru went silent at Ciel's remark. It wasn't like he was shocked since he too had suspected Veldanava. It's almost obvious it's him since he couldn't think of any other being that can erase his memory completely.
It's just that he couldn't understand why he did it to him. Surely he would have told him if it was dangerous, right?
Let's keep it a secret about my hand for a while longer. I don't want Velzard-nee to cut them off for another sample.
Though Rimuru couldn't actually see her, he could hear her let out a faint laugh.
<<Yeah, it's the last thing we want.>>
After that Ciel went back to her work and Rimuru was once again left in familiar silence.
As he stared at the red maple tree through the window, he unconsciously let out a sigh.
Though he pretended to be okay in front of the others especially Kumara, he was worried.
Watching himself getting slowly swallowed by unknown darkness when he was just about to reach his goal and met another precious one, he couldn't help but slowly get sunk into the marsh of worry and frustration.
He had managed so far since thanks for the help of his friends and family members and will try to keep coping on, but he was getting tired every day.
The lurking danger of Ivaraj only added more stress to him as he suspected that his symptoms might be somehow related to it.
'Haah, well, there's nothing I can do except waiting for now. I hope this will all end soon.'
As he thought so, a leaf which had a dried edge fell off from the branch and spiraled to the down below to the cold and hard ground.
Somewhere at the edge of the world
Inside a ruin of the tower which was so old that no one knew who built it or why, a single figure was sitting motionless on the cracked stone throne.
The figure was wearing the pitch black clothes with dark purple linings here and there. His dark gray hair reached down to his chest and most of all, his eyes were like the black hole absorbing the lights near him.
Breaking the ominous silence, the space in front of the throne cracked and a shadow-like creature in human form appeared out of it.
It immediately kneeled in front of the figure sitting on the throne and bowed its head which was covered with tattered robe.
"The awakening is having difficulty due to unexpected resistance. It seems that it won't be able to be completed in time."
The figure remained silent after listening to the report of his subordinate. Then, he slowly stood up from the throne and began to walk toward the window.
"I won't wait anymore. It will awake faster if the energy that matches it rampages. I'm leaving in a minute."
The creature bowed deeper as he passed its side.
"As you wish, Ivaraj-sama."
..................
............
......
Exactly a minute later, the figure appeared at the gate of the castle of the human country called Farmuth.
The gatekeepers tried to stop him who had appeared out of nowhere, but was instantly turned into speck of dusts, leaving only one.
The remaining gatekeeper fell down to the ground and frantically crawled backward but was soon stopped by the wall.
"Wh- what are you-!?" The gatekeeper screamed in fear as the figure of death continued to steadily approach him, closing him in to the corner like a snake hunting its prey.
"Do you really want to know? Well, you're one of the first to fall, so I'll grant you an honor. My name is Ivaraj, the world destroying dragon."
Before the poor gatekeeper could say another world, his body got wrapped in dark flame, incinerating him in a mere second.
"Now then, let's see if this fragile world has changed since the last time." Ivaraj said as he stepped over the remaining ash and walked through the gate, which too suffered the same fate as the men who were keeping it.
"{Colorless world}"
At his command, the air rumbled violently and the world instantly lost its color. Gust of eerie wind rushed out towards every direction, reaping every single souls in their way.
What remained after the silent rampage of death was the vast graveyard, with everything that used to live on it returned to death.
At the eye of the storm of annihilation, Ivaraj stood still with the cold smile on his face.
The world of his enemy was still as fragile as ever. It felt like it will shatter into pieces with just the flick of his hand.
However, after spending endless time in the depth of the void, Ivaraj thought it won't be satisfying if he just do it. His revenge for the imprisonment should be much bigger than that.
He knew that there are lots of overpowered beings in the world and thought that it will be nice to fight them and test out the result of his evolution.
Besides, there was the plan he had prepared for a long time. The seed he had planted in his enemy's world just before his defeat. He had waited to see it grow and mix in. And now, it was time to harvest the results.
Ivaraj quietly activated a magic, forming countless spirals similar to the {Gravity collapse}. However unlike it, this spirals all met in one spot, forming the dark orb at the center.
"This will be enough to get some attention." Ivaraj said as he turned around and directly looked at the direction where the labyrinth is located.
"Now then, let's have a nice reunion, Rimuru."
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So, I'm back.
It's been a while since I, well, ghosted after the revision announcement.
So what happened to that revision? Now there's lots of reason behind that but to make it short,
I don't have enough time.
Since the rest of the story would be the same as most of the others, I'll skip to the main point.
Some of you may have noticed that I fixed the front part of the prologue. While I was doing that I thought it'll take too long so I decided to stop revising temporarily and finish the story first.
Sorry for confusing and making you wait. I'll try to write the next chapter as soon as possible.
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And to those who might need this,
Though I'll do it later on, the part from ch7 to ch16 will be revised a lot and some parts will be deleted in the progress such as ch9(lemon) or so because of the plot issue. Also the life and death of some characters might be changed in the battle starting from ch28.
I'll note the changed parts in the upcoming chapters if they affect the main plot.