The World's Ego

Walpurgis

-Walpurgis, several hours later-

Rimuru POV

After the banquet began, Clayman had started his plea and has been trying to incite the Demon Lords into 'dealing' with me.

"And so, I received this testimony from my subordinate..."

According to his story, Demon Lord Carrion tempted me to become a Demon Lord. Allured by the status, I came up with a plan to get the needed souls by releasing the seal on Veldora. For that, the Kingdom of Falmuth was chosen as the sacrifice. We successfully baited the kingdom to attack us, and at that point, when blood was shed, Veldora reawakened as planned. The Kingdom of Falmuth was annihilated. I rejoiced that I could become a Demon Lord, but Carrion said,

So, the truth is that there's a limit to how many Demon Lords there can exist at one time. And we're already at that limit. But I really want to help you become a Demon Lord. Say, Rimuru. Let's kill Demon Lord Clayman together. Then we'll have one open spot, and you'll be one of us.

"My subordinate, Mjurran, was the one who reported all of this through magical communication, but unfortunately, she is no longer with us. Which is because that savage Rimuru over there killed her!" Clayman exclaims, throwing an accusatory finger at me while I yawned uncaringly on purpose to irk him just a little

Oh, poor Mjurran! ... I would've felt that if she really was killed, but honestly... Looks like Clayman is just digging his hole deeper.

"Hey, Clayman. Setting aside the validity of what you said for now, why isn't Carrion here? The most important one in all this? Surely, he's the one we should be interrogating instead of this young Majin?" Dagruel asks, bringing up a good point

"That can't be done, Dagruel. As you may already know, Eurazania is in shambles. See, after hearing about Carrion's plot, Milim flew into a rage, burying him along with the rest of his country. She acted out of consideration for me. But the non-aggression pact between Demon Lords does exist. She's in a tricky situation until we can get more conclusive evidence than a testimony. So I've sent my troops into the ruins of Eurazania to investigate." Clayman explains to him and gives a bow to the room, "I assure you that we will procure and bring forth evidence of the plot. Therefore, I hope that we can wait before we decide how to punish Milim. That's all I have on this matter. However, I was hoping that we could decide, here and now, how to deal with this impudent slime who dares to call herself Demon Lord."

With that, he finally concluded his long speech and took his seat.

"Well then, let us hear from our guest." The blue-haired maid, Raine, announces

I took this as a cue to stand, looking directly at Clayman.

"Your name was Clayman, right? I'm sorry, but all of those things that you said back there were plain lies." I started

"W-What?"

"Firstly, Mjurran is most definitely alive. I never really cared about the Demon Lord status either. Also, for as long as I had known him, Carrion isn't the scheming type."

"Hah! Who do you think would believe such a flimsy excuse? You may have gained some confidence with Veldora on your side, but in the end, you're just a slime that can't do anything without that dragon." Clayman scoffs, trying to keep his composure

I shook my head at his accusation, "Veldora and I are friends. I would never take advantage of him that way, neither would I ever fall that low."

"Frie...?!"

As he flusters at my words, I continued, "Besides, I'm not the only one with flimsy evidence. The evidence you have rests on your subordinate's report and yet you said she was killed. You cannot call that evidence. Mjurran is also under my protective custody right now. She wouldn't give you any favorable testimony even if I brought her here now."