Harbingers of Change

Chapter 23

To finally get Veldora off his back with his aggravating attempts at playing the "wise" older brother, Momonga let him organize the next guild meeting, scheduled just a few days before the beginning of Walpurgis. The main topic to go over was the results of the harvest festival and making any last-minute preparations while their strongest would be away.

As he had already predicted, the meeting would happen in Veldora's quarters and the dragon likely was planning to turn the whole thing into some sort of leisure activity to "lighten the tension."

Rarely arriving too early or too late, Momonga arrived at the meeting place right on time and was led into the dragon's dwelling by Rima and a pair of homunculus maids, all dressed in two-piece swimming suits, only raising his suspicion of what Veldora had in mind. The faint scent of citrus and coconut in the hallways only furthered his suspicions.

"Lord Momonga." The trio bowed and Rima waved her hand for him to follow. "This way, please. Master had made all the preparations for a pleasant evening."

In silence, he followed the vampire who suggestively swung her hips, likely not even realizing what she was doing as her kind was made with seduction and distraction in mind, unconsciously following her habits. This was why Pero chose vampire brides as Shalltear's underlings after all, all the way back during the game's peak.

Rima led him into a decorated dressing room where a group of maids awaited, presenting rows and rows of colorful swimming trunks and stylish sunglasses.

'I'll just play along today.' he decided, letting the group of eager servants change him into attire suited for a lazy day at the beach.

Five minutes later, he was decked out in a purple-gold swim trunk and gold-framed sunglasses, Rima leading him onward once more.

Moving forward, he was led into a spacious room with a giant round jacuzzi in the middle, where Veldora was already soaking in the waters with a cocktail glass in his right hand, casually sipping the likely excessively sweet drink through a straw. At the walls, there were various stations of everything a heart could yearn for while soaking in the water, operated by maids in the same risque bikinis as one who greeted him at the door. A bar, an ice cream station, a BBQ grill, a towel stand, and much much more.

"Little bro! Come in! The water is perfect." Veldora waved him over, grinning from ear to ear.

"When I let you organize the meeting, this isn't exactly what I had in mind," Momonga commented while stepping into the water.

One of the maids stationed at the bar rushed over with a platter filled with various cocktails. He picked one at random and settled in, relishing the slightly citrusy scent. A guilty pleasure, considering his wives enjoyed more sweet and umami over sour and spicy.

"So, do you want me to start right away, or wait for the others?" Veldora asked, leaning back.

"I think it will be easier to wait for the rest. As uninvolved as they are in the science department, they still should at least know the general dealings." Momonga replied, taking a sip from the straw.

"Sure thing… oh there they are." Veldora perked up as Pero entered the room dressed in similar colorful swimming trunks, followed by Buku and Milim, both clad in matching bikinis that already appeared too daring on Buku's generous adult body but plain inappropriate on Milim's teenage-looking frame.

"You know, we should make meetings like this more often!" Pero jumped in the jacuzzi with a laugh, snagging a coconut smoothie.

"Agreed." Buku slid in as well, settling down between Momonga and Veldora while Milim sat down between Momonga and Pero, each getting their drinks. She went for a chocolate honey-crusted orange juice, given that the maid had wisely heeded Momonga's stare and didn't serve her booze. Ever since Buku slipped up and revealed that both poison resistance and poison immunity could be turned off it was a widely used practice to do so while drinking.

Seeing that he was completely outvoted on this, Momonga decided there wasn't a point in raising a fuss and instead just enjoyed the evening with his friends while talking about work-related matters.

"I'll start," Veldora declared after calling for a refill. "The science department is in full swing. With an overall power increase of two hundred and seventy-eight percent, Pandora could give a lot of research-oriented skills to the personnel. The extra energy even upped our base resource funding, meaning we could begin running even more experiments at once. We've even managed to get the exterminator software into the alpha phase. Don't look at me like that bro, we'll test it out on base magisteel units before slamming it in star silver models. It's based on CZ Delta's code, so there shouldn't be many problems." Veldora hastily explained, seeing Momonga's eye flames flare up.

Considering the unexpected results with Manas: Nazarick, any sort of AI research was under heavy scrutiny now by manas herself, Albedo, and Momonga.

"If we get killer robots on the loose, all you'll be allowed to make afterward are rudimentary clay pots," Momonga warned, glaring.

"It's like one of those manga about the robots and time travel… uncle, you know, the one about the robot guy in a leather jacket." Milim joined in, only adding fuel to the fire that earned even Buku's glare against the vibrating dragon.

"Let's not discuss that one today!" Veldora nervously laughed. "We have a lot of serious stuff to discuss, right? Pero, bro, you're next."

Pero gave the dragon a mischievous stare and coughed out, "Terminator."

"Come on-"

"Please tell me you didn't base the whole project on that comic and old movies?" Buku stared at the dragon in disbelief.

"No, no, no the name is purely accidental. There will be no robot uprisings'. I promise." Veldora glared at Pero for such a blatant betrayal, to which the avian only calmly sipped his drink in response.

"Let's just move on to the next topic. Pero, how is the financial situation?"

"Well in general terms, Tempest's economy took it without the lube, and we're down about three percent in total net income, not to mention to avoid paying money for the mercenaries, we are supplying goods for the Free Guild for highly discounted rates for the next month or so. On the bright side, after the upgrade, the furballs got even smarter than before and we could distribute unique skills to a lot of operatives. And that's not even talking about the general boost of tens of percent to the entire working population, enabling a lot more labor to be distributed. Mariabell tried to seem happy at the news but I think she almost had a stroke when she saw how much our side gained in pure operating power," Pero reported.

"Do we expect any downturn or financial hardship?" Momonga asked.

"Not particularly. We only skipped two days or so, it wasn't exactly the end of the world. At most, a few factories had to be rebooted and a few tons of products disposed of from improper preparations."

Buku follows with diplomatic updates, "As for international relations. Most human nations bought the defense grid test story and are unaware that we evolved demon lords. Carrion wasn't anywhere close to sober when I contacted him, but he pretty much admitted he wanted to join Tempest before we make an expensive lion rug out of him. I suggested he leave that declaration after Walpurgis but assured him he could join as one of our vassals."

"Ramiris and I talked with Guy. I had to tell him that dad…" Milim paused, let out an incoherent screech midway, and hastily corrected herself as she slid deeper into the water, trying to hide. "I mean, Momo created demon lords. He already knew something was up and threatened to come here with Velzard."

Buku gave Milim an amused look. "Aww, you finally said it. That was so cute!"

"Do you want to die!?" Milim shrieked back, her face turning beet red.

Momonga patted his adopted daughter's head, ruffling her hair. "Guy getting suspicious was expected. Buku, since you'll be the one to lead our delegation during Walpurgis, be sure not to fall for unreasonable demands even if Guy tries to threaten you."

"Don't worry boss. Between Milim and me, we'll rock the whole thing, right?" Buku winked at the still-blushing girl.

"Sure. I'll kick Velzard's ass and you can fight Guy if he acts up too much." Milim replied.

"By the way, how are things looking in general? I kinda skipped asking Nazarick for details since she's busy with getting everything back on track with Albedo." Buku inquired, switching the topic.

"Overall power level of Nazarick itself rose by ninety-three percent. We probably will have to put magicule drainers in populated areas to avoid humans getting magicule poisoning. Frey's domain had similar levels of power increase and since the cat is out of the bag there, I intend to deal with the official incorporation of her lands after the Walpurgis," Momonga explained.

"Overall, things are fine." Buku nodded. "All that remains is to deal with Luminous, put the fear of us into Leon to deal with him later, then we can finally have a breather for once. I know for sure we all need it."

Overall, the Harvest Festival was completed without any major difficulties, and in the end only required addressing a lot of smaller issues that naturally arose with the massive change.

<X>

The three self-proclaimed wives of Momonga had their own small gathering while their beloved husband was attending the guild meeting, secret to everyone besides themselves and a select few servants. Albedo, Shalltear, and Shion had gathered in the central room of their quarters, enjoying the treats and drinks Shuna had made for them to celebrate their ascension into proper demon lords.

"So, you're sure she's aiming to become one of us?" Shalltear asked while digging into a lava cake specially made for her tastes, downing it with fine red wine.

"I suspect. Although Kagali adamantly denied that she is trying to become Momonga's consort." Albedo replied while enjoying a French souffle with a glass of champagne.

"Why do you think she's trying that? I haven't seen her even try to flirt with our man. I'm not even sure if she is capable of flirting with how long she spends pouring over magic scrolls and books instead of showing off her strengths." Shion commented. Her choice of food was heavily glazed cinnamon rolls with cola as her choice of drink. Unlike the other two, she ate with her hands and licked the icing off her fingers while leaving stains on the cola glass, much to the disgruntlement of Albedo.

"She is careful. I'll give her that. But think about it. She has a similar dressing style to Shion's and even a body to match hers or mine, crafted by herself as well. She is pale as Shalltear and has the same nose as her. And that's on top of having a generally similar face to mine. What sort of fool would believe that a woman who could make herself look however she wished, picked those traits by pure coincidence?" Albedo explained her reasoning, stabbing into the last bits of the treat on the plate.

"Maybe we should just beat that idea out of her?" Shion cracked her knuckles with a grin.

"I thought we already got that out of your system today," Shalltear commented while giving her peer a passive glance, sighing.

The sparring matches were now mostly fair and fierce compared to the previous one-sided beatdowns. Of course, Shion's aggressive behavior and disregard for pain made the spars a lot more brutal, causing Shalltear's kinks to cloud her judgment a bit whenever they went at each other. Silver lining, that made the whole thing even more fun since nobody held back. The Kijin turned Oni woman, due to her new ultimate skill, grew progressively aggressive by nature and pretty much required to have a daily fight to keep herself on track. Her ultimate skill was on par with the ones other consorts have, capable of ripping through even Albedo's strongest barriers if the fight went on long enough.

"I'm good. Just saying, if she's going around our backs, she should be put in her place." Shion still insisted on crushing the competition, the cinnamon roll exploding as she raised her fist in emphasis.

"Not that I wouldn't want to see her in pain, but if our beloved wants to expand his harem, we should accommodate that, not fight it. Besides, there are other ways to break her in." Shalltear voiced her opinion, being the surprising middle ground of the conversation. Usually, she sided with one of her peers depending on what suited her goals the best at the moment.

"Indeed, but we also have to make sure unworthy women do not join our ranks. Remember how long we were against Shion's inclusion," Albedo replied, reaching to refill her glass.

"That is true, but Shion proved time and time again she was ready to fight for that position against impossible odds like someone created by a Supreme Being would. I don't see Kagali doing the same. That woman's a cowardly snake looking out for herself more than anything." Shalltear said, glancing at Shion with a faint smile.

At first, neither she nor Albedo took her claims of becoming Momonga's wife lightly, harshly punishing her each and every time no matter how hard the kijin tried to keep her claim. But Shion rose back up after each beating, sometimes spitting her blood and teeth in their faces. It was this unrelenting dedication that couldn't be broken which earned the respect of her peers, allowing her entry since she had proven herself truly dedicated to their spouse.

"We will make sure she knows she won't join our ranks that easily and needs to prove her dedication and desire to be a good wife. I'm sure if her motives are only for political gain, Momonga is already aware of that and would not let her make a move. If she acts out, Shion will have her chance to break her." Albedo smirked.

Even a fool could see what sort of power being Momonga's consort could give to a woman, and thus this position needed to be carefully guarded since any ambitious woman could decide she was worthy enough to stand by the side of their ultimate ruler.

Editing by aidan_lo.

Proofreading by aidan_lo, Sluethen, clagan, Cay, KieraKieraARTS, Milk, CakeEight, Working_Stiff, Nervy, and Stac.

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