"Big Bro Veldora!" Ignoring all of Veldora's cool posturing and overwhelming death aura, Risa immediately tackled Veldora.
Wait, should I be concerned about the death aura thing?
'Answer. No. This section of the cave has already been sealed off in a Dominion / Unlimited Imprisonment combination barrier. The death aura was expected.' Isis immediately told me. Awesome. Was that Risa's forethought or yours?
'Risa's. As an aside, this portion of the Sealed Cave has been completely sanitized. As of this very second, it may be the cleanest space on the planet. I see no issue if you choose to eat directly off of the cavern floor.'
Are you trying to change the subject, Isis? You know, it's more on Risa's growth than you that she thought of it first. You're primarily an analyst, you know? She's a born and bred inventor. Totally different beasts.
'...That's… Hmph.' Isis trailed off. It was nice to hear it growing a mind of its own, with opinions of its own. I hoped it wouldn't sulk for long.
Risa, Veldora and I spent the next three days in the cave, working to help Veldora get ahold of his new powers. It was a slow, tough slog, but that was natural. After all, Veldora's EP was over 120,000,000.
One Hundred and Twenty Million. In other words, around two hundred times as powerful as I'd been before my Harvest Festival, and I'd been strong enough to completely stomp anything short of a True Demon Lord or True Hero even back then. Utterly horrifying. Probably enough to literally destroy the entire planet, if he ever felt like it.
Fortunately for me, it didn't really feel real.
Mainly because I was comparable now. Somehow, my EP was somewhere between twelve and sixteen million now, though my and Risa's growth was so abrupt that neither of us had stabilized quite yet. Hers was somewhere in the vicinity of eight million now.
"HAAAH! I have done it! I have conquered my aura!" I shoved the whole 'new abilities' thing into another line of thoughts with Parallel Thinking as I was interrupted by Veldora's shouting.
"Wow! Cool!" Risa's eyes were sparkling.
"No, you dumbass!" I shouted, smacking Veldora on the back of the head, "You're hiding your aura, not trying to destroy the whole damn cave!"
This was going to take a while. Part of me really wished that I could just use Aether to give Veldora a portion of Belzebuth's capacity to store his aura in, help him control it, but Set made that impossible.
"Oh. So… like this, then?" Veldora tried again. The death aura got a bit smaller.
Maybe.
"No more manga for you until you can leave this cave without killing all of Tempest." I rained down judgement on the failure.
It was super effective! Veldora's aura instantly got like… twenty percent smaller.
…
"In case you forgot, if Sir Rimuru and Lady Risa are gone, then we have no way to rescue our Lord Carillon! We need to go in there and save them, risk be damned!" When we left the cave, we found that a large portion of Tempest, including every single lycanthrope refugee, were congregated right outside the cave door. The lycanthropes were led by Suphia, who was arguing with Diablo and Althea about whether to storm the cave or not. Benimaru was trying to mediate, but…
"Sir Rimuru and Lady Risa ventured into the cave of their own volition." Althea shot Suphia down, "I assure you, they are in zero danger."
"Yes, I agree." Diablo said, "Besides, if something was capable of harming Lord Rimuru, you would be instantly eradicated. No help at all."
While that was probably the truth, still rude. Suphia bared her fangs at him. "YOU WANNA GO!?" She hissed.
"Quiet, yowling-"
"Enough, Diablo! You aren't helping here. Listen, Suphia. If Sir Rimuru and Lady Risa are in danger, then we will take action, but if Veldora, the guardian deity of the Forest of Jura is truly back, then we cannot afford to make any ill-advised moves and stir his wrath." Benimaru stopped Diablo before he made the situation any worse by killing Suphia where she stood.
Finally, I decided that I'd heard enough. "Thanks, Benimaru, but you don't need to worry about that. Sorry for worrying you guys!"
"""Sir Rimuru! Lady Risa!"""
"Everyone, this is Lil' Ol' Veldora in the flesh! It took us a while to teach him how to control his aura, otherwise we would've been out sooner. He may be a bit shy, but he's my close friend, and I promise he won't bite! Try to get along!" I gave the best introduction I could think of.
The reply? Silence. Everyone's eyes landed on Veldora in stunned disbelief.
"Wa-wait a minute, Rimuru! I take offense at that nonsense! I am not the least bit shy, I-I'm a people person! It's just that I haven't had many chances for socialization lately, what with how few people made it to me alive." Veldora objected boisterously.
"Sounds like an excuse, Big Bro Veldora." Risa replied with a mischievous smile.
"Umm…!" Treyni was the first person to recover from the shock of hearing that this guy who possessed absolutely zero majesty was the actual Storm Dragon. "Mr. Veldora, what is your relationship with Sir Rimuru and Lady Risa, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Oh…? You wish to know? Eh-heh-heh!" Veldora cackled.
"Yes! By all means!" Treyni played along with his little posturing, but Risa casually destroyed that.
"He's Big Bro Veldora. Nothing more, nothing less, right, Big Bro Rimuru?" She asked me, a hand to her temple in confusion.
"Ha-ha, right, Risa. He's Big Bro Veldora." I assured her with a smile.
And suddenly, it was like everyone completely understood. And even more bewildering, the instantly accepted it like it was totally natural for one of the strongest beings in the world, a literal natural disaster to be not only hanging around with me, but also using one of my Replications as the basis for his physical form.
The resurrection festival that'd begun five days ago continued through the night. We celebrated with food, games, and dancing in the streets like there was no tomorrow, Veldora casually joining in the festivities, regaling the people of Tempest with story upon story of things that I was certain hadn't happened to him.
For example, I was pretty sure that Veldora had never carried a turtle across a whole continent, only to meet an old man who would then go on to give him a magic orb and teach him the deep secrets of true martial arts as a reward for his good deed.
It was nice to see Risa acting like the child that I really wanted her to be, for once. She drank Veldora's stories in with wide eyes, even though I was sure that she already had access to the real versions through Mnemosyne if she really wanted to. I guess curiosity doesn't discriminate, even when the stories are just adapted versions of manga.