Alright then, time to freshen up the mood and get back to work behind the scenes.
First off, I asked the Demon King to arrange two things: a delivery of sweets and a meeting with the Divine Word Church.
On the sweets front, I received a powerful "Leave it to me!" so I'll wait expectantly.
For the Divine Word Church, we'll probably have to wait for their reply.
They've got one of my puppet spiders dispatched over there right now, so communication should be easy enough.
But they just finished fighting a war, so they might not be in a position to hold a meeting right away. I suppose there's nothing to do but wait patiently.
Then again, we haven't fully retreated or advanced our forces yet either, so we're not exactly in fighting shape either.
So the only ones who can move around freely right now are me, Vampire-kid, and Fermina.
Technically the Demon King could move if she wanted to, but the supreme commander can't exactly be wandering around aimlessly.
Huh? What about the Tenth Army?
Just leave it to
And so, I'll start with what we can do using the personnel available.
First, I'll have the fragment in charge of system operations probe whether there's any way to stop the Goddess from tampering with the system any further.
If it's possible, then do it.
Abandoning the Hero System entirely is impossible.
We can only destroy the system by exploiting the brief window during a Hero succession.
Forcing it would cause adverse effects on the current Hero.
In other words, on Yamada.
Besides, it would mean consuming a massive amount of energy to destroy the Hero System — a completely counterproductive outcome, so it's not happening.
So then, I'm heading out to rendezvous with Vampire-kid and Fermina.
I'll recover the Poti body and store it in a separate dimension for now.
I'll analyze it later.
For now, I need to focus on preparations to deal with Yamada's motherland.
"So here's the thing — go bring the Empire under our control."
"What do you mean, 'here's the thing'? I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to say."
I gave Vampire-kid her instructions, and the idiot can't even understand what I'm saying.
What a hopeless girl.
With this sort of thing, you're supposed to sense what the other person is trying to communicate through feeling alone.
It's absolutely not because my explanation was insufficient.
Not at all.
The upper echelons of Yamada's motherland have been infiltrated by
I don't know what Potimas's intentions are in doing this, but it's obvious that leaving it alone will only lead to bad things. So it's time we did something about it.
Specifically, eliminate the Potimas fragment that's been scheming away, and kill the people who've been consumed.
The king and his inner circle, and so on.
Saving someone who's already been consumed probably isn't impossible.
But it would take an enormous amount of effort, and we'd probably only be able to save one person.
And while we're busy saving that one, the rest would get taken out.
So it'd honestly be easier to just give up from the start and wipe them all out with a clean sweep.
Of course, eliminating the entire upper echelon of the kingdom means a major incident is unavoidable.
And since it all has to happen at once, it's going to be pretty spectacular.
If we don't do it simultaneously, Potimas will catch on.
So here's what I'm thinking: have Natsume pull off the deed.
I considered doing it myself, but I'd prefer to keep my existence hidden from Potimas as much as possible.
He probably figured out I was involved to some degree after I killed the Hero, but there's no way he'd predict I'm a god.
It'd be better if Potimas keeps believing that our strongest fighter is the Demon King.
Kuro's not going to lift a finger no matter what, so she doesn't count as a fighting asset.
So the ones I've pinned my hopes on are Natsume and his little sister.
I'm planning to use the fully berserk Natsume as a disposable pawn, with his sister pulling the strings.
That way, the public's attention will be focused on Natsume and drawn away from me.
And the Demon King's Army movements can be hidden behind that cover too.
Now, Natsume is a prince of the Empire.
So why not make maximum use of those connections?
The forces Natsume can deploy on his own authority are probably pretty limited, so we'll use Vampire-kid's Charm to manipulate the Empire's upper echelon and back Natsume up.
Natsume himself has the Lust skill, the highest tier of Charm, so this is our chance to seize control of the Empire from the inside.
Once we've done that, deploying the Demon King's Army to the
Mmm.
Even I have to admit, it's a brilliant plan.
Quite villainous, though.
But that ship sailed a long time ago.
I explained all of this to Vampire-kid and Fermina with great enthusiasm.
Phew. That was harder than killing the Hero.
"Got it. Then take me to this little sister of his."
What do you mean, "got it"? You didn't get anything.
Vampire-kid, didn't anyone ever teach you to explain things to people thoroughly from start to finish?
Sense it through feeling? Sheesh, you think I'm some kind of psychic? Nobody can do that.
Honestly, young people these days — never enough words. It's hopeless.
Well, we might end up working together in the future, so if she wants to meet the sister, I'll introduce them.
I sent a fragment to check on the little sister.
Since her big brother Yamada suddenly started acting suspiciously in the middle of class and walked out, she's been pretty on edge.
She's back in her room, but she's restlessly pacing all around it.
Does she really care that much about her big brother?
I see, I see.
Very well then. Time for a surprise visit at dinner.
I teleported straight into the little sister's room.
"Wha—!?"
The little sister went rigid in shock at our sudden appearance.
Vampire-kid is staring intently at her.
And Fermina is looking at the little sister with an expression full of sympathy.
I don't get it.
"You want to know what happened to your big brother?"
The little sister flinched at my question.
How transparent. Well, that works.
Now then — shall we begin our transaction with a goddess, not a demon?