[Book 3] That time I got reincarnated as a slime,no, a DRAGON?

3rd Person POV

After listening to Rimuru's story, everyone was calm in the outside, though their thoughts were in a raging storm. Well, most were calm, except...

"Uwaaah..... CIEL.... You went through so much,..... *Sniff**sniff* i am so sorry for jumping to conclusions..." Vena said as she had caught both Ciel and Chloe into what can only be called a giant bear hug. Both Ciel and Chloe had an awkward look on their faces.

Throughout this entire time, they had remained standing. If the chairs that had been created by Ciel been alive, they would have most definitely be fuming at the fact they were completely ignored.

"C-Calm down. Ciel! What should we do?" Chloe started panicking, not knowing what to do. Seeing Vena and Chloe like this, Ciel just sighed in resignation. After a good ten minutes did Vena calm down enough so that they could sit down talk. Once everyone has taken a seat, the discussion between the chaos lords began in earnest. Unlike the merry atmosphere before, things suddenly became serious. Even Vena, the most emotional of them all had a straight face.

Since it was a circular table, there was no head seat. To Rimuru's right was Ciel, and to his left Chloe. To Ciel's right was Vena, then Nereus, Zephyr, Hila, Lucien and Ryu. Once everyone was seated, Zephyr spoke up first.

"Alright. I am sure everyone knows why we are here. But I will just reiterate because of Rimuru." Zephyr looked around for other's reaction, but everyone just nodded. Seeing that, Zephyr continued to speak.

"Alright. Even though the war with Gods of Order is currently in a stalemate, things won't remain the same. Right now, only a few small skirmishes occur here and there every few decades or two, but things will soon take a turn for the worst.

Right now, the fold in the Fabric of Space that is protecting us from the Outer Gods is going to smoothen out. Once that happens, we would without a doubt get pincered from both sides. Once that happens, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that we will be wiped out. So, it's better to resolve the problem at hand and deal with the Gods of Order right now." Zephyr finished, earning a nod from everyone.

"Well then, let's plan our actions then. We can't really wipe out all of them either, as that will reduce our combined fighting prowess against the Outer Gods. So, we will have strike quickly and make them surrender as quickly as possible with as little sacrifice from both sides as possible." Nereus said.

"You don't need to worry about most of the common soldiers, I will protect their soul, and with my little sister's help, we will revive them later on. The main problem would be the weaker Gods, I cannot grasp their souls, so I can not revive them. The stronger ones can revive on their own, so they won't be a problem either." Hila said.

"... If that's the case, that only leaves us with one choice, doesn't it?" Vena asked.

"That's right. We will have to take over this World Tree." Ciel said as she put down the document that was in her hand. Both Rimuru and Ciel were going through the information about both the Chaos Lords, their armies and control, as well as that of the Gods of Order. Despite the fact that both Rimuru and Ciel were using mind acceleration at a near infinite magnification, it still took them nearly half a minute to do through it all. This is tantamount to how much information there was to go through. Meanwhile, Chloe had completely given up on going through the details, she just looked through the briefs and gave up. There was no way she could match up to Rimuru and Ciel in this.

"That's right. The World Tree is the only way." As soon as Nereus said that, a projection of a large tree could be seen atop the table. The entirety of the tree was floating in the void. It's roots did not have anything to latch onto. Since distance apart, these roots would have an inflated spherical part, which on closer inspection would yield the result that they were worlds.

The roots of the tree were going through hundreds, if not thousands of worlds, absorbing the energy from its World Core, and using it grow. The fruits that were hanging on the canopy of the tree was nothing but new worlds that the World Tree was giving birth to. There was only one thing common in all these worlds. Each and every one of them had a miniature world tree on it, much like the World Tree in Sarion.

This surprised Rimuru, Ciel and Chloe for a bit, but they soon understood that this was a way for the World Tree to create offsprings.

"At the heart of World Tree, there is the incubation room. Destroyed or fragmented souls of all the first Era Gods are currently stored there. Though they are beyond the scope of revival, the amount of energy that they still passively release is enough for the World Tree to stabilize the defenses. We just have to destabilize the defenses by connecting the connections between the souls and the World Tree. The main problem would be to enter the incubation room." Vena said as she explained the main aim as well as the victory condition for the war.

Just as Lucien was about to add something, a sudden change in space occurred in the centre of the table, and a portal, about five metres in length and three metres wide opened. With a sister purple aura leaking from it, it could give anyone the creeps. All the nine people in people in the room were surprised.

Xyrath was one of the seven capital worlds of the Chaos Empire. There were extreme space time regulations, and opening a portal here was no easy feat. Even the Chaos Lords need an anchor to open a portal here. But this portal had not only opened without an anchor, it wasn't even using Chaos Energy to sustain itself. Whether source of energy it was using, it was obtaining from the other side of the portal.

Seeing this, all nine of them quickly released their aura to stabilize the portal and make sure that nothing can cross the portal. Once that was done, one after another, all the other Chaos Lords fell back on their chairs as their souls went to their clones that were always kept in their territory, in case an emergency took place. If such a portal could open in Xyrath, the was no doubt that it could also open back at their capitals.

After a few minutes, they began to retake control of their true body. They all had confused expressions, and seeing each other, they all understood what had happened.

"This is the only one. There was no such portal back in our capital." Hila said, and everyone nodded. Both Vena and Nereus did not have a capital as they were nomadic in nature, but they still had to make sure that their temporary abode was safe.

"Where do you think this portal leads us to?" Ciel asked. She had been trying to analyse this portal all this time, but was unable to do so. This left her speechless and frustrated.

"Can't we just find out by going through it?" Lucien spoke with a smirk.

"That's right. Though the question is, do we dare? With the war on the horizon, we have no idea what might happen when." Hila said coldly.

"That's right. Let's just vote. Even if we do decide to go, let's only send our clones, so that even if they get destroyed, it's fine." Rimuru said, and everyone nodded.

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I hope you guys like it. Where do you think the portal will take them?