The Devil Chooses This Moment to Play It Normal
THE DEVIL CHOOSES THIS MOMENT TO PLAY IT NORMAL
“Well, we made it through another day, eh?”
“We sure did. That was the most challenging rush we’ve had since I joined this location.”
Libicocco and Iwaki were both sweating a little as they chatted.
“I’m so hungry… What a slog that was.”
“There wasn’t a single moment to take a break…”
Akiko and Kawata closed their registers, chuckling a bit about the uncommonly huge figures entered into the day’s sales journal.
“The café space has been closed down!” Maou said as he jogged down, carrying the journal from the upstairs registers.
“But certainly, having the trainees working hard sure helped us make it through the day, didn’t it?”
Two people had joined the crew a couple weeks after Libicocco, each playing unsung-hero roles in the responsibilities they were assigned, so the veterans were able to work without excess concerns.
“It’s the first time we beat figures from the Kisaki era!”
Maou heard Iwaki softly boast to herself as her team closed the downstairs. The Hatagaya Station MgRonald, after a long era of seemingly magical sales increases every year, had put up much more normal statistics since Kisaki’s departure—some good periods, some not-so-good ones. The fact they’d made it through a busy day like this without major issues indicated that Iwaki got along with the Kisaki-trained crew—and that the Iwaki gang, led by Libicocco, meshed well with them, too.
“My liege, do you want to visit the bathhouse?”
“Sure. Man, I sweated like a pig all day.”
With the restaurant behind them, Maou and Libicocco headed straight for the Sasanoyu public bathhouse to shake off the stress. After toasting the day’s successes with the lady at the counter with some milk, they took in the cool evening breeze as they headed home.
“I believe you begin later tomorrow, my liege?”
“Yeah. You get off by evening, don’t you?”
“I do.”
“I’ll run the washer in the morning, so give me anything you need washed.”
“Very well. Oh, and do you mind if I use the leftover eggs from breakfast?”
“Sure. Please.”
“All right. Have a good night, then.”
“Yeah, I’m exhausted. I think I’ll just sleep, too.”
The two of them, king and subject, lay down on opposite sides of the living room table.
“One second,” Maou said, sitting up.
“What’s wrong?”
“…Isn’t this kind of weird?”
“What is?”
“What isn’t?” he groaned from underneath the orange-tinted light. “It’s everything.”
“…”
Libicocco sat up as well, slouching forward as he crossed his arms in a threatening fashion.
“Do you mean how your life hasn’t changed at all, Your Demonic Highness, even though we may have to launch Devil’s Castle very soon?”
But when he spoke, Libicocco’s words were delicate.
“You can read me like a book, huh? Well, you’re right. I’m not doing a damn thing in all of this!”
“You’re keeping a decent job.”
“I—I am doing that, yes,” Maou grunted, scratching his head.
With Suzuno taking an Archbishop’s seat, the battle against heaven had recently made a very sharp turn for all of them. Emi had just departed early this morning for Ente Isla to check up on how her promotion and the Crusade were impacting matters. Chiho, despite quitting work and stepping away from Ente Isla, was now functioning as a sort of data clearinghouse. Ashiya was running around the world, negotiating between Ente Isla’s Devil’s Castle and the human race—he had to, or else the whole heaven-war thing was doomed. Even Urushihara was serving as Ashiya’s assistant/Kinanna’s transporter, although he was busy attempting to wrangle Kinanna alongside Ashiya and Gabriel right now.
“Didn’t Emilia say it herself?” the demon went on. “She told you she felt confident taking this journey because you’re still going along like always.”
Libicocco meant to reassure Maou—
“You know, Ashiya still doesn’t like dealing with Emi very much. Why are you so eager to take her side?”
—but instead, the King of All Demons was now questioning his loyalty.
“N-no, I mean, she is our coworker, and Chiho Sasaki keeps bugging us to get along with her. Besides, with my powers, I have no chance to ever compare to her, so I thought it best to avoid thinking or acting too confrontationally. You know, if I resist what Emilia and Chiho Sasaki tell me too much, that’ll cause trouble for Ms. Iwaki, won’t it?”
“Yeah…” Despite being a walking, talking ball of intimidation, Libicocco was almost being too concerned about what others thought of him. It made Maou wince. “And you’re okay with that? Like, your pride?”
“I’ve been an underling for a very long time. If I need to be involved with something for an extended period, I’m good at that.”
Come to think of it, back before Maou united the demon realms under the name Satan, Libicocco, while a chieftain, was mostly treated as an underling by Rubicante, a higher-level leader. As he stated, he had never fought one-on-one with Emi (unlike Ashiya or Urushihara), and he didn’t much like his chances against her. If someone like him tried to take on such a lofty presence on pride alone, he’d just be letting her do whatever she wanted with him. So Maou could understand Libicocco’s philosophy, but…
“Where’s your spirit? Your rebel drive?!” Maou squawked.
“Hmm. Ever since I got involved in this, I’ve started to think more often that I need to save my temper for when it really counts.”
“You’re even more responsible than Ashiya!”
Compared to Ashiya, who wasn’t afraid to openly clash against Emi and Suzuno still, Libicocco seemed almost too ready to retreat and take the long view.
“Well, doesn’t the whole thing just seem silly to you? For example, Chiho Sasaki.”
“What about Chi?”
“Just hypothetically speaking, back in Ente Isla, we never once considered the value of a human life, did we? But, for example, if I decided I wanted to kill Chiho Sasaki for giving me some lip or the like, why would I need to debate over that at all? I could just flick my finger at her, and it is done. Hypothetically speaking, of course.”
Libicocco wanted to be sure that was understood as he breathlessly continued.
“But if I did that, it would only satisfy my urges for a few seconds, wouldn’t it? Then you, Lord Alciel, and Emilia would rip me apart, and it’d be over. I’m sure all of the Malebranche would pay for it, too. Lord Camio would likely wipe out my entire clan. Everything’s changed from when we took on Ente Isla, and if I don’t have the power to change any of that, then my only choice is to do what I can, when I can. Right?”
“R-right…”
“So, you know, no matter what Emilia says to me, as long as it’s not slander or a malicious lie, I’ve decided not to sweat the small details.”
“Y-you have…?”
Seeing Libicocco, once prone to bouts of violence, become such a perceptive, understanding person was, in a way, exactly what Maou wanted from him. He was a test subject in this grand experiment to see how demons could function in human society, and every achievement of his was a new milestone. The outlook on life he’d laid out indicated he had a grasp of human relationships, relationships that demanded he analyze the feelings of others and keep himself disciplined. If Maou, Ashiya, and Urushihara were the first generation of demons in the human world, Libicocco was the second. The sight of him actively trying to assimilate into human society should have had Maou overjoyed.
But:
“But that’s not the problem right now.”
“Huh?”
“…No. I’m sorry. The way you’re thinking… Well, that’s fine. Yeah. Keep it up.”
“All right…”
What concerned Maou wasn’t Libicocco’s progress toward living in human lands. It was his own position in this.
In the end, of course, he’d have to join forces with Emi as the main weapon against heaven, violently oppressing his foes with all the power he had. That was true, but depending on how things went, that might not happen for a while. And what’s worse—here was Libicocco undergoing these massive changes as he adapted to his new environment, and meanwhile Maou himself wasn’t changing at all in response.
“It’s not a bad thing at all. Not at all. It’s just…”
He got turned down for a manager position. Sariel, not Maou, was able to keep up with Kisaki’s managerial approach. Chiho, not Maou, was able to stay abreast of trends and stay in contact with everyone. Naturally, he wasn’t the kind of person to let that make him feel weak and powerless, doubting the people around him. But the whole reason the six of them had agreed to take on heaven was so that his “daughter,” Alas Ramus, could see her siblings.
“But this is my own kid…”
“No it’s not.”
Maou ignored Libicocco’s pointed response.
“This is my own kid, but here I am, keeping up my normal life and letting everyone else handle stuff, because I’m ‘too busy.’ What’s up with that?”
“I’m not sure I can tell you…but after living in Japan as long as you have, if that’s what you have to say, that’s not a good thing, is it?”
“I mean, it’s Emi who pays for Alas Ramus’s food and clothing. It’s Chi, or Suzuno, or Nord who plays with her; it’s all my minions who worked on presents for her. I have no idea what’s going on right now, but I’m all ‘oh, I’m busy’ to everyone. So I’m going to bathhouses, having a drink, going to sleep without trying to contact anyone… That’s bad, isn’t it?”
“Did we have a drink?”
“The milk.”
“…My liege…”
Even underneath that tiny light, the intimidating face seemed full of a strange sort of pity.
“Your Demonic Highness… If you had left with Emilia, we wouldn’t have been able to keep up at work.”
“Well, I mean, as someone who failed managerial training, that’s true in a way, but in another way, I didn’t wanna say that. It just feels like I’m escaping reality in order to feel needed in society.”
As Urushihara and Amane often reminded him, at the end of the day, Maou’s position at the Hatagaya Station MgRonald was still part-time staff. There was no real way to rank them, but as a former Devil King, if asked whether to prioritize world-shifting events or his shifts at a fast-food franchise, the choice should be pretty obvious. Until now, he had Mayumi Kisaki and his chance at a manager spot serving as goals for him, but that was all gone now.
“Am I…okay, staying like this?”
“My liege, please keep yourself together. What’s gotten into you?”
Libicocco, now legitimately worried, lurched up to his feet. Then, despite it being past one in the morning, the Room 201 doorbell rang.
“You awake, Maou? I hear voices.”
The two of them tensed up, but relaxed once they realized it was Amane Ohguro.
“Why are you here this late?” Maou asked as he unlocked the door.
“Sorry. It’s kind of a rush. I know this is sudden, but do you feel sick or anything like that?”
“Huh?”
She normally braided her hair, but it was down right now. Despite that, and the well-worn sweatsuit she had on, she looked deadly serious to them.
“No, I don’t…feel anything wrong, I guess?”
“Really?”
“Well, it was a busy day at work so I’m tired, but it’s not like I caught a cold or anything, no.”
“…All right. Well, I dunno what’s up, then. I thought it was something to do with you, but…”
Amane looked genuinely confused. It gave Maou an idea.
“…Did something happen to Acieth?”
If Amane barged in here sensing some issue with Maou, then chances were it had to do with the Yesod fragment fused within him—Acieth Alla. Amane nodded her agreement, brows furrowed.
“Nord came to visit earlier. He said something wasn’t right with her.”
“Did the landlord say anything?”
Maou had always surmised that Miki Shiba, Amane’s aunt and the landlord of his apartment, was something besides human in nature. That turned out to be true—in fact, she was something akin to Acieth and the other Sephirah children.
“Aunt Mikitty told me to go check up on you, so that’s why I’m here. I’m sorry, but can you come with me?”
“Sure. I don’t work until later on tomorrow.”
Leaving his apartment to Libicocco, Maou followed Amane to the Shiba house next door. Something etched into his very soul repelled him from both Shiba and her residence, but if something was wrong with Acieth, there was no telling how it might affect him, to say nothing of Alas Ramus over in Ente Isla. As wary as his landlord made him, he could avoid her no longer.
“This way. I think she’s resting more now, but…I guess it was kind of rough for a while.”
Proceeding down a hallway whose wallpaper, carpeting, and colors all teamed up to intimidate him, Maou was guided into a room.
“Ah… Maou…”
There, in a bed, lay an extremely haggard-looking Acieth.
“H-hey… What happened?”
One look at the pale face and colorless lips made it clear she was ill.
“Wellllll… Sorry I make you do the worry late night. You must have tired, so I tell them no, tomorrow is fine, but…”
And if she was being this self-sacrificing, something had to be seriously wrong with her.
“Did you eat something you shouldn’t have?” Maou asked, going up to her bedside.
“Yeah.”
“You did?”
He’d meant it as a joke, which, sadly, failed. Acieth may have been a born glutton, but it wasn’t like she picked up food wrappers off the street…
“Oh, wait, you did, didn’t you?”
“I don’t know what you’re remembering, but five-second rule, I always follow it!”
“There’s definitely no evidence behind that rule, you know. What did you do?”
“I don’t know! But, you know, the timing of it, I think I understand it.”
As Acieth explained, she first began to feel sick at around ten minutes after eight this morning.
“Down to the minute, huh?”
Maou figured that was when she decided to go dumpster diving or whatever. But the situation was more serious than that:
“This morning, I ate the breakfast with Dad in his apartment. Then Emi, she send text to him…saying ‘I go to Ente Isla.’”
“Oh?”
“At the time, I think, ‘Oh, that no big deal,’ but now I think maybe that when I begin to have the sickness.”
“So it’s because Emi—or Alas Ramus, I suppose—went over there, or opened a Gate or something?”
“Maybe… I think… Me, I don’t know, either…fwehh…”
With a heavy sigh, Acieth shifted in her bed. The effort seemed all but suffocating to her.
“Does she have a fever or anything?” Maou asked the adjacent Amane.
She shook her head. “Not like a virus-type fever. But it looks like her illness is making her body temperature fluctuate a lot. The problem is that not even Aunt Mikitty knows what’s causing it, or how we can fix it, and also… Ah.”
“Huh?”
“Ooh.”
Amane’s face tensed up.
“Maou, hold Acieth down for me! I’ll be right back!”
“Huh? Huh?!”
“Unnngggghhhhhh… Hrreeehhhhnnnggghhhhh!!”
“Whaa?!”
Acieth all but sprung up from the bed, face paler than ever, and let out a belch at such a volume that Maou was sure he’d be covered in vomit. At the same time, Acieth’s entire body began to lightly glow.
“Ahhh?!”
Soon, she was emitting light from her eyes and mouth so bright, Maou couldn’t keep his own open.
“Oh, crap…?!”
Maou had seen this once before. When he went to Ente Isla’s Eastern Island to save Emi, Acieth had pulled this same act after a massive meal, spewing everything she had eaten in the process and literally blowing Maou into the air. If this light was about to launch the two of them again, they might end up blowing a hole in his landlord’s wall.
Reflexively, Maou deployed a barrier of demonic energy around Acieth’s face in front of him.
“Agghphh?!”
“Huhh?!”
But the light deflected by the barrier bounced right back onto Acieth’s face, sending her jaw upward and turning her head toward the ceiling.
“Aaahhhhhh!”
It didn’t destroy it all at once, but the beam of light began to singe the ceiling. The thought of paying restitution promptly began to torment Maou’s mind.
“H-how am I supposed to hold this down?!”
He tried to hold Acieth back down—the recoil from this light beam against the ceiling seemed to be arching her entire body backward. But that light looked like it’d destroy pretty much anything it touched. He couldn’t point her face away from where it already was angled.
But then:
“Maou! Out of the way!”
With a massive rush of force, Maou was tossed to the side—replaced by Amane, carrying something oddly large in one hand.
“Hyahh!”
She smacked it point-blank against Acieth’s face. There was a dull thud as sprays of red flew around the room.
“Ah… Amane, what are…?! Amane… Amane?”
At first, Maou thought Amane had smashed Acieth in the face with a blunt weapon. But when he opened his eyes, he was greeted by what, for all the world, looked like half of a watermelon. Its red flesh and juice were splattered all over the room. The searing light was gone, and then…
“…mnch…mnch…”
…they could hear the sound of Acieth, face buried in the fruit, chewing away.
“Huhh?”
“We need to have her eat…or else this happens.”
“…Whaaaaaat?!”
“It’s been like this since this evening. She needs to have something in her mouth at all times, or else that crazy light shoots out of her eyes and mouth and she starts breaking stuff. Aunt Mikitty says the Sephirah is probably falling out of control, but if we don’t know what’s triggering or causing it, there’s nothing we can do…”
“Chomp…chomp…”
Acieth’s face was buried in the fruit enough that Maou was concerned about her breathing. She showed no sign of extracting herself. As he struggled to grasp this situation, her face went deep and deeper into the semicircular rind, until she began making gnawing, rasping sounds he didn’t know were possible with a watermelon.
“…Done.”
Now every edible piece of it was thoroughly picked over. She lifted the edge of her nose and her mouth from the bottom of the rind, triumphant.
“So again, let me ask…”
“Yeah?”
“Maou, are you sure you don’t feel sick?”
“I think I’m about to be.”
Just watching this charade, feeling his skin itch from the watermelon juice that covered it, thinking about all the reds and pinks that would never come out in the wash—at the very least, it was starting to depress him. Even discounting the physical damage, the fact he had been powerless the past few minutes to help at all made him feel even worse. He did want to help his friends, now fighting their own battles in faraway places. What he didn’t want to do was deal with Acieth, facing unprecedented trouble even as she was wearing the rind like some kind of demented Halloween mask.
“Roughly, she needs at least around four rice balls every ten minutes.”
The voice from Amane sounded desperate as it entered Maou’s ears. He didn’t bother asking what she meant.
“Um, are you all right?”
Maou would finally make it back in the early-morning hours, when he was greeted by a Libicocco who clearly hadn’t got a wink of sleep.
“Emilia’s father just came up, and he said you might be in some kind of trouble…”
“Yeah, I just traded places with him… I’m so tired… I’m sorry, just let me sleep for now.”
“Oh, er, okay. Do you need an alarm?”
“No… I already set it.”
“Right. Well, I’ll make some breakfast, so eat it whenever you can. Also—”
“I don’t need breakfast. Give it to Amane or Nord when you go out.”
“What?!”
Ordering his underlings to feed breakfast to their neighbors was well out of the norm for Maou.
“…Please. Just do it. I’ll explain later.”
Something about the way he put it made Libicocco shiver with fear. He nodded and cleared his throat.
“But were you about to say something just now?”
“Ah, yes. Um, Emilia’s father asked to borrow some miso from me for some reason, so I let him have it. I couldn’t say what he needs it for, but—”
“Borrowing miso? What’s next, a cup of sugar?”
But Maou knew exactly what Nord was thinking. Acieth had some disease where she had to be constantly fed at all times. Presumably, he was trying to add some variety to the menu. Maou had only seen people borrow food ingredients from neighbors in manga from decades ago, but he understood all the same.
Then another thought occurred to him.
“…Wait. Nah, it couldn’t be…”
He looked at his refrigerator, his mind in a haze. Then his lips began to curl upward.
“Ashiya and Suzuno did it all the time, didn’t they?”
“Hmm?”
“…Ahhh… Well, I’m sure you know this, but don’t ask for miso back from Nord. I’m pretty sure he’s gonna pay you back with something else, but whatever it is, just accept it, all right?”
“A-all right. I need to get going, so you just want me to take this to Amane Ohguro, then?”
Libicocco, a little reluctant, neatly wrapped the sausage and eggs he’d just whipped up and took the plate out the door with him. Seeing him go, Maou finally collapsed into his futon.
“Maybe I can get three hours,” he said as he closed his eyes, hoping to get as much sleep as he could before work.
“No! Wait, wait, wait!!”
Then his body spasmed back up.
“What am I doing in a daze here? Now’s not the time for this!”
How could he not have noticed until now?
“Alas Ramus must be okay, right? Emi hasn’t contacted me at all!”
Acieth and Alas Ramus were sisters. If one of them was acting strange, something was likely to manifest itself in the other, like twins. Right around when Emi took Alas Ramus with her to Ente Isla, Acieth began to feel weird, she had said. It wouldn’t be unthinkable to see the same thing happen to Alas Ramus.
“Damn it… But the Central Continent… No, I can’t, they’re monitoring it… But maybe it’s better than nothing? No… I’d better contact Farfarello first…”
But not only was he on duty all day yesterday, it was the busiest day so far in the Iwaki era. He followed that up with a night of kitchen duty for Acieth, bringing his brain to the brink of utter exhaustion. With Amane and Shiba right nearby, and with all their stores of demonic force drained after dealing with Kinanna, Maou only had the strength of a typical young man. The fatigue was starting to give him a physical headache.
“An Idea Link… No, if it’s demonic force, they’ll catch it. I could have someone use the feather pen to open a Gate… I need to call… Chi, or Rika Suzuki… Ah, dammit, Chi’s at school right now…”
Was it fatigue behind that headache, or was Acieth’s illness affecting him now? He didn’t know, but it made focusing hard for him. And with every moment, the clock kept ticking, robbing him of more and more sleep time.
“Rika Suzuki… Will she answer…? No… I’m gonna have to text Chi and get Acieth’s thing worked out… Damn it… No, no, I’ve already bothered her enough with the whole Suzuno thing…”
The fatigue and sleepiness made it no longer possible to keep his head up straight. Then, suddenly, he felt something next to him. A gentle voice whispered into his ear.
“You look awful. Sleep a little.”
“I can’t right now. I need to get in contact, or…”
“I understand the situation. You have work today, do you not? So sleep. I will handle the necessary contacts and arrangements as best I can. Do not worry.”
“Oh… Well, sorry… I’ll just close my eyes for a bit, then…”
Within his hazy consciousness, Maou had just entrusted…someone…to do…something.
And then that consciousness swiftly left him.
What felt like an instant later, his phone’s alarm grated against his ears as he opened his eyes again. He felt a dull throb on his temples and behind his eyes; it didn’t feel like he’d slept at all, but the phone’s screen had cruelly advanced three hours nonetheless.
“…Water…”
He had gone to bed without brushing his teeth, so his mouth felt all gross. Rinsing it out, he noticed something placed on the living room table.
“Ahh?”
It was a note whose content—and whose handwriting—were totally unexpected.
Rice balls and miso soup in the refrigerator
There was no signature, but the writing was familiar to Maou. Opening the fridge, he found three large rice balls and a small, covered pot. Waves of appreciation enveloped him, even as he pondered how this feat could’ve been engineered.
“Oh, are you up? You need to go soon, no? Did you eat?”
Now, for some reason, the creator of this impromptu breakfast was inviting herself through his front door.
“…What are you doing here?”
“Is it that strange for a woman to return to her own home?”
Standing there, in a familiar kimono and apron, was Suzuno Kamazuki.
As he sipped the miso soup Suzuno had reheated for him, taking pains to keep his back up straight, Maou glanced at her, seated diagonally from him. The first question that crossed his mind was whether, after just coming home from her Archbishop ordination, it was safe for her to come back again so soon.
The second was…
“Mm? What is it?”
“Oh, um, nothing.”
“Ah.”
Suzuno cast her eyes down again.
This listlessness was the big question in Maou’s mind. Her head and her vision both were pointed slightly downward. When she spoke, her speech began and ended with less sharpness than before. She might just be tired out, he thought, but if so, her hazily sitting here as Maou finished eating was incomprehensible.
She had prepared food for him many a time in the past, but almost never on a one-on-one basis like this. Maybe never at all, in fact. They had eaten together more times than he could count so he couldn’t say for sure, but either way, just sitting there, waiting for him to finish, was something Suzuno would never do normally.
“Mm? Oh, you mean this dress?” She glanced down at herself. “Libicocco told me as he was leaving that Acieth was having some manner of trouble. When I asked Shiba, she said they had to keep Acieth continually fed, so I helped them.”
“…Oh. Hard, wasn’t it?”
After making rice balls until sunrise, Maou meant that from the heart, to some extent. But Suzuno just smiled a bit, shaking her head.
“It was nothing too exerting. Acieth’s appetite is hardly surprising news by this point. In fact, only Nord would know better how to satisfy her than me.”
She might be right.
“Are you done? I will do the dishes, so get ready for work.”
“O-okay…but Acieth…”
“Do not let it concern you. Me, Nord, and Amane will take care of her together. I will place a call to your restaurant if something happens. Just focus on your work like always.”
“Ah… All right. Sure. But…”
“If you are worried for Alas Ramus, then my apologies, but we can only reach out to them through Farfarello. I cannot say if they will receive the message immediately, but it is the best we can do.”
She had looked ahead to all of Maou’s concerns and addressed all of them in advance. He honestly appreciated that.
“Okay. Um, sorry about all this.”
“Not a problem,” Suzuno said as she nimbly took Maou’s place setting to the kitchen sink. Maou watched her go. The sight of her rinsing seemed like the Suzuno he knew, but something seemed off; something he couldn’t place his finger on. He started preparing for work anyway.
“Oh, hey, uh…”
“I have no intention of turning toward you. If you intend to change clothes, make it quick.”
Once again, she’d read his mind. And this time, the answer was “just do it.”
Maou really couldn’t. Changing in the same room as a woman took a certain bravery that he couldn’t summon right now.
“Why are you acting like that at this point?” Suzuno turned and smiled at him, not a hint of malice on her face. “If I recall, you opted to attack me in your underpants because your uniform was borrowed and you wanted to keep it intact.”
“No, um, that’s kind of a different story…and you attacked me first, you know! Also, stop phrasing it so I sound like a dumbass!”
“My phrasing is the issue? I believe that Chiho and Emilia were there was well, were they not? No shirt, no pants, and you going on about the elasticity of your boxers or whatnot…”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry! You win! Just turn the hell around!”
Having Suzuno rehash a moment from when they’d first met left Maou with no space to defend himself. By the time he’d quickly changed while Suzuno’s eyes focused on the sink, it was time to head for work.
“Leaving?” Suzuno asked.
“Y-yeah. For today.”
“You have to close tonight, do you not? Libicocco said so.”
“Oh, he did? So you…”
“I will stay in my apartment for the night. I thought it needed a cleaning the last time I returned, so I will take care of that…and I worry for Acieth, of course.”
“…All right. Um, don’t overexert yourself.”
He wasn’t sure what he meant by that. But he said it anyway.
“Right. Take care now.”
“S-see you.”
Maou trundled himself out the door, as if fleeing Suzuno’s weird vibes. Seeing Shiba’s house outside made him concerned for Acieth, but he moved on. There was nothing else he could do today.
His shift started at eleven, and already the MgRonald was seeing signs of another crowded day. He sprint-walked to the staff room and changed into his uniform. As he did, his house key slipped out of his pants pocket and clinked against the floor. He picked it up, returned it to his pocket…and then it hit him.
“Wait… Suzuno doesn’t have the key to my place, does she?”
“Ugghh…”
She just couldn’t stop heaving those dry, heavy sighs.
“I just can’t stop thinking about it…”
Chiho had quit her job, taken a step away from Ente Isla’s troubles, and intended to push herself into the world of college exams. Now, with a self-deprecating smile, she looked down at the city outside her window. From this room at the Hatagaya location of the Senshu Academy test-prep center, she had a bird’s-eye view of both the MgRonald and the Sentucky Fried Location across the street from it.
Chiho had chosen this location of Senshu Academy, in a mixed-use building along the shopping arcade jutting out from Hatagaya Station, because they had a good individual tutoring program. Since she was starting exam prep a little later than the average, she would need to narrow down her list of schools and formulate a learning plan for them pretty fast. This was the only academy within her sphere of activity that could potentially bring her to a level worthy of the schools she hoped for, even starting in late April as she had.
“This is so awkward…”
But the final session of this center didn’t end until nine forty-five in the evening. Everyone had to be out by ten; in other words, she’d be getting home the same time as when she worked at MgRonald.
Her mind was working now, sort of, but not exactly on college prep.
“Focus… Focus…”
If she was saying this out loud to herself, it was pretty clear that Step Two of college prep was tripping her up.
Even now, as she sat there, someone might be facing a crisis in Ente Isla. Even in the shorter shifts she walked away from, the crew might be facing huge crowds and massive hardship. And maybe she’d run into Maou on the way home.
“Uggh…”
If there was any real difference between now and before, it was that between Chiho’s school and test-prep schedule, she had the time to stop by home and change clothes on most days. She usually reported to MgRonald in her school uniform, so getting to walk down the shopping arcade in a normal outfit felt somehow novel.
“I won’t have the time for stops along the way, though…”
With its one-on-one instruction, Senshu Academy’s students didn’t interact with one another much at all. Sadly, her friends Yoshiya Kohmura and Kaori Shoji had already signed on to different exam centers by the time she joined this one. There may be other Sasahata North High School students coming here, but Chiho hadn’t recognized anyone yet—and she was here to study anyway, not to expand her friend circle.
For the time being, Chiho had spoken only with the assistant teachers here at this Hatagaya location. The test-prep site she went to during middle school boasted of smaller teacher-student ratios, but even then, she was taking classes with around ten other kids at once. It thus took some time for her to get used to Senshu Academy’s system of prerecorded classes, with a class leader and assistants on hand to provide additional guidance as needed.
As her assistant put it, she wouldn’t prosper in this system if she wasn’t prepared to learn—so if she could master it, it would make college life a lot easier. In an environment like college, which didn’t offer a uniform learning experience, being proactive was apparently key.
The assistant sounded like she knew what she was talking about, although Chiho was surprised when she found out she was a college student herself, working part-time here. There were four assistants, each attending famous name-brand universities in Tokyo and each naturally earning stellar grades. Their own exam memories were still fresh in their minds, theoretically letting them offer guidance on a more personal level. Teaching in a center like this meant being involved with the futures of a lot of people at once, so Chiho assumed all the staff had to be full-time salaried workers—but here, having the assistants be real-life college students was one of the attractions. Since the schools they attended were likely being targeted by many of the students at Senshu, the center had a reputation for providing a lot of on-the-field info about life at those universities, the sort of thing websites and pamphlets left out. To Chiho, learning that people did jobs like this, too, was a real eye-opener.
“I wonder if I’ll be like that in two more years?”
In her eyes, the assistants, all aged twenty-ish, were no different from the “grown-ups” she’d interacted with on a daily basis. Even now, they already had the aura of adulthood that she saw in Kisaki and Iwaki. But in chronological terms, she herself was only two or three years away from that.
“Suzuki… Akiko… Shimizu…”
Chiho recalled the “adults” close to her who were the same age as the academy’s assistants. Rika Suzuki, Akiko Ohki, and Maki Shimizu were all, in different ways from the staff here, grown women to her. She wasn’t shallow enough to think it just naturally happened once you reached that age…but clearly, it took more than just reading books and taking quizzes to turn out like them.
“Hmmm…”
After all, her relationships tended to put her in a “youngest child” role a lot. That applied with Maou and the other Ente Islans, of course, but even Kaori Shoji tended to take the initiative a lot in their friendship. She had no deep relations with the younger people in her archery club—they mostly gathered around Yoshiya Kohmura, since they had all gone to the same middle school.
As she thought about it, Chiho began to feel like she had always “looked up” to someone, ever since she was tiny. Very early on, it was her cousin in Nagano. Starting in high school, it was her seniors in kyudo, with their fancy white bamboo bows. Now she couldn’t stop comparing herself with the adults in her social circles, and it wasn’t enough to tell her how to carry on.
Everyone around her said there was no need to panic, and that sounded reasonable whenever Chiho heard it. But now that things had changed and she was back to being a simple high schooler, she had this looming dread she had let much more time pass without thinking about her future than she’d realized.
Even worse, she wasn’t at all a bad student to start with. She could keep up with the first set of courses she took at Senshu well enough, and she scored well on the occasional tests to measure her progress. But turn that around, and she didn’t really know what to aim for beyond achieving “good results”—and after two months of coming here, she just couldn’t put her mind into the coursework.
Maki Shimizu had told her to try to keep as many options open as possible for herself. Rika had advised her of the importance of bringing people close to her, rather than trying to adjust herself for other people. Kisaki had said that, if she valued Maou, she had to prioritize herself first for now. But after she put herself first, what should come next? Mentally, the process was going so slowly, she could hardly stand it. It felt like this problem drove her to rock bottom like clockwork once a month—and whenever she felt like she had a solution afterward, the slightest change in environment would shake her all over again.
“What do I want…to do, huh…? …Ah.”
And even as she thought about this, she was writing up the core points of the video lecture in her notes. It astounded her.
She remained in this daze until the end of the period. Coming to, she looked up at the clock, noticing the people around her gathering their things.
“Um… I don’t have any class tomorrow, but can I use the study rooms anyway?”
A vague feeling gripped her that studying at home was like a magnet for phone calls from other planets, so for the past few days, she had been taking full advantage of the academy’s study spaces. Of course, if someone reached out to her from Ente Isla, there had to be an emergency going on. She wasn’t trying to ignore any of that, but…
“Ah…”
…but unluckily for her, the study spaces were already reserved for the times Chiho could use them. She thought about maybe working something out with her teaching assistant, but—again unluckily—that assistant was currently dealing with four or five students at once, so she wouldn’t be free for a while.
“Well, so much for tomorrow, I guess. Have a good night!”
Aoki, the teaching assistant who was also a student at Waseta University like Maki Shimizu, called out to her as she turned around. “Oh, you too! Take care!”
Chiho turned back and nodded as she left, taking in the fresh Hatagaya air and marveling at how much nicer it was outside these days.
“Mmmh…!”
She had been seated the whole time, so her back muscles were all knotted up. Stretching herself out, she was about to take a glance at the MgRonald and head on home when something stopped her.
“Heeey.”
“Huh?”
The voice directed at her was so casual, it instantly made Chiho turn around.
Then, realizing she was being surrounded by three unfamiliar men, she began to grow wary. “…What do you want?”
They didn’t seem much older than she was, but she had never met any of them before. This was probably…
“You go to Senshu Academy? I do, too, but you wrapped up for the day, right? If you’re hungry, you wanna have dinner together? Like, at the Mag or Sentucky?”
She had never experienced it before, but this was a classic pickup line. The man said he went to her academy, but he was clearly dressed for a casual night on the town—and she had never seen him there before.
This had never happened to her once after leaving her part-time job, and yet here she was.
Chiho visibly winced. It being her last year in high school, she thought going back to the more typical role of an aspiring college student would lead to some changes in her life—but she didn’t want anything as dumb as this. She had walked here, like she usually did for her job, but it looked like her bicycle would be a safer bet from now on.
“I’m tired, so I’m going home.”
It was ten in the evening, but the plaza in front of Hatagaya Station still had a lot of people. Figuring these pickup artists wouldn’t try anything too rough out here, Chiho tried to sidestep them and get out from their circle.
“Aw, c’mon, you’re just gonna study at home anyway, aren’t you? You oughtta get something sweet in you so your brain can work better.”
The man who spoke first unexpectantly took action, stepping in front of the direction Chiho pointed herself.
“I don’t want to eat with someone I don’t know, so—”
“Hey, we’re both Senshu students. Let’s get to know each other. Maybe give each other some tips.”
“…Haaah.”
Chiho sighed. This was most unwelcome.
There was no way to tell whether they actually attended the cram school or not, but Chiho was in no mood to play along; she didn’t owe anything to the prep center, or to MgRonald or Sentucky for that matter. But if they really did go to Senshu and she complained to the headmaster, it might just create more trouble for her, depending on what the school did. She didn’t want to forcibly brush them off only to be ambushed in some dark alleyway, so she decided the smartest thing was to join them at MgRonald and seek out someone’s help when the time was right.
But then she noticed something. She shrugged her shoulders and gave the group a light nod. The young men, taking this as a sign of resigned agreement, flashed grins that didn’t exactly mark them as high-class people.
“Okay, cool! How ’bout we go sing some karaoke somewhere? Work some of that stress off!”
Chiho glared at the man. She didn’t know what was so “okay, cool” about that.
“Weren’t you taking me to dinner?”
“Hey, they got food at karaoke, too. You know that, right? So come on.”
Then, acting too familiar for his own good, he tried to grab Chiho’s hand.
“Don’t touch me, please,” she said in a slightly stronger tone of voice, brushing off the advance.
“Oops… Oh, you don’t need to act all stuck-up like—”
“Did you not hear me? I said don’t touch me.”
“…Look, I know we’re not exactly Prince Charming or whatever, but I’m not asking you to do anything…”
“And I’m telling you: Do. Not. Touch me. All right? I think it’s about time you gave up.”
“Whoa, why’re you glaring like that…?”
“Because I have to.”
“Hey!”
Suddenly, a deep, rumbling voice rang out as a gigantic shadow loomed over the men:
“The hell you people doing?”
“Huh? What’re…ah…?”
The men turned around, a bit surprised, only to find a sight that dominated the whole of their vision. It surprised them even more—his frame was easily bigger than the three of them put together, his deeply chiseled chin only adding to the intimidation.
“Uh… Ah, ah…oh…”
Considering the bravado they’d begun their advances with, the men didn’t seem quite so used to people challenging them on the street. The presence of Libicocco in street clothes completely destroyed their confidence.
“What do you guys want with our boss?”
“B-boss?!”
Chiho chuckled as the would-be pickup artists started to tremble. “‘Boss’…? Well, I guess you’re not totally wrong, but…”
“This way, Boss.”
“Right. Sorry to bother you.”
Called over by Libicocco, Chiho sauntered out of the men’s circle and hid behind his back.
“So. If you got business with the boss, what is it?”
“N-no, um…excuse me…”
As the man tried to sidle away, Libicocco used his rumbling voice to land the telling blow:
“Hey, kid. I work right nearby here, okay? If you try pulling this crap within sight of me again… You get me?”
“Eep…!”
With a yelp, the pickup artists fled into the crowds. After watching them go, Chiho let out a light sigh and bowed to Libicocco.
“Thank you. Sorry about that.”
“A couple of blows could’ve easily floored those humans. What were you doing?”
It was a non sequitur of a comment following her thanks, but Chiho laughed it off and shook her head.
“Well, I don’t have any attack moves I can pull off with my bare hands.”
“…I still can’t help but wonder why you stood up to me back then.”
Libicocco was talking about their first encounter, on the roof of Sasahata North High School.
“Well, then and now, I liked my chances of winning…or, you could say, I had an escape valve.”
“Did you? If I hadn’t finished my shift just now…”
“Sure. There’s a lot of people on this street, so if I’d started yelling or running, someone would’ve stepped up.”
“Most people ignore that, yes? I saw it on TV.”
A demon chieftain from the Malebranche tribe “saw it on TV.” Chiho found it hilarious, but she was just as aware of that.
“Oh, I would’ve been fine. Ms. Iwaki and Sariel are here, too, and nobody working at MgRonald would ignore trouble outside. They wouldn’t have that many customers at this time of night, either. So along those lines, I wasn’t scared at all.”
“Acting like you own this city…”
Libicocco almost looked disgusted at this but followed it up with a dumbfounded smile. Chiho smiled with him.
“In that case, I’m sorry I barged in.”
“Oh? No, don’t be! You really helped a lot. I could see you approach us, too, which helped me keep my head together.”
“Yes, but at a time like that, wouldn’t you want His Demonic Highness coming for you?”
He acted so normal saying that—he meant every word of it, too—that Chiho didn’t react for a moment.
“Even you think that way, Libicocco…?”
“No, I think one of Emilia’s friends said it.”
Why did Rika wind up talking about that with him? And why did he so readily accept it?
“After last night’s difficulties, my liege was exhausted all day. If you like, I could accompany you home.”
Chiho was ready to accept the offer. She was already curious about what these “difficulties” were, but:
“…Ah, I see. Well, tell him I said not to overexert himself.”
“Certainly.”
He did not tell Chiho about said difficulties. And on the way home, Chiho never tried asking Libicocco about them. Libicocco, perhaps picking up on this subtlety and never the chatty type in the first place, was mostly silent the whole way.
“…Well. It may not be for me to say, but don’t work yourself too hard. See you.”
“Right. Thank you very much. You take care, too, Libicocco.”
They parted ways at Chiho’s front door, completely like normal, and then Libicocco headed home.
Back in her room, Chiho put today’s textbooks and notes on her desk then went downstairs to the living room, where her mother presumably had a meal coming for her. In another moment, Chiho was watching her mother’s news program as she waited for dinner to be reheated.
Listening to the newscaster act all excited about international soccer scores, Chiho tried to imagine the difficulties Maou might be facing. It probably wasn’t any devastating event on Ente Isla—if it was, Libicocco would’ve surely broken the news to her first thing, and someone else would’ve rung up her phone by now. But if it wasn’t, something unexpected must’ve happened either at his apartment or at MgRonald.
“…He realizes he can always call me…”
“What was that, Chiho?”
“Ahh, nothing.”
Even she thought she was being unreasonable. Just the other day, she was complaining to Maou about being treated like a switchboard operator. Libicocco was there to hear it, and that was likely why he opted not to tell Chiho anything she didn’t ask about.
“Okay, it’s ready.”
“Oh, thank you.”
Picking at the reheated leftovers, Chiho mulled over her thoughts. Was Maou eating all right? Was life alone with Libicocco affecting his food habits for the worse? Acieth wasn’t sponging off him, was she?
…How is everyone doing?
“Something up, Chiho? Is it still cold?”
Her mother noticed her rather slow pace. Chiho just shook her head and consciously tried to speed herself up. She was done by the time the news ended, so she hopped back up to her room to “go over today’s classwork.”
Once the door was shut, she completely ignored the study desk she’d laid out yesterday, collapsed on her bed, and hugged a pillow.
“…Why can’t Suzuno just quit her Archbishop job?”
Again, Chiho was being unreasonable.
All the pain Suzuno was enduring in Ente Isla—and even her appointment to Archbishop, for that matter—was because of the wishes of Alas Ramus, and of the six people gathered in that apartment.
But still, Chiho couldn’t help but think that while Suzuno occupied Room 202, she would have a valid reason to visit Villa Rosa Sasazuka. With her around, Chiho could visit that apartment without worrying her mother. If she called up Suzuno and asked if she could use Room 202 like her personal study space when Suzuno was out, she’d be able to check up on Maou and the gang at any time. If Suzuno was still on Earth, Chiho could keep tabs on them, making sure they didn’t resort to junk food all day.
It was a selfish, self-serving thing to imagine.
“…If only…I had the kind of power Suzuno has…”
Her cleaning abilities, her fighting skills, her spirit, her broad-mindedness, her intelligence, and her age—no matter the category, she could never take on Suzuno and win. Suzuno, more than anyone else, was the adult woman she was closest to in her life. Even in this situation, she was working right alongside Maou with his full trust…and from the bottom of her heart, Chiho envied her.
“Ugghh… I’m sorry, Suzuno.”
Chiho apologized aloud for imagining Suzuno in vain. Suzuno had her own pains and distresses, things only she could understand. Only through lots of effort and struggling did she get to where she was today, but Chiho imagining herself teleporting straight into her position was beyond despicable. Still, her brain refused to stop imagining it.
This had happened before. Thanks to something beyond stupid, she’d let her jealousy for Emi get the best of her one winter’s day—the day she’d learned just how shallow and superficial she herself was. Come to think of it, it was Suzuno who’d consoled her back then, too, wasn’t it?
What would it take for Chiho to become a grown woman, like Emi, or Suzuno, or Rika or Akiko or Maki or Iwaki or Kisaki?
I don’t know. I don’t know.
Would she start to see how if she focused on her studies like any other kid, got admitted into a university, and led a college life like anyone else’s?
She didn’t feel that way at all. She didn’t feel like she could accomplish much of anything.
What had she done up to today? What had she achieved? Even when she’d obtained the Spear of Adramelechinus, it was Suzuno calling the shots for her. It wasn’t Chiho who had engineered that miracle—she had just stood in the center of it. That was the work of Suzuno for planning it, Adramelech for staying so attached to that land, and Dhin Dhem Wurs, Laila, Nord, Rika, Acieth, and Libicocco for making all the arrangements.
It wasn’t my power at all.
“…Nnngh…”
If her mind was stuck in this rut, she could easily run out and go to Room 201 right this minute. But the serious-minded, commonsense side stopped her, telling her that it wouldn’t solve anything. That normal side of her—gifted at acting like a good girl, even though she couldn’t even do anything—annoyed her. It was that side of her that took advice from people and had brought her to this point. So why did she want to throw in the towel after just a few days?
She wanted to scold herself. This was only the first wall to overcome. It was just like cutting down on your friends, your extracurriculars, your work, and your play for the sake of studying.
…No.
Something in her denied it.
It was all just a dream.
The whole Ente Isla thing was a dream, one Chiho only wished were true. Like a kid good at sports who wanted to turn pro someday. Like a kid addicted to manga who wanted to draw it for a living. Like a kid dreaming of being a big movie star. Ente Isla was a dream Chiho wanted to reach for in her life. But did that dream connect to the other end of the path she was trying to take? How could she connect it to the dream ahead?
I don’t know. I don’t know.
“Ahh… I just…nnggh…”
She just wanted someone to notice these pointless feelings she had. Her frustration made her groan. She couldn’t let her mother hear her, so she buried her face in her pillow, but it still made her groan.
She had no idea her heart was this weak. She had gotten too confident. Ashiya, and Suzuno, and Emi and Emeralda had given her all this praise, and she was deluded into thinking she was a strong person. Instead, she was nothing at all special. Left alone, she couldn’t fend off a pack of guys on the town. A few days of going to test prep, and she was already looking for excuses not to study. She was comparing the good points of her best friends with the worst points of herself, just wallowing in inferiority. She was a hopeless, helpless, spoiled child.
This must have been exactly why Maou never gave a reply to her confession. She was going to be like this for years, wasn’t she? Maou would forget all about her feelings, and then he’d probably stay in Ente Isla for good, handling this war against heaven she wasn’t even a part of.
She hated that so much.
She wanted to hang out and eat with everyone again. She wanted to cook with Ashiya and Suzuno; she wanted to play with Alas Ramus alongside the reluctant Urushihara; she wanted to comfort Maou whenever Yusa said something he didn’t like.
If Suzuno became an Archbishop… If Maou, Ashiya, and Urushihara created a new “demon race” in Ente Isla from their subjects in the demon realms… If Yusa brought Alas Ramus back to her family…
Those days would never come back. They couldn’t.
And I don’t have the right, nor the power, nor the value to demand that from everyone.
Because I’m the only human from Japan among them.
“…Hmm?”
And then she detected a trace of holy energy in the air.
Chiho lifted her face up from the pillow. It was just a tiny sliver, but after several days away from everyone, she was sensitive to that little change. It was leaking out from her desk drawer, and she knew what it was from.
From the drawer, she took out a small box.
“Is this…?”
Her ring, ensconced with a Yesod fragment, was lightly glowing. Apart from that, nothing was happening—but this was like nothing before now. Unless Chiho or someone else applied force to it, the fragment was just a jewel, transparent and a shade of pink. That was it.
“…”
Holding the box with the ring in it to her chest, Chiho thought for a moment.
“Whoa, what’s that?”
The fatigue made Maou waver a bit as he pointed at something in the corner of the room. Libicocco, perhaps expecting the question, gave him a baffled look as he pointed at the wall separating them from Room 202.
“Huh? She brought it over here? And then just left it?”
They couldn’t be blamed for their confusion. When Libicocco made it back home, he found that Room 201 now had what looked like a bladeless electric fan in the corner.
“Looks like it, my liege.”
“What’s her deal? I wanna ask, but I doubt she’s awake now. Her light’s out. When did you make it back home?”
“A little past eleven, I think. I stopped by the bathhouse.”
“Huh? Don’t you get off at ten? Did you go somewhere else?”
“Oh, umm…” Libicocco paused for a moment. “I…ran into Chiho Sasaki on the way.”
“Chi?”
“Yes. And, well, given how things were, I took her back home.”
“…Oh. Well, thank you.”
Libicocco sounded hesitant, but Maou, for his part, felt it best to avoid actively discussing Chiho as well for now. Apart from a few words of encouragement, he didn’t ask for any more details.
“It’s still a bit early, but maybe it was hot in here? That was mean of us. We never gave her a key, so she must’ve not been able to leave the building.”
“…No, she said she went shopping and visited the landlord like normal.”
Maou found himself poking at Suzuno, unavailable to defend herself, even though he knew it was pretty well impossible for any burglar to target his apartment. There wasn’t anything worth stealing in the first place, either.
“Hmm? So, again, why did she leave this here? And what about this?”
The fan wasn’t the only new member of the family.
“This has to be Suzuno’s. What could she be doing?”
On top of the refrigerator was perched a small stand mixer. They didn’t need any confirmation to know it didn’t belong to Room 201, so Suzuno must’ve brought it in for some reason.
“Ah, well. We can ask her tomorrow…and if Suzuno went to bed without contacting me, things must be chill with Acieth for now. I’m beat, so I wanna get some sleep. I’ll put down a futon.”
“My liege, you start work tomorrow morning with me as well, don’t you?”
“No, I begged Ms. Iwaki to change me to the afternoon. Luckily, I guess they were able to work it out with another location. I’m worried about Acieth, so…”
“Bell said she went over to cook or something crazy like that, but what happened anyway?”
“I don’t really know myself…but I think it’s a sign of something bad comin’ our way.”
Acieth’s illness simply amplified existing anxieties about the battle against heaven. Acieth had proven to be well-on unstoppable against the space-suited figure. In Heavensky, and at Sasahata North High, she had saved Maou’s hide on several occasions. He didn’t want to totally rely on her, but Acieth, just like Alas Ramus, was a Sephirah child who needed rescue. He didn’t want her to set out for the final battle while sick with…whatever this was.
“Oh, did Suzuno say anything about Ente Isla? Why did she come back home in the first place?”
“She didn’t say anything in particular. She was napping in this room when I arrived.”
Something was off. The last time Suzuno was home, her promotion to Archbishop had clearly shocked her. She and Chiho went out for udon noodles that night, discussing their future strategy, and she seemed to be reassured enough when she left. But maybe she wasn’t totally convinced yet. She’d never run off and abandon her role, of course, but it looked like he’d need to discuss matters with her.
“Humans can be a handful, can’t they?”
“Well, that’s gonna be part of the equation from now on. Let’s put down our futons. They’re in the closet… Whoa, what’s this?”
Opening the closet door, in the middle cubbyhole Urushihara usually called home, Maou found a large, unfamiliar machine sitting there. Not “unfamiliar” in that it didn’t belong to him, but in that he had no idea what it might be for.
“This may be worse than we thought…”
Suzuno had to be behind this. At this point, the thought of meeting her tomorrow scared him a little.
The next morning, about an hour after Libicocco had wrapped up breakfast and gone out for his all-day shift, Maou could hear Suzuno suddenly spring to life in the next room over. He winced at the noise—like she was moving something heavy around—but looking at his phone screen, he saw that it was late enough that he might as well get moving, so he rolled out of his futon and crept out the door.
“Ah…Devil King. My apologies. Did I awaken you?”
Suzuno was out in the corridor as well, and for reasons only she knew, she was carrying a microwave oven.
“N-no, it’s fine…but what’re you doing this early in the morning?”
Suzuno bashfully turned her eyes away.
“Well… It is oversize garbage day…so I am taking some out.”
“Oversize garbage day? You’re gonna throw that microwave away?”
Taking a closer look at the appliance, he saw that it had a sticker on the side indicating Suzuno had paid the required fee to Shibuya Ward’s sanitation department to have the garbage men haul it off. Despite that, it was definitely newer than the oven in Room 201, the buttons on it offering far more features.
“Hey, by the way—what’s been your deal since yesterday?”
“…There is nothing at all,” Suzuno replied, averting her eyes again.
Maou rolled his own. “Look, if you’re gonna lie, at least try to make it a good one, okay? Or act in a way that’s not gonna make me suspect the worst. Shouldn’t your line of work back home make that easy for you?”
“L-lay off of me. Out of my way, please. I need to bring this out front by nine AM.”
Her eyes, wincing and still pointed away from Maou, had faint dark circles below them. Maou winced his face even harder than she did and snatched the microwave from her hands.
“Will you quit playing stupid? Give it to me!”
“Ah! What are you doing?!”
“This is too nice to throw out, so I’m taking it. Now I’m sure of it! You’re trying to palm off that fan and the mystery machine in the closet on me, aren’t you? What the heck is that thing anyway? It’s huge and has a big-ass pipe stickin’ out of it.”
“It…is a futon dryer.”
“A futon dryer?”
The machine’s shape didn’t indicate that at all to him. Maou felt like he was about to lose his mind. Suzuno, taking this to mean she was being made fun of, began to blush as she turned her head down.
“That was my purchase, but I hardly used it at all…and I would prefer it did not go to waste.”
“I hate you so much. If you’re gonna throw stuff out, throw that out first! What do you think would happen if people knew you tossed this brand-new microwave? Ashiya would have the hissy fit of a lifetime, and it’s not even his.”
“It—it is none of his business. Besides, it is my property. I may do with it what I please—”
“Look, Great Demon General Crestia Bell, if a subordinate’s acting out of line, it’s their superior officer’s job to do something about it before it is too late.”
“Nrgh…”
Suzuno had taken advantage of her rank in the demon realms to make assorted demands of the Devil King Satan in the past. Having a chance to get back at her gave Maou a bit of a thrill—but seeing Suzuno stare at her feet, keeping her head down, kept the rush from lasting long.
“I’m not due at work till later. Come in for a late breakfast.”
“What?”
Suzuno flashed Maou a quizzical look at the sudden invite. Now it was Maou averting his eyes.
“Lately, I’m starting to get you a little,” he said as he took the microwave into Room 201.
“H-hey!”
Then, with a single flowing motion, he ripped the garbage sticker off the device.
“Whoa!”
“If you’re gonna be throwing stuff out, I’ll take it, and you can have this instead.”
He attempted to slap the sticker on the old microwave in Room 201. It refused to stick. This threw him.
“Huh? Why won’t it go on?”
“Because it is designed so you can only affix it to something once. Otherwise, people could steal your trash.”
“Really? Wait, so I gotta buy another one?”
“You can fill out the back side as well, so if you show that to the garbagemen, they will take it for you. Have you never done this before?”
“No. I’ve never bought anything oversize enough that it needed special handling like this. I’ve seen these stickers before, but I have no idea where you buy them. Can I get them at the convenience store or something?”
“Ah, I see. Ha-ha…ha-ha-ha-ha-ha…”
Suzuno apparently found this hilarious, but her laughter sounded hollow to him.
“Ha-ha…aahhhh… Sorry. I was not expecting any of this, you see…”
“You’re that bent out of shape over your promotion?”
“…” Suzuno didn’t answer. But the expression on her face was easy to read.
“Not that I’m in any position to talk, but you really need to get some rest. Your face looks terrible,” Maou said.
“…Over here…”
“Hmm?”
“Would it be all right if I slept in this room?”
“What?!”
She must have been referring to Room 201. She must have, but the request just made no sense.
“I don’t need to remind you that I don’t have a guest futon…”
“I know. But I want to sleep over here.”
……………Uhhhh……………uhh, all right. Whatever.”
Stricken by a terrible premonition of things to come, Maou grabbed his old microwave and the garbage sticker, attempting to beat a hasty retreat. He was stopped by Suzuno grabbing the back of his shirt.
“I, um,” he stammered. “I’ll leave the key out for you today—”
“You do not leave work until later, yes? I will stay awake until then.”
When he fearfully turned his head around, Maou’s eyes met with Suzuno’s. They were almost pleading with him. He had seen this once, before the battle against heaven—right on the outside corridor here, on a cold winter night.
“I am…a little tired,” she said softly.
“…”
In a weird way, Maou was glad this came after Libicocco had left for work, and while Acieth was being tended to at Shiba’s house. He sighed as he ruthlessly removed Suzuno’s fingers from his shirt.
“Gah?!”
He accidentally, and very lightly, hit Suzuno on the crown of her head with the microwave he was still carrying.
“Wh-what was that for?!” she protested.
Maou, a tad fatigued himself, snorted. “It wasn’t for anything, duh. It couldn’t have hurt that much.”
“Go ahead… Hit me when I’m down…!”
“If you’re ‘down,’ then say so. If you want time off, just file for some.”
“File for some?!”
“Remember what our relationship is, Great Demon General Crestia Bell?”
“Will you cease that?!”
“Just in case you have the wrong idea, the Devil King’s Army doesn’t work on snide little suggestions. In this office, communication is key. Am I right?”
“…Oof.”
“Or, what, did this relationship grow to the point where I’m expected to pick up on little hints from you?”
“Sh-shut up!”
It was a rather roundabout metaphor for Maou to use, but judging how Suzuno was bright red and about to tear up, he got his point across well.
“You’re the one who should shut up,” he said.
“Wh-where are you going?!”
Maou had intended to leave with that curt observation, but Suzuno’s half-screamed voice clung to him. Peeved, he looked down at what he was carrying.
“I’ll come back once I drop this off, okay? You’re way too old to be acting like an abandoned puppy. Also, that microwave’s mine now, all right? No takebacks.”
Maou eyed the clock for just a moment and left his room.
“…”
Suzuno was in a daze, but not five minutes after he’d left, she heard a large truck stop in front of the building. Then, five minutes later, Maou was back. Seeing that Suzuno was just as frozen up as ten minutes ago, he sat down on the floor, holding up his head with an elbow on his knee.
“So? What kind of pointless crap’s runnin’ through your head now?”
Chiho hated how weak-willed she was.
Because here she was, in front of Villa Rosa Sasazuka on a Saturday morning.
Nothing seemed unusual from the outside. The windows on Rooms 201 and 202 were shut, preventing her from seeing inside.
“Are Maou and Libicocco at work? …Ah!”
Peering into the front yard, she saw that the usual bicycle she’d expected to be there was gone. Maou, at least, must have a shift—and if he was working, that meant nothing had gone seriously wrong. Just because her Yesod fragment glowed a little, that apparently wasn’t enough reason to come hurrying over here. She had also visited to address the anguish she kept experiencing every night, worrying too much about everything, but that was impossible if nobody was home.
Just when she was about to turn around and head back—
“Huh?”
—Chiho stopped after noticing something small in the yard. It was on the other side of the entrance to the property, seated on the ground against the wall of Room 103: a boy staring at the sky and looking bored.
“Erone?”
“…Oh, Chiho! Good morning.”
Upon noticing her, he patted the dust off himself and ran up to her.
“Everyone upstairs is at work…and everyone else is over there.”
“Over there?”
Erone was pointing at Shiba’s house next door.
“Nord is at Ms. Shiba’s residence?”
She didn’t know what business he had there, but she wasn’t that aware of what he did in his life. Maybe it was plausible enough…
“You’re here to wish Acieth well, too, aren’t you?”
“Huh?”
The words wish Acieth well made Chiho’s face tense up.
“What happened to Acieth?!”
“Oh, you didn’t know? She’s been sick the past two or three days.”
“I’m sorry, I had no idea… I haven’t talked with Maou too much lately.”
“I know. You have ‘college prep’ to deal with, right? Acieth said so, too. She said we can’t get in your way.”
“B-but if she’s sick, I wanna at least see how she’s doing! Is she all right?”
“I dunno, but Amane said I shouldn’t come near her too much. That’s why I’m just watching stuff around here today by myself.”
“Oh. I’m sorry to hear that. Maybe she has the flu? Kind of late in the season for it, but… Or maybe some kind of bacteria in her gut?”
If they wanted Erone to keep his distance, it must be something contagious.
“Amane said she doesn’t know what it is, but… ‘Bacteria in her gut’ is a stomach thing, right? Maybe it’s that.”
“You think so?”
“Yeah,” Erone said, never one to show much emotion. “That, and she’s eating two hundred rice balls every day.”
“I don’t think I heard that right,” Chiho replied, not skipping a beat.
“Yes, you did. Two hundred.”
“Well, if she’s eating that many, no wonder she’s got tummy issues!”
“No, Chiho. She started eating two hundred rice balls after she got sick.”
“Wait, she didn’t get sick because of all the rice balls?!”
“I don’t think even Acieth could stuff that many in her stomach, normally…”
“Uhhhh, I’m sorry, I’m really confused here!”
Acieth’s world-class eating skills were common knowledge by now, but two hundred rice balls a day was beyond any “world” Chiho was aware of. Besides, putting together what she heard from many different people, even on a good day, she concluded that Acieth’s stomach could handle, at maximum, a bit over forty regular MgRonald hamburgers in one go. If they were talking the kind of rice ball sizes they sold at convenience stores, two hundred of them would weigh well over forty pounds.
Forty pounds of pure carbohydrates…a day? The amount of rice they’d need to pay for was ridiculous, not to mention the electricity required to cook it all. They’d have to start buying it by the pallet if that kept up, and without an industrial rice cooker or two, they’d never keep up the pace.
“And apparently she gets angry if the rice they use is the cheap kind, so—”
“She’s being that selfish?!”
“She says it ‘doesn’t work.’ I guess unless it really satisfies her, she lets out this crazy light beam from her face.”
“This is sounding a lot more serious than I thought!”
If Erone was calling it a “crazy light beam,” it must have been pretty grave indeed. Any light generated by a Yesod fragment could easily have the power to physically destroy stuff.
“So what on earth happened to her? My own fragment actually started to glow a bit for some reason, so I came here because I thought something may have happened to Acieth or Alas Ramus. This sounds pretty serious, doesn’t it?”
“…I’m sorry. I don’t know too much about the Yesod fragments. Mikitty said it might be going out of control, but mine’s different from hers, so…”
“Oh, um, sorry…”
Erone, after all, was the boy who’d stopped the subway in Tokyo once after being enveloped in a black, shadowy metal underneath Shinjuku. It probably wasn’t a tasteful question to ask him.
“But it sounds like Acieth started feeling sick right after Alas Ramus went to Ente Isla. I don’t know why that is, but I don’t think it’s unrelated. So…if you have the time, why don’t you go see her? I bet she’ll be happy to see you.”
“Okay. But… Oh! Right! Hey, you mind if I went into Nord’s apartment real quick?”
“Huh? That’s fine, but what do you need?”
Chiho put both fists up in the air. “I’m visiting Acieth when she’s ill. I need some kind of a gift, don’t I?”
Leaving Erone for now, Chiho jogged off to a supermarket near Sasazuka Station, barely bothering to look at the price tags as she filled up her shopping basket. The total at the cashier was higher than anything she had paid before, the handles on the plastic bags digging into her finger joints as she lugged them back to the apartment.
“Wow! That’s a lot!”
“Erone! You mind giving me a hand?”
“Okay! I help Nord in the kitchen every day, so anything you need!”
She patted Erone on the head as he marveled at the piled-up ingredients. Then she rolled up her sleeves.
“…Let’s do it!”
“Huh? Suzuno?!”
“What? Chiho?!”
“Oh, you’re an angel from heaven! That’s food, isn’t it?! More provisions?!”
That last line would sound natural from Acieth, but instead it came from Amane, looking a bit thinner after not being out for a few days. Without a moment’s hesitation, she grabbed the pot in Chiho’s hands and whisked it straight to the room Acieth was resting in.
“Acieth! I have a treat from Chiho!”
“You do?!”
If anything, Acieth sounded healthier than ever to Chiho. But:
“Oh, come on, not in one bite!”
By the time Chiho ran into the room, the large pot filled with enough stew to feed her whole family for dinner and still have leftovers for tomorrow was completely gone, not a drop remaining.
“That was gooooooooooooooooooood!!”
“Well? Think you can hold out a bit?! It’s twenty minutes until the next meal!”
“I think, I do okay!”
“Don’t worry, Amane! I’ve got a lot more where that came from, and I’ll cook some rice, too!”
“What are you, some kind of goddess?!”
Amane wasn’t her usual self. She was shedding tears, even.
“Suzuno is heating up some oden soup in Nord’s apartment! We’re working on three different flavor patterns, so can I bring them in as we finish them?”
“Got it!”
Both Chiho and Suzuno were wondering why the other one was there, but seeing Acieth’s current state, they could definitely work that out later. Chiho had only a brief glance, but the walls and ceiling of Acieth’s room appeared pockmarked with innumerable holes and damage—it was as if some Mafia gun battle had taken place in there, no doubt the “light from her face” Erone had talked about. If she shattered a window and the neighbors heard it, there would be absolutely no explaining this.
“Mm? Chiho! What are you doing here?!”
There, wearing a frilly apron that matched his tall frame poorly, Nord was carrying a tray with a good loaf’s worth of bread slices, toasted and topped with honey, fruit, ice cream, and so on.
“I heard from Erone! Sorry, but I’m borrowing your kitchen for a bit!”
“All right! Thank you!”
Dark circles weighed down the appearance of his eyes. Cooking for Acieth for several days in a row must have taken him to the brink.
“Okay, coming up, we have oden, curry, pork miso soup, and rounds two and three of the stew on deck!”
““Thanks!”” screamed the two grown-ups as Chiho followed after Suzuno, rushing over to prepare more food. Amane and Nord, their voices almost breaking, told Chiho everything she needed to know about the trouble they faced, something she didn’t expect at all. With her getting involved and opening up Room 202 as well, there were now three kitchens in full operation, and by the afternoon, Acieth’s room was finally full of enough food to keep her sated for the day.
“You truly saved us, Chiho. Acieth seems to have quite the appetite today…”
“She went through over a hundred rice balls this morning alone. She’s got to be getting sick of them.”
“Sick…? Ah, yeah, you might be right.”
For a moment, this sounded incredibly extravagant to Chiho. Then she realized that eating a hundred of just about anything would likely get boring fast.
In the living room of Room 202, Suzuno was slumped over her tea table, completely spent. Chiho was sitting cross-legged, chuckling to herself. For now—whether she was full, or some other condition within her was satisfied—Acieth was taking a nap. In the meantime, rice was cooking away at the kitchens in Room 101, Room 202, and Shiba’s house, and it was time for a break before prepping Acieth’s dinner.
“Erone told me she ate two hundred rice balls a day,” Chiho said.
“The quantity changes depending on her condition, apparently. The worse she feels, the more gluttonous she becomes. We were solely focused on things we could produce a great deal of. Picking up oden soup ingredients from the supermarket never occurred to us. We can buy a lot of that for cheap, so we will have to rely on that and hold out for now.”
“Yeah, in terms of having to take her time eating, it’s a good idea. Hopefully, she can build up more of an immunity or whatever.”
“Normally, if you ate that much, your body would physically fall apart.”
“It’s strange, isn’t it? You know, a lot of people who can eat a whole lot are actually really small and skinny. Like, their stomachs are located lower down than most people’s, and that lets them pack in a lot more, I heard.”
“It hardly matters where her stomach is. How could hers possibly hold ten or so pounds of rice at once? Ugh…”
“You know, though, I haven’t been running around a kitchen cooking like that since I quit my job. It was hard but kinda fun, too.”
“Ha-ha-ha… Ugghhh.” Suzuno turned her face away a little. “I am sorry. Relying on you like this, when you can least afford it… Are you safe not having to visit that ‘test-prep center’ today?”
“I have a class tonight, but I’ll be free until evening. We were so busy that I never got a chance to tell you, but earlier…”
Chiho explained that she stopped by today because her Yesod fragment was acting like it never had before, raising concern that something had happened to Acieth or Maou.
“And what you found,” observed Suzuno, “was sheer gluttony.”
“I tried bringing my ring up to Acieth’s forehead while she was sleeping, but nothing special happened at all. Maybe it’s unrelated.”
“I doubt it is wholly unrelated. Perhaps they are meant to react together in some different way.”
“Some different way?”
“All these Yesod fragments manifest themselves in different ways, you see. If you try to force the reaction, it could only drive them further beyond our control.”
This gave Chiho pause. Maybe that little experiment earlier was carelessly unwise of her.
“Well,” continued Suzuno, “we will have to continue waiting and seeing. On the other hand, just because Acieth is facing issues may not mean Alas Ramus is in the same boat… Besides, thanks to a few recent events, I have a much better grasp of the timing of our upcoming Crusade.”
“Oh, you do?!”
“Yes. In the meantime, we will have to wait either for Acieth to improve, or for more news to come from Emilia or Alciel. We can consider our next steps at that point. But until then…”
“Um, Suzuno…?”
“Mm?”
“When did you come back here? I don’t think it’s been that long since you got appointed Archbishop… Are you supposed to be on the Northern Island right now?”
“No, the Western at the moment. I am back at headquarters, in the midst of a purification ritual for my upcoming ordination.”
“In the midst of it…?”
That made Suzuno’s presence in front of her right now a mystery.
“I have…absconded from it. It is an annoying rite.”
“You can do that?!”
Piecing together everything Suzuno had said during her last visit, the appointment of a new Church Archbishop was a historical event, on the level of inaugurating a U.S. president or choosing a pope in the Vatican. That was when she had heard that the ordination ceremony itself only comes after a long itinerary of observances and rituals. Despite that, the person behind all this epoch-making Ente Isla news was currently crafting rice balls in her landlord’s kitchen. That couldn’t be right.
Suzuno’s hangdog face stretched out across the table.
“It is fine. Nobody is looking anyway.”
“No?”
Suzuno sounded like she was making excuses for running a red light at two in the morning. It flummoxed Chiho.
“This purification rite—it actually has a far more florid name than that, but nevertheless—has been assigned to me for ten days, this being a special case. Anyone being ordained must report to an area within our headquarters known as the Divine Grotto, where they must meditate and pray for a set period of time. That is where I theoretically am at the moment.”
In actuality, of course, she was in a sixty-year-old apartment building cooking rice balls.
“Well, if you think that’s okay, then fine by me, but…”
“Nobody will be checking up on me, trust me. That is how these matters work. Thus, I am free to do what I want here for another week.”
That was Suzuno’s claim, and she seemed reasonably sure of herself. It also certainly served Chiho’s needs, as well as those of the Devil King’s Army. But it still seemed very strange for Suzuno to openly flout something like that…and Suzuno must’ve picked up on Chiho’s apprehension.
“Why would I ever want to hole up in a dark, gloomy chamber and keep Alas Ramus so terribly depressed as I prayed?”
She seemed to be using the meanest words possible to describe the proposition.
“Earlier, Chiho, I must admit, I treated you very poorly. But I truly was unnerved by the announcement, and I truly had no idea what to do about it.”
“Oh, um, that’s okay…”
“But now… How to put it? It all just seems so ridiculous.”
“Being an Archbishop?”
“…Many things. Normally, this purification rite would take a month.”
“Wow! A whole month?”
That sounded long to Chiho, but considering the holiness of the position and the influence it had on the world, it didn’t seem that far out of line.
“But what do you think Archbishop Mauro told me? The man tasked with supervising our department of holy scriptures and teachings? He said we could shorten it to ten days, ‘given the circumstances.’”
“Oh? He can just do that?”
“No. Not normally. But apparently, given the urgent need to hurry along the Crusade, God will allow it this time. Convenient, is it not?”
“And this ‘Divine Grotto,’ let me tell you, is another fine piece of work.”
The derision echoing in her voice certainly didn’t sound like something from the mouth of a future Archbishop. But it also didn’t sound like Suzuno, who knew the identity of her religion’s God and declared that her true faith lay within her own heart.
“There is a large rock there, which you are meant to sit on and pray, or…exorcise yourself, you could say. It forms a natural sort of surface to sit on and contemplate the mysteries of nature or whatnot…but there is actually a cushion built into it.”
“Huh? A cushion?”
“To be exact, a ‘cushion’ of scraps of cloth, plant leaves, and whatever sand and earth there is around the rock. The Archbishops of all the past generations must have built it up over the years, to preserve their legs and make the thirty-day prayer session less of an ordeal. This grotto is atop a rising cliff, but it is dry and airy up there, well exposed to sunlight. It is actually rather soft to sit on, like straw.”
“Wouldn’t people get mad if they knew about that?”
“Only those at the very peak of the ecclesial bureaucracy would ever have a chance to sit there. Who would question something that generations of Archbishops have participated in? It is akin to a secret cubbyhole in a school classroom, something passed down from era to era.”
That seemed like a rather common thing to compare it to.
“And listen to this. Normally, I am meant to survive the rite with only a small supply of beans, vegetables, and water, supplied by the last Archbishop to be ordained…but let me tell you, my provisions were several dozen times fancier than what I expected.”
“Fancier?”
Suzuno questioned why her stipend differed so much from the standards she had read. Mauro, who was ordained after Cervantes despite being much older, casually explained that since her ceremony would come immediately after this rite (and the Crusade right after that), there was no need for excessive self-restraint that could affect her health at a delicate time.
“And hearing that… Well, I think it broke something within me. My very faith in the Church.”
Here was a Church eager to bend its rules whenever that made things easier. Right now, of course, a successful Crusade was their primary concern—especially considering what had triggered that Crusade in the first place, the “holy dream” all the current Archbishops somehow had at the same time. Clearly it was divinity at work, and thus, it really should behoove them to consider God’s intentions as they went ahead with the ordination procedure. Instead, in the name of the golden banner of a Crusade, all “holiness” was being cast aside—and the Archbishops, supposedly moved to tears by the divine vision they’d had, saw no concern about that whatsoever.
“It is all one giant contradiction,” Suzuno uttered bitterly. “These people, driven by God to take action, are ignoring the very things that must be done to support this God. How could this nonsense ever be tolerated? They literally saw God, in the flesh—but my ordination, and my prayers, are all being cut down two-thirds because time is so short. How can they be so content with that?”
“…I don’t know… I’m afraid I might offend you if I say this, Suzuno, but…” Chiho began.
“Go ahead.”
“I think all the Archbishops…want God to praise them, don’t they?”
“…”
“They saw, and experienced, all of that…so I think they want to do whatever it takes to answer the call. But those were just dreams. It’s not like they caught God on a surveillance camera. If they want the Archbishops to believe, they’ll need to keep using the current Church system as it exists. So…”
“Yes?”
“I think the Archbishops actually believe in God more than they ever did before, actually. And then—”
“Right. You are absolutely right.”
“I came to the same conclusion.”
“Huh?”
Suzuno sat up and grasped Chiho’s hand in both her own.
“And that is exactly why I ducked out of it.”
“What?”
“Their faith has likely regressed back to its original, simplest, purest level. So they decided to try to bend the long-established rules behind all the showy ceremonies, things decided by God-knows-who long ago, the way a politician may try to massage the law to his advantage. As they see it, there are more important matters at hand, no doubt. They want to exercise the full brunt of their powers, for the sake of their true ‘God.’ …Chiho?”
“Y-yes?”
“What do you think this is called?”
“Um… What do I think it’s called?”
“Yes. The Archbishops exercising their full powers for the sake of God.”
“Oh? Umm…”
“Personally, I would call it love.”
“Looove?” Chiho repeated in surprise. That had come out of nowhere.
“Love does not seek compensation,” Suzuno said. “Faith is the same way. Sometimes it is a bond that helps you control yourself, but at the same time, if you want a fulfilled heart and a peaceful society, then love is absolutely necessary.”
“Y-yeah, you’re right…but what’s wrong, Suzuno? Are you tired out?”
Chiho didn’t think Suzuno had ever talked to her so fervently about religion before. She was born into the Sasaki family, which was apparently Buddhist, but there was no altar or other accessories around the house. The topic was rarely one she considered in her daily routine. And that was Japan in a nutshell—people giving each other Christmas presents, going to the local Buddhist temple on New Year’s Eve, and switching to the Shinto shrine on January 1 proper without a second thought. When a distant relative passed away, Chiho offered incense to a shrine during the funeral; when her cousin in Nagano got married, she took dozens of photos of the chapel.
Right now, Suzuno didn’t seem like a “cleric,” or a practitioner; someone who knocked on your door and started going on about God or the Buddha or holy scriptures unprompted. She seemed more like an evangelist, and that made Chiho step back a little. Suzuno, perhaps picking up on this, looked aside, a bit ashamed of getting overly excited, as she let go of Chiho’s hand and sat straight up.
“M-my apologies. This was just such a revolutionary new way of thinking for me that I, erm, became a bit excited.”
“No, it’s fine, but… Really, what happened to you, Suzuno? You sounded like you didn’t want to be an Archbishop earlier, but are your feelings, you know, changing about that…?”
“They have. Yes, I suppose they have.”
Suzuno, kneeling properly on the floor, stretched her body and looked at Chiho, her chilly eyes betraying none of the passion from before.
“You see…I envy you, Chiho.”
“You do?”
Yet another curveball. Suzuno was showing different colors to Chiho with each passing minute.
“You have the kind of convictions that took me over twenty years and the total upheaval of my world to finally gain a vague grasp of.”
“Uhmm…”
“The four Archbishops, through this Crusade, inadvertently came to acquire a love-based devotion from it—a devotion that sprang from the joy of having God look toward them. That was all it took to gain this desire to do anything for your chosen target, without any expectation of being repaid. This feeling.”
Chiho mentally prepared herself for more of the same from before. Then she noticed something odd. When Suzuno said “this feeling” just now, she did something strange with her body.
“After the Crusade succeeds, the Archbishops will all undoubtedly acquire untold amounts of earthly wealth. God, on the other hand, will give them nothing. Of course not…because we are going to slay that god. The ‘God’ of our scripture does not exist in Ente Isla, but I am sure they will silently accept this lack of repayment, not a single moment of enmity in their minds. They will remain dedicated to their faith, all because of that single dream they were given…”
“Suzuno?”
Suzuno had been keeping her right hand at her heart the whole time. Her cheeks were flushed. She was older than Chiho, but there was innocence in her expression—full of a small, flickering, but still unmistakable happiness.
The expression reminded Chiho of something. It was nothing Suzuno had showed before. No, Chiho herself had. She knew how it felt.
“So I realized. I… I believe that I love…Sadao Maou. Satan, the Devil King.”
“…”
As much as she understood the words, Chiho found her heart strangely calm about them.
“I felt the responsibilities of my appointment crush me. I was disillusioned by the Archbishops trivializing the ceremonies. But I said nothing to anyone as I returned to Room 202. Then I ran into the Devil King, looking about ready to die. And I thought to myself: As painful as this is for me, why have I never considered any other path besides the one I am on? You may laugh if you want. But even as I was thrown for a loop by the fleetingness of the Church’s faith, here was this man, exhausted from making rice balls for Acieth, hoping to retire early for tomorrow’s workday, but too concerned that Alas Ramus may be in trouble as well—but, also, too weary to think straight, head hanging down as he sat on the floor. Seeing him convinced me. This was why I came back. Because I wanted to see him in these beautifully normal times.”
She spoke with a quick pace, the exaltation spreading across her face.
“The Church is a house that protects its faith based upon love. To me, the Church—my home—is in this apartment building. It is the Devil King I love, and life with everybody here… So…from the bottom of my heart…I envy you, Chiho.”
A tear welled up in the joyous Suzuno’s eye. “Simply because you love him, you are able to be with the one you love…and I envy that.”
“…Can I ask you a question?”
“…Please.”
Chiho, her voice sounding a bit tense, felt no jealousy or malice toward Suzuno. In fact, she half knew the answer already.
“Didn’t Maou run away from you? Didn’t he make a face, come up with some diversion, bring up his upcoming shift, and run off on you?”
“…!”
That seemed to surprise Suzuno. She opened up her eyes.
“…How did you know that? That…I told the Devil King about what is in my heart?”
“Oh, I can tell. I’m your friend, Suzuno.”
Chiho smiled, looking a tad distressed. Now it was her taking up Suzuno’s hand.
“Suzuno, you’re not the type of person who can hide what you really love, are you?”
“…You think not?”
“Whenever you have some udon or whatever else you like, you always have a big smile on your face. When you see a pretty hairpin, or Alas Ramus is being cute, or you see something else you love, you’re grinning from ear to ear. And then you always fervently go on about what makes them so great, don’t you? From multiple angles.”
“You… You may be right…”
“It’s always the same thing. That’s why I thought you probably told him.”
Suzuno looked surprised at Chiho’s intuition but quickly averted her eyes. Her pace accelerated as she attempted to make an excuse.
“At—at first, I just discussed everything I knew about the other side. I wanted to—to share what I knew, is all.”
“Right, and then you built up some momentum. And honestly, I do the same thing. Like, you probably heard me, didn’t you, Suzuno?”
“Oh, er, um, my apologies. The way things were then, you know, I had some more…malice in mind, you could say, um…”
“But now, even though you know I love Maou, you just can’t hold it in anymore, can you?”
“Mm…”
That much meanness, Chiho figured, would be forgiven. She pat the shoulder of the silenced Suzuno and shook her head.
“It really brings me back, you know? Me treating you as my sworn enemy, trying my hardest to keep you from taking him… Learning all about cooking from my mother… But back then, to me, you were nothing but this anonymous grown-up woman. Now, for the first time…you’re my rival in love.”
“Chiho… I don’t want you to have the wrong idea. I have no interest at all in being betrothed to the Devil King, or spending my life with him forever. But I love him, so if I can remain someone precious to him, I would hope for nothing else… To tell you the truth, I planned to take this opportunity to move out of Room 202.”
“Huh?”
After her ordination, Suzuno intended to serve as both Archbishop and Great Demon General, working as a kind of buffer between the Western Island (not likely to accept demons moving in anytime soon) and the other continents. If so, however, she wouldn’t be able to while away the hours in Room 202 like a retired grandmother, looking through kimono catalogs and playing with Alas Ramus whenever she visited. So she was trying to get rid of her furniture and appliances in a hurry, and that was when Maou had caught her.
“Oh, so that’s why…”
“Hmm?”
“When I was cooking in Room 101, I noticed this microwave in the corner that wasn’t plugged into anything. I thought I had seen it somewhere before, but that was Maou’s, wasn’t it?”
“Huh?! So he didn’t throw that away after all?!”
“Oh, I think he probably intended to return it once you calmed down a little, Suzuno. But he didn’t know what was troubling you then, so I bet he just had Nord keep it until he could go fetch it again.”
“…”
Chiho didn’t think her theory was far off the mark. Suzuno was nodding to herself now, convinced. Seeing that, Chiho looked at the spot formerly occupied by the microwave currently in Room 201.
“And along those lines, you know, I’m just so incredibly jealous of you. You know, Suzuno?”
“Huh?”
“Maou’s so casual with you, you’re way better at any kind of domestic chore than I am, and just imagining you two talking about whatever little thing just because you get to live next to each other… And, you know, whenever Maou acts along the lines of, like, ‘just leave the Church and the Western Island to Suzuno, she’ll work it out,’ it just amazes me; the equal footing you have with him. I mean, I know he values me, but we’re still not really equals at all. I’m still just a kid.”
“No you’re not! Chiho, you…!”
“I’m a child. Unlike you, no matter how much I love Maou, I’m not an adult on equal footing with him. I’m just ‘Chi,’ you know? It took your help, and Libicocco’s and Lidem’s, before I could finally be called ‘Chiho.’ Remember how much of a kid Maou treated me as when I went out for the zirga?”
She ran an idle hand against the tatami floor.
“I’m grasping for something that doesn’t exist. But if you feel the same way, Suzuno, I figure—you know—asking for this much wouldn’t be frowned upon. I’m in the same boat you are.”
Then she turned toward Room 201.
“What do I want? I want to keep joining you all for meals forever. Forever and ever.”
“Chiho…”
“And yes, I’d like to marry him, and no, I don’t want you to take him, and so on and so forth. But until yesterday, I was truly worried that we’d never be able to eat together like before again. You’re going to be an Archbishop, Maou and his friends are going to Ente Isla to do all their demon duties, Alas Ramus and Acieth and Erone are gonna live in heaven with their family…Yusa, and her parents, will go back to their home village… And then I’d just be stuck reminiscing with you, like ‘Oh, we all went through a lot in Japan, but it was sure nice, wasn’t it?’ And then our magic will fade away, and we won’t be able to open any Gates…and I’ll be all grown up in Japan. But…”
The only possible picture of the future. The one she spent evenings mulling over, face buried in her pillow. But now Suzuno was driving a wedge into that sad scenario.
Or maybe Emi was the first to do that. The day before she went to Ente Isla, Emi said she felt safe taking the journey because Maou was so dedicated to his daily routine on Earth. And now, here in Room 201, Suzuno had discovered her own feelings for Maou as he struggled with his life—and revealed them to him. Nobody was rich among them; it was a constant riot, but there was something warm about that dining table. It was precious, deep within their hearts; more than Suzuno or Emi or even Chiho realized.
So wasn’t it all right for Chiho to express herself a little more, if she wanted to preserve it?
“Hey, Suzuno, what’s it like in Ente Isla right now?”
“Um? What?”
Suzuno helplessly blinked at the sudden change of subject.
“What were you going to report back to Maou about first? Like, about how the Crusade schedule’s changed because of your ordination, or about how Urushihara and Laila took Kinanna over and that changed a whole bunch of things?”
“Er… Yes. Farfarello in the North and Emeralda in the West provide me with information from reliable sources, so I think they can be trusted. Emeralda did chew me out for never telling her my birthplace, but…”
Chiho, not knowing much about the ordination process, wasn’t sure why that was an issue. But between her Yesod fragment glowing last night and running into Erone earlier, her mind had been full of vague thoughts, and now she wanted to act on them.
“Suzuno?”
“Y-yes?”
“You being my love rival makes me want to steel myself and say ‘Here we go!’ on the one hand…but on the other, I think I’m gonna get to like you even more, which I’m glad for.”
“Um…yes… Using the term love rival to describe it strikes me as very, ah, embarrassing, but…”
“But on the other hand, there’s also something I’m angry about.”
“Oh! W-well, of course, I—”
“With Maou, I mean.”
“Huh? Him?”
Even after everything she’d said before, Suzuno was prepared to have Chiho lay it on her. Instead, she got a very thoughtful look from the girl, much to Suzuno’s surprise.
“I’m angry because I’ve been letting his reply to me slide for so long, pestering him and seeing him get all confused about it, and now he’s taking the exact same approach with you as well.”
“W-well, my own confession came so suddenly, and I did not suggest we become a couple or anything of the sort, so there was little in the way of a reply he could give…”
“But if there’s no chance at all, I want him to say that. We’re talking a demon and a human being. I’m not going to expect our feelings for love to be exactly the same, so if he could just tell me, I could accept it and wait, or give up, or whatever I need to do. But he won’t even do that. He acts like he’s got the human race all figured out, and yet he’s pulling all this. In fact, I bet right now he’s complaining with Kawacchi about how he’s dreading coming home tonight because he was all vague with you and didn’t say what he meant!”
Chiho was taking advantage of Maou’s absence to draw a pretty vivid picture, and why it made her angry. And she wasn’t done yet:
“So I’ve decided on something. And if I want to take action on it, Suzuno, I need you to lend me some of your time after this. We have a few things we need to discuss.”
“And once we work it all out…”
To Suzuno, who had just admitted her love for Maou to Chiho, her suggestion was enough to make her keel over.
“…Would you mind joining me at MgRonald?”