HMS 3-1

Chapter 1

The Demon King and Hero Unwittingly Become Parents

In a room filled with the smell of machine oil and metal, polished gears began revving and spinning.

The chain machinery generated great power and acceleration from minimal power input. Furthermore, the new gear shifting system allowed for flexible control.

The frame that composed the body was polished and shiny. Light, but sturdy.

Its safety features were also top-class. Optic sensors allowed automatic safety flash activation to the front, and an alarm let the user know the location of the vehicle. Also included were reflector plates which allowed for quick response in the event of unforeseen enemy contact from any direction.

Its ease of use however, did not take away from its loading capacity or the comfort of the cockpit at all.

The seat was made of leather. It had a high-capacity container in the front, and an option to outfit loading units in various locations.

“So, what do you think? I got you everything you wanted!”

The mechanic, who was covered in the smell of machine oil, pointed to the machine proudly.

“…I won’t know until I try it out.”

The other young man shook his head and made a difficult expression. And then, the oily man replied,

“I thought you’d say that. I’m done with setting it up, and I put everything I have into it. It’ll weather a hundred years of you riding it, no problem.”

He crossed his arms as if issuing a challenge.

“I look forward to testing that.”

The young man grinned and helped himself onto the seat.

“Oh… this is…”

The man covered in machine oil grinned at his surprised tone.

Off to the side, a small shadow watched the two men and muttered gloomily.

“What kind of farce is this?”

Paying no attention to the voice, the young man grabbed the handle and stepped on the right pedal.

In that moment, the man exclaimed in a shocked voice,

“Whoooooa! Amazing! It’s so light! Having a gear shifting system on a bike makes it this light!?”

The young man let out a great shout with a broad smile on his face as he pedaled out of the storage room and rode around.

“I’ll take it!”

“Great! And since it’s you, Maou-chan, I’ll give you a special discount. How does 29,800 yen sound?”

“You’re the best, Hirose-san! Oh, and she’s paying for it. Thanks, Suzuno.”

The young man called Maou nodded to a girl who was wearing a yukata and sitting in a folding chair.

The man covered in machine oil raised his eyebrows and looked at the girl.

The girl Maou had called Suzuno, who looked like she did not want to be there at all, took out a traditional silk coin purse.

“Shop Master, what was the meaning of of your verbal exchange just now?”

Hirose’s Cycle Shop was a five minute walk from Sasazuka Station, which was on the Keiou line in the Bosatsu-Doori* shopping district of Shibuya. Hirose, the manager, took the towel that was wrapped around his head and laughed.

“He’s just really enjoying himself! But are you really going to pay for it, miss? Are you Maouchan’s girlfriend?”

In that moment, the girl’s entire face twitched.

“Please do not make such a poor joke. There was a certain circumstance that forced me to pay for it. Sadao-dono, how long are you going to loaf around for? Do you not need to fill out a antitheft registration form or something? Return here immediately.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Sadao Maou came back with a grin stretching across his face, along with his brand-new, shiny, high-end city bicycle.

The aluminum frame was equipped with reflector plates in all directions and a headlight that turned on automatically in the dark. It was Maou’s dream bicycle, the six-speed Bridgesutton* city bike.

The bicycle itself is 29,800 yen, and the anti-theft registration is 300 yen… Let’s round it off by giving you another discount. How does 30,000 yen even sound?”

(Note: The Bosatsu-Doori shopping district is a spoof of the Kannon-Doori shopping district, and

Bridgesutton is a spoof of Bridgestone, a Japanese bicycle manufacturer.)

“I thank you for your generosity.”

Suzuno took out three neatly folded 10,000 yen bills, flattened them out, and handed them over.

“Thanks. Since you’re here already, why don’t you get one too, Miss? How ‘bout it?”

Suzuno shook her head, despite Hirose’s recommendation.

“I have not had the necessary training, so I will have to decline for now.”

“Necessary training?”

Hirose tilted his head slightly. Suzuno answered in a serious tone,

“I have heard that riding a bicycle does not require a license, but instead requires training through objects called ‘training wheels.’”

Hearing her, Maou imagined the short Suzuno furiously riding a children’s bicycle with training wheels, and almost burst out laughing.

“That might be pretty cute.”

“You are not thinking of something stupid, are you?”

Seeing Maou trying to contain his laughter, Suzuno glared over at him.

“Sigh… Shop Master, I would like a copy of the receipt.

“Huh? Oh, right. Is it alright with you if it’s handwritten? It’s 30,000 yen, so I’ll need my seal.”

“Please make it out to ‘St. Ignold, Inc.’”

Maou was surprised upon hearing that.

“He-hey, that’s…”

However, Hirose did not react in the slightest. He quickly finished writing the receipt, and tore it off. 

“Here, thanks! Maou-chan, since she bought it for you, take good care of it.”

“Uh, yeah…”

Leaving the bicycle shop with Hirose sending them off, they walked into the street of the shopping district and headed toward the apartment complex where they lived.

Maou was giddy with his brand new bicycle, but Suzuno grimaced in the summer heat under her parasol.

“What’s the point of you getting a copy of the receipt?”

“If I keep accurate records of my expenditures, I might be able to have them reimbursed in the other world after I defeat you in the future.”

“So you’re going to tell them ‘I was forced to pay for a bicycle for my target, the demon king,’ or something like that?”

Suzuno glared from under the parasol.

“Should I also tell the Church’s clergy that Demon King Satan was a cheapskate demon who forced another to pay for his bicycle?”

“This is an age where leaders are expected to be moderate with their resource usage. It’s supposedly not a bad thing for the ruler to look like they care for the commoners and show their dedication to eco-friendliness. And I’ve got that down!”

The demon king who boasted of his eco-friendly appeal stopped, and turned towards the shop that he had just passed.

“Hold up a sec, Suzuno. I need to stop by the stationery shop.”

Maou locked his bike by the roadside, and headed into the small shop, which looked more like the kind of place that would sell toys or sweets rather than stationary. When he came back outside, Suzuno looked quizzically at the item he had purchased.

“What are you buying instant glue for?”

“Heheheh, glad you asked! Take a look at this!”

Maou grinned, and took out a small, red piece of plastic out of his pocket.

“This is the reflector plate from Dullahan, the bike you destroyed. When the police called me there and were about to scrap it, I was able to get this back. It’s like a memento.”

Maou glued the reflector plate onto the new bike’s metallic front basket.

“Now, he has inherited the soul of Dullahan, who proudly sacrificed his life to protect his master!

Henceforth, he shall be known as DullahanII!”

“…Good for him.”

She had nothing against Maou being attached to his possessions, but she thought that a man his age giving his bicycle a name was sad to look at in many ways.

“Are you finished? Let us go, Demon King.”

And that man was none other than the nemesis of all humanity, the lord of all demons, Demon King Satan.

The girl who called herself Suzuno Kamazuki while she was in Japan sighed deeply, and began walking without waiting for Maou’s reply.

Suzuno walked gloomily as her clear, glass hairpin reflected the bright summer sun that shone straight through her parasol.

***

Demon King Satan. The lord of demons who had attempted to conquer the distant, alternate world of Ente Isla.

Sadao Maou. The young adult who made a living through part-time jobs in a residential area just outside the city of Tokyo.

No human or god could have predicted that one day, the demon king who aimed to take over the world would find himself living meal-to-meal by taking part-time jobs near Sasazuka Station in Shibuya, Tokyo.

A little over a year had passed since he lost the battle against the Hero, Emilia Justina, and found himself in the alternate world, Japan.

Making the sixty-year-old wooden apartment in Villa Rosa with an area of six tatami mats into his temporary Demon King Castle, the demon king Satan — or rather, Sadao Maou — became a part-time worker who had taken control of his future. However, in just a few months, many incidents had occurred in his vicinity.

The first year was filled with hardships and money had been hard to come by, but he had worked diligently every day.

And about nine months ago, he had been promoted to a long-term, part-time position at a MgRonald located near Hatagaya Station, one stop away from Sazuka Station. Earning the approval of his supervisor, a position which he himself hoped to be attain one day, Maou’s life in Japan began to settle on its course.

However, the moment Hero Emilia, who had taken on the name Emi Yusa, arrived in order to give chase to the exiled Demon King, his peaceful days ended.

On the other hand, one could also say that the busy, law-abiding lifestyle of making enough money to eat through a part-time job was never peaceful to begin with.

Either way, his traitorous former subordinate nearly killing him and even humans betraying their own Hero certainly qualified as disruptions of his everyday routine.

The Demon King resolved all those incidents and his peaceful life returned. He went back to diligently working part-time and earning a living so he could eat three meals a day.

Even when the Hero came over from three train stops away to pick a fight, and a clergy of the Church of the Divine Creed moved in next door in order to whittle away at the demons’ health using holy food, the Demon King kept living the life of an ordinary citizen in order to someday resume his plan to take over the world.

Holding onto the belief that this ordinary, everyday life and his diligent work at MgRonald in order to climb up the corporate ladder would one day lead to his goal of world domination…

Crestia Bell, the Head Interrogation Officer of the Judicial Correction Division of the Church of Divine Creed, also named Suzuno Kamazuki, lived next door to the Demon King Castle and gave its residents food that was poisonous to them. However, Maou returned the favor by making her pay him back for the bicycle that she had destroyed, and then some.

Possibly because of that, Suzuno’s sour expression never left her face the entire time.

“…Was it a bit too expensive?”

Maou asked Suzuno as if he was concerned about her mood, even though she was the one who was after his life and had destroyed his bicycle. Suzuno sighed deeply under her parasol, without looking up at Maou’s face.

“I think I am beginning to understand why she is lackadaisically leaving you at peace.”

“Huh?”

“Is the shop master of that bicycle shop a friend of yours?”

“Yeah. We used to just see each other at community clean-ups and weren’t really close, but his wife and kid came to MgRonald a few times. We started to become friends after that.”

Maou described his very normal relationships with other humans. Suzuno turned the corner of the street and entered the shade, letting out a sigh as the heat decreased and her level of misery did the opposite.

“I prepared for the worst when you said we were going to the bicycle shop.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Suzuno took a thin catalog out of her tote bag and handed it to Maou.

“I trembled at the thought of what sort of high-end model you would demand as an indemnity to the demon king… I already realized that the debt I owed you was great.”

Maou flipped through the catalog quickly with one hand. It was a bicycle catalogue.

“A Mauntain Bike? Or a Road cyc… Load Cycle? Or that Bee Em or something that can drive through rough terrain! Anyone would have thought you’d demand something equivalent to those!”

“…You don’t have to use western words if you don’t know how they’re pronounced.”

“I have to challenge myself with language studies! A-anyway, just 30,000 yen even after anti-theft registration was a bit anticlimactic. A letdown, even. I brought 200,000 yen with me today.”

“Oh, come on. Did you really think I’d demand something that luxurious when you already know how I live? I got Dullahan I for 6,980 yen at a Dokki Li Quijote** in the southern part of town.”

Suzuno only became more miserable as Maou gave the catalog back while boasting of his frugality.

“A bloodthirsty demon king was buying something with a human’s money. It would be absurd to not think something was going to go wrong!”

“You really don’t trust me, do you. Or does that mean that you think you can always trust the demon king to be evil? But either way, no offense to Hirose-san, but I doubt he’d carry something that expensive.”

**Dokki Li Quijote is a spoof on Don Quijote, a discount store chain in Japan.

As Maou laughed nonchalantly, Suzuno looked up with an annoyed expression.

However, Maou seemed to think of something and looked down. Suzuno glanced away, avoiding eye contact.

“But how do you have 200,000 yen on you? You just got here recently, and don’t even have a job. I’ve been working my tail off, and I’ve never even seen my account balance above 200,000.”

“Unlike you or Emilia, I was able to make preparations before coming here.”

Suzuno shrugged her shoulders and answered tersely.

When Suzuno had gone to Shinjuku for the first time with Hero Emilia, also named Emi Yusa, she stopped by a large pawn shop, Mugihyo,** where she had pawned off some jewelry which fetched prices that would have made Maou’s eyes pop out.

Of course, she had no intention of telling Evil incarnate, the demon king, exactly how much money she had. Suzuno had enough margin to not have to work for several months as long as she lived modestly.

“Yeah yeah, it must be nice to be you, Ms. High-roller.”

Even while giving Suzuno a back-handed compliment, Maou rang the bell of his new bicycle with a broad grin on his face, like a little child who had just gotten a new toy.

“Well, either way, thanks. I’ll take good care of it.”

“…”

Upon hearing something unexpected, Suzuno looked up at Maou without thinking. Their eyes met even more so than they had before, and she hurriedly broke the line of sight with her parasol.

**Mugihyo is a spoof of Komehyo, a large pawn shop chain in Japan

“It’s absurd for someone as evil as him to thank someone without a hint of pretense or maliciousness. When was the last time someone thanked me so honestly?” she thought.

“I-I merely paid my debt. It already belongs to you, so do whatever you wish with it.”

“Yeah.”

They walked for a bit longer in silence.

“De-Demon King.”

“Ah?”

Trying to shake off a feeling of uneasiness that she did not understand, Suzuno broke the silence, stopped walking, and pointed to her side.

“Wha-what are those? They suddenly appeared over the past several days in shops that handle flowers and in supermarkets.”

Suzuno pointed to the front of a flower shop.

Plain, white bundles of sticks lined the front of the shop, pushing the colorful flowers out to the side.

“Oh, that’s ogara.”

Maou answered without a second thought, but Suzuno nodded with a surprised expression.

“I see, so they’re dried and shaped like that before they’re grated by tofu shops.”

“…Tofu?”

Maou was confused for a moment as to what Suzuno was suddenly having an epiphany about, but understood what was happening upon remembering the tofu shops they had passed by earlier.

“Uuh, hey, Suzuno. It’s not okara, it’s ogara. O-ga-ra.”**

True to her status as a member of the Church of the Divine Creed’s diplomacy and religious mission division, Suzuno had invested significant effort for an Ente Islan in learning Japanese cultures and customs.

However, that worked against her as well. She often mixed up her research with some vocabulary she had already learned, causing her to say some strange things every once in a while such as the training wheel incident earlier.

“Oh, I know. I will have croquettes for dinner.”

“Listen when people are talking to you. And what are you, a housewife?”

“Croquettes are also fantastic cuisine, but to use okara, which was supposed to be nothing more than a wasted byproduct, and make a low-cost, low-calorie cuisine out of it that is in no way inferior to the original is truly amazing. The ingenuity and skills of the chefs in this country are fearsome indeed.”

As Suzuno tilted her head and thought out loud about her dinner menu and the source of her food, a married couple stopped by the shop to buy a bundle of ogara.

“It’s almost the Obon Festival. That’s used for Obon’s welcoming fire and sending-off fire.” Maou answered while pointing at the bundle of ogara.

“Obon… that’s right, the ceremony for households to celebrate the ancestral spirits. However, is that not typically held in August?”

As expected, she seemed to have researched matters pertaining to religion and spirituality thoroughly.

“Yeah. In the old, lunar calendar, the seventh month falls out on August of the Gregorian Calendar. But just in Tokyo, the welcoming fire is lit during July of Gregorian Calendar. And that’s what’s used to make the fire.”

**Ogara are stalks of hemp. Okara is a soy byproduct from making tofu and/or soy milk.

“Hm. I was under the impression that this was a spiritually dead country, but practices like this are surprisingly widespread.”

“I wonder why only Tokyo does this early, though.”

“Yeah, there are lots of explanations, but the most prevalent one is that when Japan switched to the Gregorian Calendar from the old lunar calendar, the Department of State issued a law to conduct everything according to the new calendar, but apparently the only place that responded was Tokyo. The farthest parts of Japan in particular couldn’t switch from following the lunar calendar because they’d been following it for hundreds of years. They couldn’t just switch because a law was issued.”

“I see.”

“Oooooooh.”

“Even now, the Obon holidays are usually in the middle of August, right? But Tokyo and parts of

Kanagawa that were under the strong influence of the government back then conduct Obon

during July of the Gregorian calendar, while everywhere else holds the festival in August, which is the seventh month of the old lunar calendar.

“…You seem to have really looked into this.”

“Maou-san, you know so much for a demon king!”

“Yeah, I spent a lot of last year running around researching stuff like this, but a lot of it ended up being useless trivia… huh?

“Hm?”

“Yes?”

Maou and Suzuno both realized something and turned around slowly at the same time.

“What!? Chi, Chii-chan, when did you…!!”

“Chiho-dono! How long were you here!?”

When she got there was a completely mystery. Chiho, who was Maou’s junior at work, a high school student, and the only Japanese person who knew about the alternate world of Ente Isla, stood there in her high school uniform.

However, she was not holding a school-specified backpack. Instead, she carried a silver, portable cooler box.

“Did I surprise you?”

Chiho smiled.

“I decided to give you a taste of your own medicine, Suzuno-san… but all I got out of it was what you were talking about after you decided you were having croquettes for dinner.”

“I-I see. School’s out already? Isn’t it too early?”

“We already finished our finals, so we’ve been having a lot of early dismissals.”

Chiho answered cheerfully. Come to think of it, she had said something about a test around the time of Tanabata, but she never talked about how her grades were back then, nor had she reduced her working hours. On top of that, her grades were not affected at all by the incidents involving Ente Isla. She must have nerves of steel.

As Maou thought that, Chiho’s wandering eyes stopped at Maou’s new bicycle.

“Oh? You got a new bike?”

“Yeah. Suzuno crushed my old one that time.”

Maou patted Dullahan II’s seat.

“The demon king said he found a bicycle that he liked, so I bought it to pay him back.”

Suzuno added with an annoyed tone, as she tried to regain her composure after being thoroughly surprised.

“By the way, why are you here, Chiho-dono?”

“I came to buy what you and Maou-san were talking about.”

Chiho pointed between the two of them, to the flower shop that they had been discussing earlier.

“Ogara?”

“Yes, I’m doing errands for my mom. And I was going to stop by your place later too, Maou-san.”

Chiho shifted her body, revealing the cooler that hung from her shoulder.

“We got some ice cream from my dad’s relatives, but my mom and dad don’t like to eat sweet things. I have a lot, so I thought maybe you’d like it.”

“Ice cream!? Seriously!? Is that really okay!?”

Maou’s eyes shone at the cold food that descended upon him.

“Whaaat!? That’s awesome! Yeah, yeah, I’ll take it! Thanks a lot!”

“Great. Okay, please hold on for a second, I’m going to get some ogara.”

Chiho headed to the flower shop after watching Maou jump for joy.

Suzuno watched the interaction between the demon king and the high school girl.

“…Maybe it’s okay to just leave him be?”

She muttered the question that she had started to ponder recently.

A cry of joy reverberated throughout the demon king’s castle, where the midsummer heat was overpowering and the electric fan did its best to circulate the warm, humid air.

“Ice cream!?”

“Ice cream!!”

A new sign of life was instilled into the eyes of Alciel and Lucifer, the residents of the demon king’s castle and two of the archdemons who served the demon king Satan, as they heard the words of Maou, who came home with Chiho next to him.

“Bu-but, isn’t this a Haagen Dezse premium gift box!? Are-are you sure we can have this!?”

“Please, don’t worry about it, Ashiya-san. We still have a lot more back home.”

Chiho replied, holding the box out towards Ashiya.

Shiro Ashiya, who was in charge of the household chores and finances, saw what he believed to be a radiant, angelic light behind Chiho and fell prostrate before her.

“How… how can we even begin to thank you and your parents, Sasaki-san…”

“Please, you’re making this a bigger deal than it really is.”

Even Chiho was taken aback by the tall Ashiya falling to the floor at an unbelievable speed. “Whoa! There are so many great flavors! Let’s hurry up and eat some, Ashiya! Get the spoons out! The spoons!”

“Urushihara… Don’t you have something to say to Chii-chan before that?”

Maou said with a tone of disgust to Urushihara, who couldn’t see anything other than the ice cream.

Lucifer, who called himself Hanzo Urushihara and spent his all his time loafing around in the demon king’s castle, paid no attention to his scolding.

“It’s fine, Maou-san. I already knew that he was that kind of person.”

Even Chiho spat out an insult while smiling.

In the incident where she had found out the true identities of Maou and the others, Chiho was put through a great ordeal by Urushihara, who had been their enemy at the time.

After he was defeated and surrendered to Maou, he spent most of his time in front of his laptop, not even helping with the house chores. Because of those reasons, Chiho had always been cold towards him.

Maou chuckled slightly, and patted Chiho gently on her shoulder in hopes that she would feel better.

“Well, anyway, I really appreciate it.”

“…Uh… um, no, no problem.”

In an instant, her face turned beet-red for a reason other than the heat.

Chiho had already told Maou of her feelings for him directly, but since she did it in a way that didn’t require a reply from Maou, his response to her confession still remained up in the air.

However, she also understood why Maou couldn’t answer her easily, so she was at peace even though her confession remained unanswered.

But even so, her heart jumped as a result of some of Maou’s unintentional actions every once in a while.

“Uh, oh, right, Suzuno-san. We have to get Suzuno-san too… huh?”

Chiho tried to hide her blushing face by getting Suzuno, who had come back with them, but she was nowhere to be found as Chiho stuck her head out of the door and looked around outside. “She went back out as soon as she came back.”

“Re-really?”

“Strawberry, green tea, mint… what’s this? Pumpkin? Amazing!”

“Hey! Urushihara-san! You have to save some for Suzuno-san, too!”

Hearing Urushihara’s excited voice, Chiho came back inside quickly.

“Whaat? We have to save some for Bell, too?”

Urushihara looked absolutely dejected. Chiho puffed up her cheeks and snatched back several of the ice cream cups that Urushihara held in his arms.

“You can’t have any unless you listen to me! How many were you planning on eating by yourself!? You’ll get a stomachache!”

“Don’t treat me like a little kid! I’m hundreds of times older than you!”

“I don’t care how long you’ve lived, you’re still a kid, Urushihara-san! Even a grade schooler knows better than you!”

“Heey, can you tone down the fighting? It’s already hot enough as it is.”

Maou stepped into the fight slowly to break it up, took the cooler box, and handed it to Ashiya. “Anyway, take one cup and put the rest of them in the freezer. Just save a vanilla cup or something for Suzuno.”

“As you wish, sir.”

Ashiya took the cooler respectfully, and bowed to Chiho once again. He then proceeded to put the rest of the ice cream in the freezer neatly, one by one.

“Whaaaat? Only one?”

Still holding on to the strawberry-flavored ice cream in his hand, Urushihara stared longingly at the cups that were being put away.

“Why do we have to save one for Bell? She’s our enemy, isn’t she?”

“U-ru-shi-ha-ra-san!?”

“Wha-what, Chiho Sasaki!? She’s your enemy too, isn’t she? In more ways than one!” Chiho’s blush, which had nearly faded away, returned in full force after hearing Urushihara’s words.

“She-she’s my enemy!! But she’s my friend too!”

She replied firmly.

“Huh? What does that even mean?”

“This is this, and that’s that! You can’t even understand that. That’s why you’re still just a kid,

Urushihara-san.”

“Humph. Of course. I’m just a kid, so I don’t get it at all. I don’t understand how a girl can be jealous of her enem-igh!”

As Urushihara tried to bicker back to Chiho, he let out a groan as he was hit suddenly in the head.

“That is enough, Urushihara. If you insist on your insolence against Sasaki-san, to whom we owe a great debt, I will confiscate your strawberry ice cream and cancel the internet service!”

The teary-eyed Urushihara looked up to Ashiya, who had an expression like that of an evil demon.

“You just eat and sleep all day, eat up our budget, and don’t lift a finger to help with the house chores! You are worse than Crestia, who bring us holy cooking! Even if the heavens allow it, I will not allow your insolence against Sasaki-san, who showed great kindness, regardless of who she is and who we are, to our lord Demon King and in her aid to the demon king’s castle!”

The stay-at-home husband of the demon king’s castle brought down a great lightning strike as he stood in front of Chiho to protect her.

Ashiya had not been comfortable with Chiho becoming close to Maou at first, but had been completely won over by Chiho and her mother’s cooking and now held an unwavering belief that the Sasaki family was their savior.

Seeing Ashiya’s face, Urushihara made a frightened expression and took a step back.

“Fi-fine… Hmph, I can’t believe you AND Maou got completely tamed by some high school girl.”

He muttered and held his head where he had been hit, but still held onto his strawberry ice cream and sat dejectedly at his usual spot in front of the laptop desk.

“Over here, please, Sasaki-san. You’ll have better circulation here. Please, have some barley tea.

Ashiya sat Chiho at the head of the casual kotatsu, placed cups of ice cream and barley tea in front of her, and moved the fan so that it blew gently on her.

The new Demon King Castle, also known as Villa Rosa Sasazuka, did not have standard air conditioning.

In these kinds of situations, a renter such as Maou could arrange to have an air conditioning unit installed with the permission of the landlady, Miki Shiba. However, she was currently traveling overseas and had not returned in a long time.

Since Maou could now count on a regular source of income, unlike the previous year, he tried to directly contact the real estate company that also managed the property. However, he had found out that the company did not have a contract to perform direct modifications to the property.

Therefore, while the real estate company could change a lightbulb in the public spaces, they did not perform services for individual units, instead only acting as an agent for the landlady.

Case in point, the landlady Miki had let them know in person that there would be earthquakeresistance construction two months ago.

In order to install air conditioning, a hole had to be made in the wall in order to connect the outside and inside units, therefore classifying it as “modification of property.”

The landlady was not trying to hide her whereabouts by traveling abroad, however. She would periodically send letters that told them where she was and what she was doing.

However, her letters usually arrived several weeks after she sent them, by which point she had already gone somewhere else. Therefore, using her letters to track her down so they could contact her was an effort in futility.

In any case, Maou, Ashiya, and Urushihara locked up her letters in a box without opening them. The “Landlady Swimsuit Incident” that occurred shortly after Urushihara arrived still left a scar in each of the three great demons’ hearts.

Ever since then, they had ignored every one of the letters until Suzuno moved in next door. Suzuno, who did not know who their landlady was, asked them “what if the letters contained some important message?” Because of that, they opened the newest letter just a few days ago. Her stationary was fancy to the touch and embroidered with golden thread, as usual. Her elegant penmanship was as fancy as always; one would assume it was written with a fountain pen or quill.

The landlady was apparently in Indonesia. Since the Swimsuit Incident had involved a picture from Hawaii, they feared something similar being sent from Bali. However, the letter said that she was participating in a ceremony that celebrated the spirits of the aborigines in Borneo Island, for reasons and motives unknown to them.

The picture included in the letter showed a group of what they believed to be the aborigines wearing their traditional colorful garments, and the landlady in the middle of them. She was wearing a dress woven with gold and silver sequins, as well as a wide hat with over a dozen feathers standing on end like a peacock with its colorful feathers spread out. On her face were an incredible amount of makeup and a smile.

In that moment, Maou gave up trying to get in contact with the landlady and decided to just let nature take its course.

They had managed to survive the previous year’s summer without air conditioning, and this year, they now had Urushihara crippling their budget.

Maou convinced himself that this was a sign from God that he should not waste money just because he had a bigger salary. He didn’t care whether it made sense for the demon king to make his decisions based on divine revelations.

“I thought it’d get really hot here, but this apartment gets surprisingly good circulation,” observed Chiho.

“Yeah, that’s one of the few redeeming qualities about this place. It’s a corner unit, so we have a lot of windows, too.”

To avoid the direct sunlight, the window was covered with a bamboo screen from the downtown Dokki Li Quijote, the birthplace of the original Dullahan. All the windows were opened as far as they would go, and the fan was able to circulate the warm air. This was only possible because Villa Rosa Sasazuka had a small garden, and was not directly surrounded by other buildings.

“Heeey, Maooou, are we really not gonna get A/C?”

Urushihara asked lazily and miserably, contrary to Chiho, who was enjoying the summer breeze.

“I already told you. We can’t get a hold of the landlady, and we have no money to pay for the construction. I don’t wanna die from the electric bill because of some cheap, half-baked air conditioning unit, anyway.”

“Uuuugh.”

“I’m not a fan of A/C either.”

Chiho also answered, while licking her rum-raisin ice cream.

“My classroom has A/C, but someone always sets it to the lowest temperature after P. E. or something. It’s always so cold.”

“Even the conveniences of civilization can bring ruin depending on their usage. I get chills just thinking about what the school’s electric bill must be,” Ashiya remarked while eating a green tea ice cream and sympathizing with something completely irrelevant.

“People who do stuff like that are loud and annoying to begin with. If you try to raise the thermostat even a little bit, they’ll throw a fit saying, “It’s hot, it’s hot,” and turn it back down, right?”

Maou answered with a frown on his face, his spoon moving up and down in his mouth as he spoke. He was eating a cookie crunch ice cream.

“That’s exactly right!”

Chiho nodded and agreed emphatically.

“They don’t think ahead. Or it’s more like, they have to have instant gratification and don’t care about what’s gonna happen in the long term. And they’re always the raucous ones.”

“Exactly! …wait, what?”

“Hm?”

“Maou-san, how do you know this?”

Chiho, who had been agreeing with a strained smile earlier, asked Maou curiously.

“Maou-san, you’ve never attended a Japanese high school, right?”

“That’s right.”

“When I’m listening to you, I agree with everything you say like we’ve all been there, done that.

But I just realized that that’s a bit strange.”

“Oh yeah, I guess so.”

Maou ate the last bite of his cookie crunch, savoring the taste. He got up, threw the lid into the inflammable plastic trash bin and the paper cup into the paper bin, then let out a sigh as he leaned against the sink.

“Demons are a bit more extreme when it comes to getting what they want, but humans and demons aren’t all that different when it comes to stuff like this.”

“…”

“…Maaan… one’s not enough…”

Ashiya stayed silent as he listened to Maou, but whether Urushihara was listening was unclear. Urushihara placed his empty strawberry ice cream cup next to his laptop desk and stared longingly at the freezer.

And at that exact moment…

“Oh? Suzuno, where were you? Chii-chan brought you some ice cream.”

Maou looked outside through the open window to see Suzuno walking by, carrying something large.

“I see. You have my gratitude. Once I am done with what I need to do, I will gladly accept her gift.”

They spoke through the window lattice. Suzuno seemed to be carrying a small bundle of timber.

“…Hey, what’s that for?”

“Hm? It is merely timber.”

“No, I can see that. I’m asking what you’re going to use that for.”

The reason Maou was so insistent on asking was the absurdly huge amount of ogara that she

carried in her other arm.

“As the member of the division of religious missions, I am interested in this “Obon” event.

Therefore, I thought to experience it myself.”

“…And?”

“It involves making this… welcoming fire, does it not? I have heard that the ancestral spirits return using the smoke from this welcoming fire.”

Seeing that his hunch was correct, Maou hung his head slightly and motioned through the lattice for Suzuno to come in.

Suzuno frowned, but opened the door to the demon king’s castle and came in regardless. “What do you want? I was told that it is preferable to do it before the sun sets, so I need to go get—ow!”

Maou chopped Suzuno in the head to prevent her from finishing.

“Wha—what was that for!?”

“Are you trying to burn down the apartment!? No matter how you look at it, you’ve got way too much fuel!”

“Wh—why you! You think me a fool just because I am from Ente Isla, don’t you!?”

Suzuno, slightly tearing up from the chop, snapped back angrily while inventing a new category of insult.

“Did you really think I would set fire to all of this!? The timber is for building a bonfire in the backyard! The only things that will be burnt are the bundles of ogara—ow! Ju—just because my hands are full, why you!”

Maou struck Suzuno a second time.

“Then that’s even worse! Didn’t you see Chii-chan buy just one bundle!? And a bonfire in the backyard? How big of a welcoming fire were you going to make!? This isn’t a campground!”

Behind the Villa Rosa Sasazuka building was a small area surrounded by block walling, consisting of an open space that was just big enough to be called a backyard.

A large broadleaf tree stood in the yard, on which an unbelievable number of cicadas came together every summer and sung their great chorus all season long, even though they were in the middle of an urban area.

“Come on, guys. Simmer down. Suzuno-san, I have some vanilla ice cream for you.”

“I will gladly accept it!”

Since the demon king’s castle had no air conditioning, it went without saying that Suzuno’s unit didn’t have it either. Suzuno accepted the ice cream as a means of conflict mediation for a different reason however. She brought brown sugar syrup and soy flour from her room and added it to her ice cream. After eating it slowly to savor the flavor, she asked a question to clarify something she still didn’t understand.

“Then how am I supposed to make a welcoming fire!? According to my research, priests are to either build a pyre, or set a grandiose bonfire in the temples by lining the frame with wild rice straws!”

It was unclear how she had researched all that in the short amount of time since they had bought the bicycle, but what she was describing would only apply to a full-fledged festival or a Buddhist temple ceremony.

“Ashiya.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Maou snapped his fingers, causing Ashiya to spring into action immediately. He brought an earthenware plate, a lighter, and a string made from twisted newspaper over to Maou.

“You can get all this from a 100-yen store. Any store that sells tableware will give you old newspapers for free. And this plate is called a horoku.”

Having said all that, Maou took one of Suzuno’s many ogara bundles and stepped outside.

“And ogara is just 90 yen if you go to the same place Chii-chan did. Even the expensive kind shouldn’t cost more than 200 yen.”

Chiho and the stone-faced Suzuno followed Maou outside as he walked down the apartment stairs and placed the horoku down next to the apartment gate, which faced the street.

He then took the vinyl wrapping off of the ogara bundle, and began breaking the long stalks into many shorter pieces.

Since it only took about two-thirds of the bundle to completely fill the horoku, Maou gave the rest of the bundle back to Suzuno and set fire to the newspaper string with the lighter.

Once he placed the burning string underneath the ogara, the fire spread quickly and smoke began to rise.

“That’s it! This is the simplest way to make a welcoming fire!”

“…What?”

“And by the way, you’ll set off the smoke detector if you do this in an apartment, so do it outside.

Any questions?”

Suzuno’s eyes were full of doubt and suspicion as she looked back and forth between the small welcoming fire on the horoku and Maou.

“…Don’t be absurd. The welcoming fire is for the purpose of leading the ancestral spirits. It is an important annual ritual, is it not? How can such a ceremony be so simple and casual?”

“I mean, you can say what you want, but this is what it is. Right?”

Maou looked not at Suzuno, but at Chiho for confirmation. Suzuno looked at Chiho as well, hoping that she would prove him wrong. However…

“It might be really casual, but he’s not wrong. It’s better to get the fire from a Bon paper lantern or from your family temple, but that’s difficult in urban areas. Also, you have to do this.”

Chiho leaned over towards the horoku.

“Put your hands together, and pray for your ancestors to be able to return here safely.”

“…Tha-that is it?

“And some homes with buddhist altars make cucumber horses, supposedly.”

“Oh, yes. My family does that, too.”

“Cu-cucumber horses? Wha-what are those?”

Suzuno became dazed and confused. Maou and Chiho looked at each other and shared a laugh before continuing.

“Once Obon is over, you make another fire to send off the spirits. When they’re on their way back with the welcoming fire, you make a cucumber look like a horse to have them come back quicker, and when you send them back with the sending-off fire, you make a eggplant cow to let them go back slowly.”

Maou explained seriously, while Chiho nodded repeatedly in agreement. Watching the two of them, Suzuno placed her hand on her forehead and groaned.

“…I have run into many religions, but never have I encountered such a simple, yet complicated ceremony.”

“Well, in full-fledged celebrations, you might see candles lined up on the roads or a huge bonfire like what you were trying to do, but most people in residential areas just do this. Some Buddhist sects don’t do anything at all, and you can’t just start a fire anywhere. If you really want to see the real thing, why don’t you go to a festival in a more rural area in August?”

“Maou-san, you know so much.”

Chiho widened her eyes, looking stunned.

“I tried everything that I thought might help me recover my powers last year. I thought just maybe, some demon might notice the welcoming fire and come pick me up.”

Maou uttered sacrilegious words about a sacred ceremony meant for calling home ancestral spirits.

“But it’s not like my ancestors are on Earth, so I guess the welcoming fire would be just wasted.”

“You make it sound like you would have ancestors if you were to return to the other world.” Maou scowled at Suzuno’s words.

“Hey, you think we demons grow on trees or something? We have ancestors and parents, too.”

“Maou-san’s… parents…?”

Chiho knew Maou’s true identity, but found it hard to even visualize what a demon king’s parents might look like.

“Well, my ancestors and parents all bit the dust a long time ago, and to be honest, I don’t really care whether they’d follow my welcoming fire and return.”

However, Chiho was saddened by how casually Maou spat out those words.

“Please… don’t say something so sad.”

“I mean, even if you say that, there aren’t any decent demons that grieve for their ancestors, so we have no way of knowing anything about them. And besides, I don’t even remember my parents.”

“I-I see… I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for you to have to say all that.”

“No, no, I’m the one who started talking about this. Anyway…”

Maou waved his hand back and forth in front of his face while looking at the saddened Chiho as if to say, “Don’t worry about it,” and leaned over to the horoku and the welcoming fire, which had begun to weaken.

“Don’t forget to put the fire out completely afterwards. Traditionally, you’re supposed to put out the remains of the fire with water droplets from a wet lotus leaf, but have a bucket of water nearby just in case. The ashes go either to the plants for fertilizer or out with the flammable trash.”

“…There is not a shred of reverence or passion in this. This is the culmination of the lack of spirituality in modern Japan.”

“You should respect the customs of wherever you go. Think of it as being open-minded. And go get a bucket of water, Suzuno.”

And in that precise moment when Maou gave that instruction,

“Heeey, Maooou!”

Urushihara stuck his head out of the door and called out to Maou.

“The meddlesome one is comiiing!”

“The meddlesome one?”

Maou looks up towards the second floor, and then,

“Who’s meddlesome?”

He was filled with dread upon hearing that voice behind him.

He turned around slowly to face the chilling voice at his back.

And standing behind him was…

“Oh, hi there, Yusa-san.”

“Oh, Emilia. I see, it is already time.”

The Hero who had saved Ente Isla, Emilia Justina, who also went by the name of Emi Yusa, gave a cold glare.

She had a parasol in her right hand, and a large paper bag which seemed heavy in her left.

Pushing the stiff-faced Maou aside with the handle of her parasol, Emi looked up the stairs at Urushihara.

“Lucifer! How did you know that I was coming? Did you plant some creepy tracking device on me again!? Did you!?”

“O-of course not. I just saw you with a camera that points outside the room. He-hey, cool your head a bit. We have ice cream. Ice cream!”

“You know that I have every intention of eliminating you all once and for all, right?”

“I-I’m being serious! Here, see?”

Urushihara stepped inside for a second and came right back out, waving an ice cream cup and a webcam in his hands.

“…”

Emi glanced at the ice cream rather than the camera for a moment, but looked away immediately and turned toward Suzuno and Chiho.

“Hi, Chiho-chan. Did you bring the ice cream?”

“Uh, yes. My family got it as a gift, but my mom and dad don’t really eat sweets.”

“…Figures. These guys would never have the money to buy Häagen Dezse on their own.”

“Hey, don’t you know that it’s shallow to judge a man by his wealth?”

Maou interjected after being treated poorly, but Emi ignored him, took out a handkerchief, and began fanning herself.

“Mint Häagen Dezse cups only come in the gift boxes. They’re never sold individually. I can almost see your joyous expressions when you received the ice cream from Chiho-chan. If the demons from the other world saw you now, they would probably cry. You’re poor and useless, both as a demon and as a human.”

“…I’m sorry, Maou-san. There’s nothing I can say back to her.”

Chiho looked down apologetically.

“…Did you just come here to sneer at how poor we are? You sit in an air-conditioned apartment and workplace all day, you environment-hating Hero!”

“I’m sorry, but the A/C came with the unit I live in, so it’d be a waste if I didn’t use it. Besides, it’s a new, energy-saving model and I never set it lower than 28 degrees. You have no right to criticize me.”

“Damn it! Just showing off the difference in our living standards like that!”

Emi ignored Maou, who was stomping his foot in frustration, and faced Suzuno.

“I got here a little early. I hope that’s alright.”

“No, it is fine. Thank you for coming. I will prepare myself right away, so please wait for me.”

Suzuno began climbing up the stairs after answering. However,

“Hold on, take this first.”

After being stopped, Suzuno was presented with a large paper bag.

Inside the bag was a box of energy drink bottles marked with a picture of a general bearing a hawk as his sigl. Maou and Chiho had no way of knowing what it was, but the contents of the bag were, unsurprisingly, the sacred- energy-restoring Holy Vitamin Beta that Emi had received from her Ente Islan allies.

“O-oh… this is it, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Take two bottles per day. They’re hard to come by, so use them well.”

“…What kind of shady deal are you having over there?”

Maou interjected as the two of them had a vague conversation over a paper bag. They then turned toward Maou at the same time.

“Be especially careful around him.”

“That goes without saying.”

“Hey!”

Maou interjected, baring his teeth.

“I don’t remember doing anything heinous that would make you treat me like some kind of a thief!”

“What are you talking about? You were directly responsible for some very, very heinous work.” Emi’s response was cold.

“How is my work that got me promoted to shift manager in less than a year ‘heinous’?”

Maou’s tone became even more heated. However,

“Maou-san, I don’t think she’s talking about that work.”

Chiho added calmly.

“Yusa-san, Suzuno-san, are you going somewhere?”

“Yep. We’re going to go look at household appliances and cellphones.”

“Appliances and cellphones?”

“Indeed. My sojourn here likely is going to be more extended than I prepared for, so I must make the necessary preparations for my daily living here. However, the previous incidents have caused me to realize that my methods of investigation were outdated. Therefore, I wanted Emilia to accompany me in the event that some confusion may occur.”

“Ah, I see.”

Chiho was glad that her friend wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon. But on the other hand, she couldn’t be completely happy that a woman would be staying next door to Maou for an extended period of time, especially since said woman considered him her mortal enemy.

“Well, we wouldn’t have to do any of this if I just cut this beggar demon king down.”

Emi smiled mischievously and looked at Maou, as if she was reading Chiho’s thoughts.

Maou broke into a cold sweats and Chiho also wondered for a moment if Emi was being serious. 

However,

“…Well, I said some time ago that I wouldn’t do that, and besides, it’s better if she stays here while we come up with a good solution that’ll satisfy all of us, right?”

“Ye-yes.”

Chiho replied in a monotonous voice as she realized that Emi was being serious.

“Ahaha, sorry, sorry. It’s okay. I won’t do something like that in front of you, Chiho-chan.”

“It’s when you’re not in front of me that i’m worried about, though…”

Chiho finally smiled, albeit nervously.

“That will depend on the demon king’s heart.”

“Humph. You’ll never meet such an eco-friendly, subject-minded, hard-working demon king anywhere else! And I couldn’t care less about your little secret transaction! So stop worrying and get out of my face!”

Maou shooed Emi away, as if he were a sulking child.

“Are you not remotely embarrassed to be accepted by your mortal enemy as an eco-friendly, subject-minded, hard-working demon king?”

“I’m aiming to be a demon king with universal appeal who won’t bring shame upon anyone!”

“Yeah, but if Ente Isla could see you now, they’d be completely ashamed that they struggled so fiercely against your army.”

Emi shrugged in indifference.

“…But what are you doing? Making a fire when it’s already this hot outside?”

She tilted her head as she looked at the nearly burnt-out ogara in the horoku next to her feet.

“I saw smoke on the way here, and I thought something was burning.”

“Uuuh…”

“Um…”

“Emilia, are you really not aware of what this is?”

This time, Maou, Chiho, and Suzuno glanced at each other unintentionally.

“Come on… you can’t be like that. That’s why people say stuff like ‘youngsters these days,’ you know?”

“…I’m sorry, Yusa-san… there’s nothing I can say back to him.”

“Very well. I will instruct you on it at a later time.”

“What? …Whaat?”

Emi was taken completely off-guard by the sudden change of position and could not understand what landmine she could have tripped, as not only Maou, but even Chiho and Suzuno reacted in an unpredictable way.

“Regardless, Emilia, I receive this with gratitude. If you would be so kind as to wait for me, I will be ready in a moment.”

Suzuno took the paper bag, thanked Emi, and began to walk upstairs.

Emi looked at Suzuno and the nearly burnt-out ogara, still not understanding what she had done wrong.. Chiho made an ambiguous smile to break the awkward atmosphere, and the last bit of ogara finally burnt out, causing the trail of smoke that had been rising from it to disappear It was at that precise moment.

“Wha?”

“Huh?”

“What!?”

“Kyah!”

“Wh-wh-whoa!”

Maou, Chiho, Suzuno, Emi, and even Urushihara, whohad been sticking his head out of the door, let out shouts of surprise at the light.

The light was not the blazing sun that was beating down from the sky like a sharp sword, but rather an explosion of light with actual mass that appeared out of nowhere on top of the burnt-out ogara.

“Crap!”

The one who moved quickly was Maou.

“Hyah!”

Maou cried out as he tightly held onto Chiho, who had been standing closest to the horoku, and ran away from the source of light while carrying her to the tree in the backyard.

Maou groaned at the blinding torrent of light, and then shouted,

“Grab onto of something! It’s a Gate!”

“!!”

“What did you say!?”

Emi and Suzuno reacted quickly, dropping everything they were holding, and held onto the stair handrails with both hands.

The heavy paper bag fell from the stairs as Suzuno let it drop from her hands, and it crashed and made a heavy sound.

As an opening to an alternate world, Gates and their properties depended on the nature of the user’s power and their purpose for creating it.

However, a trait that all gates shared was that if the gate’s capacity allowed for it, whatever touched it would be sucked into it.

And in this unexpected situation, the person who was in the greatest danger was Chiho, who had no supernatural demonic or sacred powers.

“Hey, which is it, in or out?”

Maou shouted, his hands full just trying to cover Chiho.

PG60

“Something is coming through!”

Suzuno shouted back, but she could not see exactly what was coming through.

An outwards Gate. In other words, someone was coming to Japan from somewhere through the Gate.

Upon realizing that the Gate wasn’t going to suck in whatever was around it, Maou let go of Chiho and stood in front of her, squinting into the blinding light.

“…What is that?”

He saw a large, round shadow appear in the center of the light.

“it-it doesn’t look like it’s a human or a demon!”

Emi was also able to see the round shadow.

As soon as the shadow appeared, the light suddenly started fading rapidly.

To be more precise, it was still extremely bright because of the midsummer sun. The torrent of light from the Gate ceased, and the details of the round shadow could now be seen.

“It’s a fruit… but more importantly…”

“It’s huge…”

Suzuno and Emi, who were closer to the gate than Maou, crept up to the light slowly.

And as if a water faucet was being turned off, the rest of the light from the gate disappeared in an instant.

In that moment, their surroundings returned to their normal colors, and the summer sun returned to the backyard of Villa Rosa Sasazuka.

Maou and the others watched as the object that had appeared for no apparent reason fell with a thud onto the ogara ashes.

“Hey, hey, hey, hey!”

“Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no!”

“Noo! Maan…”

Rather than the mysteriousness of the object, it was the fact that it had fallen on the ashes that spurred the three lower middle-class citizens into action.

Maou picked it up, Emi moved it away with her feet, and Suzuno quickly took out her handkerchief and wiped the part that had been dirtied by the ashes..

Luckily, the ogara had completely burnt out, and there was no trace of the fruit having been damaged by high temperatures.

And when the three let out a sigh,

“My eyes! My eyeees!”

Urushihara seemed to have gotten a great amount of the light in his eyes. Maou, Emi, and Suzuno were snapped back to reality as the sound of Urushihara’s cry entered their ears.

The three of them looked at each other instinctively, and then looked at the object that Maou was holding and Suzuno was wiping.

“What are you babbling about, Urushihara!?”

“My eeeyes! Gah!”

“Hey, stop loafing around over there. Someone will kick and trip over you.”

“Do-don’t say that after kicking me!”

“It’s your fault for lying down by the doorway! …My lord, what’s going on? What is that large fruit?”

However, the three who stood in the backyard could not analyze the situation calmly until Ashiya asked them lackadaisically from upstairs.

The fruit was so gigantic that Maou, an average sized man, had to use both of his arms to hold it up, as if he were hugging it.

It was a heavy, golden, apple-shaped fruit.

If they filed for an application for the Guinness Book of World Records, they probably would have shattered any previous records immediately, but they did not even think of eating it.

“Is… it… actually an apple?”

“It could also be a pear… however…”

“…There’s no apple this huge in the demon world either. Don’t tell me this is an apple-shaped demon.”

There are demons that camouflage themselves as plants in the demon world. However, they were usually human-shaped and changed their appearance to something along the lines of trees, and demons that shapeshifted to gigantic, round apples were unheard of.

“If it only came with a return address like Sasuke Express*…”

Maou grumbled, having no idea what to do with the fruit.

*Sasuke Express is a spoof on Sagawa Express, a shipping service company. The “Sa” in Sasuke and Sagawa share the same kanji.

A Gate couldn’t open on its own, so there had to be a user that opened it.

There was no way of knowing who was behind this now, but the situation could change drastically depending on whether it was sent here specifically or by accident.

“Give me a break.”

The first to change her thought was Emi.

“Just how many times are these ‘incidents’ going to happen in the general vicinity of the hero and the demon king? That whole thing with Sariel was just a little over a week ago!! Seriously, nothing good ever comes of being around you!”

“I could say the exact same thing about you!”

Maou could not stay silent as he was made out to be some type of troublemaker.

“Speak for yourself! The source of all our recent chaos was you humans!”

“Ugh…”

“Well, um, we deeply regret that.”

Emi could not find any words to form a counterargument, and Suzuno mumbled apologies while avoiding eye contact.

“And no matter how you look at it, there’s no way a demon could open a gate that gives off that much light! I’m sure it was someone from Heaven! Here, take it! Chill it in your fridge and eat it or

something!”

Maou added and thrusted the apple at Emi, who took a step back in surprise.

“No way! We’re about to go into the city to go shopping! How in the world are we supposed to carry something that big around with us!?”

“Like I give a damn about your convenience! You’re the one always stalking us whenever you want! You stalker hero!”

“Who-who are you calling a stalker!? Who’d spend so much time on you if you weren’t the demon king!? You beggar demon king!”

“Shu-shut up! Dressing up all nice in this suffocating heat! You office lady hero!”

“Humph! At least I’m not wearing the same faded, cheap, plain white shirt every day, you t-shirt demon king!”

The verbal exchanges kept escalating, and somewhere in it, it became unclear whether they were trying to insult each other or just spout nonsense about each other’s lifestyle. In the midst of it all, Maou finally uttered the irrevocable words;

“A cheap, plain white sports bra is good enough for you, you chopping board hero!”

Suddenly, Emi’s eyes, which had grown weary from the bickering and the summer heat, lit up and displayed a newfound, malicious will to fight.

“That’s it! I’m cutting you down right here, right now!”

“Huh-wha-wa-wait, Emi! Someone will see us! Hey, no holy sword! We can talk about this!”

“I’m not listening to any of your excuses!! My power exists to vanquish evil!!”

Sacred power which manifested itself as an golden aura came forth from her right hand, and her holy sword, Better Half, materialized.

Also known as evolving heavenly silver, and safeguarded by The Church of the Divine Creed since ancient times, the holy, evil-slaying sword rested within the hero’s body, and only she could wield it.

“Wh-wh-wh-whoa! A-are you serious, Emi!?”

“My Lord!”

Since Emi drew her holy sword, Ashiya could no longer just sit back and watch their bickering as usual and tried to run down the stairs, and—

“Zwhaaaaaa!?”

Since he had come outside wearing slippers, he completely lost his footing and fell all the way down the stairs, letting out an incredible scream.

“Wow, you’re such a klutz, Ashiya.”

Meanwhile, Urushihara’s eyes had recovered from being blinded by the light, and he was lying by the doorway, watching everything. And then,

“Huh? Where’s Chiho Sasaki?”

He noticed that Chiho was not taking part in the ruckus at all and began looking around for her. Soon enough, he found Chiho dazed underneath the cicada-filled tree, and tilted his head in confusion.

“Very well. You have my permission. Cut him down.”

For unknown reasons, Suzuno also glared at Maou with a face full of fury.

“Hey, don’t say something disturbing so casually! Help me out here! Wait, you’re on Emi’s side!

Damn it!”

“Demon King! Prepare yourself!”

He could not believe that his ambition to conquer the world would end because of a white sports bra.

What ran through Maou’s mind was not a replay of his entire lift, but rather a ridiculous, almost comical regret.

Without a chance of dodging Emi’s lightning-fast strike and having no other choice, Maou shielded himself from the holy sword bearing down on him from above with the apple, even though he knew it was useless.

“What?”

However, the blade of the holy sword that divided the heavens and obliterated the ground never split Maou’s body in half, no matter how long he waited.

Maou raised his head slowly and fearfully, and…

“…”

He saw Emi, staring with wide eyes at the apple between the holy sword and Maou.

Maou had no idea what was going on, and couldn’t move regardless. In place of him,

“My… My Lord… ugh…”

Having finally recovered from his free fall, Ashiya saw what had happened.

His lord, using the apple to shield himself. Crestia Bell, with her hands to her face, shocked at something. Emilia, who had struck with her holy sword. And…

“…A hand?”

What Ashiya saw was a hand coming out from the apple.

A human baby’s feet and a hand had sprouted from the huge round apple.

“Wha-”

“Wha-”

“What the heck is this!?”

Ashiya and Suzuno blurted out, and Emi yelled.

If it had just been that an arm had grown out of the apple, then it might have been a surprise, but it would just have meant that it was a plant-shaped demon.

However, the issue was that this baby hand had stopped the blade of Emi’s holy sword dead in its tracks.

By no means had Emi held back or hesitated with her strike.

She had had every intention of splitting Maou in half from head to toe along with the apple in one slash. Since she had acted out of pure rage, she couldn’t be sure if that would have actually happened, but the force of her blade should have at least cut the apple in two.

Emi stepped back quickly in surprise, and Suzuno took her hairpin out of her hair at the same time.

“Materialization War Art: Iron Light!”

At Suzuno’s command, the cross-shaped, glass hairpin became a gigantic, sacred hammer. Suzuno and Emi both prepared themselves against the unknown enemy.

Ashiya also finally stood up, and began thinking of possible courses of action.

However, even as the former commander of the Eastern Ente Islan Continent Invasion Army, considered the most cunning general of the Demon Army, he had not had the experience necessary to prepare him for a situation involving a holy sword-wielding hero and an apple that grew limbs being on top of the demon king.

Suzuno drew her weapon, but she was also at a loss as to what to do. She held her hammer and did not move a muscle.

“…Wha-what? What happened?”

Maou could not see the top of the apple, but he ooked around in fear and confusion with the apple still in his arms.

“Ma-Maou?”

The one to break the silence was Urushihara, who was watching everything from the common hallway upstairs.

“Fo-for now, why don’t you put down the apple, upside down?”

“Put down the apple…? What the!? The hell is this!?”

Maou was about to put down the apple as Urushihara suggested, but upon seeing the baby hands that were growing out of it, which were moving around as if asking for something, he threw it on the ground in shock.

“Whoa!”

Changing their stance from their instinctive reaction to attack the unknown object, the group let out a cautionary cry and stared at the rolling apple.

“Wh-wha?”

Emi, who happened to be in the direction of where Maou had thrown the apple down, jumped out of the way with an exaggerated motion.

However, the apple began rolling towards Emi furiously at a speed that was far beyond what the inertia from Maou’s throw should have given it.

“Whaaaaaa!? What the heck is this!?”

Spinning its tiny hands round and round like propellers, the apple chased Emi around the yard. Neither Maou or Suzuno had any idea what to do, so they just stood and stared at the peculiar situation.

Possibly due to losing its momentum, the apple came to a rest in the middle of the yard. As if she were a mouse cornered by a cat, Emi leaned on to the cinder block wall that surrounded the yard, completely out of breath.

However, the apple still did not give up. It extended its two hands straight towards Emi as if it wanted her, and began waving then up and down.

“He-hey, no matter how you look at it, it wants you, Emi.”

“Wheeze… wheeze… wha-what? Ew, I don’t want that.”

Even though her intent to kill Maou had disappeared, Emi could only stare in bewilderment at the absolutely ridiculous situation. She repeatedly look back and forth between the holy sword in her right hand and the hands that were extended toward her.

The hands of the apple that had stopped the blade of the holy sword which had swung with all her power.

Or rather, to be more precise, it had stopped by some kind of a buffering force, much like when water was struck by an open palm.

Emi began thinking that the number of people or things that the holy sword wouldn’t work against had been increasing lately. If the apple was also unaffected by the holy sword, then it was very possible that it was somehow related to Heaven, much like Sariel, who came to steal the holy sword.

Once Emi reached the end of thattrain of thought, she returned the holy sword to her body as a precaution.

The next change happened at that moment.

At the instant that Emi put away the sword, the hands which were waving up and down suddenly fell limp, as if they had lost all strength.

Upon seeing something like a puppet that had suddenly had its strings cut, Emi cowered and let out a short scream.

“Ew! Wha-what is it now!?”

The change was something similar to an apple being peeled.

The yellow skin unraveled like a belt.

It seemed that the outer skin was a hardened shell to protect whatever was inside, and underneath it was empty space.

As everyone except Chiho watched, the armed apple then…

“…apshoo!”

…became a baby girl, and let out an innocent sneeze that echoed across Villa Rosa Sasazuka.

“…”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“…”

Everyone just stood speechless as they stared at the peculiar, unexpected turn of events. They could not even look at each other, as their eyes were glued to the baby that had come out of an apple.

“…apshoo!”

As if responding to the second sneeze, the unraveled skin floated into air again and slowly began changing its shape, eventually becoming a yellow, one-piece dress as it that had been its original form.

“Huh?”

In the brief instant during which the dress was formed, a mark appeared on the little girl’s forehead, but only Maou noticed it. It was a purple, crescent moon-shaped mark.

“Ooh.”

However, it disappeared in an instant.

For a little while, the little girl patted her forehead where the mark had been. She then made one of her hands which had stopped the holy sword dead in its tracks into a fist, looked around, frowned slightly, and tiredly rubbed her eyes.

After spacing out briefly, she laid sideways on the ground.

“…spuuu…”

And fell asleep.

The ruler of the demon world, the demon king. The hero who had the blood of an angel coursing through her veins. The great demon general. A member of the clergy of the Church of the Divine Creed. And a fallen angel.

None of these people from theunbelievable birthplace of an alternate world could react to what had just happened right in front of them.

“He-hey!!”

Impressively, the first to get their senses back was Maou.

“Wha-wha-wha-wha-what is- what is…”

However, he had not completely snapped out of his confusion, and could not talk coherently.

“Ho-how should- how should I know!?”

The same could be said of Emi.

“Ma-Maou!”

The alarmed voice came from Urushihara, who had the highest point of view.

Suzuno and Ashiya jerked and looked up at Urushihara as if his voice had been a clap of thunder.

Urushihara was looking down the road that ran towards Sasazuka Station.

“Not good! There are people coming!”

That statement instantly snapped them all back to reality.

In other words, regardless of who the little apple girl was or whether the light from the gate had been seen, they could not afford to attract any more attention.

“He-hey, Emi!”

“Wh-what!”

“Thi-this-this girl? Is it even a girl? Anyway, bring her upstairs!”

“Wh-why me!?”

“Sh-she’s a girl, so a girl like you should carry her! I’ve never even held a human baby before!”

“I never have either! Well, I have picked up a baby before, but I’ve never held a sleeping baby like this.”

“Ugh! You are pathetic, both of you! Demon King! Hero!”

The one to take action was Suzuno.

Ignoring the rest of the surprised group, who were treating the peacefully sleeping little apple girl as if she were an paranormal object, Suzuno picked her up gently without waking her, as if she had done so countless times.

“Oh, impressive.”

“We clergy learn how to handle babies for baptism ceremonies! Alciel! I am taking her up to

Demon King Castle! Take out the futon! The futon!”

“Do-don’t give me orders, Crestia! O-owowow…”

Even while bickering back at her, Ashiya pulled up his aching body and headed straight up the stairs.

Suzuno followed him, took off her traditional sandals off, and climbed the dusty stairs in her white, traditional socks.

“Hey, Emi! You come up, too! Suzuno, why did you take your sandals off!? Take them with you!”

“It’s so she won’t slip! Wait, Bell! Here! The paper bag!”

Emi picked upher and Suzuno’s belongings that they had dropped when the gate opened, and followed the others upstairs, barely squeezing through the door.

“Hold on, Chii-chan? Where’s Chii-chan? I haven’t seen… huh?”

Maou finally realized that Chiho was nowhere to be seen in the midst of the supernatural event. The ominous feeling that Chiho might have been affected by the torrent of light from the gate because she had no resistance against demonic or holy powers ran through Maou’s head.

However, upon a closer look, her cheeks were rosy and a happy smile floated on her face, with an expression like she was seeing a good dream.

“He-heey, Chii-chan?”

“…eld me…”

“Huh?”

He couldn’t make out what she was, so he drew closer.

“…held me, Maou-san held me. Ehehe, held…”

She whispered with a blissful smile on her face and held her hand up to her mouth.

“…Uuuuuh…”

Maou let out a small groan as he frowned a bit, and then,

“Hoi!”

“Kyah!”

He let out a short yell and clapped his hands right in front of Chiho’s face.

The sound brought Chiho back to her senses, and she looked around quickly.

“Is anyone home? Chii-chan!”

“Hyah! Ma-Maou-san! Uh-I-I-I was!”

“It’s okay, sorry, but now’s not the time! We have to get back into Demon King Castle!”

“Huh? Wha-wha-wha! Ma-Maou-san, hand, my hand!”

Not giving Chiho enough time to completely recover from her confusion, Maou pulled her upstairs by the hand.

When all was said and done and they were all back inside Demon King Castle, everyone was completely wiped out for one reason or another.

＊＊＊

A group of people from an alternate world and a high school girl stuffed their faces with ice cream in silence beside the little apple girl, who slept in blissful peace on top of a bath sheet that Ashiya had laid out.

To be more precise, Chiho did not eat much of her ice cream, but the other five kept eating theirs to escape from reality.

Emi finished her ice cream first, and,

“…Okay, we’ll be taking off now…”

“Hey! Stop right there!”

She tried to get up and escape, but Maou stopped her by holding onto her foot.

“Hey! Don’t grab my feet!”

She tried to shake him off, but…

“Shhhhh! You will wake her up, Emilia!”

Suzuno put her index finger over her lips and whispered.

Emi soured her expression and lowered her foot. However,

“…Bell and I have nothing to do with this! You do something about it!”

“As if! No matter how you look at it, she came for you!”

They argued with each other in whispers.

The apple had undoubtedly charged after Emi and extended its arms toward her before it had become a little girl. Whether that was because it was reacting to her holy power or Emi had simply been standing in the direction where its arms had been extended was unclear, but considering the the timing of her arrival, which was exactly when Emi had materialized her sword, the former seemed more likely.

“You take her back, or at the very least stay here until we know what’s going on!”

“No way! If this has something to do with me, then there’s no doubt it’ll be nothing but trouble! I’m getting out of here as soon as I can!”

“Held… my hand…”

Beside the arguing Maou and Emi, Chiho was still spaced out.

“I should have said this ages ago, but I’m sick of getting dragged into all your troubles!”

“What? So are you saying you’re going to solve all my problems?”

“Yeah, right! I’m saying that you should learn how to wipe your own ass!”

“Ew! And if I could, I would! But I have no control over any of this! It’s not my responsibility!”

“Come on! You…”

“Be quiet! She’ll wake up!”

Ashiya warned them in a whisper, but their voices kept escalating as they tried to shift the responsibility onto each other.

“He held me, Maou-san’s hand, it was so big…”

“…What happened to Chiho-dono…?”

“She’s been like this for a while.”

“Silence, Lucifer. I was not asking you.”

Suzuno saw that everyone aside from Ashiya, who was trying to calm the bickering pair down, was going to be useless, and moaned as she put her hand on her forehead.

“Didn’t this happen because you made some weird bonfire!? You must have summoned it, just like back at Tanabata!”

“How would I know!? And besides, what do you mean, ‘back at Tanabata?’ Don’t criticize me when you don’t even know what a welcoming fire is! It’s a Japanese ritual, and has nothing to do with us!”

“See! It was you who summoned it! Your leftover demonic powers must have gotten mixed with a

Japanese ritual again! If you summoned it, you take responsibility!”

“What do you mean, ‘leftover?’ Call it ‘strategically put aside!’ Stop complaining and contribute to solving the problem every once in a while!”

“What!? You make it sound like I never do anything!”

“But you always just go with the flow and never do anything!”

“What did you say!?”

“Bring it!”

“I already told you two, be quiet!”

Aiming for the heads of the demon king and hero, who were completely lost in their extremely immature argument, Suzuno brought down the hammer she had summoned.

Neither Ashiya nor Urushihara could stop her.

“Uh-um-sorry!”

“No, wait, you’ve gotta be kidding m-agh!”

The hammer only hit Maou, who was taller than Emi.

She held back and didn’t put any force into it, but even an ordinary hammer to the head could cause an injury. Maou nearly teared up at the pain, and glared up at Suzuno, but…

“Oou.. Afu.”

A small yawn and a shuffling sound stopped everyone in their tracks.

The little apple girl sat up, and rubbed her eyes as she yawned. After rubbing her eyes for a bit, the little girl looked around, and stopped and looked at Maou.

“He… hey.”

Maou tried talking to the weary-eyed girl.

“Oou?”

He had no idea whether she could understand him, but figured she’d at least know that he was trying to talk to her.

“…goo’ monin.”

However, defying all expectations, the little girl spoke not with an Idea Link, as Maou and Emi had when they had just arrived in Japan, but in perfectly normal Japanese.

“Yo-you can speak Japanese?”

Maou had no idea how the mysterious little apple girl who had arrived through a gate could speak Japanese. He crept up slowly so as not to scare her, and asked her that question. “ah wittle.”

“A little? Okay. I see.”

Maou nodded awkwardly and turned around in search of help from others, but Emi, Suzuno, Ashiya, and Urushihara just held silent expressions that told him to keep going.

It wasn’t what Maou had wanted, but he mustered his courage and asked the little apple girl a question.

“Um, what exactly are you?”

“Fu?”

The little apple girl looked back with big, blank eyes, as if she did not understand the question.

Regaining his composure after realizing his mistake,

“I mean, um, name, yeah, what’s your name?”

Maou turned to his experience from work, and asked as if she was a little child that a customer had brought.

This time, the little girl made an expression that showed she understood the question, gave a small yawn, and answered,

“Alas Ramus.”

“Alas Ramus?”

“Mh. Alas Ramus. Apsho!”

This time, a little sneeze. As if that had woken her up, she opened her half-shut eyes all the way and suddenly began looking around quickly.

“Wah!”

Urushihara jumped at her sudden change, but Maou, who was somewhat used to children’s sudden changes in behavior, was able to keep his composure.

Because of that, he was finally able to achieve a mental state where he could observe the little girl who called herself Alas Ramus.

From a human viewpoint, she looked to be about one or two years old. Her extraordinarily bright silver hair could almost reflect sunlight, but one bunch of hair was shaded violet; the same color as her eyes.

Maou was particularly bothered by something and looked at her forehead for a moment, but there was nothing there. Putting that matter aside, he continued to question her.

“Alas Ramus, where did you come from?”

“Ah, Yes… od?”

After having some difficulty thinking, she gave an unsure answer that sounded like a word.

“Yes…? No, I wasn’t asking for a yes or no. Where’s your home?”

“home… home? Ah donno.”

“I-I see…”

Maou carefully thought about other questions he could ask.

“…Do you have a mother and a father?”

“ma, fa?”

Perhaps the words were too long, or perhaps she just couldn’t understand them. Alas Ramus shook her head as if she was stumped.

“I just want you to tell me about your mommy and daddy, Alas Ramus.”

She might be mysterious, but she has the appearance of a human child. It seemed reasonable to ask her about her parents, as long as her answer…

“daddy is… Satan.”

…wasn’t something like that.

The eyes of the entire group bored holes into Maou’s back.

“I see… so your daddy is Satan… huh?”

Realizing what that answer meant, Maou turned around and faced the others.

“…Wait, me?”

“She…”

“Definitely said…”

“Daddy is Satan…”

“Right…?”

“Ma-Maou-san!?”

Chiho, who had been in a blissful, dream-like state until that moment, suddenly snapped out of it and started to interrogate Maou.

“Ma-Ma-Maou-san, you had a child!?”

“Wa-wa-wait, a second, Chii-chan!”

“Did-did you actually have a wife or children when you were the demon king!?”

“No! No I didn’t, calm down! I never had any!”

“My-my Lord, are you speaking the truth!?”

“Hey! Why are you on her side, Ashiya!?”

“If you had a secret child, the news would shake the demon world! As the future heir, she needs specialized education! The best we have to offer! Why did you keep her hidden from me for this long, after she has grown this much, my lord!?”

“Wait! Why are you already assuming she’s my child!?”

“Tha-that’s right, who is your secret demon mistress? Since the demon army was mostly male demons, was this before we invaded Ente Isla!?”

“I said, she’s not mine!! …Huh?”

As Maou was sandwiched by the double interrogation of Chiho and Ashiya, Alas Ramus made her way out of the towel sheet,

“oof, umf.”

put her small hands on the tatami, took an uneasy foothold, and put a brave expression on her innocent face as she got up slowly.

From that, they determined that she was at an age where she could stand, but that was the least of their worries at the moment.

Alas Ramus gave it her all, swinging her arms and legs to clear the great distance of half a tatami mat to reach Maou.

Seeing such an adorable sight, the entire group’s face softened for a moment, but in the midst of such a tense atmosphere, Alas Ramus took Maou’s hand and breathed through her nostrils as if she were smelling him.

“…daddy!”

With a smile that stretched across her entire face, she grabbed onto Maou.

The tension in the air in that precise moment was excruciatingly difficult to describe.

Chiho and Ashiya’s faces twitched and their mouths opened and closed silently as if they were goldfish gasping for oxygen, Urushihara retreated to the corner of the room to escape from any possible collateral damage, and Emi and Suzuno just stood silently, having no idea what to do. And of course, the most dismayed of them all was Maou, who had just become a father.

“Wa-wait! How in the world did you decide that I’m your dad!?”

“Daddyyy!”

“Come on! Stop saying stuff that’ll just throw more dynamite into the volcano!!”

The gears in Maou’s head began spinning at an incredible rate as he tried to think of anything that would pacify the pale-faced Chiho and Ashiya, resulting in him thinking of a question.

“Tha-that’s right! Mommy! Who’s your mommy!?”

Alas Ramus gave Maou a big, blank stare.

Maou was trying to prove his innocence by showing that her mother was someone he didn’t know.

Alas Ramus’ appearance was that of a one-to-two year-old. That timeframe would place her conception right around his battle with the hero Emilia. Ashiya should understand that Maou had no time to be fooling around with a demoness back then.

“Mommy!”

But Alas Ramus answered Maou’s question right away, without having to repeat it this time. At the same time she replied, “mommy,” she pointed the index finger of her tiny hand without a shred of doubt.

Everyone realized that she could already point with her finger, which was again the least of their problems, and the group turned to look at what she was pointing at.

“…Huh?”

In the direction of her pointed finger was Emi..

“…M…m-m-m-m…me?”

The blood drained out of Emi’s face faster than anyone else’s there.

The air in Demon King Castle was completely frozen, even though it was the middle of summer.

As if hammering the final nail into the coffin,

“Daddy! Mommy!”

Alas Ramus pointed to Maou and Emi clearly, in that order.

The stupefied Maou and Emi had no idea what was happening. And then…

“…huuurgh…”

“Waaaaah! Ashiya! Pull yourself together! Are you alright!?”

Right then and there, Ashiya passed out and fell, causing Urushihara to run over to help him up.

“Yu-Yu-Yu-Yusa-Yusasasa-Yusa-san?”

Chiho crushed the not-yet-empty ice cream cup in her hand.

“The father is the demon king, and the mother is the hero? This is beyond world-shattering…”

Suzuno’s words symbolized the chaos that was to ensue.

And while the adults were caught up in the whirlwind, Alas Ramus, the little apple girl, happily ran in a figure eight around “Mommy” and “Daddy.”