THE DEVIL AND THE HERO STAND STRONG IN SASAZUKA 1 page

?Not you again. This early in the morning? Look, I have work today, so could you let me sleep some more??

It was hardly that early. Emi, after all, had left the same time Rika went off to work.

Rika tried to stop her, suggesting she take another day to rest. But she didn?t want to cause too much trouble for her friend, and the thoughts she dwelled upon over the previous night had driven her to room 201 of the Villa Rosa Sasazuka apartments as quickly as she could manage.

Since her own clothes were bloodied, she borrowed a blouse from Rika. She wore the same suit and shoes from the night of the accident as she clambered the Villa Rosa staircase and mashed a finger on the doorbell.

She expected that Maou might not exactly heave the door wide open for her, so she had an excuse in hand?a brown paper envelope she purchased from the convenience store. It was enough to capture Maou?s notice as he cracked the door open, still not ready to remove the chain.

?Don?t worry. There isn?t poison or a razor blade inside or anything.?

?I don?t think I?ve received anything from you I didn?t regret.?

?Oh, well, in that case, I think I?ll just keep this thousand yen??

Maou snatched the envelope away.

?Okay, we?re even now.?

?Hey! I thought we promised you?d stop interfering with us for a while.?

?I think me rescuing you from the cops more than makes up for that.?

?Ugh, you stupid little??

Emi interjected before Maou could finish his evaluation.

?Yesterday!?

?Uh??

?Was Ashiya?I mean Alciel all right??

A look of clear suspicion crossed Maou?s face.

?Did you get clocked in the head or something last night??

?We?re talking about him, not me. He wasn?t hurt or anything??

She knew this was an inelegant way of picking his mind. But there was no other way to broach the topic.

?No, no injuries. Major blow to his ego, though.?

The look of suspicion remained on his face.

?And he didn?t turn back into his demon form or anything, either.?

?Ah?!?

?What? Isn?t that what you were asking about?? Maou snorted at Emi, who was unable to hide the shock. The confrontational tone drained from her voice.

?How do I know you?re telling the truth??

?Well, what if I said he was a demon? Would you bust in here and kill us??

?I??

Maou continued, not expecting a useful response.

?He could tell I reverted back, too, for a little while. He spent all night crying about ?Ooooh, I failed to serve my liege at his hour of need,? et cetera, et cetera, and now he?s sleeping in this morning. What the hell am I gonna do for breakfast now??

Ashiya had remained staunchly human. Internally, this disturbed Emi.

Rika?s monologue suggested to her that Maou regained his demon form temporarily because his body had consumed the terror and anguish from the nearby survivors, converting it into magical force.

If that theory proved true, Maou could have used the power he had before yesterday to summon any manner of disaster. Say, an earthquake strong enough to make an underground corridor collapse. And he could repeat the process, continually feeding off the negative emotions of his victims, until the Devil King Satan finally resurrected himself. And if this was Maou?s plan, there was no reason for him to hesitate any longer.

Satan, in his conquest of Ente Isla, was a cruel, merciless tyrant, one who thought of a human being?s life as no more consequential as that of a blade of grass. It was easy to picture him immediately moving to take action.

So she flew to his squalid apartment in a state of half panic?and found the same dopey-looking face peeking out behind the crack in the door, whining about how he needed to be on time for his shift. What was this Devil King thinking, going on with his human life? It was beyond Emi?s comprehension.

His next question brought Emi into an even higher plane of bewilderment.

?But, hey, were you all right? I saw your forehead. And you used some of your power when you put Chi to sleep, didn?t you??

??What??

Emi froze on the spot.

?What are you?saying??

?What do you mean, what am I saying? I?m just asking if you?re okay. Your power isn?t back, right??

The easy explanation would be that she had suddenly, inexplicably, failed to comprehend the Japanese language. If only it were that easy.

?Are you being?serious??

?What? Am I not allowed to be concerned about people??

Maou acted honestly peeved as he fired back.

Emi could feel the blood drain from her face. She felt sick. What could this man possibly be saying to her?

She was gripped by an intense loathing, one far stronger than what rose up upon her first encounter with Maou and Ashiya in Japan. It was almost the same hatred as she felt the day she learned of her father?s death.

?I am not so weak?that my enemy should be concerned for me.?

That was all she could say, at the end of it.

?Oh??Yeah, I guess so, huh??

That was all the response Maou had to offer.

?Anyway. If that?s all you needed, you mind leaving me alone??

?With pleasure.?

Emi quickly turned to make her exit. She wanted to feel out Maou a bit more, in hopes he?d drop a clue to the riddle behind his transformation. But if she stayed here any longer, she honestly wasn?t sure what the disgust bubbling within her chest would make her do.

Maou looked on, concerned, as she left. Whether he understood her feelings or not, he plainly found her behavior puzzling. Suddenly, something sprang to his mind.

?H-hey! Emi!?

But Emi showed no sign of stopping, in a hurry to leave as quickly as possible.

?You?re gonna slip if you??

He wasn?t quite able to relay the intended message before the moment came. The sound of corrugated iron panels loudly scraping against each other greeted his ears.

?Ah!?

That was all the reaction Maou heard from Emi.

The corrugated-iron stairway structure, replete with peeling paint and visible rust, had long been tilting to the side, the result of long years of supporting itself against the wind, rain, and weight of time. It had achieved an odd concave shape, just barely skirting legal regulations.

A soundless scream was heard as the weight so cruelly placed upon these stairs consumed its potential energy and tumbled to the ground.

??if you go downstairs in those heels.?

Maou finally completed the sentence once the noise died down.

A sulky-looking Ashiya, wearing a jersey he had lying around on the floor, opened the cabinet that held their first-aid kit.

Atop a stack of job-search magazines bound with twine in the corner, Emi sat staring into space, unable to figure out where to direct her emotions any longer.

Considering she had slipped the moment she set foot on the first step, her injuries were miraculously light. Unfortunately, her suit, which had survived intact up to this point, was now a ragged mess of dirt and tearing. One of the pumps that flew off her feet landed right on a concrete-block flagstone, adding a patchwork of scratches to the external leather.

As for Emi herself: One sprained finger, caused by reaching out and jamming it against the handrail. Bruising on her buttocks, which was the first to hit the stairs. A scrape to the bridge of her nose, as she landed facedown below.

Overall, far more serious than the damage she took from an entire underground corridor collapsing upon her.

?My? The Hero Emilia had the Devil King?in a different form, yes, but still the Devil King!?cornered in his lair once, and now she?s been roughed up by falling down the stairs of our apartment? A black mark on His Demonic Highness more than anyone, perhaps, but??

The impact on her forehead also reopened the wound from the previous night. Blood was beginning to show on the bandage, making its way past the gauze below. The dressing itself had turned brown from the dirt and would need a change shortly. Ashiya, however, looked dejected as he showed the emergency kit to the Devil King.

?Nothing in here but adhesive tape. We did buy gauze and so forth somewhere else, no??

?Maybe. We weren?t planning on anything as rough as this. We?ll probably have to go buy some stuff. Hey, Ashiya, you mind going out to the pharmacy by the rail station and buying bandages and gauze? They oughtta be open by now. I don?t want this girl yelling at me even more.?

?Yes, my liege. May I be permitted to borrow Dullahan from you? I have other shopping to take care of as well.?

?Permission granted. Hey, if you got that much money on you, why don?t you cook something better for me??

?I am afraid, Your Demonic Highness, that your spending habits are such that I have to build my own stash and save my money carefully. I will return soon.?

Maou snorted derisively as he heard Ashiya, still wearing the morning?s jersey, pedal off.

?You better get that disinfected for now, at least. I have some stuff over here, so let?s get that washed and??

Maou sat down in front of Emi, wet towel in hand. Emi, snapping out of her torpor, snatched it from his hand.

?D-don?t touch me! I?m not a child! I can do it myself!?

?Sure, sure, sorry. Tissues are over there.?

The box of tissues that Emi had flung at Maou still laid where it fell. She wiped the dirt from her nose and forehead, then used another tissue to apply the disinfectant. Then, she was struck by a crushing wave of sadness.

?What, does it sting??

?No!?

Emi answered Maou?s simple question by throwing the bottle of disinfectant, lid still open, full bore at him.

?Whoa! What was that for??

?Shut up! What is with you, anyway?! You?re the Devil King, you idiot! Why don?t you act like one and start wrecking this world already?!?

?Huh? Where?d all that come from??

Maou was honestly surprised, unsure what Emi was trying to say. Emi continued shouting.

?What?! Who the hell ever heard of a dirt-poor, junk-food-eating, rising-star-in-the-workplace, loved-by-teenage-girls Devil King?!?

?Ngh??

Maou was taken off guard by this astute observation, but quickly rallied. ?Well, I?ve never heard of a Hero who started crying after falling down the stairs and had a demon fix her up!?

?And what kind of Devil King sends his minion off to the pharmacy for the Hero?s sake?! And what kind of Great Demon General actually says yes to that?!?

?Ergh??

Emi began shouting like a toddler, unable to process her raging emotions.

?Why are you so damn kind to me?!?

The screamed question hit Maou where it hurt.

?Why are you kind to me, to other people, to the whole world?! How can? How can you be so nice all the time?!?

Maou was at a loss to answer. The unexpected sharpness of the query stabbed directly into his heart.

?And if you can be so nice?then why? Why??

Emi shouted through the tears.

?Why did you kill my father?!?

The scream made the apartment?s wooden frame shudder. The moment of silence afterward seemed even more deafening.

Emi sobbed, out of breath. Maou stood there, unable to give any response.

?The?the Devil King I pursued was a malicious monster! He treated people like they were nothing more than insects! He loved nothing more than the despair, the blood that ran across the world!?

?I??

?You turned our fields into gigantic firestorms! You crushed our castles with your lightning! You washed away entire towns with your floods! You allowed your horde of demons to perform any kind of savage brutality they wanted! Devil King Satan! Even when you die, I will never forgive you! You took my home, my father?s fields, my father?s life, my peaceful, quiet childhood?! Everything! And I?ll never forgive you!?

?Emi, I??

?But why? Why are you?being so nice to me???

It was clear that Maou?s mental makeup had veered considerably away from his time on Ente Isla.

He was a tyrant back then. Even now, he remembered how he treated the world as his personal plaything and resolved to eradicate the human race from all the land. That desire, at least, was still there. So why was he presenting no resistance to the idea of living a comfortable life in a human-dominated world?

?I?I haven?t really thought deeply about it.?

Maou, unable to formulate a clear answer in his mind, forced the words out anyway.

?But?well, sorry, I guess.?

?? ??

Emi did not reply. Instead she looked up with her red, tear-moistened face at the man in front of her, mouth open as she stared.

His approach was casual, but Maou was apologizing from the heart.

?I mean, I didn?t know anything about any Hero at first. I was busy taking over the Central Continent and controlling my demon forces, so I guess I didn?t really pay full attention to what was going on, over on the surrounding islands? Well, I don?t mean to shift the blame to Lucifer, either, though. But what could I have done? Demons and humans? Well, we?re always in conflict with each other.?

He was clearly frustrated with himself. His eyes swiveled from one point in the air to the next, gesturing as he tried his hardest to formulate a decent excuse.

?Plus, you know, at the time, I guess I didn?t really understand humans all that well, so??

Emi was not expecting Maou to come up with much, but this reaction was wholly unexpected. She turned her reddened face to the side, the realization that she had exploded in front of Maou filling her with shame.

?Hello, I was??

That was the scene so suddenly interrupted by a familiar voice. Emi and Maou quickly turned toward the door. Ashiya walked in, as if guided inside, and behind him was Chiho, frozen as she noticed the state Emi and Maou were in.

Ashiya was just as lost himself, forgetting to close the door as he witnessed the scene.

Chiho, in her scarlet-tinged school outfit, was holding a paper bag printed with the logo of a Japan-style sweet shop located inside a Shinjuku department store.

?Uh, I?I ran into Miss Sasaki there, and she stated she wanted to meet with you, and so??

Ashiya stammered out his explanation, pharmacy bag still in hand. After a moment standing there in shock, Chiho dropped the bag she was holding. Judging by the heavy clank, one could figure the bag contained a can of senbei rice crackers, not that it mattered right now.

Maou could guess what was running through Chiho?s mind.

Probably, she still felt bad about last night. Not only did she get Maou caught up in a disaster, but her selfish request had also led to repercussions in his personal life.

So to make up for it, she dressed up in her finest outfit and decided to stop by with something to snack on as a gift. By modern teenager standards, it was a tremendously polite gesture.

And then she ran into Ashiya, his roommate, near his apartment. Chiho hadn?t exactly had a deep conversation with Ashiya yesterday, but he knew who she was, and she knew he was at the disaster site. And Ashiya, ever the gentleman, must have kindly escorted her up the stairs.

As attentive to detail as Ashiya always was, he had doubtlessly told her of Emi?s morning visit. Chiho must have accepted the news well enough, given that she was here now.

So he came in expecting an injured Emi. Not a sobbing, red-faced Emi, along with a panicked-looking Maou trying his hardest to make excuses. It was simple to picture how she would gauge that situation. What?s more, thanks to her trip down the stairs, Emi?s suit was more than a little ripped and damaged. All of this raced across Maou?s mind in the course of a single second.

The nervous step backward Chiho gingerly took turned all of this guesswork into confirmed belief.

?Uh? Ha-ha! M-maybe, uh, this isn?t the best time?? she stammered.

?Ch-Chiho??

Emi, no doubt reaching the same conclusion as Maou, rose up in a panic, realizing that Chiho was misunderstanding the scene in dramatic fashion.

?I guess it?s true?that?Maou and?Yusa? They really are.??

Chiho?s knees were shaking. Her eyes were emotionless, but the smile on her face was taut and fraying at the edges.

This was turning into a serious misunderstanding.

?N-no, Chiho, that?s not it at all! This is??

?Chi, listen, just calm down for a??

?I-I?m sorry!?

Not willing to lend an ear to Emi?s and Maou?s wholly ungrounded excuses, Chiho spun herself around and galloped out. Her school-uniform loafers kept her safe as her footsteps clanged their way downstairs. The three of them listened on, still frozen.

?That was?bad, wasn?t it??

Emi muttered the words flatly, the soul removed from her body. Maou turned his face upward, a hand covering his eyes.

?P-perhaps we should pursue her and get this straightened out??

Ashiya took a look around the area beneath the stairwell. There was already no sign of Chiho.

Snatching the pharmacy bag from the nervous, twitching Ashiya, Maou threw it at Emi. She caught it instinctively.

?Look, just go home, okay? Nothing good ever happens when you?re near me!?

There was no responding to his verbal and physical abuse.

The unexpected Chiho factor had drained all the tenseness from the apartment.

?Oh, dear, Mr. Maou, that wasn?t very mature.?

That was why even Ashiya, still frozen near the open door, didn?t notice at first.

?Picking on a woman like that! This isn?t grade-school recess, you know.?

?Aaaghh!!?

He had failed to realize until that instant that a pillar of gold was standing behind him.

?M-Ms. Shiba!?

Her long, medieval-styled, marigold-print dress shone in the morning light. A peacock feather, painted a bright golden color, stuck out of her wide-brimmed hat, the same color as the dress. Her golden hair, reminiscent of French nobility, reflected the sun?s rays atop her body. She carried a bright yellow handbag with elegant handles that resembled strings of pearls, and she completed the package with a shawl replete with lime-green lamé strands, white enamel heels, and false eyelashes that resembled a field of grass growing on the seabed, so long that even the most egregious shojo manga artist would run for the hills if asked to draw them that length. She was Miki Shiba, the owner of the apartment, and she had appeared without a sound.

It was Ashiya?s outcry that finally made Maou and Emi notice the corn-on-the-cob-shaped landlord behind him. The golden light around her seemed to form an enormous yellow halo as they basked in her presence.

?This your girlfriend I assume, Mr. Maou??

The gravelly voice seemed to belong to a woman fairly on in years, but Shiba?s wine-barrel-sized frame readily foiled any attempts to guess her true age.

?My name is Miki Shiba, and I?m the landlord here at Villa Rosa Sasazuka. It?s good to meet you!?

Emi squinted, as if trying to see through the glorious sunlight in front of her. Nodding back was the best she could manage.

?Feel free to call me Mikitty, by the way.?

?Uh, sure??

There was no other response to give.

?I had come to visit, Mr. Maou, Mr. Ashiya, in order to inform my tenants of certain upcoming matters?but I see you are both rather occupied at the moment??

With these overly prying words, she handed a piece of paper over to Ashiya, offering a whiff of her elegant perfume as her arm extended forward.

?But regardless. We have had quite a spate of earthquakes as of late, no? I?ve felt it necessary to perform seismic reinforcement on this residence, so I came to inform you of some construction work in the future.?

While this had been the case since they first met, for some reason, Maou had trouble dealing with his landlord. He didn?t mind the sassy, cheesy extravagance at all, but for some reason, his internal demonic sixth sense always told him that Shiba was a lady not to be defied at any cost.

The piece of paper contained a schedule for the reinforcement work, a notice that residents would need to vacate the property for a one-day period, and another notice that this would not change their monthly rent. The landlord?s seal was on the bottom, alongside a glossy, golden kiss mark. Maou made a conscious effort not to let his reaction to this show.

?But, there has certainly been quite a few earthquakes, hmm? Especially lately.?

Shiba made the casual observation as she sidled up to Maou.

?Y-yeah??

?In fact, I wonder if we?ll have another one today, even.?

?I?I couldn?t say.?

?And speaking of that, on my way here, I happened across a charming young woman running down the road. Crying the whole way, I may add!?

She smiled as she leered at all three of the apartment?s residents simultaneously. It was a fairly impressive physical feat. ?I believe she was heading for Sasazuka station as well??

It was that instant.

?Did it?shake just now??

Only the ever-elegant Miki Shiba chose not to nod her head in response.

?Mr. Maou??

?Uh.?

?If you?ve involved her in this, I would hope a young man would see matters through to the end, hmm??

?Wh-what do you??

Maou was thrown into confusion, unable to comprehend his landlord. But as he stood there, the shaking grew stronger and stronger.

?Y-Your Demonic Highness! Th-this shaking!?

Ashiya was shouting.

?Chiho!?

?Did you honestly think that charming young woman receiving an idea link and being subject to that sonar strike was a complete coincidence, then??

A single sentence was all it took from the landlord to turn the others into stone.

?I would think that you, of all people, would understand the power behind people?s thoughts and wills. Perhaps you had best hurry, before it is too late??

There was something lurking underneath that thick makeup. But what?

?See? You can hear it, no??

A loud rumble coursed across town.

?Argh, I feel horrible! I think I?m gonna get Gate-sick!?

?Please try not to vomit if you caaaaan??

?No guarantees, man! Erp??

?Hang in there, pleeease! I doubt we?ll have time to relax once we reach the other side.?

?Uh? You catchin? something over there? Grhh??

?A man-made magical reaction, picked up by our sonar readings. It?s far too large to be purely the latent magic of ?Japan.??

?So Emilia?s in trouble??

?Possss-ible! We may need to prepare for battle!?

?Right! Let?s hurry! I can take this!?

?Yes, sir! On our waaaaaay!?

?Oooogh! Stop making it shake so much!?

Chiho sprinted at full speed, crying. Whatever Maou and Emi had to say, that was not the kind of situation she had the wherewithal to calmly pick her way through.

I really do like Maou.

But I?m just a new girl on the job, someone he?s only just met. I can?t do anything about the history Maou and Emi Yusa have between them.

It had to have been my first love. With Maou, I was full of spirit; I had a drive, a goal I could push to achieve with him. The high school boys, all mooching off their parents and partying all night; they?re nothing compared to him.

He wasn?t particularly tall or handsome, but Chiho had still fallen in love with him.

Now that was gone, her heart ripped into a million pieces, and she had no idea what to do. So she ran as hard as she could, plunging into the crowd around Sasazuka station, running into an electric pole, tripping over a parked bicycle, colliding head-on with a pedestrian.

?S-sorry!?

She apologized, too ashamed to bring her head upward.

?Oooh, this looks like a good one.?

The voice, coming from a head or so taller than Chiho, was ringed with a bitter coldness wholly unfamiliar to Chiho?s ears.

?I had been following you since that last mistake, but I didn?t think you would be caught up in despair for them so easily.?

It was a young man, on the small side. He looked normal enough?long, flowing hair, T-shirt, and jeans. He couldn?t have been much older than Chiho, either.

But what about those eyes? Those purple eyes, with pupils that seemed to shine a rainbow of ominous colors that Chiho had never seen before?

?Chiho Sasaki. Allow me to take that hatred and despair the Devil King and the Hero brought to you, and make it a reality!?

They were in the middle of the midmorning Sasazuka bustle. Two people stopped in the middle of it caused a traffic situation in and of itself.

?Hey, get outta the way!?

A young, fashionably dressed man drowsily warned the stranger, placing a hand on his shoulder.

??!?

Suddenly, the T-shirt ripped itself apart in the area the hand touched him. The young man was blown away by the thing that popped out of his shoulder, plowing into a line of parked bikes.

?Ahh?!?

Chiho let out a scream, deep within her throat. Other passersby stared at the man, unable to fathom what had just happened.

It was a wing. A set of large, jet-black wings, jutting out from this person?s back.

?The hunt has begun. Today, I will surpass the Devil King for good.?

At that moment, an elevated Keio rail line collapsed, the victim of a mysterious explosion.

Maou and Emi ran, Ashiya a small distance behind them.

The rumbling they heard right after the explosion couldn?t have been caused by anything other than the influence of something magical.

Judging by the landlord?s warning, it was clear she was, to say the least, no ordinary person. But there was no time to get to the bottom of that.

?Hang in there, Chi!?

Maou kept running.

?Look!? Emi pointed ahead.

??What in the world?!? Ashiya groaned to himself.

The rail line had fallen. The elevation bridge had collapsed to the ground, crushing the shopping mall adjacent to Sasazuka station. They could detect residual magic in the area, but this was nothing like the barriers Maou had impulsively built to rescue people.

Beyond the mess, on the Koshu-Kaido road, Maou could see two figures in the air, the Shuto Expressway spanning across the sky above.

The enemy no longer had any reason to hide themselves. The bystanders that had escaped harm stood off in the distance, staring at the rubble and the figures in the air.

?Them?!?

?Who?are they? How could they have??

?How do you think?!?

Maou began to climb up the rubble, dodging the broken power lines and making his way past a mountain of detritus that was liable to collapse again at any moment. Emi and Ashiya followed behind.

There were two of them: a man flapping his giant wings as he carried something at his side; and another, this one floating in the air, the hood on his ghostlike robe covering his face.

As they surmounted the rubble, Maou detected something. Something returning to him once again. Why? He should have been overjoyed, but instead he found it disturbing. It wasn?t something he planned to regain this way.

A nagging thought like that never would have occurred to him during his demon-realm days. But now?

?Good to see you, Lucifer! Brought a new playmate with you??

The winged figure in the air replied with a spate of dark laughter. ?Well, well! The Devil King Satan! Or should I be referring to you as Sadao Maou instead? And how nice to see Alciel safe and sound!?

?Lucifer?? It couldn?t be??

?N-no? Why are you here now???

Emi was at a total loss for words. Ashiya shook his head, unable to believe the sight before him.

Only Maou remained strong, his stern expression unchanged as he glared at the two floating figures.

Lucifer was the Great Demon General whom Emilia the Hero had slain first. The fallen angel who arose a demon. The general who governed the invasion and capture of Ente Isla?s Western Continent.

?How long has it been, Emilia the Hero?that is, Emi Yusa!?

?No? No way??

?Oh, yes! Your sword may have pierced through my body, and yet I am here now, before you!?

The Great Demon General Lucifer sneered, the ominous black wings befitting his fallen-angel title. At his side, like a mother carrying around its kitten, he held an unconscious Chiho.

She did not appear to be injured. But why did he decide to capture her?

?All thanks to your new friend, isn?t it?? Maou nodded toward the hooded figure as he spoke. ?When I retreated and sent a squadron over to the Western Continent to investigate, I still had no faith that you were dead. I never imagined in a thousand years the humans could defeat a Great Demon General, so the investigation was likely less thorough than it should have been??

?And thanks to that, I survived.?

Date: 2016-06-12; view: 182