THE DEVIL KING AND THE HERO DON’T HAVE VERY MUCH TO DO
“It was common knowledge in the demon realm that the Spear of Adramelechinus is a weapon passed down from generation to generation in the Bluehorn clan, one of the realm’s most powerful families. As anyone who knows or has fought Adramelech knows, it was, like, huge. Incredibly long, even by demon standards.”
“Yeah, the handle alone was as thick as a support pillar in a castle.”
To any of the regulars at Room 201 in Villa Rosa Sasazuka, the conference of these two speakers would have been quite an unusual sight.
“The Bluehorns wield a lot of magic that works best with water and ice, and it’s said that spear has something to do with it. I guess that was the reason Adramelech was the demon-horde commander in the Northern Island, as water-rich and close to arctic climes as it is.”
“Makes sense to me. When Adramelech first took over the continent, we started seein’ these trees of ice dotted here and there. We called ’em ice-tree towers, but when I learned they were magical plants born from the demonic force Adramelech ran through underground springs to watch over us, I was pretty shocked.”
The scene was the general headquarters of the group known among its members as the United East-West Anti-Divinity Alliance, situated on Isla Centurum, the Central Continent—and when Suzuno returned there, upon hearing Ashiya’s news that two of their targets had been secured, the sight of Urushihara and Albert leading a strategy conference was so novel, it made regular novelty seem trite by comparison.
The sight of Urushihara—the model jobless slacker—assuming a leadership position in the force was like the extra-special secret sauce liberally sprinkled over such a crazily novel sight. Neither Maou, nor Emi, nor Chiho were there. Ashiya was off on business in the Eastern Island, and Emeralda had returned to Saint Aile for keeping matters on the Central Continent safe. Suzuno rued the fact that she had nobody to commiserate with about how bizarre this setup looked.
“But…yeah. When our little questing group defeated Adramelech, we kinda left the Spear to our friends in the Northern Island as a memorial present.”
“Right. Now, I’d like to make sure no one outside our group knows about our operation to invade heaven. We have Hazel Rumack conducting business for us in Saint Aile, but neither the emperor nor his administration are aware of this. If we have all those Northern Island dudes coming in to crash the party, it’s gonna be such a pain in the ass that I’ll want to throw in the towel right there.”
“Yes. So the first order of business is to discuss how we can swipe Adramelech’s relic from the Northern Island with as small a party as we can manage.”
The meeting, led by Urushihara and Albert, was attended by Suzuno, Rumack, Farfarello, Laila, and Nord.
“You described it as a ‘memorial present’ for the Northern forces,” Nord hesitantly said, being the most normal human being in the group. “So where is it right now?”
“I think this’ll be the easiest way to explain it,” Urushihara replied, taking out his familiar laptop. The screen showed a photograph of a town located in what looked like a range of high mountains. “I had Ciriatto from the Malebranche take these pics with Maou’s digital camera, and y’know, considering how he’s all claws and no, like, anything else, he’s pretty handy with that thing. Anyway, this is a shot of Phiyenci, which is the capital shared by the clans in the Northern Island. It’s nicknamed the ‘Goat Pasture.’”
The shot depicted a wide plain that was filled to the horizon with uniquely low-roofed brick buildings. In one corner was a wide-open space that took up about a fifth of the landscape, like a sports ground too big for its own good. In its middle stood a high, towering structure, apparently some kind of monument. With a tap of the keys, he switched to a close-up photo of this edifice, revealing it to be some kind of giant metallic pillar.
“Look at that,” Rumack sighed as she looked at the high-resolution image. “Such an incredibly detailed depiction… I want this.”
“Don’t abuse it,” warned Albert, taking Rumack out of her reverie. She sat back up, straightening her posture.
“Dude, I’d be happy to show you a few models way faster than this pile of crap.”
Urushihara never missed a moment to slam Maou’s Luddite approach to electronic purchases.
“But anyway,” he continued, “I think these pics give us everything we need. It’s pretty clear, right? They put up the Spear of Adramelechinus in the middle of the Goat Pasture as a monument to symbolize the defeat of the Great Demon General of the North.”
It seemed like a natural, preplanned part of the Pasture, staring down with all its glory at the largest city in the Northern Island. The butt end of the Spear was buried in the ground, secured with something resembling cement around the base, and visitors could go right up to it if they wanted. It almost looked like a gravestone memorializing Adramelech, and judging by the people lazily picnicking and meeting up around the site, it was clearly a bit of a tourist attraction.
“So I guess you can tell,” concluded Urushihara, “that we can’t just take the Spear or ask for it or whatever, right?”
Suzuno, Rumack, and Nord nodded back.
The fact that the Northern Island, a geographically punishing land filled with innumerable races, ethnic groups, and clans, was heralded as the most peaceful of Ente Isla’s five continents was mainly thanks to Phiyenci, the Goat Pasture.
Every five years, the Island held a “zirga,” a large, united gathering of representatives from all the major players native to the land. On this occasion, they’d hold the election for the chief herder, the head of state for the entire Northern Island. This election took a good two weeks to carry out, and it turned the Goat Pasture into a huge festival, filled with the produce, culture, and customs of people across the region.
The zirga was also an occasion for all the Mountain Corps, the elite fighters picked to defend the Northern Island, to assemble and (if necessary) hold combat games in order to solve deeper problems that no measure of discussion between clans could solve. This meant that the history of this land involved very few massive, blood-soaked wars; it also meant that the clans almost never dared to invade one another’s territories. If the times called for it, all these clans could unite to form an astonishingly well-oiled machine of warfare, but in times of peace, it was much more of a “what’s yours is yours, what’s mine is mine” climate.
Thanks to this national character, the people’s image of Adramelech fundamentally differed from the way other lands thought of their local Great Demon General.
“I mentioned this in passing to you a while ago, Bell, but seriously, Adramelech was this close to having the Northern Island welcome him with open arms,” Urushihara volunteered.
“What? Why?” a surprised Rumack asked. When the Devil King’s Army invaded the Western Island, she was vice-captain of the palace forces, only to have her land subjugated by the very slacker leading this meeting right now. Under Urushihara’s, or Lucifer’s, rule, the Western Island—while not as much of a mess as Malacoda’s Southern Island—was not at all the well-oiled bureaucracy Alciel ran in the East, and the human casualties and chaos were at least as bad as anywhere else in the world. It was hard for Rumack to imagine that a Great Demon General nearly took over the North without a fight.
“Yeah, I guess you could say Adramelech’s personality was a good fit for the Northern Island’s people, hmm? In an understated way, he had a real human side to him.”
“Hee-hee!”
Suzuno snickered a bit at this. She had heard it from him before.
“Once he disarmed the Mountain Corps and booted ’em from the island, he made the chief herder hold a zirga, where he talked about the policy behind his invasion and let the opposing clans have their say. Anyone who didn’t go along with the guy got slaughtered, of course, but he actually accepted some of their feedback, too. I dunno. Just the fact that he was open to talking at all, you know; that was enough for the folks up there.”
It wasn’t that anyone actively wanted the Devil King’s Army to be there, but compared with elsewhere, the people were more willing to accept a negotiated defeat.
“Kinda weird to think, though,” Urushihara went on. “Like, when I think of Adramelech, I picture this dude who couldn’t think his way out of a paper bag. I can’t believe he’d be crafty enough to try currying favor with humans.”
“Lucifer, can you shut up a sec? Rumack’s glaring at me.”
“Ow!”
Albert, much larger than the twiggy fallen angel, gave Urushihara a sharp elbow.
Here at this meeting, Rumack was the only person who actively saw Urushihara as a foe. Albert had only joined Emi’s quest after she had defeated Lucifer, but having him and Rumack—villain and victim—face-to-face made for a very delicate situation.
“Anyway,” Albert continued, “the problem is that Phiyenci, along with all the clans in the Northern Island, have accepted Adramelech’s occupation as part of their shared history. I’m from there, and since I helped Emilia beat ’im, that spear he left kinda symbolizes a turning point in that history, y’see? Defeat, followed by victory.”
“So you’re sayin’ they need it? That sucks. It’s kind of ours, dude.”
“Shut up, Lucifer.”
“Are you saying,” Suzuno ventured, “that you would not intervene with them for us, Albert? You don’t think they would give up the Spear?”
“It ain’t gonna happen,” came the point-blank reply from Albert. “Never in a million years. That’s why I got you all together here, ain’t it? Anything I’d try is gonna cause drama. If we really mess this up, we might wind up prodding the Southern Island, too.”
“…True,” Suzuno groaned.
Maou and Emi might have only been in this for Alas Ramus, but Rumack and the knights under her command had a clearer, more present reason—to defeat Ignora and avoid the potential destruction of Ente Isla’s humanity in the nearish future. But doing this involved finding the Noah Gears and launching Devil’s Castle into space, and the humans and the demons had to team up to achieve that. That was only possible thanks to Maou’s deep links to Rumack and Emeralda from the holy empire of Saint Aile, as well as Ashiya’s extremely personal relationship with Hu Shun-Ien, the Azure Emperor of Efzahan. Most other nations weren’t even aware of this operation, and for that matter, it had never been formally announced to the world that the Hero Emilia and the Devil King were even alive.
If this effort got out to the public, whatever the truth was behind it, everyone knew people would hear it as Saint Aile’s Hazel Rumack and the Azure Emperor forged a secret pact with the demons and run with that. It’d sow the seeds of suspicion all over the North and the South, as well as the smaller kingdoms in the West.
No one in this group had ever suggested that they should elicit support from other nations—this being a quest to save humanity, after all. The state of the Sephirah and Tree of Sephirot was something you really had to be close to Maou and Emi to fully grasp. In areas where Church influence was still weak, it’d take decades to even persuade people that Sephirot was connected to the holy force that ran the world. There was no way to convince everyone that teaming up with demons was the only thing to do, and no nation was about to sign off on a mission as daunting as “slaying a god.”
Without any real, visible danger like the Devil King’s Army coming their way, there wasn’t going to be any teamwork—the power struggles taking place within the Federated Order that was formed to rebuild the Central Continent made that clear enough. And these power struggles were laying themselves out like capillaries, along the lines of every political and economic issue facing every nation in the post-Devil King world, making the players ever greedier as they laid their cards down.
That was why Rumack, Emeralda, and the Azure Emperor decided to hurry things along themselves instead. That would make everything go far, far smoother, and keeping it confidential would also put a lid on most of the ensuing power games. It meant a large, heavy burden for Saint Aile and Efzahan, but this burden was also an advantage—the ability to tackle this potential threat ahead of anyone else, a chance that far outclassed the potential losses that prodding the heavens and Sephirot might lead to. Saint Aile and Efzahan definitely had other motivations as well, but there was no doubting that this alliance was the smoothest way to handle this heavenly war.
And now, there was a thorny problem—or rather, a pointy one. Having the Spear of Adramelechinus inside Phiyenci, the shared capital of the Northern Island, presented numerous difficulties. It was physically and politically impossible to take the Spear without the common people knowing.
“Even if we negotiated with them,” Suzuno mused, “the question becomes who we would send. We would need Albert to bear the full brunt of responsibility, but he could hardly handle it by himself.”
“Yeah, that’s the thing. Lemme make this clear: All right, my name’s a bit known around there as a heroic companion, ’n’ all that. But once I set foot back home, I’m my momma’s boy all over again, you know what I mean? I ain’t really got the clout to pull a bunch of clan chiefs my way. And this is Adramelech’s final relic! We’d have to get the chief herder involved, and by that point, there’s not much even Eme could do. In terms of overall balance, I’d say people like Rumack or Emilia are our best bets to contact them with.”
A chief herder didn’t have the absolute authority to (for example) give direct orders to all clans on the continent, but the leader’s words truly did have force behind them. Everyone knew the extent of the powers they wielded; they wouldn’t recommend someone apt to abuse them. Besides, however things worked inside the Island, if an outside visitor wanted to see the chief herder, they would still need an ambassador-level title if they expected an audience this lifetime.
“In that case,” Urushihara said, “let’s break out Emilia. If we explain things to her, I doubt she’s gonna say no.”
“No,” Rumack flatly replied. “If you’re considering her, go with me instead. This way will take longer, but it’ll save us trouble later. With Emilia, things would get too big, too fast. Depending on how the chief herder responds, it could turn into a fight for control of her, like in Efzahan. With me, if anything happens, Saint Aile can step up to put it out.”
“Hold on,” protested Albert. “If you’re not on the scene here, it’s gonna be hard to balance out the human side. Even if it’s me, Eme, and Bell, we can’t deal with Efzahan and the emperor leading them that well.”
Suzuno sighed. “No matter what we do, we keep running into these stupid power struggles…”
The literal end of the world didn’t mean political and monetary issues simply disappeared. Very little of Saint Aile’s government—not even the imperial court itself—knew about this operation. If word got out, Emeralda and Rumack would get hauled in front of their parliament and probably banned from further participation. It’d also mean the Northern Island would become broadly aware of foreign elements from Saint Aile and Efzahan attempting to influence political matters in their homeland. Rumack’s public presence in the Northern Island was thus unwise.
“Besides,” Albert continued, “what do you think would happen if we sent Emilia up there? The Northern Island would welcome ’er, yeah, but to the Southern Island, we’d be a bunch of outcasts. All that stuff at Heavensky’s been kept on the down-low, except for a few rumors here and there. All the world has so far are these sketchy tales of Emilia with nothing solid to back them up. If the Northern clans accept that she’s alive, Emilia’s never gonna have a calm day for the rest of her life. The fallout might even extend all the way to Japan, that other land.”
“You humans are so meddlesome,” noted Farfarello. “It is just as Lord Lucifer says. The Spear belongs to Lord Adramelech. If all you humans have to offer us are petty excuses, we demons can simply seize it any time we please, can we not? There is no need to burden your human nations any further beyond that.”
“Right!” Urushihara gave the demon a sarcastic round of applause. “I was waiting to hear that, Farfarello.”
Albert, on the other hand, gave him a rap on the head. “Hold it, you fool of a Malebranche! Did you forget how you lost several generals out of your Efzahan volunteer army with that logic? If a cadre of demons attacks the Goat Pasture now, at a time of peace, you could wind up baiting the Federated Order into wiping out any demons left on this planet. If this castle here gets attacked, getting up to the moon’s gonna be the least of our worries, let me tell you.”
“Pfft. What is your bright idea, then? If we left matters to you humans, judging by this conversation, it sounds impossible to retrieve the Spear without any difficulty or loss of life.”
Albert and Rumack winced. The demon was hitting them where it hurt.
“Yes, the demon realm has been racked with strife and disorder as of late, but now, we have banded under the banner of the Devil King, ready to follow his orders. You humans, meanwhile, are too obsessed over honor and greed to even care about the future of your descendants. I can hardly see how we’ll kill any gods like this.”
“Enough, Farfarello,” Suzuno interjected. “If anything, this whole effort is a huge step forward for us.”
“…Pfft.”
The demon held his tongue. Suzuno was a Great Demon General, more or less, and he had some respect for that.
“Then how about this, Albert? I could work through the Reconciliation Panel and request that we borrow the Spear in order to investigate the remains of the Devil King’s Army. We can return it once our battle is over, and I think if we give a bare minimum of explanation, the reaction should be rather more measured…”
“That could work, yeah. It’d get it in our hands, at least. But I guarantee ya someone from the North’s gonna be with it the whole time. And how’re we gonna explain it when it’s people from the Central Continent hauling it off—not Sankt Ignoreido, headquarters of the Church? We can’t casually say Oh, we’ll explain everything later once we give it back. ”
“…Yes. Good point. We are taking one of the island’s most valuable assets.”
“Yeah, and don’t forget the other problem, Suzuno: Even if we manage to make off with the Spear scot-free, someone from the North’s gonna be looking over it. If they’re good people, then great, but if they start carryin’ on about what the Island or the clans get out of this, it’s gonna blow up on us before we can launch the castle. The North and the West could wind up at war by the time we get back from the moon.”
“Man, what a pain, dude,” Urushihara grumbled. “So what can we even do, then?”
Albert was proving to have a knack for shooting down every suggestion from his companions. Everyone was starting to feel weary.
“Besides,” Urushihara went on, “why do you have, like, so little influence in the Northern Island, Albert Ende? I mean, Emeralda Etuva’s one thing, but a word or two from Emilia was all it took to get the head of Saint Aile’s palace guard here on our side.”
“Quit remindin’ me,” Albert groused resentfully. “Yeah, maybe I helped the Hero, but before then, remember how you whipped my ass and the asses of my whole Mountain Corps? Folks have long memories up there! And between all the stuff I’ve been doing for the West with Eme and the fight I had with ya, I ain’t exactly on great terms with the clan chieftains at the moment, no. Plus, the current chief herder—Dhin Dhem Wurs is her name—she’s the one who banded all the clans together when Adramelech took over and the one who slapped the demon’s spear up as a monument. I just haven’t helped out the North enough to ask her to borrow the Spear for—”
“Whoa. Albert?!”
“…Mm? What?”
It was Laila, who had taken a step back from the group and listened silently, who sent up the whoop of protest.
“Who did you say the chief herder was?”
“Huh?”
“You said it was Dhin Dhem Wurs?”
“Yeah…”
“The Dhin Dhem Wurs who was born from a side family of the Wurs clan? The youngest of eleven boys and girls, but so talented with a bow and arrow that the legends say she was born ‘with enough bows for the whole family’? The Dhin Dhem I know from the Wurs clan is small, pushy, and never one to humor fools…”
Albert opened his eyes wide. “What, you know the lady?”
Given the chief herder’s position as head of state, it wasn’t too unusual for someone to know her name and history. Laila went far beyond that.
“Dhin Dhem was the last person I gave a Yesod fragment to outside my husband and Emilia.”
“What?!”
“Huh?!”
“Whaaa?!”
Suzuno, Urushihara, and Albert understood the portent of that.
“This was a good sixty years ago! She still went by her childhood name of Lidem Wurs at the time.” Laila blinked a bit, not expecting all this attention. “Before my husband and Emilia, Dhin Dhem was the last of…what I suppose you could call candidates to be a Hero.”
She held her right hand out, palm down.
“Is that…a Yesod fragment? The cores for Emilia’s holy sword and the Cloth of the Dispeller?”
Rumack couldn’t help but nearly shout at the small, mesmerizing stone she had in her hand. Laila focused on it for a moment, and it began to faintly shine, then silently emit a purple light that extended out in a line pointing northward. She turned toward the ray of light, eyes closed, for a moment, then raised her face up as the beam disappeared.
“Albert… Rumack… Do you think things would be less complicated if I could speak with Dhin Dhem Wurs real quick?”
“Ah, ah, that…”
“Less complicated ain’t the half of it.”
Albert and Rumack exchanged looks with each other.
“Let’s go, then.”
“Go?”
“Yes,” declared the purple-haired angel. “To the chief herder. And don’t worry. She’d remember me. She is a kind person, more sensitive to the flow of earth and air than anyone in the Wurs clan. I’m sure she will hear us out.”
Suzuno was still anxious.
Back on Earth, Laila had the troubling habit of manipulating everyone around her and failing to wrap things up neatly at the end. It meant her claim of Chief Herder Dhin Dhem Wurs carrying a Yesod fragment seemed implausible at best—and even if it was true, Suzuno wasn’t sure the head of state would remember Laila after six decades.
But the moment they all stepped out from the Gate in the main Church cathedral in Phiyenci, she discovered a group of large, muscular men in the Northern Island’s colorful garb waiting to greet them. Or Laila, really. It surprised her a little.
“Which one of you is Lady Laila?”
Four of them had taken the trip to Phiyenci—Laila, Albert, Rumack, and Suzuno. Before any of them could speak, one of the men was asking for Laila by name, eyeing the three women in the group.
“I am.”
Laila took a step forward. The man looked at her, confused.
“I understood that Lady Laila had silver hair with a twinge of blue to it.”
“Well, after sixty years, a woman will want to change her hair color sometimes.”
“…!”
After the fracas on the Fukutoshin subway line, Maou’s magical force had healed Laila, giving her hair the purple tint it still had today. She claimed she could reverse the dye job if she wanted, but it was a pain, and she didn’t like her original color that much anyway, so she kept it.
The excessively casual nature of their exchange made Suzuno internally sweat a little, but the man looked only a tad let down. “I see,” he said. “I suppose you are the woman I heard about."
“How did Dhin Dhem Wurs describe me?”
“She described you,” the envoy immediately replied, “as ‘a handful.’”
“I see the years haven’t dulled her tongue at all,” Laila said with a smile. It was not met by the envoy, who spun around and motioned for the quartet to follow him.
“Come this way, please. The chief herder is waiting for you.”
The other three in the group meekly followed the order, all of them unsure what Laila and the man’s banter meant for them.
Phiyenci, it turned out, was wholly deserving of its nickname.
The Goat Pasture was filled with countless examples of the animal, in all shapes and sizes. Many were on sale in the market streets for their fur, milk, or meat, while others, large enough to give an adult horse or cow a run for its money, were pulling carts and transport wagons. Young girls, clad in the traditionally colorful, natural-dyed wear that was a trademark of most mountain people, even had baby goats tagging along with them like dogs or cats, which was the most darling thing ever.
This city was around three thousand feet above sea level, resulting in thinner air and lower temperatures. Given the lack of flat land to build on, Phiyenci was relatively crammed with people; as Albert explained, the port town on the continent’s southern tip was much larger and more commercially active. Still, the zirga had never moved from here in all its years. Every road and back alley was well paved, and the current Mountain Corps kept the order in every corner of the city. Diplomatic missions from nations in other continents were dotted around town, affirming its position as the nerve center of the Northern Island.
Suzuno, Laila, and Rumack had all come prepared with heavier outfits to deal with the cold, but Albert was in his same old leather jacket. Phiyenci was where people from every clan in the island gathered, and they could see a vast variety of ethnic groups running up and down the streets. One would expect a lot of people who looked like Albert, dark-skinned with white hair, but some from the northern reaches boasted lily-white skin and golden hair instead, while others looked little different from the average Efzahanian—perhaps some Eastern blood had mixed in at one point.
The one thing that united them—and made them all eye-catching—was the flashy, colorful clothing. Only a very small handful took Albert’s approach and went with all black. Some used almost every color in the rainbow, while others dressed in nothing but red or orange (the color of their clan, perhaps?). Every clan seemed to have their own style, color selection, and materials; it almost seemed like too much of a jumble for a city meant to be the capital of the continent, but it certainly offered insights into the character of the Northern Island—a gigantic federation with hundreds of clans that somehow found a way to all get along.
Suzuno and Rumack paid it no special mind, both having been to Phiyenci on official business several times. But considering how their envoy was taking Laila to the chief herder, it seemed strange how he was sticking to the city’s busiest business streets.
Their destination, in the end, was even more confusing. “Um, is this it?” Albert asked, unable to contain his curiosity. They had walked for less than twenty minutes from the cathedral, only to stop at a place not at all grand or lofty. In short, it was a cheap restaurant selling goat meat cooked on an iron plate, the kind of place you’d see everywhere in town.
“Sir Albert Ende Ranga,” the man said, turning toward him.
“Ranga” was Albert’s clan name, one he was forced to abandon after Adramelech defeated his Mountain Corps force.
He continued, “The chief wishes to treat you to a grand meal.”
“…!”
Albert froze for a moment, not expecting this.
“My lady wishes for our visitors from the West to enjoy this as well. She has been a fan of this establishment since a young age. She has reserved the entire dining room for the afternoon, so please, make yourselves at home.”
And with that, the man walked away and into the crowds, not even bothering to open the door for them.
The four of them gave one another quizzical looks, before Laila decided to take the lead. “Let’s go in,” she said, pulling the door open. Inside, they found your typical restaurant space—a few chair-lined tables, all in the traditional Northern Island style. A more formal room lay beyond, its floors lined with woven mats; in the middle of it was a sunken fireplace that guests were meant to sit around.
“Come in already! It’s too damned cold outside!”
The voice came from the other side of the hearth, as far away from the entrance as possible.
“?!”
Suzuno was the only one to pick up on who it was.
“I’m getting on in years, y’understand! This weather is killer on my knees! Get yourselves in here!”
The nasal griping reeled them all inside, Laila taking the lead as they walked toward the rear. There, they found a small, elderly woman using a wooden spatula to mix some meat and vegetables on the iron plate above the sunken hearth, adding in sauce of a shade Suzuno had never seen before.
“It’s been a while, eh? I was surprised to hear you’d become chief herder.”
Laila casually greeted the stern-looking woman. It made the spatula stop in place over the vegetables.
“I certainly can’t call you ‘Lidem’ any longer.”
“Anyone who called me that has been feedin’ the grass and plants from six feet under for years! They’re probably all mountain-deer droppings by now!”
The small head, covered in a multihued wool cap, was thrown upward, a pair of eyes looking up at the transfixed pair.
“!”
Suzuno gasped at the power behind those eyes. Was this Dhin Dhem Wurs—this old woman with a jeweled monocle, small and bent over even when seated?
“What, didn’t you know that Dhin Dhem Wurs was this old lady with one foot in the grave?”
The woman who Laila had called Lidem, seeing through Suzuno’s trepidation, half lunged at her.
“Who’re you, then? Some young up-and-comer in the Church, if I had to guess. Now how are you gonna climb through the ranks if one glare from an old lady like me makes you ruin your garments?”
“Ah, n-no, I…”
“Laila! How could you be so impolite, so careless, so silent for so long?! I’m sure you got reasons for showing up in my life right when I’m old and decrepit, don’t you?! And yet, you’re just as much a young fashion maven as ever! You could at least look like a forgotten retiree like me!”
“I’m trying to look as plain as I can. Your hat’s a lot prettier than anything I’m wearing, Lidem.”
“Of course it is! The youngest daughter of my third son knitted it for me, back when she was little. It’s the best you’ll ever find!”
The old woman began mixing up the food on the plate again, suddenly remembering why she was here.
“So! Hazel!”
“Y-yes?!”
The woman’s eyes were on Rumack now. “You’re still single, aren’tcha? Maybe you think you’ll be young forever, but lemme tell you ! Between how you are and how I am, it’s all in the blink of an eye, my friend! We don’t have all the time in the world, you know, unlike that debauched, color-blind angel over there! Get yourself a man and settle down already!”
It was like Wurs was the head of the Federated Order of the Five Continents’ nagging grandmother. The two of them knowing each other was no great surprise, but this wasn’t the kind of conversation two political figures like this would ever normally have.
“Ah, but keep your hands off that fool, the crown prince of Saint Aile! He’d be such a waste for a smart cookie like you! I tell you, that brat hasn’t gotten any more brains since he was a baby!”
“Um…”
She certainly wasn’t pulling any punches. It was an almost treasonous way to describe the next emperor of Saint Aile.
“Mark my words, you’ll never find any decent men in the West. I can see that much over in Sankt Ignoreido. They act sooo high-and-mighty, like oh, I have nothing but a chair, a desk, and my scriptures at home , but once they get old, all they do is compete to see which of ’em can pile up more gold and jewels in their vaults! I tell you, women like you gotta kick their no-good behinds outta there before it gets even worse! You hear me?!”
“Y-yes…?”
The target of her ire had switched back to Suzuno midway. Suzuno could do little but squawk awkwardly.
“And you , Ranga!”
But she saved Albert for the end. Wurs picked up an earthenware plate and a pair of chopsticks, using the spatula to shovel the meat onto the dish, then shoved it in Albert’s face.
“Here.”
“Uhh…”
“Here! Try it for me!”
“Um, okay…”
Albert, completely floored by the presence exuded by a woman less than half his height, reached out to take it.
“Did your mother teach you to eat standing up? Get in here and sit down!!”
“Y-yes, Chief!”
Cowed by the nasal voice, Albert quickly sat by the hearth. Suzuno could barely keep up with this torrent of events, but Albert did his best, gingerly taking the meat-laden plate and the wood-hewn chopsticks. Wurs jerked her head forward, motioning at him to eat up. Unable to say no to the lord of every clan in the Northern Island, he took in a mouthful of the steaming meat.
“How is it? You’re trying it for me, so you gotta say what you think of it.”
“…Um.”
Albert was just as confused as everyone else. This was the chief herder, the head of state in the Northern Island. And although he led the Mountain Corps at one point, Albert had exchanged only a few words with Dhin Dhem Wurs in his life. The Wurs and Ranga clans were far removed from each other on the social ladder, and in terms of their standings within their respective families—one way people up north judged each other—the pair couldn’t be further apart. But she wanted his opinion, and he needed to give it.
“It’s good. Really takes me back. It’s a lot like what my grandma cooked for me as a kid.”
“It is?” Albert’s whisper didn’t move Wurs an inch. Then, as flatly as ever:
“I’ve put you through a lot, haven’t I.”
Albert took a moment to chew over the observation before quickly replying:
“…Well, it’s resulted in a lot of good memories.”
“No, no, go ahead. Badmouth me a little.”
“Hey, I’m a grown man. If my friends here saw me crying into the shoulder of someone old enough to be my grandma, I’d never live it down.”
“Hmph. That’s not very nice… And by the way, how long are you bums gonna be standing there? Sit the heck down!”
“Y-yes, Chief!”
“Er, do please excuse me.”
“I would be glad to.”
“Whoa, whoa, Lidem…!”
“Hmph! Judging by the body language from Stumpy Scythe over there, I’m assuming you’re as slobby as ever, huh?”
“St… St-Stumpy Scythe?! Stumpy Scythe… That, really, that is just…”
Suzuno knew that Wurs was only making fun of her nom de guerre , but her Japanese sensibilities told her that “Stumpy Scythe” sounded suspiciously like some cutesy character with its own cartoon and merchandising line. She cursed her body as she began stress-eating the meat on her plate.
Dhin Dhem Wurs’s meddling and wheedling continued on for a considerable time to come, draining the energy from Suzuno and Rumack by the time all the food and veggies were cleaned from the griddle.
“Oh, and also , I had some ground-meat sandwiches made for you, so take them home with you, all right? You need to eat healthy, you hear me, Stumpy Scythe? You too, Hazel!”
““Yes, Chief…””
An afternoon spent slamming the younger generation made Dhin Dhem Wurs extremely self-satisfied. Adjusting her monocle, she turned to Laila.
“So what did you need? Lighting that up out of nowhere…”
“Oh, now you ask?”
Albert barely had enough breath in him to snap back, his stomach full to the point of bursting.
“Because you know, you gave that thing to me, then made me keep it on hand for the next sixty years without explanation.”
The eye—or, that is, the monocle—she had pointed straight at Albert was festooned with a litany of fancy-looking jewels. It seemed like just the kind of garish fashion choice a woman like Wurs would enjoy. But it was only at this point that Suzuno and Albert spotted the light from one of the purplish jewels on the frame.
“You’ve been taking good care of it, I see.”
“Well, of course I have. It’s thanks to this thing that I’ve stayed chief herder all these years. It’s the only thing I have you to thank for over the past sixty years, let me tell you. But you know…”
The eye on the other side of the lens glared at Laila.
“Here we are, this ‘world-class danger’ you told me about, and now I’m too damned old to do anything about it, aren’t I? I can barely lift up a bow any longer. I had to force Adramelech’s army on that kid Ranga instead.”
“That… Well, yes. I suppose I can’t blame you for seeing it that way. But Lidem, the real danger wasn’t the Devil King’s Army. It’s coming for us right now.”
“Oh?”
Wurs kept her eye on Laila, long enough for Suzuno to realize it was a Yesod fragment that was glowing on the monocle.
“I suppose you aren’t lying, are you?”
“Of course not.”
“But perhaps it’s not true, and you just believe it is, is all.”
“Oh, I assure you, it is. I was one of its causes, besides.”
“Ohhh? And that isn’t a lie, either. So you came over here for the first time in sixty years to tell me that? I can’t wait to see what you’re gonna order me to do next.”
It seemed easy for Wurs to sense whether Laila was telling the truth. She didn’t even bother to consult Albert about it.
“In that case, let me cut to the chase. We need to borrow the magical spear the Great Demon General Adramelech left behind. I’d like to have it taken to the Central Continent, and if possible, I don’t want anyone besides you to know what we’ll use it for.”
For the first time this afternoon, Suzuno noticed Wurs change her expression.
“You’re serious?”
First, it was surprise. Then, exasperation.
“Don’t give me that nonsense. You know I could never do that.”
“If you don’t, the human race is going to die out.”
“Oh, so it’s war? And if Hazel and Stumpy Scythe are here, the West must be involved, eh? If you want it, pry it out of our hands. Otherwise, you can’t have it.”
“Please, Lidem! Stop acting like a warlord! This is crucial!”
“Shut up, you slope-headed angel! If I gave you that spear without hearing the reason for it just because I knew you as a kid, I’d have every clan beating the crap out of me! They’d strip my title on the spot! So get out of here before I grind you all up and turn you into stuffing for smoked goat’s intestines!”
“Lidem! Please! It’s important!”
“Ugh, this is ridiculous! You never did think anything through, and you still don’t! Look, whether the world’s ending tomorrow or not, there’re some lines you can’t cross! Now get out of my sight! Ranga! Take this bum back to the West for me, now!”
“Lidemmmm! At least hear me out!”
Laila pleaded like a little girl begging for candy. There was no one else in the restaurant, but it still looked absolutely pathetic.
“You don’t have a single thought in your mind, do you?” admonished Rumack.
Suzuno nodded. “And here I thought we could rely on Laila at least a little bit. I see my eyes have deceived me.”
“Now I can see why people don’t want to believe in gods and angels, huh, Stum—er, Crestia…?”
“General Rumack! You were about to call me ‘Stumpy Scythe’ just now! You were this close!”
“I—I was not! I didn’t say it! I stopped midway!”
“Yes, you stopped because you were saying it! I am filing a formal complaint with the Devil King’s Army!”
“What, not the Church?! What’s happened to you?!”
Suzuno teared up a bit, cheeks reddened, as she whined at Rumack, a woman a good head taller than her and more fully developed in pretty much every other way. Rumack did everything she could to defend herself. And Albert, the only man in the room, watched this fruitless argument between two of the highest-ranked women in the world and sighed.
“…Can I go home yet?”
“All right. I think I get the picture. You’re gonna go shoot a firecracker at the moon, huh?”
The concept was massive enough to make any Ente Islan’s head swim, but Dhin Dhem Wurs didn’t bat an eye as she took it in.
“Laila,” she said, turning toward her, “I think I do need to compliment you about just one thing here.”
The chief herder supported her head with one hand. They had spent the ensuing hour keeping warm around the fireplace, the iron griddle trundled away now.
“What’s that?”
“The way you brought Ranga, Hazel, and Stumpy over. If you had come by yourself, I would’ve taken this as the West wanting the Spear for itself. By the next evening, I would’ve warned every clan about those spear thieves, it would’ve killed relations between the North and the West, and Hazel probably would’ve lost her post.”
““…””
Laila and Rumack went pale, each for different reasons.
“Still, this is a thorny problem…” Her eyebrows bunched downward as she looked at Albert. “The amount of holy force contained in Sankt Ignoreido’s holy water has gone down by half in five years? You sure the groundwater hasn’t changed routes due to a cave-in or something?”
“Yes. They worked in tandem with the Holy Magic Administrative Institute in Saint Aile to get those results. There’s virtually no mistaking it.”
“Huh. So the Church worked with the Institute after trying their boss for apostasy or whatever? That little broccoli-haired girl? I suppose I can trust in that, yes.”
““Bphht!””
Albert and Rumack laughed at the same time. The nickname wasn’t new to them.
“Wasn’t there infighting between the Institute and Stumpy’s group, too?”
“…No,” Suzuno replied, wrinkling her nose at her own nickname. “I was out on completely different business. I have simply built a close personal relationship with Emeralda.”
It was a surprise to her, seeing how Wurs seemed to have her finger on everything going on in the world from this restaurant in the North Island. It would not be wise to defy her, Suzuno thought, just because she gave people offensive nicknames.
“Hohh. So a Church inquisitor and the head of Saint Aile’s Holy Magic Administrative Institute? Strange bedfellows, I’d call that. I didn’t think they’d work as closely as the Church’s diplomatic mission and Saint Aile’s administration would—on the surface, at least.”
“Call it strange,” Suzuno replied, “call it what you will.”
“…I see.” Wurs gave her a wry grin as her gaze shifted to Albert and Rumack. “I should have known the moment I saw Death Scythe walking around with Hazel Rumack. I’m going senile, I suppose. Hey! Ranga!”
She took a pipe and a box of tobacco out of her pocket, crushing some leaves in her hand as she pushed them into some charcoal. She put this mixture into her pipe, quickly smoking in peace.
“Is Emilia well?”
“…”
Albert didn’t answer. But Dhin Dhem Wurs laughed anyway, the light glinting off her monocle.
“I see! I heard she died fighting the Devil King Satan, but… Well, well! I suppose the rumors of her being around when old man Hu from the East got his palace wrecked were true, then. Phew…”
She took two or three puffs, rather rudely using the edge of the fireplace to tap her pipe. The rapping brought Laila back to attention as Wurs stared at her.
“What’s she to you?”
“What…?”
“Ranga fought alongside Emilia. That I know. Hazel was probably her legal guardian or something. And Stumpy Scythe, since she works under Olba, I can get. But what connects you to Emilia? And more than that, Laila—I don’t think Emilia’s anything like the girl you hope she is.”
“…What do you mean?”
There was a touch of resentment to Laila’s voice.
“Exactly what I said. Certainly, she must be a good fighter—good enough to beat Lucifer and Adramelech. But she’s this sheltered little girl. She’s got guts, yeah, but without Ranga, Olba, and Li’l Broccoli, she couldn’t succeed on this adventure. She may be the Hero of the Holy Sword or whatever, but I don’t see why you’d give her something like this.”
She fussed around with her monocle a bit.
“If I could ask,” Suzuno interjected, “what do you use your fragment for, Chief?”
It struck Suzuno just now that the powers of the fragments she had seen didn’t follow any discernible pattern. Emi’s sword and armor seemed to pop right out of her fragment, but the one Alas Ramus had in her forehead didn’t demonstrate anything like that. She saw how fragments could cast beams of light between one another, but with Wurs, it seemed like Laila was using it to communicate with her in some way, too. That was the only way she could send an envoy to the cathedral to greet them, despite receiving no advance notice.
But Wurs simply glared at her. “You think this chief’s going to reveal her hand to the West so easily?” She turned back to Laila. “I don’t know how many people you’ve been tossing these fragments around to, but if all you guys are covering for Emilia, then what are you doing here, Laila?”
“There’s nothing strange about it,” Laila replied, head held up high. “Emilia’s my daughter.”
“………Your what?”
For once in her life, Wurs’s jaw actually dropped.
“What’s so strange about a mother working for her daughter’s future?”
“Your daughter? Emilia?”
“Yes.”
“This… Hoo. That is something. I can’t even remember the last time I was this shocked. I can hardly believe my ears. Well! Hmm. You’re the mother, eh? My, my, my…”
She opened her eyes wide, as wide as her wrinkled body would allow, and looked around the fireplace.
“You must be a real handful for your husband, eh?!”
“Lidem! What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Exactly what it sounds like, ka-ha-ha-ha-ha!”
The chief knew exactly how Laila would respond to this.
“But… Hmm. Now I understand. I think I’ll trust in all of you, then. But as you probably realize, whether I give you that spear or not’s a whole other question. And I guess I see why it’s bad if the world knows Emilia is alive, but wouldn’t all this be a lot easier if she got involved?”
“We can’t have that happen. For Emilia’s sake.”
“Yes, Hazel, I can see how you feel. But that’s just a small sacrifice for the greater good. Emilia’s not the type to go around calling herself a hero on a whim. It’s not right to be so protective of her that other people’s lives and honor play second fiddle.”
This argument was perfectly valid, of course. But it made Rumack visibly dour.
“I don’t see,” she muttered, “how Northerners who pushed everything on Albert Ende and curled up in their shells can tell us what’s right or not.”
“Rumack…”
“Silence, Albert. This is the kind of ‘pain’ she was talking about with you, huh?” Rumack sternly gazed at Wurs. “That’s like if we went into Saint Aile and the Church made Emilia into a ‘Hero’ icon, caring more about her glory than whether she was alive or not. You think I don’t know what the clan chiefs who tarred you as a loser did when you came back with Emilia in tow?”
“…That’s a fine point to jab at me with, Hazel,” Wurs shot back. “You see, Stumpy Scythe? This is how you use intelligence. Remember that.”
“What…happened?” Suzuno wondered.
Albert bristled. “Bell, please, don’t get into—”
“Oh, come on, Ranga, it’s true. Listen, Stumpy Scythe,” the Northern Clans leader began sharply. “This kid here’s the only Mountain Corps captain who ever lost to an outside enemy. But it would have been the same no matter which warlord in our history was leading that army. Nobody could have defeated Adramelech. Nothing to be done about it. But what happened after that…wasn’t great. This kid came back with Emilia, and he was gathering up the other clans he had been communicating with in secret…but then, there was this shameless leader who spat in his face, berating him for what happened in the past. All, you know, ‘how dare you slither back here after losing so big,’ and the like.”
Even Suzuno could tell the “spat in his face” part was a metaphor. Judging from where Rumack was assigning the blame, this wasn’t some impudent young man acting out of order, but the work of someone who let cowardice get the best of them, out of a need to separate the past from the present.
“But despite that,” Suzuno reflected, “Albert beat Adramelech, he stamped out the Devil King’s Army, and he is still working for people’s futures—including people in the Northern Island. If you say you put pain upon him, Chief, would it be about time to repay him for that?”
“You want me to cover for being stingy with my pawns, eh? Hoo boy. Hard to mount a defense against that. I have a promise with Adramelech, too. What to do, what to do…?”
“You have a promise with Adramelech? What kind?”
Seeing the chief herder hard-pressed to respond to Rumack’s ill-mannered accusations surprised Albert. Her bringing up a new name surprised him even further.
“Yes. He said, ‘When that young, brave general returns to this land, you must reward him for his efforts.’ That was just before he fought Emilia.”
“Wha…?”
This shocked Albert enough that he forgot to breathe for a moment. All words left his tongue.
“I’m sure he saw the writing on the wall once you invaded Phiyenci. He wasn’t there to fight a losing battle, of course, but Adramelech knew there was no such thing as absolutes in life.”
Albert had faced off against Adramelech three times—the first when the Devil King’s Army invaded, the second when Albert was ejected from the Northern Island, and the third when the demons were defeated for good. Losing the right to die as a Mountain Corps captain, and being denied the right to a final duel with him, must have filled him with shame somewhere in his mind, as if Adramelech never truly recognized him as a warrior. But no. The Great Demon General had recognized him as a true leader, through and through. And through his actions, he was admonishing Albert against an ill-advised death or duel, in order to show him he was a warrior with the hopes and dreams of his soldiers on his back.
“That…bastard… Why now?”
Wurs watched Albert as he struggled to deal with the swirling eddy of emotions in his heart, then pointed her pipe at Laila.
“Well, that’s the long and short of it, so I guess I’ll do what I can for you, eh? And in exchange for that, promise me you won’t mess this up, all right? Because if you save the world and trigger a huge war afterward, I won’t know why I bothered to listen to you!”
Laila spotted the glint in her eye. That advice was something everyone on Ente Isla should have taken to heart after Satan disappeared from the planet.
“Of course.”
“I hate people who say ‘of course’ and don’t actually do anything,” Wurs spat out, missing no opportunity to gripe at her audience. “Now, kid, you know we’re in the zirga season. If you’re going to take the Spear, best to do it in broad daylight, with all the clans watching you.”
“In broad daylight? What d’you mean?”
“Well, you’ve got Emilia, you’ve got Emeralda, you’ve got Ranga… Got any other pawns we can use?”
This sounded incredibly bold. The zirga was the biggest event Phiyenci hosted, attended by clans from across the continent, and she wanted them to settle things right in the middle of it.
“Because I’m gonna push the pawn of your choice toward the next chief herder election. With my backing, nobody’s gonna protest you all joining the field. It’ll be up to you to find a way to take the Spear without anyone minding. Don’t use my influence to get the thing—participate in the zirga and make the clans want to have you haul it off. You got someone who can do that?”
Upon leaving the restaurant, their hands laden with souvenirs and their clothes reeking of smoke, the thoroughly puzzled group returned to Devil’s Castle.
“She wants us to pick someone to run for chief herder?” Albert scratched his head, pausing only to bite into the sandwich of ground goat meat, vegetables, and that singularly pungent sauce he took with him. “Who could we count on for that?”
“I can understand her logic,” Suzuno remarked. “Dhin Dhem Wurs is just ensuring we set the stage correctly, so we can more easily access the Spear. The problem is…”
“Yeah,” interjected Rumack, “she doesn’t want it to look like some outsider borrowing the chief’s influence, in the eyes of the other clans.”
“So not even Albert’s a possibility,” said Laila, arms crossed and looking a tad lost. “He’s too involved with Emilia and Emeralda. In fact, his name’s still in the Saint Aile records as a substitute for Emeralda. Could anyone even match the conditions we need at all?”
If they wanted to get as much support from Wurs as possible, their candidate couldn’t have even a whiff of political involvement with other countries. That was off the table, but within the group preparing to invade heaven, nobody could meet that condition while still being well versed enough in matters to hold the job.
“Being recommended for the position is a big deal, but the conditions are just too harsh…”
The chief herder, by the nature of the post, needed to be someone charismatic enough to enjoy islandwide popularity. It required different skills from the leader of the Mountain Corps, but battle prowess still wasn’t optional. Chief herders had later become corps leaders several times in the past. One didn’t need to be head and shoulders above the pack in every field, but they couldn’t blow it in every field, either.
Rumack pored over the notes that Wurs gave her about the training a chief would be graded on at the zirga. “Personality, popularity, a superior education, archery skills in a hunting setting, familiarity with magic and horsemanship, no Eastern or Western influence, and aware of the heaven-invasion plan… It’s silly. There’s no one.”
“What about Laila? Or maybe Gabriel? He ain’t connected to the West or the East, is he? And he could beat just about anyone in combat or magic.”
“I thought about that for a moment, Albert, but we had best avoid him,” Rumack said.
“Why is that?” he asked back.
“He’s simply not fit for the job. I doubt Lady Wurs would endorse him for us.”
“What d’you mean by that?”
“Well, no offense, but it didn’t seem like Lady Wurs trusted you a great amount. Besides, I fear his lips are too loose for his own good. I’d be on pins and needles the whole time.”
She sounded reluctant to say it, but it was the unvarnished truth. Even Laila couldn’t contest it.
“Besides, Gabriel’s already been tasked with guarding Devil’s Castle.”
“Ah, yes, he was, wasn’t he? Given how low the enemy’s layin’, I totally forgot.”
No matter how rough they thought the chances were, the heavens could have picked this exact moment to storm the planet. The team had to put a sentry up around Devil’s Castle, at least, given its crucial role in capturing the heavens. But since Maou and Emi couldn’t be on call all the time, the job had to go to the second tier—Ashiya, Urushihara, or Gabriel. And since the first two were busy fixing the castle or carrying out other needed business, Gabriel needed to serve as the on-site security system, or else the safety of the whole operation was under question.
“We have to think about the human world, the enemies, and the demons, too. Maou and Lucifer look human, but their demonic force rules ’em right out.” Albert sighed. “There’s no way we can make that old bag happy. We’re screwed! Hey, Bell, you got any bright—”
“There is one person.”
“—ideas… Huh?”
“There is only one person.”
The other three gasped.
“Personality, popularity, education, magical sense, and excellent archery skills. Horsemanship, no—but she is well versed in our plans, she has worked hand in hand with us, and there are no Eastern or Western influences in her background. Plus, she knows the truth about Emilia, the Devil King, and how we are all related to each other. She is the only one.”
“Magic and archery?” Albert raised an eyebrow. “Since when did we have someone that useful?”
Laila, on the other hand, turned pale. “W-Wait! Wait! Bell, are you joking with us?! You don’t mean…”
“Who else could we call upon?”
“But—but if we—If we go with that, you know Emilia and Satan won’t take it sitting down!”
“Why inform them?”
“Bell?!” Laila was shouting now.
“There is no need to.”
“But…!”
“The chief will understand why, too, once we explain matters.”
“This is crazy! It’s just so incredibly hazardous!”
“Nothing hazardous about it. The zirga is not a battlefield; nothing the heavens would pay close attention to. Once Chief Wurs endorses her, we can keep her under your and Albert’s guard, and all is well. If we talk to the Malebranche about it, perhaps they would even volunteer to bodyguard her. Farfarello and Libicocco, at least, would almost certainly seize upon the offer.”
“That—that would be enough protection…but…”
Laila started to stammer. Suzuno shook her head, her voice cold.
“We will need to check with her first, but—at this point in time—I think she will accept the offer.”
“Wh-who are you talking about?”
Suzuno smiled a little at Albert.
“Someone you know quite well, Albert.”
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