Hataraku Maou-sama! - Volume 17 - Chapter 3

THE DEVIL KING MAKES A MAJOR DECISION 
“Hahhhh…” 
“…” 
It was afternoon, past the lunch rush, and Maou’s sighs echoed across the dining space. 
“Ahhh…” 
Then, with the evening shift, a forlorn groan emanated from the staff break room. 
“…” 
“It’s audible from here again…” 
“Yeah…” 
The crew behind Emi was chatting about it. 
“Ughhh… Gahh…” 
The sighs and wails as he performed the post-dinner back-end check were impossible to ignore. 
“Hey!” 
“…Huh?” 
It was ten at night, and Emi’s shift was over. Changing out of her uniform, she patted Maou’s shoulder in the back room, then brought her hand to her hip. 
“Can you stop moaning and groaning like that? You’re messing up my motivation, too.” 
“Ahh…” 
Maou just hung his head, the life gone from his face. 
“I’m sorry. I’m just kind of tired…ugh…” 
Another sigh, right in front of her. 
“You’re not keeping healthy habits, are you? You acted like you bounced back from it, but you’ve been terrible ever since you got rejected.” 
“Ah, shut up. I haven’t been able to sleep lately…” 
An irritated Maou attempted to defend himself. The attempt quickly petered out, lost in the halls of his darkened face. “You try living like this. Every single damn evening, that brain-dead lizard wakes me up. I’m so worried he’s up to something, I can’t focus on anything.” 
He was referring to Kinanna, of course. 
“Because if he does do something, I’m the only one who can deal with it. Ashiya’s not in Devil’s Castle; he said he had some kind of extended business in Ente Isla. Camio’s still a chicken , Urushihara and Suzuno can’t be there every day, and I really can’t beg Amane or the landlord for help unless things really go south. And the idea of leaving him to Acieth hasn’t even occurred to me.” 
“But Bell’s commuting back there daily, isn’t she? You ought to trust her a little more.” 
“It’s not a matter of trust. Whenever I get back home, I still gotta take responsibility for everything. It’s not like having someone else there makes me feel any better.” 
“…It’s really that bad?” 
“Not as bad as when he was gnawing on the closet, but…” Maou, squinting like he was dealing with a headache, began counting off an imaginary checklist with his fingers. “He starts screaming in the middle of the night; he gets his tongue all over everything; he takes a crap on my futon…” 
“Uh…” 
Emi winced. This was not the kind of conversation two on-duty restaurant employees should have been having…but it at least gave her some insight into why he was so deeply exhausted. 
“We’ve spoiled him food-wise, so he doesn’t want the fried chicken anymore. He whines about how hungry he is ten minutes after he eats. If we don’t feed him, he gets violent. He mistakes Camio for Camuinica and comes this close to lunging at him…” 
“Wait. Isn’t he restrained? You didn’t tell me about any of this. I’m supposed to watch him most of the day tomorrow for the first time.” 
Emi had volunteered to watch Kinanna at Devil’s Castle a while back, but her shifts for the next week were already set in stone at the time. It would be the first day she’d be alone in Devil’s Castle with him. 
“He’s a living thing. I can’t just shackle him to the wall; what if I kill him? We still don’t know how the Astral Gem connects to that guy.” 
When they had first captured him, that was essentially what they had done—Maou asking Emi and Suzuno to magically bind him down with holy energy. Nowadays, he had his own cardboard box alongside Camio’s, covered in a clear holy-magic case. 
“The thing is,” Maou explained with a sigh, “when he starts getting all wild, he knocks the box over. If I try keeping it upright, it breaks. I can’t, like, bolt it to the floor or anything.” 
“Huh?” 
If they were capable of tapping into mystical powers to form a magical cube around this space-alien demonic lizard, finding a hammer and a few nails didn’t seem to be much more effort to Emi. 
“S-Suzuno told me,” stammered Maou, seeing Emi’s disbelief on her face. “Even now, Kinanna’s still in an incredibly weakened state. If we expose him to really strong sorcery or holy force for an extended period of time, she’s worried that might shorten his life.” 
“What, that it’d purify him to death?” 
“If we screw it up, yeah. I dunno how many millennia he’s been alive, but the way she put it, she’d never forgive us if we mess something up with him, he atrophies to death, and we lose everything…” 
“All right, but if he’s knocking around the box you’re holding… I mean keeping him in, what if he hurts himself?” 
“I know, all right? But I don’t see any perfect solution. I tried asking Suzuno for a stronger metal cage or something lighter I could hang from a pole or something, but if he wants out of it, he always finds a way. Imagine you’re sleeping, and all of a sudden the corner of a metal cage hits you on the head. It’s not even funny how much that hurts. Luckily, it happened to me and not Camio, or else he’d just be dead. And his mind’s so out of whack, every time he acts up, it’s with his full strength. I just can’t deal with him…” 
In other words, Maou was at his wit’s end because of a grandpa stressing him out. That might be something he could overlook a little if this were a blood relative or someone he owed a great debt to, but to Maou, Kinanna was even less than a total stranger. The only reason they kept him was because, out of all the legends and traditions Camio had collected about the Astral Gem, he was the closest match in description. But if Camio described the Lenbrellebelve as a clan, there had to be at least a few of them around. For all they knew, maybe they all had the stonelike growth Kinanna did. They were betting otherwise, but for the time being, they weren’t even entirely sure what they were betting on. Maou was counting on gleaning some info on ancient times from him, but if all he had told Emi about was the pain of dealing with him, she doubted he had found out much over the last week-ish. 
“So… I’m sorry. I’ll try not to get in anyone’s away, but just go easy on me today. I’m really tired…” 
Emi didn’t think he was exaggerating. Taking care of an elderly patient put huge mental, physical, and economic stresses on the caregiver. But at least you didn’t have to worry about that patient absorbing demonic force and carving huge craters in the ground. The exact measure of Kinanna’s strength was an unknown, but he had already gravely injured Camio—and if he didn’t have full control of his mental faculties, there was no guessing what sort of trouble he might cause next. 
In the worst case, Emi thought, they might just have to consider taking his life. But based on what Maou had told her, she wasn’t so sure where the worst case lay with him any longer. 
“All right. Sorry I was mean to you.” 
“…Huh?” 
“I’ll stay in Bell’s apartment tonight. You’re closing tonight, too, right? I’ll take care of anything that happens, so just try to stay focused for the next two hours or so, okay?” 
“Yeah…but what’s up with you?” 
“What?” 
Through his fatigue, Maou blinked, his face tightening. “You’re just being so weirdly kind to me.” 
“I’m covering for you because you’re being a pain to everyone else at work. Don’t get the wrong idea.” 
“…My bad.” 
“It’s not the first time. What’s up with you ?” 
“Uhh…” 
“Well, see you.” 
“Thanks…” 
Emi wrapped up the conversation before he could form a response. 
The cold no longer chilled to the bone these days. Normally, as part of her commute, she’d board a train at Hatagaya Station for Meidaimae, but this time, she opted to walk to Villa Rosa Sasazuka. Given what Maou had said, she wanted to hurry right there. 
 
“I didn’t expect to see you two at this park… Oh, who’s that?” 
The previous day, when Kisaki ran into Emi and Chiho at the park, the first thing she noticed was Alas Ramus at their feet. It made her smile. 
“If she’s with you right now, were you just at Marko’s place?” 
“Hiiii!” Alas Ramus waved excitedly once their eyes met. 
“Well, hello there,” Kisaki replied with a smile. “But I don’t see Daddy around…?” 
“Um… We’re watching him at the moment,” Chiho said. “He’s got a few things to deal with right now.” 
From a standpoint of regular common sense, Kisaki didn’t have a high opinion of Maou asking Chiho for help caring for Alas Ramus. As far as she knew, the child was Maou’s relative, and if she was here, it meant she must have been staying at Maou’s place. If she went and called Emi Mommy right now, Chiho knew it would turn things pretty chaotic with Kisaki. 
Emi, perhaps realizing this, stiffened a bit. But Kisaki just nodded at Chiho. 
“Yeah, Marko’s got a lot on his plate, huh? Is it all right if I ask what’s up?” 
A crazed magical lizard had eaten half of his apartment. It actually sounded like a safe enough thing to say to her, but she’d never believe it. Thus, Chiho opted for a “mostly truthful” approach. 
“Well… Maou’s, um, grandfather got hurt pretty bad, so he’s taking care of him.” 
“Oh…” Kisaki frowned. “Well, I know he’s too proud to accept charity from me, but could you guys do me a favor? If you could kinda hint to him for me that, you know, if it gets really bad, I can be flexible with the shift schedule? I’ve been in that position myself, and I know how it can drive you insane sometimes. And not that it’s for me to say, but try to give him a hand if you can, okay? Don’t go crazy, but…” 
“All right. I’ll tell him that.” 
“Thanks. Because I’m sure he has enough on his plate as it is.” 
Emi and Chiho knew exactly what Kisaki was talking about. 
“Yeah,” Emi said, before deciding to venture a question. “Um, if he didn’t get accepted then, was that his only chance, or…?” 
“No, not at all.” 
““Oh?!”” they both exclaimed at once. 
“But it’s gonna be a year before he can try again. At the earliest.” 
“Ohh, I see.” 
In other words, they only offered managerial testing once a year. 
“At the earliest, though?” 
“I forget if I told you or not, but floor crewmembers need a recommendation from their manager to undertake the training. This time around, he needed approval from me, as his manager, and then the area manager above me…although, with the area manager, it’s pretty much a sign-and-forget thing.” 
“Oh, but…” 
It dawned on Emi. 
“But it’s not necessarily a given that the next manager will do that, right? She may not even want to give him a nod, in the worst case. Which, you know, I’ve met with your new manager several times, but we haven’t made the official handover yet. I’m not sure if she’s willing to accept my suggestions for recommendations or not.” 
A manager of a MgRonald was just that—a manager, bearing full responsibility for everything related to that location. For all they knew, the new manager might want to shake things up and go against the previous one’s strategies. 
“Also, frankly, Marko’s just too useful where he is. He’s serious about work, he’s precise, he’s trained in a lot of positions, and he’s super-flexible with his hours. If we recommend him for management, and he gets accepted, we’d need to find someone to replace him, and at his level, that’s tough. If the new manager doesn’t think finding a proper replacement is possible, she may decide to use Maou’s previous rejection as a reason not to recommend him again to keep him where he is. We see that a lot…” 
As Kisaki put it, whenever a new manager was assigned to a location that put up good sales results the previous fiscal year, that resulted in a hefty amount of pressure. Good sales meant a talented manager at the helm, leading a good, well-trained crew. A new manager entering such a location faced two obstacles—one, how to keep the wave going, and two, how to get the crew to accept their leadership. If a location manned by people like multiyear veterans and housewives working part-time notched good results, they could revolt against a new manager who didn’t follow the old one’s lead. They’d judge every move they made, spreading all sorts of slander. You’d often see them ignore orders, cut corners in their work, or even quit because they didn’t like the new boss—or even worse, get openly hostile. If things descended to that level, staff recommendations became the last thing on the manager’s mind. 
“But we all work really well at Hatagaya, don’t we? And our location offers a lot of different services. You don’t think we’ll get a manager all uncooperative like that, do you?” 
“You wouldn’t think so, right? But businesses are full of incompetent, petty people. And maybe they shape up later on, but it’s not uncommon to see people who really make you think it’d be better if they never existed. You just can’t ever be sure until they’re actually there. It’s the relationships between coworkers that really drive results, after all.” 
The atmosphere of a workplace really came down to the collected relationships between the staff. Sometimes a person deemed talentless might join a team, tangle with them a bit, and eventually mature into a good contributor. Other times, a “talented” worker would join up, attempt to boss around the crew, generate discord, and send sales tanking. Of course, sometimes you found that golden child who was talented enough to take good sales and make them even better—but most of the time, useless people stayed useless, unconsciously wrecking the location until they finally disappeared. 
The only thing anyone was really sure of? Once Kisaki was gone, the Hatagaya Station MgRonald would never be the same again. 
“Along those lines… I’m worried that Marko is a little too oriented with the way I do things. He’s broad-minded enough to work with a new manager, but he’s kind of got this obstinate passionate streak, too, you know? He doesn’t like it if something’s illogical or doesn’t make sense.” 
Kisaki had a good eye for her crew. Maou really did tend toward logical, reasonable answers to solutions. It made it hard to believe he was a bloodthirsty Devil King at all. 
“Plus, he’s a shift supervisor. I’m worried he’s going to try reconciling the new system with what he knew back when I was around. If he winds up clashing with the new manager, depending on how she sees him, he may not get another chance at managerial training for quite a while. Which, you know, if another manager transfers in, that changes things…but Marko doesn’t have that much time, does he?” 
““Huh?”” 
“It’s about that time where he needs to start thinking about a life plan. Your early twenties isn’t too early at all to worry about that. I just don’t think it’s realistic for him to stay holed up at MgRonald for the rest of his life.” 
““Ahh!”” 
“What?” 
Considering they were just discussing their assault on heaven and the time frames involved, Chiho and Emi, naturally, both thought Kisaki was talking about that at first. Once they realized the earthly truth, they both nodded. 
““N-no, uh…”” 
“The ages of twenty-two, twenty-five, and twenty-nine are extremely important watersheds in your life. That’s especially true with Marko—part-timing this whole way instead of going to college. If he gets too attached to his first dream of being a MgRonald full-timer, he could end up wasting the best years of his life.” 
Exactly what entailed the best years of Maou’s life was up for debate, but it wasn’t worth telling Kisaki that. 
“I mean, I know I’m not one to talk. I love my job right now, but I was so anxious during my job hunt that I immediately compromised on MgRonald the moment I got the offer. I guess I’m not exactly the world’s best motivator here.” 
“Huh?” Chiho was surprised to hear this. “You ‘compromised’ on MgRonald? I mean, I’ve never seen you anxious in my life!” 
“They called it the employment ice age back then. It was a terrible time to be out of college and looking for a career. And it was my dream to work in restaurants, but after pondering it, I wound up going with a mega-corporation. That’s why I call it a compromise. Besides, as a manager, it’s kind of my job to be anxious. We got baseline sales quotas to make, after all.” 
Kisaki smiled a bit, recalling the past. 
“You’ll know what I mean in three or four years, Chi. Job hunting is scary in a different way from high school or college exams. I bet Kota’s fighting for his life right now with that stuff.” 
It was now March, meaning that former crewmember Kotaro Nakayama was about to start his fourth year of college. The faster firms would already start giving students informal job offers around this time, and even those who didn’t formally begin hiring until the summer of senior year would be starting with things like internships, alumni visits, and the other early steps of the job-evaluation flow. It was a scary time for applicants, bombarded with information and forced to consider a future they had no idea about yet. 
“And if Marko’s seeking a full-time position, he’s gonna have to reconsider how much he wants that pretty soon. He strikes me as the kinda guy who was doing a lot even in the blank time periods on his résumé, so he’s still a level above all the other guys in his boat…but compared to the average for other job seekers his age, he’s still gonna face some bias, sadly.” 
Kisaki was only giving them the general state of matters in the job market. It wasn’t the kind of thing that’d likely goad Maou’s passion and make him want to stay in Japan. 
“…You think he can achieve something?” Emi couldn’t help but ask. She meant nothing deep by it, inspired as it was by her previous whining at Chiho. 
“Well, worst-case scenario, if he’s interested, I think I can do something for him.” 
“Oh?” 
It sounded like Kisaki really meant that. Like it wasn’t just some irresponsible promise she’d forget about tomorrow. 
“But I can’t do anything right now, and it’ll depend on him a lot, so I can’t say much more about that. Anyway, I better get going. I’m on my way to work, so…” 
Kisaki turned to Alas Ramus. “Sorry I didn’t give you any attention.” 
The child meekly nodded back. 
“Okeh… Chi-Sis, I want fwies!” 
And maybe it was nothing very important, but it was a sheer stroke of luck that she chose to nag Chiho, not Emi. 
“Didn’t you just eat?” 
“You want fries…?” 
“Ha-ha-ha! Well, at her age, she’ll want to eat her favorite stuff all the time. You can feel free to stop by, you know, if you want.” 
“Sure. But you’re walking to work? Where do you live…?” 
The park was right near the Keio train line, around halfway between the Sasazuka and Hatagaya rail stations, but Kisaki had walked in from a side road. 
“Oh, you didn’t know, Chi?” Kisaki turned around and pointed a finger forward. “I have an apartment in a building on that street over there.” 
“Whoa! That’s really close!” 
It’d be less than a ten-minute walk to her MgRonald. Chiho assumed she took a car or train to work, but come to think of it, she’d never seen her traveling to or from her job before. 
“Do you live by yourself?” 
“No, with my parents.” 
“Oh, really…?” 
Most of the adults Chiho associated with lately were living by themselves (or some equivalent), so Kisaki living with her parents seemed novel to her. She always pictured her living alone in a chic urban condo complex or something. 
“Well, if I wasn’t local, I wouldn’t be able to keep tabs on the local high schools my team works at.” 
“Oh!” 
Chiho recalled how Kisaki had asked about her high school during her job interview. 
“I know Marko has a lot to think about, but you probably have to start thinking about exams, too, don’t you, Chi? Better keep an eye on that—and everything else around you. When it comes time to move, move fast.” 
“R-right… I’ll keep that in mind.” 
“Now, for real this time…” 
Chiho watched Kisaki briskly walk away, a hand to her chest in a gesture of surprise. 
“Well, that sure scared me.” 
“Was it really that scary?” 
“It’s surprising enough if you see someone from work in real life, you know? And she lives right near here…” 
“Oh, maybe so. The fact that the Devil King lives in Sasazuka kind of inoculated me to that long ago.” 
“Yeah…” 
Chiho could already feel her shock rapidly subsiding. 
 
Kisaki had mentioned that she’d stop by the MgRonald one more time after the lunch rush, but Emi never did see her before the end of her own shift. Her missing presence was likely why they were never haunted by the wailing spirit of Sariel that day; apart from Maou running on a fraction of his usual energy, it turned out to be a pretty typical shift. 
Since yesterday, Emi had wondered what Kisaki meant by “I think I can do something for him.” She suspected—and she was pretty sure about this—that there was a concrete plan of action behind that statement. Kisaki liked to chat, but she couldn’t say something like that without intending to back it up. There was something in her mind that led her to believe she could lend a hand in Maou’s life. Emi didn’t know what—but it’d be much better for Maou if Kisaki had something envisioned for him, rather than if he tried for a full-time job at some other company that he didn’t even want. 
“Why am I thinking about this…?” 
And the reason it would be better for him was, of course, because Maou missing out on a full-time job created the danger that humans and demons could go back to their old habits on Ente Isla. There was that danger, but for some reason, Emi was connecting it directly to Maou’s work prospects. The career of her rival for all time shouldn’t matter, but if she didn’t worry about it, it could threaten peace across the world. She had to support him. The whole dilemma would be sad if it wasn’t so chaotic. 
“This is so stupid.” 
Shaking off these useless thoughts, Emi took out her smartphone. She told Maou she was staying at Suzuno’s place without actually asking her first, so she needed to do that real quick. 
The screen read “March 12” at her. Emi looked back at Maou and snickered. 
“He’s not thinking of doing something, is he?” 
White Day, the day in Japan where men traditionally give chocolate to women in return for the gifts they’d received on Valentine’s Day, was March 14. Last month, Maou had received a worrisomely enormous collection of chocolate from his demon and human cohorts, most notably Suzuno and Chiho. They didn’t manage to eat it all, of course. It made Emi wonder how long chocolate stayed edible—but then, all Chiho taught the demons was how to melt retail chocolate blocks into simple molds. If they were kept in a cool, dark place, they might get harder or a bit oily, but that shouldn’t affect the quality for a while. 
But White Day wasn’t waiting. And if every day of your life was busy, a month had a way of passing by in a flash. 
“I doubt he prepared at all…” 
If Kinanna hadn’t shown up, would he have thought about doing something in the past week? Even without the lizard, the fallout from his rejection might’ve made it impossible anyway. Actually, was he still in contact with that lady who gave him the really expensive chocolate package during training? 
“I doubt Chiho and Bell would care. They know the kind of shape he’s in. But I wish he’d do something for Alas Ramus, at least.” 
As she waited for a walk sign on the street corner, she looked to her left, a hundred or so feet to the next stoplight. Almost a year ago, she had been reunited with her nemesis at that intersection. 
“I bet Acieth’s gonna whine about it, too. Maybe I should say something to him.” 
If Emi went back in time and told herself that she’d be working at the same place, in the same town, as the man she swore to kill, worrying about his career path and whether he prepared for White Day, how would past Emi respond? 
“This is like…” 
Smiling a little to herself, she tapped the “Call” button on her phone as she watched the walk sign turn on. 
“…We’re a real married couple, huh.” 
Ten or so minutes later, Villa Rosa Sasazuka came into view as usual. Emi breathed a sigh of relief. Depending on what Kinanna did, she honestly expected to be greeted with a pile of rubble. 
She went up the stairs, not seeing or hearing anything unusual. First, she knocked on the door to Room 202. 
“Emilia? Alas Ramus and Kinanna are sleeping, so keep it down,” Suzuno said quietly. 
The door opened. 
“…Oh, Chiho? And Acieth?” 
“Good evening, Yusa! I’m staying over tonight, too.” 
“Hello, Emi! I hope you are doing well!” 
Chiho was wearing an apron, a fetching smell emanated from the apartment, and Acieth was already hard at work snacking on a plate piled high with cookies. Maybe they’d changed tactics and bribed Kinanna with some sweets? Removing her coat, Emi sat by the futon in the corner Alas Ramus slept on and observed the kitchen. The counter was lined with chocolate chips, food coloring spray, and other baking necessities. 
“Why are you baking at this time of night?” 
“We’re experimenting a little.” 
“And I am taste tester!” 
Emi could see that from a mile away but still smiled and nodded stiffly. 
“We actually just finished this batch. Wanna try some?” 
They looked like regular round cookies. Taking one, Emi spotted the faint aroma of butter—a dangerous temptation pre-bedtime. 
“This is good. But really, why this all of a sudden? Are you giving them to Kinanna?” 
They couldn’t have been doing this simply to feed Acieth. Kinanna’s upkeep seemed like the most likely reason, but Chiho’s response went beyond anything Emi could imagine. 
“It’s almost White Day, so…” 
“Huh?” 
“Considering we were the ones who started this,” Suzuno explained as she sampled a few of the burnt and misshapen cookies from an earlier batch, “we can hardly ignore how things are right now, can we?” 
“Yeah, I was the one who taught the demons that White Day is for giving back. It’d be mean to drum up their expectations and leave them empty-handed, so I thought we could bake these for the demons.” 
“Oh…” 
Emi stared blankly at Chiho’s rapidly moving hands. 
“Of course, this is only for demons!” Acieth insisted. “I will make him give good, expensive sweets to me, and Chiho, and Suzuno, and my big sister! He must spend a thousand more yen, all the days he is late!” 
She was proving to be quite the loan shark. 
“By the way,” Suzuno casually added as she watched the evening news, “did he ever pay back the gift he received from that woman during training?” 
“That’s a different issue,” countered Chiho, her back turned. 
“Oh, and Emilia, we gave Alas Ramus a few cookies after dinner as well. It would be mean to a child, after all, baking all these and denying her a single one. So bear that in mind.” 
“…Sure. Thanks.” 
Chiho, Suzuno, and Acieth weren’t just worried about how Maou would approach White Day—they assumed he’d have nothing, and they were taking action to cover for him. Chiho, in particular, had the demons make chocolate to help forge deeper bonds between them and Maou; now she was on Maou’s side, making cookies to repay their efforts. Over in a corner, Emi even saw a bag from a hundred-yen shop, filled with what looked like gift wrap. 
It made everything she muttered to herself on the way home seem incredibly embarrassing now. 
“…!” 
“Yusa?” 
“What is it, Emilia?” 
“You have the hunger? Eat more!” 
But none knew what made Emi bury her face in her hands just then. 
 
As it turned out, Kisaki made it back to MgRonald just after Emi left. 
“Ugh, that meeting went on forever! Sorry I’m late. The ten PM crowd’s all gone, I assume. How’d it go today?” 
“About the same as always,” replied Maou. “No real trouble.” 
“Oh? That’s good.” Kisaki checked the clock. “You know, Marko, I got a text from Kota today.” 
“Kota?” 
Maou looked up at the unexpected name. Kisaki paused. She knew full well what her words would mean to him. 
“It sounds like he got an offer.” 
“He did?! That’s fast! He’s still technically a junior, isn’t he?!” 
“It is fast, but not unusually so. Plus, he was already in the whole internship system and stuff. So that’s one down for him, at least. He’s still courting his first choice, so he’s staying on the job hunt a while longer.” 
“Oh, yeah?” 
“Yeah.” 
“But that’s still good news, isn’t it?” 
Kisaki raised an eyebrow. 
“I mean, most of the time,” he stammered, “you never hear what happens to someone after they leave. I’m glad things are going well for him.” 
“Yeah. Say, Marko…” 
“Yes?” 
“Are things calming down for you yet? I still wanted to treat you to dinner.” 
“Oh! Um, tonight should be fine… Do you mind if I call home first?” 
“No problem. But if you can’t… Sorry to sound pushy, but I really want another chance to talk to you sometime, so.” 
“Oh? Um, sure. Gotcha.” 
It was rare for Kisaki to be so bold like this. But for now, he’d need to text Suzuno and Emi after work to make sure he could be a little late. 
“Ugh… That stupid lizard.” 
It felt a bit too much like a man calling his patient wife to ask whether he could join his coworkers out drinking. He grumbled about it a bit as he changed and sent the texts. He received responses promptly. 
“That’s all right. But not too late, okay?” 
“Understood. Feel free to spread your wings a little, now and again.” 
They were both so kind about it that it made him sick. That, and for some reason, Chiho sent him a text at almost the same time. 
“Don’t worry about us here! Camio’s doing better. He walked around the apartment a little tonight.” 
It was followed by a photo of Camio doing a little wingspread pose in front of the box with the sleeping Kinanna. If Chiho was there this time of night, she was presumably sleeping in Suzuno’s apartment. He assumed she’d be all right with Emi and Suzuno there should something happen, but… 
“I’ll try to wrap this up as soon as I can.” 
But Maou, not quite sure why Kisaki wanted to see him so bad, still felt nervous. It had been a while since his rejection. Considering she just told him about Kotaro Nakayama’s offer, it couldn’t have been about that. Kisaki wasn’t the type of person to rehash old debates that were long past being solvable. 
It was now past the closing hour. Maou went out to clean up the street in front of the entrance. 
“Why’s it so bright out? …Huh?” 
And there he saw a Buddhist statue. A far cry from the wailing ghoul of yesterday, this Sariel statue had pure, unclouded eyes. The brightness was because his eyes were lit up—literally, as opposed to the eerie aura of the other day. 
So Maou whapped him on the head to make him stop. 
“What the hell, man? …Ow! You’re hot! Is that holy energy?! You’re glowing, dude! Everyone’s gonna see you!” 
“Ah… Maou.” 
But Sariel’s eyes and face remained in their pure form, looking straight up at Maou. 
“Yes… Indeed, I am at a loss. At a loss, but at the same time, I am taken by a vision of pure happiness.” 
“What the hell’re you talking about?!” 
Maou could understand if the news of Kisaki’s transfer sent him into depression. But now, like a purified holy statue, he was standing motionless in front of MgRonald. No matter what he did, he had a knack for bothering people. 
“Something up, Marko?” 
“Huh? N-no, um…” 
As before, Kisaki shouted at him from inside. It only seemed to intensify the light from Sariel, as Maou gave him a sideways glance. 
“Was Sarue out there?” 
“What? Y-yeah, uhh…” 
“Oh, he’s already here? I invited him.” 
“You did?!” 
This was such a surprise, Maou found himself shouting right in front of the entrance. 
“Sorry I didn’t tell you, but he’s joining us tonight. Tell him we’ll be just a bit longer, all right?” 
It was a massive surprise, but it certainly explained Sariel’s new awakening. Back when his ban from the Hatagaya Station MgRonald was lifted, he was elated, purified, to the point where he almost ascended to heaven. If Kisaki had not only spoken to him, but invited him to dinner, it must’ve been like heaven moved itself down to Sariel’s doorstep. 

“Maou?” 
“Yeah…?” 
“I… What should I do? What should I say to her?” 
“I dunno? You never seem to have trouble talking her damn ear off. Why’re you freaking out over going out with her?” 
“I… I feel unprepared. Now that the moment has finally come, it’s like my brain has shut off on me.” 
Even an angel, presumably alive for thousands of years, got tongue-tied when the woman of his dreams spoke to him. 
Maou ignored Sariel—still glowing and now nervously looking at his watch—and went back to closing duty. 
“I have even less of an idea what’s about to happen…” 
He already had little idea why Kisaki had invited him to dinner. But if Sariel was coming along, he was totally lost. 
“Okay, all set. Ready?” 
“Y-yes!” 
Once they were done, Kisaki and Maou left through the front door, Sariel still an unmovable statue. He had managed to wind down the glowing, somehow. 
“So like I said, Maou here will be joining us. Thanks for taking the time for this.” 
“The—the pleasure is mine!” 
“…” 
He didn’t know what would happen. But he said he’d go, and that meant he’d be sharing a table with Sariel. No matter what happened, he was be obliged to treat the man with respect as “Mr. Sarue from Sentucky Fried Chicken.” He wasn’t looking forward to it—at all—but soon they were through the entrance at the usual izakaya . 
“Sorry to keep you out so late.” 
“N-no, no!” 
Was this really the same man who heartily sang his original love and passion-filled poems to the general public inside MgRonald? Sariel, seated across the table from Kisaki, was like a frozen stone, one apt to shatter if you hit it with a hammer. 
“Mr. Sarue? Are you okay? Would you like something to drink?” 
Maou, unsure how to act, presented him with a drinks menu. 
“I-I’ll get a beer!!” he replied, ignoring it. Maou wondered if alcohol was a good idea in his condition. 
“Yeah, maybe I should have a drink, too. It’s been a while. Maybe shochu ?” 
She started thumbing through the menu. Maou, feeling self-conscious about having a plain oolong tea, decided to join in for one round. 
“And I’ll have an oolong…highball.” 
After making the order, he realized this was just the second time he had tried alcohol in Japan. The first time was at a little welcome event held a while after MgRonald hired him. Kisaki was there then, too—and really, he didn’t remember how it tasted. 
So Kisaki ordered the three drinks for the table, along with a few dishes to share. Due to the late hour, the drinks all came first—Sariel’s draft lager, Maou’s oolong- shochu iced tea, and Kisaki’s straight shochu . 
“Well, here’s to another day in the books. Thanks for coming out, you two.” 
At her signal, everyone raised their glasses. Sariel, with his medium-sized stein, was obliged to hold it with both hands to keep from shaking too much. 
Maou took a drink of his highball. A cool yet warm sensation streaked down his throat. Kisaki watched him as he enjoyed it, warmly smiling, head propped up with her arm. 
“To be honest with you, I wanted both of you to drink a little bit tonight. If I said something stupid, I wanted to be able to laugh it off as the alcohol talking. Thanks for taking my invite on such short notice.” 
“Sure…” 
“The—the honor is mine!” 
Kisaki dove into a small bowl of edamame, taking occasional sips from her drink as she spoke. 
“I know it’s late, so I’ll get right down to business. As you know, I’m transferring to a new job at the start of the fiscal year on April 1. The Hatagaya Station location’s gonna have a new manager, and I hope both of you will get along with her…” 
“Of—of course I will!” said Sariel, despite the concept turning him into a vengeful wraith on the streets when he first heard the news. 
“But that doesn’t matter tonight. There’s actually a favor I want to ask from you both. That’s why I invited you.” 
“Y-yes?!” 
“A favor—? Whoa, you’re gonna break the glass with that death grip.” 
Maou thought he could hear the stein cracking in Sariel’s hands. He didn’t know his own strength, apparently. 
“I’m twenty-seven now.” 
“I am aware, yes!!” 
“Huh? …Oh.” 
Maou wondered what kind of crime Sariel committed to know that piece of info. Then he recalled that his boss was Kisaki’s friend from when they were young. 
“And the department I’m transferring to is more of an internal home-office thing, but once I work there three years, I’m thinking about leaving the company.” 
““Huh?”” 
Maou and Sariel both let out surprised yelps. In three years, Kisaki would be thirty—right when you entered the main earning period in your career. 
But the truth dawned on Maou then: 
“You’re gonna go independent?” 
Kisaki nodded. She dreamed of having her own bar and restaurant, and both Maou and Sariel knew she was taking baby steps toward that dream. But hearing that resolve straight from her mouth was still a surprise to them. Honestly speaking, Kisaki was getting one killer promotion. It put her on the track to big things in the MgRonald Corporation. And now she was talking about doing away with that stability… 
But why was she telling them? 
“Yeah. And I suppose you could call this headhunting.” She belted down her glass of shochu . “Marko, Sarue… Three years from now, I want to hire you.” 
The night wind felt good against Maou’s flushed cheeks—an unfamiliar sensation. He was on his way home, pushing Dullahan II along. The shocking offer had paralyzed his mind; he still wasn’t sure how to parse his feelings about it. 
The city around him was quiet, as if it was watching over him. Villa Rosa Sasazuka, too, was serene. The lights were off in Room 201 and 202—no unusual sounds or anything. Quietly, so as not to wake anyone, Maou went through the door. 
“<Ah, Satan, you have returned?>” 
“Whoa!” 
Kinanna’s voice pierced the darkness, a pair of reptilian eyes shining a fluorescent green in the air. Maou’s pulse, already quickened by the alcohol, began to race. 
“<Y-you’re awake? Why are you out?!>” 
“<Out? Don’t be silly,>” the composed lizard replied. “<This is not outside at all!>” 
He was seated in the middle of the room, the box inside his holy-energy cage ripped to shreds. Next to it, Camio was gently dozing as always. The sight frustrated Maou a little. The chicken could be eaten at any moment, and yet, he was chill enough to sleep? 
“<I will always be inside this burrow. I will never renege on my promise to you.>” 
“<This burrow? That’s a mean way to put it… Wait.>” 
He steeled himself, assuming Kinanna was talking nonsense again. Then he noticed something else. 
“<I will always be here, so as not to renege on the pact within my body. I will only move from here when chaos rules the world anew.>” 
“<Um… Where is ‘here’?>” 
“<What? Have you forgotten, Satan? After all the tears you shed, begging me to forgive you?>” 
“<S-sorry… I’ve also had my hands full lately.>” 
He had to play along. 
“<Hmph. Very well. Do not worry. When Legoon visited my burrow earlier, I taught him a lesson he’ll not soon forget!>” 
“<Well, ah, good work…>” 
“<But if Legoon has found where my burrow is, then has Camuinica been dispatched?>” 
“<Well, you know, uhh, he has a son…>” 
It felt strange, referring to the father figure who’d raised him as someone else’s child. But he did anyway—to great effect. 
“<What? A son?! Then we must care for him! So there is another generation… Ah, this is excellent news! We must care for him, so the nefarious Legoon never finds him! But I do not appreciate how the Nothung is not being maintained. Oh, if only I could move from here, I would come right over to celebrate—but alas, it is not to be. Please, give Camuinica my warmest regards!>” 
“<I will. He’ll be glad to hear that.>” 
Maou took off his shoes and sat next to Kinanna, keeping the lights off to avoid startling him. 
“<Say, Kinanna, do you know where the Astral Gem is?>” 
It sounded like, for the first time over the past few days, he had awakened some Gem-related memories. Maou tried hooking some of them, figuring he had nothing to lose. 
“<Hmm? I am inside, in case the worst happens. I do not know. You are the one who made the burrow that way.>” 
“<Oh, did I? That’s right.>” 
What did he mean by that? What did being inside mean here? 
“<What, are you tired? You could never defeat Legoon like that. You became our chieftain after overwhelming us with your sharp-tongued words. Now is no time for weakness.>” 
“<…My apologies. All these things are happening at once, and it’s just a lot for one demon to deal with.>” 
“<I see! And that is what brought you to me? Yes, I imagine it is. What with young Camuinica and all… Yes, yes…>” 
Kinanna raised his voice in self-satisfaction. Then he blinked and looked around the room. 
“<But why is it this dark?>” 
“<Huh? Because it’s night right now…>” 
“<Night? Of course not. There would be stars in the sky at night.>” 
“<What?>” 
“<The sun shines in the sky. The blue star twinkles. The star that brings such pure, kind light to my burrow.>” 
“<I…see…>” 
He must have been talking about the sky back in the demon realms. But never, in all his years there, did Maou see stars in that realm’s skies. It was always red, day and night, covered in thick clouds kicked up by the strong winds. And what blue star was this? 
“<Wait! Is Legoon behind this?!>” 
“<N-no. I walked all the way here, but there was nothing outside. It was perfectly peaceful.>” 
“<Was it? By the way, Satan, what happened to Camuinica?>” 
“<Um…>” 
“<I have not seen him lately. I must sharpen his Nothung…>” 
“<Don’t worry. Camuinica’s busy raising his son right now.>” 
“<What? He has a son?! Ahh, finally, a new generation!>” 
“<Mm-hmm. I go check up on him every now and then, but he’s focused on that since Legoon isn’t coming anytime soon.>” 
“<I see, I see! But that’s no reason to let that sword go unsharpened! Tell him to visit me once things settle down, if you could…>” 
The conversation was starting to loop, but Maou patiently stuck to it. By the time Kinanna finally exhausted himself and fell asleep, the night sky was starting to lighten in shade. 
Looking down at the snoring lizard, Maou prepared to sleep himself. The tatami-mat floor was still wrecked, so he laid some cardboard on the floor to keep from damaging his new futon, yawning the whole way. 
Then there was a small knock on the door. He opened it, only to find a sleepy-eyed Emi. 
“Huh? Emi? You…” 
“Finally done, huh? You were talking that whole time?” 
“Yeah, sorry. Did I wake you?” 
“No. Sorry, but I was sleeping just fine through it. But when I woke up and noticed you’d stopped, I thought something might’ve happened.” 
“Oh… Yeah, he just fell asleep a moment ago. That was after I was out drinking, so it wasn’t so bad.” 
“Were you out late?” 
“No, I was back here a little past one…” 
Maou looked down at his watch. It was almost five. 
“I’ll watch him. You can sleep a little.” 
“…I will. Thanks.” 
With Maou’s nod, Emi entered the apartment, noticing Kinanna sprawled out in the middle of the room like it was his reserved spot. 
“Whoa! Why’s he out?!” 
“I dunno. Can you restrain him?” 
“I guess…but I don’t want to wake him up. I’ll figure something out if he does.” 
“Thanks.” 
Maou went back to his futon, tossing the small, wrecked cardboard box in Emi’s direction. 
“I don’t have any, like, cushions or anything, so sit on that if you want. I can’t pay for your clothes if you rip them on something.” 
“You really need to apologize to your landlord.” 
“I can’t right now. He might just rip this place apart again. I will when it’s all over.” 
His back was turned to Emi. His answers weren’t exactly forward-thinking, either. 
“What did you talk about with Ms. Kisaki?” 
With Emi here, Maou was now fully relieved of his duty, and his guard was completely down. Emi had mixed feelings about his attitude, but she asked anyway, wondering what motivation Kisaki would have to ask him out. 
“…Ahh…” 
Maou stopped for a moment. 
“I think some of the meat Chi and Suzuno cooked up is in the freezer. If the lizard wakes up and acts all hungry, give that to him.” 
“Right, right… Good night.” 
He was so tired that everything must’ve been a pain to him. Figuring she could ask him again later, Emi meekly sat down on the cardboard, reaching for her smartphone to kill the time. Maou, Kinanna, and Camio. Three demons, exhausted and sleeping—and she was guarding them. It made her feel incredibly out of place. She smiled a little about it. 
“We talked,” Maou said, his back still turned, “about where my starting point is and stuff.” 
“…Huh?” 
It took time for her to realize he was answering her question from before. It sounded like this was something important. 
“What do you mean?” 
“…Zzz…zzz…” 
“Hey?” 
No answer. Leaning over, she found Maou fast asleep with a pained expression. She stared blankly at him for a moment. 
“…Well, thanks,” she said, standing up and leaning against the kitchen counter. 
“Mmh… Emilia… bok… ” 
Then, with hardly a break, Camio woke up. 
“Oh, morning. I just picked up guard duty from the Devil King. He got out of his cage again, so keep quiet. I’ll get ’im if he wakes up.” 
“Oh, dear. My thanks to you. Ahh, nothing good has happened to me in my times in Japan, churrrr… ” 
Emi smiled. She knew this was actually an arch-demon, but the mannerisms of a large black chicken were just too weirdly cute to her. 
“Are your wounds better?” 
“I’d like to say they are fully healed, but it is hard to tell for churrrr until my demonic force returns. That will be difficult around Kinanna. Peep. ” 
“Ah. Well, at least you’re feeling well.” 
She was glad to see a demon safe. She expressed that emotion in words. There, in the quiet early morning, she contently watched the back of the sleeping Devil King. 
“Hey, Camio? What do you think the Devil King’s starting point was?” 
“ Peep? Starting point?” 
“He was talking about that before he fell asleep. He went out to eat with his boss last night, but they were talking about something related to their starting points as people.” 
“Hmm. Starting points. I peep wonder. I am not sure myself. I imagine one reason my liege sought to unite the demon realms was the annihilation of the Blacksheep clan, but cheep certainly that was not the only spark.” 
“Blacksheep?” 
“The name of the clan His peep Demonic Highness was born in.” 
“Blacksheep… Is that the name of a particular species of demon, like the Malebranche?” 
“Indeed. Malacoda, the Southern Great Demon General, is from the Bluehorn clan. Alciel of the East is of the Iron Scorpion. And I am a peep Pájaro Danino.” 
“I think I’ve heard the name Bluehorn before. What about Lucifer?” 
“Among us, Lucifer peep is known as an outcast . The term refers not only to Lucifer but to any demon who is the last or among the last of his kind, due to being annihilated or subjected to mutation. His Demonic Highness himself may be an outcast by this point, in fact.” 
“An outcast…?” 
The last, or among the last, of his kind. That meant the Blacksheep clan was gone. 
“Why did the Devil King become the Devil King…?” 
There, for the first time, Emi wanted to know about the past of the demon called Satan, someone who had always been Devil King for as long as she’d been alive. 
Maou finally started moving his achy joints a little past eleven, the sun now high in the sky. 
He woke to find Suzuno, not Emi, in his room. There was now also a wooden crate, much sturdier than the cardboard box Camio called home, and Kinanna was sealed inside it. 
“Whoa, you didn’t nail that to the wall, did you, Suzuno?” 
“I— peep —I warned her it might be a bad idea,” Camio sheepishly stated. Suzuno, on the other hand, looked proud. 
“This apartment is already a disaster area,” Suzuno said. “Another nail or three will not change matters. We should have done this from the very beginning. With a crate, I can cast a spell meant for sealing up a treasure chest, not physically binding a creature down. This way, he can only annoy us with the sounds he makes banging around in there. It should help you sleep better at night.” 
“Yeah… Maybe, but… Where’s Emi?” 
“You saw her early in the morning. She did not sleep much last night, so she is having a nap in my apartment. Chiho told me your shift begins in the afternoon today? If you want something to eat, I can prepare it for you.” 
“…Yeah, if you got something, I’d appreciate it. God, that drinking last night must’ve dehydrated me. I’m so thirsty.” 
“You, drinking? How novel.” 
“The kinda situation I was in, I had to drink to withstand it,” Maou said as he filled and gulped down a cup of water from the kitchen tap. “I only had two drinks, too…but I feel so heavy. This must be what a hangover’s like.” 
“Likely, you simply have a low tolerance. Let me see your left hand.” 
“Hmm? …Ohh?!” 
He lifted up his palm. Suzuno jabbed a single finger into the middle. There was a shock, followed by a refreshed feeling that coursed across his body, freeing him from the dull alcoholic haze. 
“Wow, that was great. What was it?” 
“A spell that energizes the flow of water inside you and dilutes the alcohol. It has little effect if you ingest a great deal of it, but the spell is simple enough that it does no harm to a demon.” 
“Yeah, I feel a lot better. But that’s kind of a niche spell, isn’t it? When do you ever use it?” 
“Many are the clerics among us who cannot drink or are vulnerable to its effects. But we cannot perform our divine ceremonies and rituals and only pretend to drink our holy wine.” 
Maou blinked at this. Talk about the perfect solution to a common (?) problem. 
“A lot of demand in the industry then, huh?” 
“I…hesitate referring to the Church as an industry.” 
“I mean, to the average person, a spell like that would make no sense, but if you’re ‘in the business,’ so to speak, you’d know exactly what it’s for, that sort of thing.” 
Suzuno gave Maou a funny expression. Something had inspired him, and it wasn’t just the anti-hangover spell talking. 
“Oh, speaking of, sorry about showing up so late yesterday.” 
“Not at all. Emilia and Chiho were here with me. And you could hardly afford to turn down a proposal from Kisaki, so close to her transfer.” 
“I appreciate that. I think last night gave me more insight on the future.” 
“Insight?” 
It might have been Suzuno’s imagination, but she felt some of the light from before returning to Maou’s eyes. 
“Listen, do you have any urgent business in Ente Isla today?” 
“What? I could sleep here tonight if need be, but what’s the matter?” 
“In that case, today… Well, actually, tomorrow morning, I have something I want to talk about with you, Emi, and Chi. I’d prefer tonight, but I can’t have Chi sleeping over here two nights in a row.” 
“All right. Should I tell them?” 
“Yeah. If you can, I’d like to get Ashiya and Urushihara here, too. And Laila and Acieth while I’m at it.” 
“Is this a major undertaking you are planning?” 
“Not major in my book, no, but something that’d probably piss you all off if I did it without warning, so I wanted to talk about it. Ugghhh, I’m so tired.” 
With a hefty yawn, Maou got up, the vibrant force extending off his back like an aura. Suzuno watched him as he looked at the morning sun. 
“Well, if you feel better, then all is well.” 
The way he was talking, he’d never reveal it until everyone was there, no matter how much she prodded him. Suzuno moved on to cooking breakfast. 
“Maou, is it me, or…is the whole Sentucky building glowing?” 
Chiho, fresh from school and about to start her shift, felt obliged to whisper the question into Maou’s ear, so none of the other crew could hear her. 
“Yeah. It already was when I came to work.” 
“That early…? Doesn’t anyone else see it?” 
“I’m not sure. Maybe, if they’re looking out for it.” 
“Um, are you okay with that?” 
“No, but I think you could still play it off as an optical illusion or something. Good thing we’re on a well-lit city street even at night, huh?” 
“What do you think happened to Sariel…?” 
If something supernatural was happening to Sentucky Fried Chicken, Chiho surmised Sariel had to be the cause of it. She was right. 
“Well, you know how Ms. Kisaki invited me out last night?” 
“Yeah.” 
“Sariel came with us.” 
“Huh?” 
“Yeah, she invited him.” 
“Whaaat?!!” 
If someone else had said that to Maou, he’d react the same way. 
“Did—did—did Sariel finally use his angel magic to take over Ms. Kisaki’s mind or something?” 
“No, nothing like that. I know it’s easy to think that, but no.” 
Maou could see why Chiho needed assuaging. Until Kisaki started talking, he had zero idea why she’d do something like invite Sariel to eat with her. He doubted Sariel did, either. And when she originally said “I want to hire you” to them, neither understood at all what she meant at first. 
 
“Marko, Sarue… Three years from now, I want to hire you.” 
Maou and Sariel froze, blinking helplessly. 
“Hire us?” 
“I—I am not sure what you mean…” 
“I mean exactly what it sounds like. You both know my dream, right?” 
“Y-yes, the bar and café…” 
“I’m saying, when I’m ready to manage that, I want you both to help me. We can discuss compensation later, but I want to get a company going and hire you on in relatively quick order.” 
“I’ll do it.” 
Realizing Kisaki was serious, Sariel bit on it like a Venus flytrap whose feelers were set off by a juicy bug—a reflex, his own volition playing no part in it. Maou gave him a slap on the head for it. 
“What was that for?!” 
“Dude, you… Er, I mean, please give it some thought, Mr. Sarue.” 
“I don’t need to! What reason do I have to hesitate?!” 
“If you don’t, that’s fine. But unlike me, you’re a full-time employee at Sentucky, Mr. Sarue. Are you sure you should commit to a new job that quickly?” 
“All the thinking in the world won’t help you if you don’t act on it. And all my decisions are snap decisions!” 
“That’s not what I mean! And what about you, Ms. Kisaki? Hiring Mr. Sarue? Are you trying to doom this café from the start?!” 
Maou brought a hand to his forehead, as if dealing with a migraine. 
“Maybe hindsight is twenty-twenty and all, but you know, I really do trust Sarue.” 
“Trust him how ?!” Maou blurted out. 
Kisaki snickered back. “Well, he’s never gonna stab me in the back, right?” 
“Of course I won’t!” 
“No, um… All right, probably not, but…” 
“And yes, he sometimes says and does strange things, but he’s always a perfect gentleman to women.” 
“Thank you for saying that!” 
“I have a feeling we don’t share the same concept of a perfect gentleman, Ms. Kisaki.” 
“I’ve noticed something over the past few days. To put it nicely, Sarue is a perfect gentleman. To put it poorly, he’s a loser.” 
“That is an honor to hear!” 
“Shut up! Are you gonna react that way to everything she says?! Ms. Kisaki, what are you talking about?!” 
Now Sariel was in his element. Shedding all the nervousness, he was back to his usual outlandish behavior. Kisaki paid it no mind. 
“Considering how he showers me with praise every single day, he’s never laid a hand on me, has he?” 
“Laid a hand…? Well, technically speaking, no, but…” 
“And he draws a very clear line between business and private matters. Besides, the Sentucky in Hatagaya’s a good sales performer.” 
“It is…?” 
Maou recalled Kawata telling him how Sariel had attempted to apply for a part-time job at the MgRonald across the street. 
“And I’ve realized that I’m totally capable of fending him off, too. So think about it. He adores me, he’s a faithful worker, and he’s easy to handle. You don’t see people like that too often.” 
“You truly think so much of me… Ahh… Am I dreaming?!” 
“Don’t you get it? She’s telling you you’re a useful idiot.” 
As sorry as most people would be for Sarue in this context, the man himself was in a state of abject joy, so Maou laid off. 
“…Well, whether I agree with you or not, Ms. Kisaki, I’m fine with it if you are. But don’t you want to hear why as well, Mr. Sarue? Like, why us, and what your conditions are, and so on.” 
Kisaki smiled defiantly at the word conditions . She was sure she had them now. Sariel, meanwhile, shook his head violently. 
“Conditions?! Ms. Kisaki is seeking my company! What more conditions would I need?!” 
“That’s not how I would describe it. Also, Sarue, Marko’s right. I’m asking you to entertain an offer that could drastically lower the amount of money you make in your lives. So listen up. When your boss talks about labor conditions to you, you need to listen.” 
Sariel, suitably chastised, fell silent. 
“Basically, there are two reasons. First, I want to run my own bar-café, but as it is, I would need to run the managerial side by myself, too. If I did that, I’d be lucky to last three years before I got exhausted. Running a restaurant is about a lot more than making food and drinks and serving it to customers. I need other people who can handle that for me at any time, so I can focus on other stuff. That’s reason number one.” 
“Right. Fair enough.” 
“Second, I don’t want to spend a lot of time and money selecting my starting staff. As I said, I definitely can’t run this thing by myself—but if I want to hire part-timers, I may have to wait a while until I attract them, and frankly, I’m not gonna have the time to train them from the get-go. On the other hand, I’d gladly pay to have you on board, and I can leave the space for you to run it when I’m busy.” 
“Wait a minute, Ms. Kisaki! You trust him with that? I understand if you think he’s a useful idiot, but how can you possibly trust this guy?!” 
“Like I told you. Because he’s deeply, inconsolably in love with me.” 
“That I am! And I won’t let anyone beat me on that!” 
“Whoa?!” 
Kisaki’s strange logic portrayed her in a totally different light to Maou. 
“Well, all right, I’m half joking there, but…” she quickly followed up. 
“I’m always one hundred percent serious!” 
“Will you shut up?! Um, joking or not, that’s just crazy talk. Where are you getting this from?” 
“Before I say anything further, Marko, let me ask. What do you think you need to open an Italian-style bar…or a café, to keep this simple?” 
“Huh? Well…” Maou thought for a moment, realizing how broad the question was when talking about management. “You have to develop a menu first. Drinks and food. Then you work out the recipes, then your wholesale prices and suppliers. Dishes and utensils. Also, you gotta find a space and get the tables and chairs for it…” A pause. “Oh, and you need a custodian, too. Then once you start getting customers, you look at the numbers, compare what sells with what doesn’t, revise the menu… Then, um…” 
He listed the things that occurred to him during day-to-day MgRonald operations, but nothing else came to mind. Then he noticed Sariel grinning confidently at him, nostrils flared. 
“Hmph. Shallow. How shallow, Maou!” 
“Huh?!” 
“All you’re talking about is the front-of-house operations!” 
“Really?” 
“You can’t manage a restaurant unless you handle the back end, too, Maou. In other words, the money.” 
With an aggravated expression, Sariel made a circle with his thumb and index finger. 
“You started by thinking about building the part of the restaurant the customers see. But that’s wrong. You start managing a place by calmly, coldly checking over the cards in your hand.” 
His voice was calm, as if admonishing an underperforming student. 
“You have a loan from the bank. You have collateral. You have your personal funding ratio when you open for business. You have a repayment plan. You have your operational budget for the time being. Cash flow. Sales goals. Plus a lot more details, but you have to calculate all these when you’re launching a new location. If you don’t have a full business plan with all these numbers worked out, the bank’s not going to sit down with you, much less give you a loan. And if you do get that loan and have a budget to work with, that’s when you can start thinking about what the place looks like. Though, really, you do that in parallel with the money stuff after a certain point.” 
Maou had learned about this in his managerial training. Why didn’t he come up with that himself just now? And why was Sariel rattling this off so perfectly? 
“You have to maintain your books—accounts payable, accounts receivable, expenses, salaries, taxes. You have to interact with the bank regularly. If you hire part-timers, hiring and training them is part of the job. And if you’re treating it like some nondescript café on the outskirts of town, the only way that’ll work is if you have roots in the neighborhood, or you’re a rich businessman doing all the building and running this as a side hobby. Whether it’s a bar or a café, you’re dealing in luxuries. It’s not a vital, life-supporting business.” 
“I hate to say it, but Sarue’s right. The Italian bar-café concept isn’t too mainstream in Japan, either.” 
“I don’t need to tell you how accessible, cheap, comfortable chains have altered the landscape in most neighborhoods. That’s the kind of scene we’d be abandoning a career-track job to wade into. You need to understand that massive businesses and pioneers used vast sums of money and time to deploy countless talented people into this business, and that’s what’s behind the restaurant you visit on a regular basis. If you mess up the basic weapons you need when joining the fray… Heh-heh. Maou, I don’t think you have what it takes to run a location.” 
The words, coming as they did after his rejection, stabbed Maou like a knife. The fact that it was Sariel doing the stabbing made it sting even worse. 
“If you start,” Kisaki said, “by thinking about what you want the customer-facing things to look like, your budget’s just going to keep ballooning. Sometimes you need to make an effort on the back end to make the front more attractive, sure, but management needs to be based in reality. It’s nothing you can dive into romantic dreams over when you’re talking about it. And even before I dive in, I think Sarue and I are of similar minds about this. He’s the man Himeko Tanaka herself put in place to compete against me, after all.” 
It was high praise from Kisaki, who didn’t know the truth behind how Sariel got where he was. Sariel, meanwhile, held his nose so high that his head was about to fall off. 
“Like Sarue said, money gets involved with far more than just the opening. MgRonald has a single company-wide system for handling daily accounting and supply work, but if you’re a single location, you gotta do all that yourself. Hiring an accountant or a tax agent costs money. You have to solve as many problems as you can on your own, or you’ll run out of money. That’s another thing difficult to keep up with if I’m all alone. I need to learn it all and come to grips with it as a manager. And while I do that, the difference between having a trustworthy staff on hand or not is huge.” 
Maou knew that back-end work was key to restaurant management, but he still didn’t see how that connected to needing him and Sarue. If Kisaki was running the back, either one of them could handle the front. 
“I was thinking about that after this transfer,” Kisaki explained when he asked. “If I’m gonna do this, I want to do something big. I’ve built up all this knowledge in a large corporation. Why should I be content with being the queen of a little fiefdom? I don’t want to use this dream simply to keep food on my table.” 
She’d need to keep at least one location going, of course, or there was no point. But just doing that couldn’t be described as a lofty goal. 
“If the business gets on track eventually, we could totally consider a second location. Then we’d have more people. And when that happens, if I have a faithful employee with managerial experience—like Sarue—I could immediately leave the location to him.” 
“I—I see…” 
Maou had internally figured that Kisaki wanted to go independent so she could run a funky little place with a small but dedicated customer base. He was wrong. In fact, he rather haughtily said it himself at one point, didn’t he? That if you aim high and fail, you’ll still reach a higher point than you would if you set your goals lower? 
“And when that happens, Marko, that’s probably when you’ll really be tested.” 
“What do you mean?” 
“If our business expands, I’ll get on the front lines less and less. You know the ideals I have about field-level work…and I think you’re the only one who can keep those safe for me.” 
“Protect your ideals on the field… Ow!” 
Maou groaned as the jealous archangel stomped on his foot underneath the table. He put up with it. He did kind of whack him hard on the head earlier. 
“I know the approach you take to work by now. There’s really not a lot of people out there who can learn and acquire new skills and techniques while they’re busy with everything else. And you’ve got the skills, and the drive, to use the MgRonald limited menu to satisfy any customer. You like working in this business, don’t you?” 
“Well, I don’t dislike it, but couldn’t anyone do that if they tried…?” 
“If they tried, yeah. But not many can do that. If they could, we wouldn’t have this entire industry of certification courses and classes on how to improve your cooking and so on.” 
Kisaki looked Maou in the eye. 
“Yes, a lot of people are hard workers. But not many of them truly love their work from the heart, trying to improve on their own volition while still on the job. I think you’re one of the few people who really do. And when I say that, I’m not saying the rest of the crew is worse than you, but… You know, like I said, one reason why I have so much praise for you is that, out of the people around me, you have the most freedom in your future as a part-timer. I kind of figured internally that if I asked, maybe you wouldn’t mind following me.” 
In a way, it was almost like she was asking him out. Out of the corner of his eye, Maou could see Sariel glaring at him, his face about ready to explode. 
“For now, Sarue and I are talking strictly about the hard money aspects. You need money to build the foundation for a lot of dreams. But as I told you, working hard on the back end so you can get more romantic with the front is also important. Why am I dreaming of running an Italian bar-café, something so nonmainstream in this day and age? Well, it’s because I had a starting point that made me embrace that dream.” 
“A starting point…” 
“My maternal grandfather ran a café.” 
That café was in Kawagoe, Saitama Prefecture, northwest of Tokyo. Kawagoe, home to many historic buildings, was a popular place for visitors from nearby Tokyo to visit, and his café had been a cherished part of the local scene, keeping it pretty busy…apparently anyway. Kisaki had been a kid at the time, so she didn’t know for sure. It was usually decently crowded when she visited, but her grandfather always saved a bar stool for her, blending up a special mix of coffee that was okay for kids to drink. 
“You could smoke in there, like you could everywhere back then. When I look at the photos, it didn’t seem trendy at all, inside or out. Granddad ran the bar while Grandma did the serving, so I’m sure they didn’t have a lot of staff expenses. If they were both counted as full-timers, they could save on taxes that way, too.” 
Considering this was the starting point for her dream, Kisaki wasn’t exactly gushing about the place. 
“But my grandfather, standing there by the bar, just seemed so cool to me. He’d wear this starched white shirt my grandmother ironed for him with a black tie, a well-worn apron, and a perfectly kept mustache. If you looked up coffee shop owner in the dictionary, you’d see a picture of him there.” 
“So you were inspired by the grandfather you admired?” 
“…Well, to be honest, I only felt that way about him after he closed it down.” 
“Oh?” 
“My grandmother died when I was thirteen or fourteen, and when she did, it really took a toll on him. He couldn’t hire someone to replace her at that point, and then he broke his hip falling down the stairs. He wound up having to close the coffee shop not even half a year after her death. But…” 
But while her family worried that being bedridden and out of work would make him go downhill fast, something unexpected happened. 
“All the café regulars stopped by to check on him.” 
He had a pretty wide customer base, including a few children brought there by their own grandparents. And the one thing they all told him was that they wanted Mr. Kisaki’s coffee and tea again. 
“They missed his work. What greater reward would an artisan want? And seeing that, it made me want to try his coffee again, too. I asked him, and he said, ‘When I’m better, when I’m better.’” 
Maou dreaded where the story was going for a moment. But after a lengthy recuperation, Kisaki’s grandfather finally recovered and made some coffee for her. 
“Using only what was there in the kitchen, he made my coffee exactly how I liked it. He used cheap beans from the local grocery store and filtered tap water. But it was great. I was shocked. It was the same beans and water Dad put in the coffee maker every day, but the taste and aroma were on a whole other level.” 
She asked him what his secret was. His answer: “I just know exactly how you like it, Mayumi.” 
“The way that he put it, people have a lot of number ones.” 
“Number ones?” 
“Yeah. When we talk about food or drink, we subconsciously categorize them a lot—we say we like this from group A or that from group B. My grandfather knew the unique aspects of the roasts he dealt in, and he had a skill for guessing which one any given customer would like and making it for them.” 
As he put it to her: 
“‘If you literally ask them what the best whatever is, they’ll universally give you the absolute number one on the market. But it’s not like they eat or drink only the very best out there. You know what I mean, Mayumi—how this might be the best dish at this restaurant, but if you go to that café, you should get this instead? That’s what I mean by people having lots of number ones. My job at the café was to get customers to pick their number one from my selection. It’d be far too presumptuous of me to select an absolute number one for them. I’d have them try a few different things, and if they found something they personally liked the best, that was a job well-done in my book.’ 
“So then I asked him what my number one was. And he said: 
“‘If someone told you what it was, Mayumi, it wouldn’t be your number one any longer. You find your favorites on your own, so they’ll be convincing to you. It’s not something someone can teach you.’ 
“And you know, he never did tell me what my number one coffee was. So I started experimenting, trying to replicate what he made for me. He passed away when I was a sophomore in college, but before he did, he taught me a whole lot of things. Not, like, really tricky techniques or anything. But even now—even if I run into something I think is good—I’ve never run into the coffee my grandfather made for me. I really think it’s something I need someone to make for me, if anything. So…” 
Kisaki looked at Maou. 
“I think you’ve got what it takes to re-create the starting point of my dream. And if you do, that can connect to providing my café’s ideal offerings—the constant drive to give each customer the best things possible.” 
Ignoring the demonic death gaze from Sariel, Maou thought this over for a moment. But not a very long moment. 
 
“Wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-what was your answer?! You! What did you say to her?!” 
“Whoa, Chi, what’s wrong?!” 
Chiho was giving Sariel a run for his money, with how intently she was staring Maou down from below. 
“I-I-I-I-I mean, th-that’s almost like her saying ‘I want you to cook for me every day’!” Chiho went on. “That’s, like, eighty percent of the way toward a marriage proposal!” 
“M-marriage? What’re you talking about? Nobody mentioned marriage!” 
Chiho was visibly perturbed, and Maou was unsure of what to say. She understood what he meant; she really did. But was this really just a conversation between two people dedicated to their work? 
“I know they didn’t, but they might as well have! Anyway, what did you tell her?!” 
Kisaki’s choice of words alarmed Chiho, but there were more important issues at hand. The way she saw it, this was their best possibility yet for avoiding the danger Emi had brought up. Everyone knew Maou had a deep respect for Kisaki, and Kisaki had just asked for his help running a new company. When they spoke at the park, Chiho had no idea Kisaki would make Maou a full-timer through launching her own restaurant. It seemed like a trick, somehow—but outside of getting promoted within MgRonald, this was the most effective way of keeping Maou in Japan. 
If he wanted to stay with a Japanese company, that would change the prospects of nearly everything else in the world. It wouldn’t solve all of Emi’s many concerns, but wouldn’t it at least keep a lot of people around her from being sad? 
But Maou simply pointed at the glowing Sentucky across the street. 
“Can’t you tell just from that? Sariel said yes, and I said no.” 
“You… What?!” 
She was sure he’d say yes. Maou, expecting that, smiled. 
“Three years is just too far away. Neither anyone else nor I could ever predict what I’ll be doing then. If she had said next year, I would’ve agonized over it a bit more, but three…?” 
“That… That’s true, yeah.” 
Three years was more than an ample amount of time for the world to change. By then, whatever problems the world had after the conquest of heaven would become clear. Not even Chiho knew where she’d be by then. 
“So I told her that if she still had a free slot in three years, invite me in then.” 
“Yeah… Wait, huh?” 
“Hmm?” 
“In three years…?” 
“Yeah, like, if she still wanted me with her when she went independent, call me.” 
Chiho’s eyes opened wide. 
“So you’d say yes then? If she asked you in three years?” 
“Well, it’s Kisaki inviting me, y’know. It beats getting in a panic and taking a job someplace weird, right? I’m not exactly floored by the thought of having Sariel as a coworker, but…” 
“Will—will you stay in contact with her that long?” 
“Huh? I’m not gonna change my number or anything.” 
That wasn’t what Chiho had asked. The mild-mannered man seemed totally oblivious of the concerns she and Emi had for him. 
“Oh, right. Do you have time to stop by my apartment tomorrow, Chi? It’d have to be kind of early in the morning—like, eight or so.” 
“Um?” 
“I wanted to talk about the future.” 
“The…?” 
The future. The meaning behind that flashed through Chiho’s mind in multiple layers. It made her face turn red, then blue, in alternating order. But: 
“Maou, are you flirting with a coworker on the clock? That’s against regulations.” 
Akiko appeared out of nowhere, face looking grim. 
Chiho leaped up. 
“Gahh?! M-M-M-M-M-M-Ms. O-O-Ohki?!” 
“Hey, Aki. We’re not flirting.” 
“You invited her to your apartment to talk about the future! Either you’re flirting with her or proposing to her.” 
“Proposing? Not that word again… But I guess, yeah, the way I worded that…” 
“Please stop, Ms. Ohki! It’s nothing like that!!” 
“All right, all right. Not that it matters, but the joint across the street is super-packed today, and we’re not, so Kisaki’s in kind of a huff. You better try finding some work to do.” 
“Sure thing.” 
“I told you, it’s not like that!” 
Maou grinned as a reddened Chiho looked up…to find Kisaki at the counter, reading her sales journal and growing visibly paler. 
“Why…? Why are our numbers so low today…? What’s happening at Sentucky…?” 
Seeing her, Maou and Chiho simultaneously thought the same thing: 
It’s your fault, though, Ms. Kisaki… 
Emi, watching Kinanna over in Room 201, had just received a rather harried call from Chiho on her phone. 
“That’s so like him, though, isn’t it?” she said. “Not wanting you to stay two nights in a row.” 
“I—I have a bad feeling about this! Maou said he turned Ms. Kisaki down, and whenever he tries to assuage me like that, it’s always when he’s thinking of something really, really no good!” 
“You read him like a book, huh?” 
And Emi doubted that Maou suspected that for a moment. 
“But he won’t do anything too weird, will he? Not if he’s having everyone come over for it.” 
“You—you don’t think? What if he announces that once this is all over, it’s back to being Devil King, so good-bye, Japan?” 

“He wouldn’t say that. Not at this point in time. Besides, if he said that in front of me , he’d have no complaints if I killed him right then.” 
“Maybe…but you know, Maou runs by his own weird logic a lot of the time, so…!” 
“I was hoping you’d say that I wouldn’t kill him, but…what would he gain by declaring that to all of us? The only one of us who’d be glad to hear that is Alciel, pretty much.” 
“Yeah, I think he’d be all ‘How could you say that to her?’ and stuff!” 
“But he was normal at work today, right? So just try to be patient and not worry too much, okay?” 
“O-okay… I’ll try. I’ll wake up at five AM tomorrow and head on over!” 
“Nobody’s going to be there then. Calm down. It’s fine.” With a light smile, Emi moved her phone to her other hand. “He only told you about Ms. Kisaki, didn’t he? All I heard from him was to go to his place tomorrow morning, and even that was through Bell. And all he told Bell was to work out a time for tomorrow. So don’t worry. He thinks a lot of you, all right?” 
“No, not you, too, Yusa!” 
“Not me what?” 
“Never mind! …But is it really gonna be all right?” 
After calming Chiho down and chatting about a few other things, Emi put down her phone. 
“…So you didn’t hear anything?” 
“Nothing, dudette. He told me to come back because he had something important to talk about, so I did.” 
“Oh. Well, good.” 
Urushihara was sitting on the closet shelf, legs dangling as he watched the computer on his lap. His response made Emi breathe a sigh of relief. 
Back at the Ente Isla Devil’s Castle, Ashiya was receiving an unusual visitor. 
“Hey. You’re back, huh?” 
“What do you want?” 
“Whoa, what kinda greeting is that? I was sittin’ here waiting for you. They told me you’d be back from seeing the old lady in Phiyenci today.” 
It was Albert Ende, waiting for Ashiya in the throne-room tatami space. 
“Laila… I told her to keep quiet,” he grumbled. 
“Whoa, don’t blame her. She didn’t tell anyone. The old lady herself contacted me.” 
“What? Dhin Dhem Wurs?” 
Ashiya eyed Albert suspiciously. Albert just rolled his eyes back at him. 
“Who else? She heard the story from Chiho and Bell at the zirga, but the only demons she met there were the Devil King and that Malebranche guy. She wanted me to confirm that it really was Alciel inquirin’ about her. So I quizzed Laila about it, and—would you believe it?—she revealed that she was the intermediary between you and her. That’s all.” 
“…I see.” 
Ashiya wouldn’t have any way of knowing, but the monocle in Wurs’s possession contained a Yesod fragment that reacted to the auras let off by people, revealing to her whether they were telling the truth. But Wurs still wanted to check with Albert about the demon knocking on her door—and she had reason to. She knew something that would eventually be known to all of Ente Isla but that Ashiya was keeping under wraps for the time being. 
Albert smiled at Ashiya, as if reading his mind. “So following what I heard about, I figured I oughta wait here and chat with you a little.” 
“About what?” 
“Alciel, have you ever heard of Vashrahma?” 
Ashiya pondered this for a moment. 
“The nation of warriors in the Southern Island desert?” 
“Right. Down there, you have the lands of Tajah constantly fighting among themselves—the main family and all the branch domains—and Vashrahma is right in the middle of that. A neutral but military state. The fact that all the Tajah domains squabble without destroying one another is because none are stupid enough to make enemies out of Vashrahma.” 
“And what about that?” 
Ashiya asked the question, but by this point, he knew full well what was motivating Albert to tell him this. 
“Well, I happen to know a Chief Rajid from the Vashrahman army. Everyone in that nation, from their leader on down, is a warrior. I think you’ll find ’em more receptive to you than most.” 
“…” 
Ashiya glared at Albert awhile but turned away, defeated. 
“I failed to account for this. It looks like Wurs trusts you more than I thought.” 
“The other Southern clans are still all yappin’ at me about losing to Adramelech, and… Well, not just ’cause of that, but…” Albert pointed at a window behind him. “I’d like to think I know about the pain of a wandering warrior more than anyone else.” 
“…You think Emilia or Emeralda or Rumack would accept them?” 
“Emeralda trusts my judgment. Emilia…I can’t be so sure about, but we can reveal it to her later. And Rumack? Hell, I don’t see how she matters in this. She’s a Westerner. You’ll hear from her when she realizes what you’re up to, or if she thinks she’s necessary. Otherwise, leave her be.” 
“Logical enough. But depending on how Vashrahma handles things, if Rumack comes along later and complains, we may not be able to do anything about it.” 
“Oops! Well, good thing I set things in motion early. Everything needs to be in balance, y’know.” 
Albert ran his hand across his head in a “phew!” motion. 
“If you like, we could head there right now. They’re just off the Fire Road. It’ll sure warm you up after your visit up north.” 
“Sorry. Not today. I need to return to Japan soon…but I would like your help as a liaison. I will contact you about this later.” 
“Oh, figure out something new about that lizard with the Astral Gem?” 
“Perhaps. That would be nice.” 
Alciel really meant that but didn’t expect much. The sheer tension of Sadao Maou, the Devil King, in the message he’d sent out disquieted him more than anything. 
“Wh-what is that?” 
While Emi was on the phone with Chiho, Suzuno was walking through Hatagaya, stocking up on some purchases and internally worrying about the quantity of food Kinanna required. Then she noticed the Sentucky Fried Chicken. It had an aura of moonlight around it, glowing a shining yellow. And it was not a metaphor—the restaurant really was faintly glowing. 
“That light… I detect a slight holy energy. What is Lord Sariel doing…?” 
Despite it being well past the dinner rush, and despite the lack of any flashy new menu items or special offers, there was a line out the front door. It was unnerving. The MgRonald across the way, meanwhile, looked deserted—a sight that reminded Suzuno of times past, oddly enough. 
Then a massive figure silently came up to her from behind, dwarfing her tiny body. 
“It’s glowing, is it not?” 
“Agh?! Um, Ms. Shiba?!” 
Miki Shiba was framed by the setting sun, herself a radiating ball of light—in no small part thanks to her dress, festooned with squares of crystal glass and absolutely not part of any woman’s daily wardrobe. It made her look like a disco ball with arms and legs. 
“I detected something strange, and Amane’s been so worn down dealing with our friends from Ente Isla that I am checking on this myself…but if that’s all this is, it should be safe enough to leave be.” 
“It—it is? Are you sure?!” 
“It’d be a problem if he was deliberately using holy energy to attract customers, but that doesn’t appear to be the case here. This is just the happy spirit coming from the restaurant. A power-infused light, naturally created by their hearts.” 
“A happy spirit…?” 
It was the sort of term you might’ve seen in cult religions and tabloid advertisements twenty years ago. Hearing it from the talking disco ball—a real mystery of a woman, unlike any of those ads—made Suzuno frown. 
“You know, we are not kind to those who wish ill upon the world. But we certainly would not dissuade anyone from finding happiness. In fact, I would even want to protect, and support, that happiness.” 
“Y-you would…?” 
“And not to prod too much in your business, Ms. Kamazuki, but have you been inside this Sentucky before?” 
“Er, yes. Several times.” 
“Ah, very good. I so rarely frequent this level of dining, so I am a tad curious. I thought I would go inside for a lark, but would you care to join me?” 
“N-no! Um, I have some urgent shopping to take care of, and I need to return home right away!” 
Unlike with Maou and his roommates, the mere presence of Shiba didn’t seem like a threat to Suzuno. She just didn’t want to dare venturing into a fast-food joint brimming with something as fishy as “happy spirit,” which Sariel just had to be oozing inside. 
“Ah, very well,” Shiba replied, not looking too offended. “In that case, perhaps I will pick up something for Acieth, then. Ta-ta for now!” 
She took her place in the back of the line, the light from her just as dazzling as from the Sentucky. And Suzuno, with a nervous gulp, found her feet (and a sneaking suspicion that doom was near) taking her toward MgRonald. 
“Good evening… Oh?” 
It was Maou, tending to business on the first-floor counter, who happened to spot her first. 
“Suzuno? What’re you doing? Did Kinanna do something?!” 
Maou, seeing her storm in here with panic all over her face, feared the worst. But she shook her head violently as she clung to the counter. 
“How—how are your sales today?” 
“Huh?” 
“How are your sales today?!” 
“Wha—? What’s with you?!” 
What kind of pressing emergency would drive Suzuno to ask about MgRonald sales figures? 
“What happened to Lord Sariel?! Something that turned Sentucky into the street’s most popular eatery, I would assume!” 
“Huh? Oh, uhhh, well, a few things, last night…” 
“Well, right now…” 
Maou froze. Suzuno appeared to have devastating news for him. 
“…Ms. Shiba is in line at Sentucky.” 
“Oh—” 
But before Maou could even let out a groan: 
“What?!” 
There was an explosion of invisible light. That was the only way to describe the force that expanded over all of Hatagaya, sending Suzuno’s and Maou’s attention upward toward the sky. The rest of the customers, as well as Kawata and Akiko, did the same. 
How to explain what they saw? It was like Sentucky Fried Chicken had become the world’s largest diamond, shining like a thousand moons. The light coming through the window was warm, powerful, and gentle. 
“Why’s it look so…solemn out there?” 
“Devil King… The shrubbery outside is blooming…” 
Right when Shiba presumably went through the Sentucky doors, the glorious new light from their rival made spring come to the plants outside MgRonald, making them flower like a well-tended garden. 
“What were they doing in there?” Maou asked as the disco ball gracefully walked away, satisfied with the two barrels full of chicken in her hands. 
“I think,” observed Suzuno, “I am starting to see why you fear Ms. Shiba so much.” 
“Wh-what was that, just now?” 
Chiho, feeling a wave of energy gently caressing her, looked out her bedroom window. It felt like the holy energy Emi and Suzuno wielded but with an edge that made her shiver. But right when she opened the window, her phone rang. 
“Oh, who’s this? …Suzuki?” 
The display bore the name of Rika Suzuki, Emi’s friend. 
“Hello? Chiho? You got a moment?” 
“Yeah, sure…um, I think.” 
Chiho wasn’t sure about that wave she just felt but nodded anyway. 
“About tomorrow morning…” 
“Huh? Tomorrow morning?” 
“Yeah. Maou actually texted me this afternoon.” 
Maou and Rika had exchanged numbers? That was enough of a surprise to Chiho—but then again, Rika had been back and forth between Earth and Ente Isla numerous times. It wouldn’t be strange if they stayed in contact, just in case something came up. It wouldn’t be, but why did Maou pick today to text her? 
“I was working when he sent it, though, and I didn’t notice it until I got off. But I figured he’d be working right now if I called or texted him, so I thought I’d talk to you instead. Did you hear anything about tomorrow morning?” 
“Hear…? Um, what did he text you?” 
“It was pretty simple. Just, like, I have something important to talk about, so can you make it to Villa Rosa Sasazuka tomorrow morning? That kinda thing. He said morning but didn’t give a time, so I wasn’t sure what to do.” 
“Maou…” 
Chiho brought a hand to her head. Maybe this sort of communication was another reason why the managerial program turned him down. 
“Plus, you know, I work tomorrow, so if it’s like ten or something, I can’t make that. But if he went to the trouble to contact me about it, doesn’t it sound like he’s made some huge, important decision about Ente Isla? I really want to be there for it.” 
Rika, with her feelings for Ashiya, was in largely the same boat as Chiho. She hadn’t been involved with Ente Islan affairs for quite as long, but she cared for him and Emi nonetheless—she wouldn’t want humans and demons to clash any more than Chiho did. 
“He told me he was aiming for around eight.” 
“Oooh, that’s cutting it close… I could be there for maybe an hour then, but oh, well… But hey, if they’re gonna be killing that god or whatever, shouldn’t they start thinking about what comes after that? I hope he doesn’t keep leading us on like this when the time comes. He’s the leader—he’s got a responsibility to give us the facts when we need them.” 
“Yeah, totally…” 
“Chiho?” 
“Yes?” 
If Chiho sounded down over the phone, Rika’s voice made it seem like she was ready to fight right now. 
“We’re not gonna let ’em get away, okay? We gotta hang on for dear life!” 
“…Pfft!” 
Her words were simple but strong. Rika really was an older sister figure to her, and as such, it was a thrill to see her in action. Compared to Chiho, who tended to approach serious situations with excessive worrying, she was a force to be reckoned with. And when all the worrying in the world didn’t solve a problem, it was people like her—doers, not thinkers—who would really save the day. 
“Why don’t we go together? I can wait for you at Sasazuka Station.” 
“Okay! I’ll try to be there at seven fifty, all right? So let’s both go to bed early tonight! I gotta go make sure my shows get recorded! So see you later! And thanks!” 
“No, um, thank you?” 
“Why’re you thanking me? Did I say something? Ah, well. See ya.” 
Rika’s boundless enthusiasm was just the antidote Chiho needed. The mysterious discomfort she felt before the call was now completely forgotten. 
The evening was about to end peacefully. 
Emi was on Kinanna duty all day, but thanks to Suzuno’s morning contributions and Urushihara coming back midway, the day passed without major incident. Camio was now much better, occasionally even keeping Kinanna occupied to give Emi a break, even if the chicken Suzuno prepared for the lizard still seemed to give him the willies. 
Chiho and Rika both went to bed an hour early. Alas Ramus got to stay at Villa Rosa Sasazuka for the second night in a row, much to her excitement. Kisaki, reeling from the worst day of sales at the Hatagaya Station MgRonald during her entire tenure as manager, glumly staggered back home. Meanwhile, nobody saw Sariel at the Sentucky all day, but the customers kept on coming so far into the night that they had to close early due to running out of supplies. When Laila and Nord came to Shiba’s house to pick up Erone, they found him and Acieth sleeping peacefully, the latter blissfully holding an empty SFC barrel in her hands. And Amane, sent out to pick up more after two barrels turned out not to be enough, turned into a pillar of ashes and blew away in the wind. 
And: 
“Y-Your, Your Demonic Highness, what is this sight I see before me?!” 
“J-just calm down, Ashiya. I can explain!” 
It was already past midnight when Ashiya, standing at the door to Room 201, visibly shook at the sight of Kinanna’s aftermath. 
“The walls, the floors, the curtains… Curse that lizard to hell!!” 
“Ahhhh! Wait! Don’t kill him! Don’t use any demonic force! He’s freakin’ dangerous, I swear to you!” 
“Alciel!” shouted Suzuno. “Please, you must hold back!” 
“Do not stop me, my liege! Lord Camio! Whether he is an ancient demon who protected the first Devil Overlord or not, I cannot forgive this! We are the ones who must face up to our landlord, I will have you know! How much do you think we’ll owe her for wrecking the apartment in such grand fashion?! She already bent the rules about pets for us— Ohh, if she only knew what happened… And you! Urushihara! Where did those headphones come from? I have not seen those before!” 
“…Damn, you noticed already? What’s the big deal? I’ve been working a lot lately, you know!” 
“You may use that excuse once you’ve made up for the past year of laziness!” 
“Ashiya! Please, calm down!” Maou protested. “Kinanna’s finally fallen asleep! You don’t want to deal with him awake, trust me!” 
“No, my liege, this is a serious problem! If only I was here to observe you, I could have put this lizard and Urushihara in their places!” 
“Whoa, are you putting me on the same level as a lizard?” 
“You should appreciate the fact that I did not put you below him! We were not done talking yet! You ordered those headphones online, did you not? Just when I thought you’ve matured a little, this happens! Yes, just when I thought you’ve regained some of your self-awareness as a Great Demon General…” 
“Yeah, yeah, sorry. Good night.” 
“Wait, Urushihara! Open that closet door! I am not done with you yet!” 
“Ashiya, seriously, calm down! It’s fine!” Maou said. “I worked a lot of hours this month, and I’m sure the landlord will understand once we explain things to her—” 
“Your Demonic Highness, listen to me. Whether our identities are known to her or not, the relationship between her and us remains the same. The only difference is that instead of a management company, we are now essentially renting a space from the planet Earth itself. Do you understand me? We continue to live here out of the generosity of our landlord!” 
“You don’t need to blow up the scale of this that much…but yeah, I guess you’re right about that.” 
“Indeed. And it is therefore inexcusable to assume we will be forgiven when we cause a disaster like this. Our landlord would be perfectly fine if we disappeared tomorrow. In this situation, we must bow to her as deeply as possible, and be as sincere as possible, as we apologize to her. That, and we must save as much restitution money as we can so we can remain in her good graces!” 
“All right, all right! I’ll explain everything to her, so just be patient with me tonight!” 
“This atmosphere feels just like home again, my bros. I hate it.” 
“Urushihara, we can hear you!” 
“Yeah, yeah… Oh, here’s a delivery confirmation. Arriving tomorrow morning? Did I buy something else?” 
“Damn you, Urushihara! Wasting our hard-earned money yet again?!” 
“Oh, shut up! Go back to Ente Isla, Ashiya!” 
“Never! Not if this is going on behind my back!!” 
The verbal combat between a late-arriving Ashiya, Urushihara, and Maou continued well into the night. Emi and Suzuno, in their futons next door and listening in, looked at each other. 
“…Funny, isn’t it?” 
“Yes.” 
“Zzz…zzz…” 
Meanwhile, Alas Ramus was safely in dreamland, not giving any notice to the voices through the wall. 
“It has not been that long, timewise, but it seems like much longer.” 
“If it was like this all the time, it’d show how peaceful the world is.” 
“Not all the time, I would hope. You get to enjoy this once in a blue moon. I have to endure it daily, and it grates on me. Particularly in the way we share a wall with Lucifer’s closet.” 
“Oh, right.” 
Emi smiled and adjusted Alas Ramus’s blanket. Suzuno did the same on her end, then sunk into her own sheets. 
“But…just tonight is fine, I suppose.” 
The torrent of abuse streamed in from Room 201. And despite it all, that cacophony of noise turned into soothing music for Emi and Suzuno, both falling asleep before long. 
 
At eight AM the next morning, the front yard of Villa Rosa Sasazuka was unusually crowded. Ashiya, Urushihara, Emi, Chiho, Suzuno, Alas Ramus, Acieth, Rika, Amane, Laila, Nord, Erone, and Shiba—they were all there. 
“So,” Emi said first, “with all these people here, what’s he gonna do first? And Rika joined in, too? And why’re you carrying them in your arms? You gonna start a mobile zoo or something?” 
Maou held Camio in his left arm and Kinanna in his right. The lizard was unrestrained, alarming Amane a bit. 
“Um… Well, I thought about some other approaches, but I figured this was the best in the end. But this is important enough that I really wanted everyone to be on hand, so… Sorry to ask you all here this morning.” 
“That—that’s fine, but… Is this really that important, Maou…?” 
This early in the morning, and Chiho already looked like she saw a ghost. Meanwhile, Rika, standing next to her defiantly, locked eyes with Maou, clutching Chiho’s hand to support her. 
“Let me just say,” a concerned Amane added, “depending on what you have in store for us, you know Aunt Mikitty and I may not sit by idly, all right?” 
“I…can’t comment on that.” 
“Oh, no…” 
Chiho’s legs were already shaking. Maou’s pat response made Emi and Suzuno sharpen their eyes on him. 
“Look…dude…just say it… I’m tired…” 
The comment from Urushihara, standing on the top step of the stairway to keep his distance from Shiba, did little to relax the atmosphere. 
“Right,” Maou began, not wanting to delay things further. “Well, as some of you know already, my application for a full-time managerial position at MgRonald was turned down.” 
A pained Ashiya shook his head. “Ahh… A harsh truth to bear…” 
“And as I know all of you are aware, our battle to free the brothers and sisters of Alas Ramus, Acieth, and Erone will begin once we obtain the Astral Gem, which we’re pretty sure is here in Kinanna.” 
The lizard under Maou’s arm started jabbering about something, but none of the non-demons in attendance understood him. 
“<Shut your mouth.> So… With my initial goal of a full-time job at MgRonald off the table, I now officially have no reason to remain in Japan.” 
“Oh, Maou…” 
“Hang in there,” Rika said, holding the tearful Chiho’s shoulders. “If he starts acting weird, hang on to him. For dear life.” 
Everyone assumed it then: Maou was saying good-bye to Japan. 
“ But. But… I just want to say, I’ve actually been headhunted.” 
Everyone was wrong. They all glared at him in silence for a moment. “Huh?” a few of them went in chorus, unnerving Maou. 
“What? Guys, listen to me. I can’t give a lot of details for nondisclosure reasons, but a certain party has asked me to join their inaugural staff when they start up their own company. But unfortunately, this isn’t going to happen for at least another three years…” 
“Why’re you talking about that ?” a confused Emi asked. 
“Maou, you said you turned that down,” Chiho added, the tears in her eyes receding for a moment. 
“Well, I had to. That’s in three years. I’m intending to beat Ignora, of course, but what if I’m killed or wounded beyond recovery? I’d feel so bad if I had to renege on my promise.” 
“…Oh…” 
That was the reason? He’d turned it down for now because he didn’t have a handle on his future yet, but he’d take it up again in three years if he was interested? Those in the crowd who knew about Kisaki’s dream had no idea why Maou was bringing this up, and those who didn’t were completely lost. 
“So… Yeah. I can’t say exactly what it is right now, but I’ve got different motivations going forward, so I can’t give up yet on becoming a full-timer in Japan. So I’m gonna keep living in poverty here for a while.” 
“Maou!!” 
No longer able to hold back, Chiho leaped for him. 
“Whoa?!” 
“ Peep?! ” 
“ Squeak! ” 
As Chiho hurtled toward them without concern, Camio and Kinanna panicked. 
“I—I was so worried that—that you’d never come back to Japan this time… That you’d be Devil King all over again…!!” 
“Ch-Chi?!” 
Her noble tears continued to fall as she hugged him, paying no attention to the assorted animals in his arms. But even then, nobody was sure what Maou wanted to say here. Emi and Suzuno were relieved for a moment, but their faces were clouded with confusion immediately afterward. 
And Rika was even more honest: 
“…Why am I here?” 
“She’s right,” an exasperated Amane said. “Why’d you make everyone here take time out of their busy schedules just to talk about your career plans? And this early, too?” 
Maou hurriedly shook his head. “N-no! It’s not like that! I just wanted to come out with that, since I know some of you were concerned… You’re the one who said it, Urushihara!” 
“Huh? Said what? You’re blaming the audience turning against you on me?” 
“You said I didn’t have any reason to be preoccupied with Japan any longer! So I worried that Emi and Chi were thinking the same thing! I wanted to tell them that I still have a reason to be here! I didn’t want to string Chi along, and if I kept leaving them in the dark, I was worried Emi and Suzuno would kill me!” 
“Oh, come on…” 
“Why did I ever swear my loyalty to you…?” 
“Huh? Why’re you looking at me like that?” 
Both of them bore holes in Maou with their stares. He had clearly riled them. 
“You’re so awful.” 
“I see you had no trust in us at all.” 
“Th- that’s what you’re saying to me?! It—it’s not like that with us, I swear!” 
“…No, my liege, I question the peep wisdom of saying that myself…” 
“Wha?!” 
“…Daddy, you don’t trust Mommy?” 
“Maou… You know, Emi and Suzuno, they will not do the mean things to you with no reason! Have you lost your mind?” 
“Is what I did so bad that you think I’ve lost my mind?! And no, Alas Ramus! Daddy totally trusts Mommy!” 
“You liar,” Laila said. 
“Indeed,” Erone added. 
Nord, snickering, led Erone away. “Let’s go over here for a bit, all right?” 
“W-wait! Don’t go away yet! I haven’t gotten to the gist! That wasn’t the main subject! I wouldn’t ask you all here just for that ! Listen to me till the end!” 
Everyone except Ashiya and Chiho had their doubts about this. 
“It—it’s not like that, guys… To you, especially, Emi… I need to make something clear. If I want to beat Ignora and nail that job in three years, there’s something we can’t avoid any longer. I wanted to say it to you…” 
“Well, go ahead,” retorted Emi, not expecting this to be anything important, either. “Say it.” 
Maou placed Camio on the ground and let go of Chiho, as if preparing to make the announcement of his life. 
“Based on what Kinanna’s told me, it looks like—for the time being—we haven’t quite reached the Astral Gem yet. There may be some other secrets behind the other relics we have, too. So…” He paused for a moment, stalwart. “I’m thinking about going to the demon realms myself to investigate! At my next work break, I think I’ll go back there.” 
A few moments of silence ensued. 
“You haven’t been back yet?” 
It was Emi who came up with the obvious question. 
“Um…?” 
“Oh, you haven’t? Uh…” 
“Wait, so that’s what you called all of us over for?” 
“I thought the Devil King had paid a return visit long ago.” 
“Huhh?!” 
Emi and Suzuno had friends in the audience. Amane, and even Rika, were excitedly nodding at each other. 
“Why would we think otherwise? We know you were in close contact with Camio and the Malebranche chieftains. I assumed you visited them back at New Year’s.” 
“Oh… You did?” 
This cold reception took the wind completely out of his sails. 
“But um, like, I’m the Devil King, right? If I went back to my realm without telling anyone, I figured you’d all assume I was up to something no good, so I didn’t think I should go without any warning. That’s why I stayed and left things to Ashiya and Urushihara and the Malebranche…” 
“Maou… You really thought about us, didn’t you?” 
“I’m more shocked you assumed I wasn’t thinking about anything…” 
Chiho seemed slightly moved by this, for some reason. Maou, seeing the other side of the coin, felt conflicted all over again. 
“But anyway. Back to the point at hand. The whole conflict between Kinanna and Camio has its roots back in the demon realms, and I get the idea that Satanael left something behind wherever Kinanna lives. We’ve had a pretty easy time recovering the relics so far thanks to you all, so I don’t want to screw up the Astral Gem in the end. So… Um…” 
Without warning, a car stopped in front of the apartment, a deliveryman from Sasuke Express hopping out of it. “Oh, it’s Mr. Fukuyama,” whispered Urushihara, recognizing his face at once. 
The man stopped once he noticed the crowd in the front yard, eyebrows raised. 
“Umm… I have a Jungle delivery for Mr. Maou?” 
The combination of Sasuke Express and Jungle pushed all of Ashiya’s buttons simultaneously. He glared up the stairs. 
“Urushihara… Today of all days…!” 
“Huh? No! It wasn’t me, man!” Urushihara briskly shook his head. “I didn’t buy anything except the headphones!” 
“Oh, sorry. That’s actually for me, for a change.” 
“M-my liege? You purchased something off the net?! What could it have possibly been?!” 
Ignoring Ashiya, Maou jogged up to the deliveryman, lizard still under one arm. Signing the receipt, he had him leave the package where he was standing. It was rather large. 
“My liege…?” 
“Yeah, uh, I have all of you here, so I thought, you know, why not? But Kinanna kind of ate up all my time, so you’re gonna have to make do with this.” 
With that, he took a wrapped package out of the box and gave it to Chiho. 
“Here you go, Chi.” 
“Maou! Is this…?” 
It was wrapped in Jungle-themed gift paper, leaving its contents a mystery. It was accompanied by an announcement from Maou even more epoch-making than his promise to visit the demon realms. 
“Today’s White Day, right? I really wanted to repay you with something more unique and fancy, but I ran out of time, and this is all I could get.” 
“What…?!” 
Chiho, Suzuno, and even Emi were astounded. Acieth, meanwhile, looked like a predator inching in for the kill. 
“Um, can I open it?” 
“Well, sure…” 
Chiho, who was ready to start chewing through the wrapper unless she heard otherwise, opened it. Inside was a small box of fruit-flavored candy. 
“Ahhh! Ah, ah, ahhh!” 
Her eyes lit up like a child as she marveled at the box from every possible angle. 
“Th-thank you so much! I—I can’t believe you got me this…!” 
“You’ve done a lot for me, Chi. I had to repay you today , at least, ’specially because there aren’t any events like this for a while to come. Sorry I lazed out and bought your gift online, but…” 
“I’m so happy, Maou! I almost want to frame this and put it on the wall!” 
“Um, you should probably eat it instead,” snickered Maou as he took more packages out of the box. 
“Hey. Rika Suzuki.” 
“Huh? Me?! Isn’t that, like, a ton bigger than Chiho’s?!” 
Maou presented Rika a box that—in terms of cubic area, at least—looked a good ten times larger than Chiho’s. 
“You’re special. I factored in what you gave to Ashiya and Urushihara, too.” 
““Ah…”” 
Ashiya and Urushihara both groaned. Ashiya, of course, was in no environment to be thinking about White Day gifts, while Urushihara didn’t have anywhere near the thoughtfulness to buy any. 
“It looks big, but it’s light, so don’t expect too much. It’s some kettle corn from that trendy American place.” 
“W-well, thank you,” Rika said as she accepted the box, unsure how to react to the regret the other two exhibited. “I mean, I didn’t think I was gonna get anything at all!” 
“Next, Suzuno and Acieth.” 
“I… I thank you. I am surprised…but thank you.” 
“Woo-hoo! Maou, he remember the White Day! Not believable! Woo-hoo!” 
Suzuno awkwardly took her box, while Acieth ripped hers out of Maou’s hands and started chowing down, not bothering to hear what it was. 
“…You really thought I was that thoughtless all the time, huh? And this is for our landlord and Amane.” 
“Oh, good heavens, you really shouldn’t have!” 
Amane blinked. “Huh? Us too? Did we give you anything?” 
“You’ve both helped us out a lot, so. Also… Hey! Alas Ramus!” 
“Hiii!” 
Alas Ramus toddled up to him, all smiles. She knew an imminent gift from Maou when she saw one. 
“Alas Ramus,” the beaming Maou said, “today is called White Day. Remember when you gave Daddy chocolate a few weeks ago? Well, today’s the day Daddy gives you candy in return. Here you go.” 
She accepted the box—and when she undid the wrapper, she found the same fruit candy Chiho received. She waved at her, grinning. 
“It’s the same! So much!!” 
“Ah,” Suzuno remarked, “hence the fruit candy.” 
The colorful candy on the package must have reminded him of the Sephirah colors. It made enough sense to her. 
Maou scratched his head. “I really had, like, no time, so I wasn’t able to choose these very carefully… Oh, also, Emi?” 
“…What?” 
If this was about White Day, she wasn’t involved. She could tell now that, despite expectations, Maou liked this living situation enough to want to preserve it. That was more than enough for her. But having her name called out made her face go blank. 
“Here’s yours.” 
“…Buh?” 
It wasn’t the most intelligent thing, coming out of her lips. But it was all she could manage. 
“But I… I didn’t give you…” 
She really did give him chocolate—mixing it in with the huge pile Maou received, unbeknownst to him. There was no way Maou could’ve found out about it. 
“No, you did.” 
“Huh?!” 
Had he noticed?! Emi’s face began to burn red, a cold sweat running down it. 
If he knew she had given him a bit of chocolate out of duty on the sly, that alone would be enough to die of embarrassment—but if he revealed that in front of all her acquaintances, especially Chiho, it’d be even worse. 
“Are—are you sure you have the right person…?” 
“How would I confuse that for anyone else’s?” 
“Huh? Wh-what?!” 
Maou seemed completely sure he had received chocolate from his nemesis. He must have noticed, somehow. It was time for Emi to face facts. 
“Like, no matter how simple it was, there’s no way Alas Ramus could make her own chocolate treats without any help.” 
“Ah……… Ah, yeah!” 
She caught herself before she said Now I get it! out loud. Yes, she had supervised Alas Ramus’s “handmade” chocolate back when Chiho was guiding the demons through the process. That was what Maou meant. 
“Besides, you really have been helping me lately. So this is for that.” 
“…Thank you.” 
Neither Chiho nor Suzuno nor Rika seemed to find this exchange suspicious. It relieved Emi, although she was surprised to feel a little disappointed, in a way. Did she want Maou to notice the chocolate she gave him? 
“Plus, with me getting rejected for that job, I thought you were worrying too much about me in different ways from Chi, so… You know, I wanted to prove with my actions that you shouldn’t freak out about me.” 

“…” 
She had no defense. She had been filled with anxiety about Maou’s future. But now, even when she thought she had him all figured out, every one of her predictions turned out wrong; all that worry for nothing. 
Why does the Devil King understand what I’m thinking about so well? Why can’t I understand what he’s thinking? Why do I hate that so much? And why did I want the Devil King to notice my…? 
“Oh, also, Emi…” 
“Y-yes?!” she replied, standing back at attention. 
“Not that I’m bribing you with this or anything, but when I go to the demon realms, I want you to join me.” 
“Wh-what do you mean?” 
“It’s not that much of a surprise, is it? I’m gonna take Kinanna along, so I want at least one person who can wield holy energy with me, or I’ll be stuck if things really go down the toilet. But Suzuno’s busy wrangling everyone on Ente Isla, and I can’t really take Chi with me over there. So can you help me out when you’re not working?” 
“But… Me?” 
The Devil King, her mortal enemy, was inviting her to come visit his homeland. Emi’s eyes burst open, surprised. 
“Please! You’re the only one I can ask! If you say no, I’m gonna have to turn to Laila, but that’s a terrible idea. It’d be huge for me if you came along.” 
“Huge? That much?” 
“That’s just mean, Satan! Also, did I get any candy?” 
Maou and Emi both glared at Laila, whining over to the side. 
“What were you expecting?” Maou snipped. “If you want a gift on White Day, ask your husband.” 
“Maybe I will! Hmph!” 
Emi looked up, only to find Maou too busy berating her mother to pay attention to her. The sight of Laila’s defiance filled her mind with fatigue. 
“It’s all right. I have some ready for her.” 
And the sight of her doting father living up to Maou’s expectations made her ten times more fatigued, if that were possible. 
“Aw, that’s so nice, Yusa! I wish I could go to the demon realms,” a jealous Chiho said. “I want to see where you were born!” 
“I would not recommend it,” snickered Ashiya. “It is quite dangerous, for one, and I am not sure there is much a young human girl could do for recreation.” 
“I also have an interest in life over there,” chimed in Suzuno. “If I can find the free time, I would be glad to accompany you…” 
“Dude, anyone can go. I’m tired.” 
“Shut up, Urushihara. Suzuno, if you aren’t too busy for it, then great. I just need a holy-magic user, is—” 
“A-all right!” Emi reflexively shouted, as if cutting off Maou’s near invite. “I’ll go, I’ll go. It’s not gonna take that long, is it?” 
“Oh, really? You will? Sweet! One day is all I need, okay? We’re just gonna search around where Camio met Kinanna.” 
“W-well, if we’re gonna do that, we should go on a day when neither of us have shifts the next day! If we get in an angel fight or something keeps us from coming back to Japan, we’d be in big trouble!” 
“Of course. We both have next weekend off, right? Let’s do it Saturday.” 
“S-Saturday? All right. B-but this is my first time going there, so get me whatever I’ll need in advance, all right? And Alas Ramus will be along for the ride, so don’t forget about her!” 
She realized she was speaking more quickly than usual. But she couldn’t stop. Why did she cut Maou off before he could formally invite Suzuno to join her? Emi, no longer sure if she really understood herself, followed Maou’s instructions and volunteered to join him—and Chiho and Rika were already whispering among themselves about it. 
“Chiho, you better have Maou treat you to a really fancy parfait or something next time.” 
“It’s all right… He has a point. I can live with the miracle he gave me today.” 
“But you know…they’re planning a date right in front of you, Chiho! One where they’re assuming they’ll spend the night together!” 
“Chiho! Rika! I can hear you!” 
“Oops!” 
“Aw, but…” 
“What do you mean, a date?” 
“You don’t have to ask! Look, are we done talking?! Then I’m leaving! See you later! Let’s go, Alas Ramus!” 
Maou blankly watched the irate, reddened Emi take Alas Ramus away, then turned around. 
“…Did I say something wrong?” 
“Maou,” a scowling Amane said next to her, “as a grown woman, let me give a young guy like you some advice. There’s a time and a place for everything, okay? And watch your choice of words. There’s a good and a bad way to say everything, depending on the atmosphere. I think I’m starting to understand why you didn’t get that job.” 
“Wh-what’s that mean?!” 
Maou was shocked at this criticism out of nowhere. But everyone else in the front yard silently agreed with her.