The Devil Is a Part-Timer!, Vol. 2 (15 page)

But what other reason did she have for taking a Gate trip on over, then? Emi studiously watched over Suzuno, lending an attentive ear to whatever she had to say.

“Well, if I could summarize it for you…”

Suzuno leaned forward, her face betraying her tension.

“My first goal was to ascertain whether you were alive or not. As I followed Olba Meiyer’s trail, however, the only clues I unearthed were related to the Devil King, and his activities in this world. Thus, I reasoned that if I kept a close watch on the Devil King himself…”

“The Hero would show up before long. I sure walked into
that
mousetrap.”

Emi shrugged. There was no other way to put it. Hook, line, and sinker.

“There is no way for me to express my sorrow for the deplorable crimes Olba Meiyer committed. Judging by the way you acted around him before knowing I, too, was Ente Islan, I can only conclude that his tale of you forging a pact with the Devil King was a complete fabrication. His actions do not reflect the collective position of the Church. I, at least, hope to serve as your humble ally.”

Suzuno leaned several inches closer.

“Now, allow me to dance around the topic no longer. I want you to defeat Satan, the Devil King, and return to Ente Isla with me. I want you to prove you are alive, expose Olba’s crimes, and guide the Church back to the path it must traverse.”

“No.”

“…That was rather fast!”

Suzuno almost spilled her tea as her elbows lost traction on the table.

“You could at least give it a modicum of thought!”

“No. I’m not working with anyone from the Church any longer.”

Emi poured a packet of sugar into her iced coffee, calmly stirring it with her straw.

“But you promised to work alongside me!”

“That doesn’t count. I made that promise before I knew who you were.”

“You care so little about your position, about your honorable reputation within Ente Isla? Why not bring it back to what it
should
be?!”

“Oh, like
I
care about what the Church and all the other kingdoms think.”

Emi stared out the café window as she calmly brushed Suzuno off. Suzuno followed her gaze.

“What is…?”

Suzuno scowled as she began the question. Emi halted her, pointing out the subway entrance facing the window with her eyes.

“Could you understand that I’m not exactly welcoming you with open arms, if you consider that you work for a group whose boss triggered a collapse in an underground tunnel packed with innocent
people, just to kill me and the Devil King? You know Olba’s here, right?”

“……”

Speechlessly, Suzuno looked at Emi, then the view outside. She nodded, even though her face had
I cannot believe this
written all over it.

“I had no idea he had gone so far…”

“Olba teamed up with Lucifer to wreck this nation, just for the sake of killing me. Emeralda and Albert know, too. They were there. In fact, you could ask Lucifer yourself later. You know that’s who Urushihara is, right?”

Emi placed her glass down as she turned toward Suzuno.

“That’s why I thought you were that attacker yesterday, too. But even if you weren’t, I have zero intention to work in tandem with someone from the Reconciliation Panel.”

“…Why?”

Emi was all too quick to respond.

“Because the Hero is charged with slaying the Devil King.”

It sounded like the most obvious of truths, coming from Emi’s mouth. It seemed to rally Suzuno’s spirits.

“Then let me join you! I traveled here with the intention of slaying him myself, if I had to.”

“That is my job, and mine alone. Don’t meddle in this.”

“How you could say such things…?”

“Do I really have to spell it out for you? You
are
a higher-up in the Reconci—well, really, the Council of Inquisitors, right?”

Emi made a point of correcting herself midway. Suzuno fell silent, feeling her blood pressure plummet.

“Listen, I don’t know what you’ve done up to this point. So I do apologize if this is hurting your feelings.”

Noticing Suzuno falling into an awkward confusion, Emi attempted to lighten the mood a little. But, “I don’t want anyone taking me defeating the Devil King and using it for their own gain. That, at least, I hope you understand.”

With that, Emi looked at a clock on the wall. It was getting close to her work shift.

“That, and I don’t know why you’re keeping them fed, but I just want to warn you—if you keep trying to mess around with them in your cute little ways like that, they’re gonna spot you out. He’s
still
the Devil King, you know.”

“…I appreciate the warning.”

“I’m going to kill the Devil King for my
own
sake. So just stay away from him, all right? Go back to Ente Isla. And rest assured, I’m never going to let any of them set foot on our homeland again.”

Picking up the check, Emi stood up, took out a wadded-up magazine from her shoulder bag, and handed it to Suzuno.

“Of course, I’m sure you’re still working on your own itinerary. So take this. It’s a free help-wanted magazine. I picked up a copy at the station just now, but there’s a lot of others just like it, so try looking around a bit.”

Suzuno looked blankly at Emi, then at the cutesy pig logo on the corner of the magazine’s cover.

“You’ll want to read that if you plan on staying here a while. Learn a bit about what people do to earn a living in this world. Your speech and your clothing are just too much of a mismatch, you know? Try researching fashion a little. Watch the people around you. I need to go to work. You can get back home yourself, right?”

Leaving the openmouthed Suzuno behind her, Emi paid the café bill and left the building.

Then she put a hand to her forehead and heaved a heavy sigh.

“I
hope
that brought the message across.”

She had already survived here in Japan for at least a week. Emi doubted this harsh rejection would be enough to drive her to despair.

Unlike Olba, she had already expressed a desire to bring Emi back home. That was enough to convince Emi she wouldn’t do anything to earn further disapproval.

It had been a packed morning. Emi wondered if her spirit could hold out for the entire shift. Perhaps an energy drink was in order. Not 5-Holy Energy β. A
real
one.

“Oh! Hey, Emi!”

Emi turned toward the voice.

“…Oh. Morning, Rika.”

Rika Suzuki, her coworker, had just reported in for work. For now, she was the one person in Japan Emi had the frankest relationship with.

“A little morning coffee? That’s a rarity.”

“Yeah, pretty much. I had to meet up with someone I know.”

“Ooh! A man, maybe? You pretty much never talk about your personal life, so…”

“Oh, come on. It was just a girl.”

The two friends walked off toward work, exchanging another weekday’s worth of idle conversation.

“I…I’m really sorry about this!”

Upon reporting to work, Maou was greeted with Dullahan, safe and sound, and Chiho bowing her head down to him like a praying mantis.

Maou laughed it off, but even now she was red in the face, hesitating to lock eyes with him.

Parking Dullahan out back, he joined Chiho inside, searching for a way to soothe her bruised ego.

“…Huh?”

He scowled as he looked around the dining area. Even Chiho, still blazing with crimson shame and embarrassment, noticed something was wrong.

Maou generally reported to work at noon sharp. Thanks to this Mag location—just off Hatagaya station, sandwiched between a residential area and an office-lined street—the lunch rush should already have been under way. Today, though, there wasn’t even the hint of a rush.

Kisaki stood behind a register, beaming. Behind her, one of the college students handling the morning shift kept a respectable
distance, his face white as a ghost. That was enough to tell Maou the whole story.

His manager always saved that plastered-on smile for days when sales were down.

“Um, good—”

“It’s been dead.”

“—morning… Pardon?”

If Maou was hesitant to speak up, he was even less ready to continue after hearing Kisaki’s hardened voice.

“Six hours since we opened, and we’re eating Sentucky’s traffic dust.”

“Huh?”

“Our customer numbers are down eighty percent from yesterday. I’m starting to think those bastards at SFC are conspiring against us.”

Even considering the circumstances, a rival franchise opening up right nearby, this was a pretty wild accusation. That 80-percent drop wasn’t unheard of—an “off” day or the wrong weather outside could make all the difference—but Kisaki was absolutely convinced Sentucky was behind it.

“Why…? Why do I have to go back to the office for training starting today?!”

Kisaki bellowed at the empty dining space in front of her, her smile unflagging. The morning part-timers shook in fear.

“It gives me nightmares to even imagine it, but if our customer stats keep up this pace the entire day…”

Kisaki’s death stare swept its way across Maou, Chiho, and then the rest of the crew. Never before had a beautiful woman’s smile sent such frigid waves of fear down their spines.

“You want to be sent to Greenland? Hmm? Are you listening, Shift Supervisor Sadao Maou?”

“No, ma’am.”

The Devil King never imagined what a frog felt like while being eyed by a pit viper. Now he did.

Grabbing Maou’s shoulders from across the counter, Kisaki’s eyes glinted like a predator out for blood.

“Then you have my full permission to do
whatever it takes
.
Destroy
SFC.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

Chiho and the rest of the crew joined Maou in a stiff military salute.

“Whatever it takes,” of course, meant whatever common sense allowed in terms of ways to improve MgRonald sales, not to physically wipe SFC off the map.

Even at the peak of lunch, traffic still failed to reach what anyone could truthfully call a “rush.” The new Sentucky Fried Chicken, meanwhile, was running a roaring business. Even from the opposite end of the street, that much was obvious.

Even the cheerful smile emanating from the statue of Major Fyres, the friendly old man that decorated the doorstep of every Sentucky franchise in statue form, seemed like a gnarled, ghastly sneer to him.

Once Kisaki left the building, the enraged look in her eyes living up to her unofficial nickname, “The Sales Demon,” Maou tried to fight back with whatever means he had at hand.

More intimate service, without getting too pushy with customers. A shake booth outside, powered by an external cooler. Finally, an employee out front talking up the current free-refill offer on MgRonald coffee. Maou ordered all that and more on Chiho and the rest of the crew. He even ventured out the door himself at times, shouting himself hoarse as he tried to coax customers inside.

But the effort was all for naught. The two
PM
register check revealed customer numbers down about 70 percent from the day before.

“Well, great. If this is what we get on day one…”

Maou stated out loud what Chiho and the staff were already thinking.

The dining space wasn’t completely devoid of customers, but there was no way these numbers would appease Kisaki’s passionate grudge against Sentucky Fried Chicken.

The chill provided by the slightly overactive AC was enough to remind the entire staff of Greenland once again. It didn’t help warm their hearts.

“Welcome!!”

Maou was the first to speak as the automatic door shuffled open, revealing a new customer. He made a beeline for the counter.

“Hello. I apologize for interrupting you, but could I speak to the manager?”

It was a small, thin man in slightly oversized sunglasses, well-defined lines framing his face. The suitcase in his hand indicated he was a businessman, but between his compact stature and the comparatively novelty-sized glasses, he looked more like a child dressed up as a mob boss from a ’70s yakuza movie.

Maou had already memorized the names and faces of all the top management that dealt with the Hatagaya location. This must be some kind of external business.

With the manager away, it was up to assistant manager and shift supervisor Maou to handle this. He walked up to the man in front of the counter, the crewman next to him stealing furtive stares at this unexpected customer and his request.

“I apologize, sir, but our manager isn’t here today. My name is Maou, and I’m the current shift supervisor. If I’m able to, I’d be happy to handle any questions you may have.”

The man lifted his eyebrows up high.

“Ah, Sadao Maou? Superb. I’ve heard the rumors about you.”

He may have been below Maou’s line of sight physically, but there was something about the man’s demeanor that made Maou feel like he was suddenly below even that.

“Despite the name, they say you are a diligent worker, a superior talent, a thoughtful leader, and above all, a font of human kindness.”

“Er, yes… I appreciate that, sir.”

What did he mean by “despite the name”? People occasionally told Maou that his name seemed a tad old-fashioned for a young man in the twenty-first century, but having this man he’d never met before make such a frank observation rattled Maou a bit.