NOVEL NEXT Chapter 18
Chapter 18: Demonic Encounter
――Library.
If I were to put it nicely, it’s simple and sturdy; if I were to be blunt, everything is plain in the Demon Lord Castle. Yet, it might be the most cultural space in the entire castle.
That said, the books here are mostly from the Human and Elf races. There are only a few written by the Demon Race. There’s no such thing as a librarian. Perhaps there was one in the lands of humans, but at least, they weren’t utilized as human resources here.
As a result, the place has turned into a lawless zone, filled with books and scrolls hastily collected from conquered territories, shoved messily onto the shelves.
In a corner of this chaotic space, a girl sat on a small chair, devouring a book.
Her name is Sophia.
She is a mid-level demon who governs knowledge.
For Sophia, gaining knowledge equated to growing power. Moreover, her “appetite” for knowledge was nearly infinite, never fading.
(Recently, I’ve been so bored… What a blessing!)
With a flap, she finished her book, closed it, and returned it to its place while licking her lips as she searched for the next one.
As one of the Demon Lord’s wives, she was contracted to Platiphia and handled everything from educating the Demon Lord’s Prince to various paperwork.
…Well, she used to.
But things changed six months ago when Demon Lord’s Prince Zilbagias entered the Demon World.
That little brat—the mischievous prince—went missing.
Her role as a tutor was left floating in the air, Platiphia was diligently waiting for the prince’s return in the Cosmos Lodge, and there was hardly any work to do.
Sophia welcomed this situation with open arms.
She could spend nearly all her days reading and studying. She never came to this world seeking work. It was all for the sake of learning; to feast on information produced by fresh, highly intelligent beings—her delicacies.
She had already devoured almost all the available knowledge in the Demon World and was tired of counting the darkwood trees growing in the realm. Besides, there was hardly any flavor in that knowledge. Labor was merely a toll for using the portal.
It was a contract that allowed her to do as she pleased during her free time, but the problem was that the educational duties and paperwork were quite labor-intensive, leaving little actual free time. …Reading the legal texts of the human race led Sophia to the conclusion that it was her own fault for not specifying working hours when entering into the contract, and thus, she dutifully labored away.
(Setting aside Zilbagias’ education, paperwork it is! Why must I cover for those rotten hobgoblins’ mistakes?!!)
Sophia indulged herself in the writing while grumbling in irritation.
The administration of the Demon Kingdom was mainly held by hobgoblins and night elves. Recently, demons have also begun to join in, but the major posts are occupied by these two races.
Hobgoblins.
Smart creatures who knelt down and joined forces before the first Demon Lord forcibly dominated goblins and ogres. Despite the name, they are almost a different race from regular goblins.
Specifically, they are as different from humans as monkeys. They may look ugly, but they are highly intelligent. Especially when it comes to money management, they can be very precise.
—However, that’s only when compared to regular goblins. Calculations may be accurate, but their initial assumptions can be wrong or miswritten, leading to misunderstandings and causing the work to become tangled. There are quite a few trivial mistakes.
In the rather rough and unwieldy Demon Kingdom, minor errors are often overlooked, or plans are made with some leeway, but for Sophia, as a demon of knowledge, who cannot tolerate “mistakes,” it was, in a way, hell.
She would be hit by dizziness from the numerous erroneous documents handed to her and storm into the office, starting from scratch to correct them. …In reality, Sophia struggled with paperwork mostly because of those numerous pointless errors.
An intermediate demon who’d storm in with veins bulging on her forehead when mistakes were made.
The hobgoblin officials literally feared her as a demon… unbeknownst to her.
(It’s so quiet…)
There are hardly any signs of life in the library.
Occasionally, a few demons would use the space—but I’d say they were a bunch of magical dropouts with neither vitality nor magical power.
The library was seen by most demons as a hangout for the weaklings who couldn’t even do something productive.
No wonder no great culture could grow here. To Sophia, it felt like a barbaric act of plundering all the crops, burning the fields, and killing the farmers.
It’s fine for now, with a heap of books from humans and elves, but what will happen in the future? If new books, new knowledge, aren’t produced, she would be left counting trees or doing boring calculations.
Such a sense of crisis.
(I wish there were more cultural demons around!)
And then she recalled Zilbagias, the prince she was supposed to educate.
Rare among demons—he understood literature and arts. At first, he refused to study, but once he began, he almost willingly absorbed knowledge like dry soil sucking in water.
Perhaps because he was young and had a flexible mind, he simply seemed to have good memory. He struggled with demon script but mastered human script in no time, and when she tried him with elven script, he learned it effortlessly, astonishing her.
Unlike her, the demon of knowledge who knew that mortals could not remember just from seeing something once.
What’s more, the fact that he balanced excellence with a desire for power was a quality unheard of in other demons.
Perhaps she should read him the grand lyrical poems of the elves. Or maybe teach him surveying techniques created by humans. No, no, he might grow horns and start wielding magic as well, and explaining the principles of the material world wouldn’t be a bad idea either—Sophia had laid out her educational plans.
But now, those plans were gathering dust.
(…Did a nasty demon gobble him up?)
She pondered suddenly.
Due to the pact made by the demon god Cannibal, demons were generally friendly towards the Demon Race. However, not everything was cut and dried. Pacts should be respected, but unlike contracts, they are not necessarily adhered to.
Besides, it’s simply impossible to “manage” all demons. There are those who gain power by evading such management, as there are individuals who seem to thrive on breaking frameworks.
No matter how powerful a demon god is, they are not omnipotent. They act like rulers, but they are not. Many remain holed up in their territories—meaning, the Demon World is a dangerous place.
Zilbagias too. That mischievous yet cultured demon.
(Was the Prince’s title useless outside of certain places…?)
What a shame. Sophia was shocked by the sentiment that was unexpectedly born within her.
At first, she thought taking care of a demon kid would just be a pain in the neck…
(Well, what’s done is done. Let’s at least hope for a death with minimal suffering.)
With a devil-like resolution, she closed the book she had finished reading and reached for the next one—
“Sophia-sama—! Sophia-sama!”
A shrill voice echoed through the library.
Wincing, she turned to see one of Platiphia’s beastman maids rushing in a hurry.
“…What is it so noisy? Please maintain silence in the library.”
“I-I apologize! But it’s a big deal!”
With her fluffy, snowy-white ears twitching, the maid said,
“The Lady and Zilbagias-sama have returned!!”
“—What did you just say!?!!”
While requesting quiet, Sophia herself raised an utterly nonsensical voice.
Could it be they were safe? Thoughts raced through her mind—what kind of demon had they contracted with, and so on—
Simultaneously, she realized.
This long vacation was finally coming to an end.
†††
About thirty minutes after departing from Cosmos Lodge.
We arrived at the Demon Lord Castle without any particular troubles.
“I’ll go report your safe return to His Majesty the Demon Lord.”
As soon as they returned to the living quarters, Platiphia, already changed into a dress, said and hurriedly departed.
After a mere short nap on the back of the flying dragon, Platiphia looked completely revitalized.
What’s with that… Her back made her look like a warrior diving into battle, or a yakuza busting into an enemy mafia turf. That’s how it appeared to me.
‘She’s ready for a fight, huh?’
Perhaps Anthe was thinking the same, murmuring casually. After all, she had been made to drink quite a lot of heated waters from the other princes’ mothers. Should she take some revenge for that…?
By the way, what are you going to do now that you’re in the Demon Lord Castle, Anthe?
‘What do you mean by that?’
Well, you’re a demon god, right?
If you walk around outside, won’t someone recognize you and your identity get exposed?
No one among the demons in the Cosmos Lodge seemed to have noticed you, but…
‘You needn’t worry about that.’
Anthe suddenly wore a self-deprecating smile.
‘I told you, right? I was so powerful that I could hardly even move on my own. I haven’t moved from the palace for a long, long time… Moreover, there are hardly anyone with the peculiar tastes who would come to poke their noses around the demigod’s castle.’
In other words,
‘Most acquaintance of mine are also demon gods of equal standing or older ones like Odigos. You’re not likely to find such people in this Demon Lord Castle. If such folks contracted and descended to the human world, it would certainly be gossiped about by nosy Parkers.’
Well, then it must be fine.
That’s to say, since you’re too high-profile, no newcomer would know you at all.
It makes sense why your identity could remain concealed at the Cosmos Lodge…
“Zilbagias-sama! I heard you have returned!”
Suddenly, the door to my room flew open with a bang.
A small, bespectacled demon girl peeked her head through.
“Hey, Sophia. I’m back.”
When I called out to her—Sophia froze.
Blinking rapidly, she took off her monocle, wiped it with a handkerchief, then put it back on.
“…Uh, haven’t you gotten bigger…?”
“Yeah. For some reason, when I came out of the portal, my body grew.”
“No way!!”
Sophia slammed her cheeks with her hands and cried out in a painful tone.
“You were so soft-brained! You’re going to have a hard time remembering things now!!”
“Is that what you say after a long reunion?!!!”
—After some fussing, Sophia welcomed me back safely.
“Even if your body has grown, we will continue your studies!!”
“Ah… yeah… I get it…”
“So, why was your return delayed? Did you contract with any demons?”
“Well, let’s say it was a mixture of things and I ended up contracting with a pretty high-ranking one.”
Oh right, I should introduce Anthe.
This is Sophia. She’s the mid-level demon who was in charge of my education.
“Oh, really?”
Anthe didn’t seem too interested as she floated out from me and landed lightly on the floor.
“Let me introduce you. This is the demon I contracted with.”
“I am not hard to bear—”
Interrupting Anthe’s words, a strange, strained sound echoed.
Sophia’s expression was one I had never seen before.
Her eyes widened so much that they seemed ready to pop out.
“W-why, why is—why is there such a… such a…!!”
As she trembled and took a step back, she plopped down onto her bottom.
“Why… is a demon god… in a place like this…!!”
Sweating profusely, she exclaimed.
“The forbidden demon… Antendeixis…!!”
—What the hell, she recognized me immediately!!