“Wait, demon lord?”

It never even crossed my mind that I’d have to meet someone so scary.

“It’s only natural that the medal of honor is awarded by the ruler of the country, so of course demon lord-sama will be in attendance. Since she is a kind person, there’s nothing for you to fear no?”

“D, Demon lord… What do I do…”

On hearing the words “demon lord”, Harukara started sweating for reasons that were entirely unrelated to the heat.

“If I happen to make a careless mistake, I’ll be killed… She’ll skin me then toss me into a fire…”

“There’s no way she would! Hey you, if you insult demon lord-sama, I’ll personally skin you and toss you into a fire!”

So she still gets tossed in huh.

Well, any normal person probably wouldn’t run into any problems but since this is Harukara, it’s not outside the realms of possibility for her to make a silly mistake and infuriate the demon lord. In fact it’s almost guaranteed.

“Harukara, be on your best behaviour alright. It might be best to abstain from alcohol while you’re at it. I can already see you puking or something in front of the demon lord-sama…”

“Got it… I’ll show her how well I’ve been brought up… I’ll end all of my sentences with ‘gozaimasuwa"”

“That’s disturbing so please don’t”

Leica also started to tense a little upon hearing about the demon lord. Everyone’s pretty nervous. Getting nervous in

front of a king is one thing, but this is the demon lord. It’d be more unusual if they weren’t nervous.

“It seems like everyone’s gone quite all of a sudden. Demon lord-sama is a friendly person, there is no need for anyone to act any differently”

So she says but there are people who are friendly to those they’re close to but cold to everyone else. I can’t let down my guard.

And so, immersed in the tense atmosphere that we had made for ourselves, we got off the carriage and entered the castle. It was a solidly-made stone building.

However, the inner constructs of the castle were quite complex.

Along the way, there were times when we had to head outside, only to enter again, this time from a different entrance. At times, we’d go down underground…. Other times we’d endlessly climb up stairs… What is this even…

“Hey, why is this so much like a labyrinth…?”

“It leads enemies that invade astray, and while they are lost we are free to annihilate them. A remnant of the past of course”

That’s really demon-like.

We went on like this for about two more kilometers. Everyone was fine physically but we were all starting to get pretty bored.

Before we knew it we had already started to relax.

“Here we are. Demon lord-sama is just beyond this point.”

We went right back to being tense.

“It’s time huh… Be polite, I must be polite…”

Tensing right up.

“Um, I do apologize

apologize but… it seems I, Harukara, have gotten a tummy ache, so if you don’t mind, may I be excused…?”

Harukara nervously raised her hand.

“You’re clearly faking it. You have no need to worry, demon lord-sama is a tolerant soul. Now come!”

Beelzebub dragged Harukara forward. Will she really be alright…

It was finally time for us to grace the demon lord with our presence. The doors that faced us were about four meters high. It took four demon gatekeepers to push the doors open.

“Welcome to Vanzeld Castle, the fortress of demons”

A voice called out to us as soon as we entered.

It belonged to a demon-san that had pretty ram-like horns growing from either side of her head. Going by her looks, she seemed no older than a middle school girl. Though of course, that was only the age she seemed to be.

“Ah, good afternoon. I am honored to be invited here today.”

“No, no. The honor is all mine. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance. You’re the witch Azussan right?”

“Yes, that’s correct”

“Wow! It’s really you! Please let me shake your hand!”

She tightly grasped my hand. Since her tail is swaying about, it must mean she’s really excited? Her tail is split into three so the movements are quite peculiar.

Since I came to a stop to greet this girl, our entire group did likewise.

“Master, if you spend too much time talking here, we’ll end up keeping the demon lord-sama waiting won’t

waiting won’t we…? I’d hate to get skewered on account of being a minute late,” said Harukara uneasily.

Looks like she was worried about making a bad impression on the demon lord.

“Ah, you’re the elf Harukarsan aren’t you! I’m very much enjoying ‘Nutritious Alcohol’! Please let me shake your hand!”

This time the girl grabbed Harukara’s hand. She was quite the frank individual.

“Owowow… You’re gripping too hard…!”

“Ah, sorry, I messed up controlling my strength a little… My apologies. Here, a healing spell.”

The girl immediately cast a healing spell that bathed Harukara in light. She was also a pretty quick-witted individual.

“Thank you very much. Um… I’m sorry, but would it be possible to please let us continue on our way?  It wouldn’t be good if we annoyed the demon lord-sama by not greeting her properly. It definitely wouldn’t be funny if she ordered ‘Off with that elf’s head!’ or something…”

“She wouldn’t say something so cruel”

“Well~ you say that, but a demon’s sense of values are different from that of an elf’s. I’ve been told the demon lord is kind, but I only half believe that. It’s for that reason that I’ve decided to create a persona to try my best and talk to her in as well-mannered a way as possible. I guess if you had to put it crudely, I’ll be attempting to fool demon lord-sama”

“Fool her you say?”

“Of course, I harbor no ill intent. However, when dealing with such anwith such an exalted person, certain courtesies are very important and must be upheld. When I don’t know anything at all about the person I’ll be talking with, it’s best for me to not be completely open and sincere. I’ll need to test the waters first.”

“Hey, Harukara… Everyone here is close to the demon lord-sama you know… You shouldn’t be telling her that you won’t be sincere or that you’re going to try and fool her…”

Harukara is really terrible when it comes to things like these and always does something careless in the end.

“Oh whoops, you’re right. I do apologize but please keep this a secret from demon lord-sama. I’ll send you three boxes of ‘Nutritious Alcohol’ in exchange”

Harukara glanced over towards the throne.

However, it was at that moment that both of us noticed— the throne was empty.

For some reason, I had a really bad feeling about this.

“Uh… Beelzebub, demon lord-sama isn’t here”

“Isn’t she right in front of you?”

Just as I suspected…

Holding both sides of the hem of her dress, the ram-horned young girl lowered her head and curtsied.

“I am the demon lord Provat Pecola Aryess. I’m not too fond of greeting people from some high throne so I’ve come down personally”

Of course. This girl just had to be the demon lord-sama. Of course that’s how this was going to go.

Taking another look around me, I realized that besides Beelzebub, all the other demons were kneeling.