“Hey..!” Akuto shouted in surprise.
There was a low rumble from the doll. Its surface began to shine as the mana gathered around it.
“Sorry, sorry. I wanted to try it with you. Don’t worry. It won’t be too big of a deal.” She put her hands together and apologized to him.
“Are you... sure it’s okay?” Akuto looked down at the doll, worried.
“It’ll be fine!” Yoshie waved her hands irresponsibly.
The light cleared up as the process of mana condensation finished. On the table lay someone who looked exactly like Akuto.
“Uwah,” Akuto said, shocked.
“It hurts to see you surprised like that, even if you’re me,” the Akuto on the table said as he sat up.
“That sounds exactly like something I’d say,” Akuto said with wide eyes.
“Well, ’cause I’m modeled off of me. I know I’m fake, but being a fake is an unpleasant thing. It’s fine if you want to do an experiment, but if you’re not going to give me anything to do, then I hope you’ll delete me soon. I don’t really feel like talking to myself,” the Akuto on the table said.
“I agree. Though I guess it’s natural that I would agree.”
“That’s the thing. How many minutes do you need to get the data?” both of them said.
Yoshie laughed.
“One hour of small talk should do it. It’s fun seeing two people with the same personality together.”
“It’s not fun for me.”
“Of course, it’s not fun for me either.”
“Now, I’d prefer we didn’t have to spend the next hour talking to ourselves.”
“That’s right. I’d rather talk to you than me. We never really got a chance to talk.”
“I’d love some hints as to how I’m supposed to act from now on, too. Keena is too much of a free spirit.” The two Akutos were speaking in tandem.
“It looks like you two have already learned how to split up your words so you’re sharing the same idea. But if I’m going to be talking to you both at once, that’s going to take a lot of effort,” Yoshie laughed.
○
“T-This is fascinating...”
A black shadow scuttered near the door of the warehouse. It was Nozomi, the girl born to be a janitor. She was wearing her maid uniform on her tiny body, and her forehead was glistening as she looked into the room. She’d been passing by on her janitor duties when she’d stopped to listen to their conversation. She couldn’t help but look inside when she’d heard what they were saying, and had witnessed two Akuto’s.
“So from what they said, if you push that button it turns into a copy of you!” Nozomi began to plot. Her idea was a little better this time, but it was still very selfish.
“I know! I’ll borrow that doll and make a copy of the Empress, then make her do what I tell her to! And then... I’ll become Empress! It’s perfect!”
And then her janitorial powers began to manifest themselves. She quickly moved to the control panel conveniently located on the outside of the warehouse, triggered the fire alarm, and turned off the power.
“Uwah!”
“The lights went out,”
“Looks like something’s wrong. The backup power isn’t working either. Let’s check outside.”
She could hear three voices from inside. She started to run back towards the door, and as soon as she saw them come out, she blasted them with a fire extinguisher.
“Uwah!”
“Hyah!”
The three of them screamed as they were bathed in white... No, two of them. Nozomi could see that one of them wasn’t moving.
—A doll wouldn’t panic at a fire extingusher...! It was a brilliant insight for her, and she grabbed the one who didn’t move.
“This way!” she said, as she grabbed the doll and ran.
“Um, okay?”
The doll’s personality was Akuto. In this case, Akuto would’ve just gone along with it. Then, she used her janitorial powers once more to stop Akuto and Yoshie from catching up with them. She dragged the doll Akuto down one of the side alleys with her. In her short time at the school, she’d learned every nook and cranny of it.
“Wait!”
“Where are you going?”
She could hear Akuto and Yoshie’s cries getting further away from them. Even the students didn’t know the path she was using, so it was easy for her to escape.
“Heheheh... they won’t find us here,” Nozomi said. She was hiding with the doll in a maintenance crawl space.
“So, what’s going on?” The doll had Akuto’s personality and appearance. He was nicer than he needed to be, even to Nozomi, the girl who’d dragged him out here.
“W-Well, you see...” Nozomi began to stammer.
Of course, she’d barely ever talked to a boy. Being this close to Akuto in a cramped space was too much for her.
“C-Can you get away from me?”
“Sorry. But I think this is your fault for choosing such a cramped space... Excuse me for a second. Is this better?”
Akuto grabbed her waist with both hands and lifted her up, setting her on top of a nearby panel at a spot higher than his chest.
“Hyaah!” Nozomi gasped, but after a moment she realized that having more space around her really did calm her down. Akuto’s face, however, was closer than she would’ve liked.
“U-Um, listen...” Nozomi began to flail her hands. Her face was beet red. But Akuto put a hand on her head, like he would a child’s.
“So, why did you do this?”
“W-Well... Hey, get your hand off me! I’m not a kid! I’m a grown-up!”
“I’m sorry. You looked young to me. No, I suppose that’s rude.”
“I’m probably older than you,” Nozomi pouted.
“Then I must apologize again. But there must be a good reason for why you did this, right?” Akuto straightened himself and looked up at her.
“W-Well... I want to use you to make a copy of the Empress.” Nozomi decided to tell him the truth.
Akuto frowned at her.
“You know that’s wrong,” he said, and put strong hands on both her shoulders.
“W-What are you doing?”
“Turning you over to the authorities. You can’t just...”
“Hyah! Noo! No! I’ll scream!”
“I don’t want anybody to get the wrong idea, but if somebody comes we can all go to the police together.”
“Gyaaah! Noo!” Nozomi began to flail her arms around.
“Don’t struggle like that...ah!” Akuto gasped. And then he froze. Nozomi’s fist had landed on his nose.
“Hyaaaah! ...Wait, the switch...” Nozomi let out of a sigh of relief.
“But if I hit the switch, what happens...?”
○
“Oh jeez... She’s the girl from last time.” Akuto shook his head.
“Is she dangerous?” Yoshie asked.
“In a way, yeah. You probably weren’t paying attention, but she’s already caused trouble once. I think she’s got personality issues. She’s got an overactive imagination and a very proactive personality, but she doesn’t handle surprises well,” Akuto answered.
“That’s an issue, then.” Yoshie nodded and took a look at the warehouse panel, then shook her head.
“There’s no issues with the warehouse. That’s bad news. It means she was after the doll. Seems like she’s got a screw loose, like you said, too.”
“Yeah. She’s probably trying to misuse it. Supposedly she wants to take the Empress’s place. She might be thinking of making a copy of Keena...” Akuto said.
“Then we’re okay, for the moment,” Yoshie said with a sigh.
“Why’s that?”
“It’s not something that’s really easy to misuse, you see. It won’t harm humans, but it also won’t just do anything it’s told. And the Empress is Keena. Even if she tried something, there’s not all that much she could do.”
“I see. You’re right. And if it’s copied
my personality right now, then probably nothing will happen,” Akuto nodded.
“Heheh. I don’t know about that. It looks like you still don’t know how difficult your personality can be.” Yoshie laughed a little. Akuto looked confused.
“Huh?”
“No, don’t worry about it. But there is a problem. There’s one part of the doll that’s rather fragile. If you push the switch too hard, it might malfunction.”
“Malfunction?” Akuto asked. Yoshie looked worried for a moment, but then shook her head.
“No, it’s nothing to worry about. Normally, pushing the nose just copies your personality onto the doll. It also deletes the old personality, too. But if you push the nose too hard, there’s a small possibility the personalities can get mixed. Outside of the worst possible pairing imaginable, though, all you’d end up with is a bit of a weirdo.”
“The worst possible pairing... For instance, somebody who was imaginative and proactive, but didn’t handle surprises well, mixing with somebody who could adapt to any situation but who was too much of an intellectual to take action most of the time?” Akuto whispered. Yoshie laughed.
“Yeah, something like that. Something like...” Her expression froze.
“That would be this Nozomi Sasahara and you, wouldn’t it?”
○
“Huh? If you’ve stopped moving, that means I can run away, you know,” Nozomi said as she went to jump down from the panel. But then Akuto’s hand grabbed her more tightly.
“Hyah!” Nozomi screamed. Akuto looked up at her and laughed.
“There’s no need to run. It’s fine. I understand now.”
“Y-you understand? You understand what?” Nozomi’s voice began to shake in awe of the terrible presence before her.
But Akuto whispered to her in a gentle voice.
“Basically, I just need to become Emperor myself. All I’ll have to do is trick Keena. And I’ll become the new Emperor.”
“W-Wait! You can’t do that! I’m supposed to be Empress!”
“If I’m Emperor, it’s the same as you being Empress. And I won’t just forget about you, anyway. Once I have the throne, you can be by my side.”
“That’s so selfish...”
“It’s not. I’m also you, you see,” Akuto said.
That’s when Nozomi realized what had happened.
“I get it! Our personalities mixed...”
“That’s right. Now just leave everything to me.” Akuto smiled at her, but she shook her head.
“Y-You can’t! I won’t be able to become Empress, then...” She tried to resist, but Akuto put a finger up to her lips.
“You’re a naughty girl, aren’t you? I think you need to be quiet for a while.”
“M-Mgggh...” She shook her head.
Akuto grinned and ran the hand he’d placed on her shoulder across her neck. The feeling of it made her shiver.
“Hyah!”
“I’ll make it so you can’t resist, little girl,” He grinned and ran his hands down her chest as he brought his face closer to hers.
“Uwahh... fwaah....” All she could do was scream and shiver.
○
“Hmm...? She’s just lying there,” Yoshie said when she found Nozomi.
“Then did he do something to her? I thought he couldn’t hurt people,” Akuto said, surprised. The two of them had been searching for a while before they’d found her.
“She’s breathing,” Akuto said as he ran over and lifted her up.
“Just knocked out cold, I guess,” Yoshie said, looking down at her face. It was bright red, and her breathing was shallow.
“Hey, you okay?” Akuto said, shaking her.
“U-Uhhnn...” Nozomi’s eyes fluttered open. When she saw him, she screamed.
“Nooo! Stop! Wait, don’t stop!” She grabbed him and began to pant violently. It was so sudden that Akuto jerked away.
“Uwah! What’s going on?”
Nozomi squirmed up to him and pressed her body against his. “Unyaaah! Have your way with me!”
“Uwaaah! Please get away from me!”
Akuto yanked her off him and with one hand grabbed her neck and lifted her off the ground. That was enough to bring her back to sanity. She struggled, but quickly stopped and looked embarrassed.
“Are you the real Akuto, then?”
“I am. I’m not the doll you stole. So... what happened?” Akuto asked. He didn’t seem to really want to hear the answer, though. Nozomi’s face turned red and she started to shake her head.
“N-Nothing... Y-Yeah! Nothing! He just gave me a karate chop to the neck!” Nozomi said, but she was buttoning up her maid outfit. Akuto looked back at Yoshie with a frown. She shook her head. Her face was red too.
“Would you not look at me? Um... I can kind of guess what happened, you know.”
“No, I wouldn’t do that... That’s what I wanted to say,” Akuto said.
“D-Don’t even talk about it. It’s pretty embarrassing for me too.” Yoshie chuckled, embarrassed. But then she tapped her goggles, and her face assumed a serious expression. She turned to Nozomi.
“Anyway, the doll ran off, right? Don’t tell me he got any ideas about becoming Emperor himself, did he?”
Nozomi looked stunned. “H-How could you tell?”
“I knew it...” Akuto and Yoshie looked at each other.
“The two personalities have mixed, and made a huge mess. But the doll can’t hurt anybody, so it shouldn’t be too bad, right?” Akuto said optimistically. But Yoshie shook her head.
“You probably don’t know this about yourself, but... He’s planning on making girls do what he wants by doing this.” She pointed to Nozomi.
“Making girls do what he wants...? Huh? Really? YOU CAN DO THAT?” Akuto looked surprised.
“Well, um... some girls, maybe. If it was a girl who was already favorably inclined to you... probably? And the real problem is, because he’s got a female personality too, he knows exactly how girls would want to be approached...” Even the normally loquacious Yoshie was beginning to stammer.
“So what you’re telling me is... No, just never mind. Do you know where the doll went?” he said to Nozomi as he set her down.
“I-I don’t know! Uwaaah!” As soon as her feet touched the ground, Nozomi set off like a fleeing rabbit. She was gone before they could say a word.
“Welp, there she goes again...” Akuto sighed.
“Forget about her. We need to find the doll,” Yoshie said.
“How?”
“Well, we should probably start with the girls that it would be easiest for you to seduce.”
“Seduce...? Do you really think...”
Yoshie just sighed.
“Just do what I tell you. First, let’s use telepathy to find out where they are. We can start with Fujiko...” She took out her terminal and began to scroll through her contacts.
○
Fujiko Eto was at the café, looking through administrative data for the girl’s dorms, when her terminal started to glow, indicating an incoming call. But just before she picked it up, she decided to reject it instead.
“Fujiko!” Akuto had called out to her. The call was from Yoshie, and it was clear who she needed to prioritize.
“What is it, Akuto?” Fujiko smiled.
Akuto’s face took on a mischevious grin.
“I wanted to talk. Alone.”
“Oh? It’s not often you give me an invitation like that.” Fujiko’s eyes sparkled as she stood up, leaving her coffee cup on the table as she took Akuto’s hands. Akuto squeezed back, and Fujiko blushed.
“Shall we go for a walk, then?”
“No, I was hoping we could be alone.”
“Oh my...! Then why don’t we go to my room in the basement? Hey, what’s gotten into you, really? I’m so happy!” Fujiko clung to his arm.
“I need to talk to you about something important,” Akuto said, as soon as they were inside Fujiko’s underground room.
“
Anything you want is important to me,” she said, pressing up against his arm.
“Great. You see... there’s a fake version of me running around.”
Fujiko beckoned him to sit down on a velvet sofa, and he did. She leaned up against his shoulder and looked up against him.
“A fake?”
“Yes. It’s a doll Yoshie made who can copy someone’s appearance and personality.”
“Oh my!” Fujiko gasped in surprise. Akuto looked into her eyes with a stern expression.
“But the doll has gone out of control, and now it’s become dangerous. It looks like it wants to become Emperor.”
“Emperor?” Fujiko asked, but she didn’t seem to be listening. She was blushing as Akuto stared at her.
“Yes. He’s going to use Keena to kill me, and then make Keena into his puppet. So I need you to prove to the others that I am who I say I am.”
“Prove it?” Fujiko said, only half paying attention.
“That’s right. Give me a small accessory or something. When I’m in the same room as the fake, you can use it to prove that I’m the real me,” Akuto said as he ran his hands along Fujiko’s cheeks. Fujiko’s whole body shuddered.
“Oh... Would you like me to give you a love bite then? I’ll kiss your whole body as much as you want. When it’s time to prove who you are, you can take off your shirt and show them that you’re covered in proof of my love. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?” Fujiko brought her lips towards Akuto’s neck.
“That’s a great idea,” Akuto chuckled, and then he moved a hand from her cheeks to her hair, and then the top of her head.
“Hey, if you’re going to ask for my help, you’re going to reward me, right?” She looked down a little again, as if she was embarrassed, and then brought her face right up to his.
“Of course. I was just about to give you a kiss. The rest can wait until after I’ve crushed the fake...” Akuto wrapped his hand around her head and brought his lips to hers. But...
“Oh? That’s not much of a reward at all. I’d want a kiss from Akuto. Not a fake.” She grinned like a naughty girl and pushed the doll’s body away.
The doll looked surprised.
“How... How can you call me a fake?”
“It’s obvious. It’s a question of love.”
Demon King Daimaou: Volume 10 Page 5
