“Oh…well, thank you.”
But Chiho’s heart grew heavy for other reasons. It was to be expected, but within Ashiya’s mind, Chiho wasn’t part of the Choshi caravan. But something else then occurred to her: If Maou was going to Choshi, what kind of people were absolutely certain to be on the train behind them?
“…Speaking of conquering the world, though, have Yusa or Suzuno discussed anything about traveling to Choshi with you?”
Maou and Ashiya flashed each other a glance, as if to confirm that yes, they really were going to conquer the world someday. Not now, but, you know, whenever.
“Come to think of it, they haven’t, really. I figured she thought you were trying to run away from her, too. I was expecting this epic rant about how she’ll chase you to the ends of the Earth and so on, but nothing.”
“Yeah, she probably thinks we’ll mind our Ps and Qs as long as we’re with someone who knows our landlord. She’s met her before, so. But Urushihara told me the two girls pushed him to the corner and made him cry about what a lazy bum he is last night, too. It’s weird, how cooperative they’ve been with us finding work. It’s like they want it.”
“You’re…right, huh? I was just thinking that Yusa’s been really kind to you lately, too…”
It was impossible to think that Emi would let the demons simply waltz out of Tokyo without batting an eye. But if she had a plan in mind, she was sure taking her time executing it.
And Sariel’s unsettling piece of news made Chiho worry as well. If Maou didn’t know what Emi was doing, or vice versa, that could put Alas Ramus in danger.
Not that it meant, of course, that Emi would work together with Maou if she knew about this new development. That was simply impossible to imagine.
“Just make sure you get your parents’ permission first, all right? It’s a pretty long field trip.”
“Take the road you have to. As long as you don’t do anything to embarrass yourself or your family, I’m not going to say anything.”
The voices of two top authority figures in Chiho’s life rang in her head.
Filled with a new sense of determination, Chiho took out her cell phone.
This was probably the first time in her life that she did something so completely self-serving. It would involve taking the bad-faith move of deceiving her parents without actually lying to them.
But it was worth it.
Having the people she held dear that far away was dangerous. She wanted to curtail that danger, as much as she could.
Nodding at Maou and Ashiya, Chiho took a few steps away and called home.
“Hi, Chiho. What’s up?”
The landline in their house had a caller ID display. Her mother immediately knew who was on the line.
Chiho took a deep breath, soothing her quickening heartbeat.
“Mom…?”
“Hmm?”
“I wanna go see the Choshi Electric Railway. Is it okay if I take a day trip out there with Yusa and Suzuno?”
THE HERO HELPS THE DEVIL REMODEL HIS WORKPLACE
“Wow! Look at that train! It’s so cute!”
At Choshi rail station, the endpoint of the JR Sobu line, Chiho squealed in pure glee at the sight before her.
It came at the end of a long journey, one laden with unfamiliar transfers—Sasazuka to Shinjuku, to Kinshichou, and then to the Chiba central station, where they boarded the Sobu Main local line. Their journey, taking them due east of Tokyo, took just over three hours.
The train that arrived at the Choshi Electric Railway platform, modestly located on the edge of the much larger JR platform in Chiba station, was like nothing Maou, Ashiya, or Urushihara had seen before.
It had been not quite two years since the demons first set foot on Earth. As such, the idea of a “train” being a four-door car made of stainless steel with long, bench-style seating on the inside was firmly instilled in their minds.
But the “train” trundling up to them now blew away their urban-oriented assumptions in the blink of an eye.
Aerodynamics was not the top priority for its boxy, rectangular body, the lower half a drab shade of red and the top half a sooty sort of black. Lighting was limited to a single round lamp smack-dab in the top of the train’s front. Despite being a single car in length, it made an enormous clatter as it bumped its way across the line.
The polished-steel Sobu Main rail car they had lounged on for the past while was something from the far-flung future by comparison. To be as frank as possible, this was old.
When it finally reached the platform, the noise when the conductor applied the brakes was shrill, almost painful—the grind of metal against metal.
“Dude, is that really a train?”
The first words out of Urushihara’s mouth were characteristically unappreciative. Chiho rolled her eyes at him.
Maou’s brain shut off for a moment upon sight of this strange, alien rail line. Suddenly, though, he noticed that the scene around him was starting to fill with an odd air of excitement.
Even Maou could tell that the other passengers offered nothing but smiles to this preposterously old-fashioned train.
It was “cool.” It “really brings me back.” It “is totally retro.” The people around it were “soooo glad [they] came.” The sense of wonderment was palpable.
Then the crowd whipped out their phones—the somewhat more dedicated rail nerds had their digital cameras and tripods at the ready—and started snapping.
“Well! I suppose people like you wouldn’t sense the elegant nostalgia exuded by this car, hmm?”
“…You’ve been here for as long as we have, you prick.”
Maou sneered at the mocking words pelting him from behind.
There, he saw Emi, Alas Ramus in her hands, and Suzuno, her hands gripping a sun parasol.
“Hmm. This is the Choshi Electric Railway De-Ha 1001 series. A native to this rail line since 1950. Although, according to the literature I read first, these types of trains ran all over Japan back then.”
Suzuno studied the free pamphlet she picked up at the station.
The question of where she picked up her research materials, how she consumed them, and why that led her to the “ditzy postwar housewife” look she so expertly pulled off was still a mystery.
“But where do we purchase tickets?”
The Choshi Electric platform began where the JR one ended. There was no turnstile or anything between the two; all they saw was a small computerized card reader.
But all this gang of pleasure-seekers had on them were the tickets they purchased at the Shinjuku service counter.
“Hmm. I suppose we buy them on the train, or perhaps from someone on the platform. That gentleman, perhaps? He has a hole-punch in his hand.”
“Whoa. They do it all by hand?”
“What are you so agog about? Just a few decades ago, every turnstile from Shinjuku to Ikebukuro and Shinagawa was manned by ticket-takers.”
Something about discussing the Japan of the past—the early-to-mid-twentieth century in particular—always added a tinge of excitement to Suzuno’s tone.
In the era she had studied for her cultural orientation prior to traveling to Japan, the JR staff still punched every ticket in the nation by hand. But it may as well have been centuries ago; even Chiho, the only native Japanese in the group, was born well after the whole system was computerized.
All Suzuno knew about that era was what she learned from books and TV. And that applied equally as much to Maou and Emi.
“But why do they go through all that trouble? Like, there’s a commuter card reader right there.”
“Don’t you see? That’s the whole point. People like this whole process.”
“Seriously?”
Ignoring the dubious Maou, Emi took Alas Ramus to a nearby station agent.
“One adult and one child for Inuboh. Oh, but I think she wants a physical ticket, too…”
She had learned somewhere that children rode for free, Maou supp
osed. But Alas Ramus’s eyes twinkled with anticipation, transfixed on the well-used hole-punch holstered on the agent’s belt.
Once her ticket was stamped and handed back to her, Alas Ramus beamed in joy, carefully clutching it in her hands.
“Well, thank you very much, little lady!”
Her sheer bliss was enough to even make the agent smile a bit.
“You see how it works?”
Suzuno looked on in triumph.
“One would never expect that level of service with those cold, impersonal automatic turnstiles!”
“…No, I guess not.”
Maou accepted that much, not that he cared.
Ashiya copied Emi’s procedure to purchase his own ticket, although Chiho was too busy shooting pictures of the train to pay attention.
Urushihara, meanwhile, was slumped over a platform bench, the heat proving too much for him.
“You know, though… I really didn’t think you’d join us.”
Maou shrugged as he regarded Suzuno. Her face peered out below her parasol, revealing a breezy smile.
“How many times must I say it? We are hardly in pursuit of you. We merely happened to choose the same destination for our summer sabbatical.”
This was beyond bald-faced.
It all began several hours ago.
As Maou arrived at Sasazuka station at eight in the morning, he found Chiho there, attempting to catch her breath.
He thought she was just wishing him good-bye at first. But Chiho was carrying a pretty hefty sports bag, making him wonder if she was off on a trip of her own someplace.
From a common-sense viewpoint, no matter how much Chiho’s parents trusted her, there was no way they’d permit her to join a small gaggle of men in their stayover summer job on the beach. At the time, the idea that Chiho was joining him to Choshi hadn’t even registered in Maou’s mind.
“You going somewhere too, Chi? Guess we’re sharing a train to Shinjuku, huh?”
“Well,” Chiho cheerily replied as they went through the turnstile, “a little longer than that, actually.”
Not even thirty seconds later, Maou realized what was going on.
“Oh, good morning, Chiho. Hey, who’re those three guys behind you?”
“Goodness, Chiho, I thought we would be waiting until the end of time! You ran into the Devil King and his minions, I see. Quite the coincidence, hmm?”
“Daddy! Chi-Sis!”
There, on a bench at the Shinjuku side of the platform, he saw Emi, Suzuno, and Alas Ramus seated next to one another.
The unpleasant shock was difficult for Maou, Ashiya, or Urushihara to express in words at first.
Thanks to their early-morning departure, they hadn’t thought to say hello to Suzuno on their way out.
Emi and Suzuno must have arranged it so they’d ambush them at the station. Their faces—as they made it a point to greet just Chiho and express innocent surprise at the suspicious individuals behind her—betrayed how much they enjoyed the harassment.
Perched in front of them was a medium-sized carrying bag. No doubt about it: They were hell-bent on following him.
“So anyway, we won’t be on the same train just until Shinjuku. It’s actually gonna be Choshi. It’s okay, though. I’ve got my mom’s permission and everything.”
Chiho certainly picked a grandiose way to answer Maou’s previous question.
The three demons’ jaws dropped. What kind of world was this, where a pair of well-meaning parents would agree to that?
“You guys aren’t getting the wrong idea or anything, right?”
As Maou struggled for an answer, Emi sneered at them from her seat.
“She might be going to Choshi, but not because she’s following you guys. She’s just coming along with us, is all.”
“…Oh, joy.”
That was too much of a whopper for any of them to believe.
“Like, what’re you freaks doing for work, anyway? You’re planning to stay in Choshi for two whole weeks?”
Emi smiled breezily.
“I took some time off. I needed some to help Suzuno move, anyway. But what do you mean ‘two weeks’? We’re just three free-roaming girls, checking out some of Japan’s quaintest and most historic rail lines. What makes you think we’re gonna stick around for that long? You aren’t keeping anything secret from us, are you?”
Maou stared daggers into Emi’s eyes. Her sheer malice was clear between the rhetorical questions. But:
“Hey, Daddy, guess what! Guess what!”
Then the excited Alas Ramus blocked his view, preventing him from firing back.
“We’re gonna go to the beach!”
And thus, everything fell into place. Maou hung his head, dejected.
Time passed.
Upon reaching Shinjuku, Maou and his unexpected traveling companions hopped on the Sobu line, marveling at the looming sight of Tokyo Skytree as the express train arrived at Kinshichou station. That took them all the way to Chiba, where they nibbled on ekiben box lunches sold right on the platform as they waited for the local train to Choshi. After another short while, they passed by the city of Asahi, near the line’s final stop in Choshi.
“Chi-Sis! Windmill! Windmill!”
Alas Ramus was perched on Chiho’s knee.
Emi and Suzuno were with them, occupying the entirety of a four-person booth inside the train car as they innocently shared snacks with one another. The three demons sat in the booth across the aisle, ignoring the overweight businessman already occupying one spot, and soon found themselves both physically and mentally cramped.
Gazing out the window, Alas Ramus was beside herself with excitement. Just before reaching Choshi, she spotted one of the gigantic wind turbines generating power outside of the city.
“Wow, Alas Ramus. You learned the word windmill and everything, huh?”
“Hee-hee! Uh-huh!”
By the time the turbines fell out of view, the intercom announced that the final stop of Choshi was near and advised passengers to prepare for arrival.
Now, on the Choshi Electric Railway platform, Maou attempted to plead his case as Suzuno stared upward at him.
“I mean, I guess Chiho really does have an interest in this rail line, so that’s fine and all, but why do you stalkers have to hound me every day of my life? You’re just here to tail us under the pretext of joining Chiho!”
Suzuno’s response was almost a little too well-rehearsed.
“Think of it what you may. There is no telling what dastardly deed you may try while away from us. I hope, for your sake, you will exercise sound judgment in your destination, just as in Sasazuka. Remember—our eyes hang from every wall, our ears from every ceiling!”
“Look, you’ve known me in Japan long enough, right? I’m like a walking, talking personification of kindness and sincerity here.”
“A Devil King is a Devil King.”
There was little he could do to deny that.
“You don’t feel stupid at all? Asking the Devil King to exercise ‘sound judgment’ out on the beach? What, do you think I’ll push you in or something?”
“Hmph. Well. As I believe I have mentioned before, we simply happen to share a destination today. So go ahead. Run off to your new workplace. Pay us no mind!”
“All right, seriously…”
They intended to follow him all the way to the beach house. That much was bleedingly obvious.
“Your Demonic Highness, I’ve purchased a ticket for you.”
Ashiya stepped in, paper slips in hand. Urushihara, for his part, lurched his way into the train and threw himself limply on a seat. The heat must have done a serious number on him.
He and Ashiya didn’t bother prodding them any further, already resigned to these distasteful riding partners. It was something they half-expected anyway. Besides, Emi, the woman they had the most to fear from, would no doubt be forced back to her own job before too long.
Although it brought to question whether there was any
hope at all for the demonic races, given that their former supreme leaders were so willing to be watched and observed by the Hero on a daily basis, where and when she felt like it.
“…Doesn’t look much like a ticket to me.”
The paper Ashiya handed to him was a thin piece of paper, torn off on one edge, with every station along the Choshi Electric line listed on it.
“Hello there, young man. This your first time in Choshi?”
“Eep!”
Maou’s body twitched involuntarily at the sudden voice from behind.
Somewhere along the line, an elderly woman in a broad sun hat had sidled up next to them, shopping bag in hand.
“Quite the old little train, isn’t it? I bet that was a surprise to you. Certainly not the sort of thing you young folks probably wanna be seen in, hmmmmm?”
“Oh, no, I, um…”
Maou had trouble replying to a total stranger sizing up his personality in such frank terms.
“But, you know, this paint job is the most popular one around here. This line’s picked up all kinds of rail cars from this place and that, so you’d be amazed at how many different cars you’ll see. Ohhh, yes! But this black-and-red little bugger’s the most popular of all. Like going down memory lane, they all say!”
“Memory…lane?”
“Of course, we ride it every day so it’s nothing special to us, but you don’t see train cars this old being driven around much anymore, hmmmm? Why, this De-Ha 1001 car here’s been running to and fro ever since they built it in 1950!”
There was a sense of pride to the woman’s voice, like she was praising a member of her family.
“The entire line was in danger of closing, you know. Several times, in fact! But more and more young folk like you showed up, and the children that live here worked so hard on everything, that a lot of people really like our little train line nowadays. So thank you!”
It wasn’t like Maou had done anything in particular. The woman must have been several times his (human) age. But Maou smiled and nodded on cue, not seeing the need to rain on this old lady’s nostalgia-tinged parade.
“So are you here to see the sights? You going to Inuboh?”
The Devil Is a Part-Timer!, Vol. 4 Page 9
