“Right,” Emi said, “but work’s gonna get busy, too, you know?”
“Well, I mean, there’s a lot of churn at the start of spring. People leave to go find full-time jobs for the April hiring rush. We got people to cover for that, you included, but you know, we’ll lose some high schoolers soon.”
“Oh. I guess Chiho may not be here for long, huh?”
Emi, still not terribly familiar with the Japanese high school curriculum, thought a bit about what kinds of assignments and tests someone Chiho’s age might have. But Akiko had other things on her mind.
“No! That’s right! Losing Chi’s gonna be huge!”
“Huh?!” Emi found herself almost shouting. “What do you mean?”
“Well, this is just my guess, so don’t tell anyone yet, but Chiho actually called me about four days ago.”
“Four days ago…?”
Emi looked at the calendar hanging on the other side of the counter. She didn’t have a shift that day.
“I thought Hey, that was weird, and when I picked up, it really was weird. She asked me if I could cover a few shifts for her.”
“What?”
This surprised Emi. At the Hatagaya location, if you couldn’t make a prescheduled shift for whatever reason, you were supposed to talk it over with Kisaki first. If she agreed to it, it was her job as manager to find someone to cover the shift for you. Crewmembers weren’t allowed to swap shifts among themselves.
“Yeah, pretty crazy, huh? I mean, just the idea of Chiho missing shifts blew my mind, so I asked her why, and her voice went all low, and she was like ‘it involves my future, and there’s this place I gotta go to help figure it out.’”
“Her future…?”
“Yeah. She’s gonna have college exams in the next school year, and that’s coming up soon, right? So I said yes, ’cause I figured it must’ve been something serious. I mean, Chi would never say something like that casually, right? And I got the okay for it from Kisaki later, but… I’m thinking, you know, maybe Chi won’t be around here much longer.”
The thought seemed to perturb Akiko.
“Like, it took me a year before I got into college, so I’m not one to talk, but right now’s about when teens really start prepping, you know? Some kids figure they’re okay waiting until their final year of high school begins, but if you consider the standardized public-school tests that took place back in January, there’s really less than one year until college exams for girls like Chiho.”
“So maybe she’ll start going to a test-prep center or something?”
“I didn’t get that nosy about it, but that sounds right to me. Kisaki looked like she knew something.”
She probably would, given how she had likely seen off dozens, if not hundreds, of teenage part-timers like that over the years. She could see the signs, the general trends, that dictated how much staff she had to work with, and she knew that February, just before the new fiscal year began in Japan, was a pretty frenetic time. It was common all across the country for high school workers to come back from spring break, then quit soon after to devote time to test prep.
“Wow… Chiho, though, huh?”
It was weird. Emi understood that Chiho was in the late stages of high school, but it was still hard to imagine her sitting in a classroom, getting test-prep advice from a tutor somewhere. The Hero didn’t know any other high school students, but based on what she had seen, she knew Chiho was way ahead of her contemporaries in talent. Maybe she figured she wouldn’t take such a…normal route in her life.
But that was the thing. Chiho was just a normal, Japan-born, Japan-raised girl. Since becoming involved with Ente Isla, she had navigated her way through innumerable crises, developing her mental and emotional fortitude. That was how Emi and Suzuno thought of her, and they would know, having both gone through far more than she had. And something in Emi told her that something as normal as college exams, at this point, wouldn’t be formidable enough to alter Chiho’s regular schedule. She had thought, selfishly enough, that Chiho would always be there for her.
“That was selfish, I know.”
Quitting MgRonald to prepare for college didn’t mean Chiho would be cut off from Emi and the rest of the staff. But it did mean a little more distance—and now the demons, Emi, and Suzuno had let the battle against Ente Isla’s heaven pull them further away from Sasazuka. Emi couldn’t guess what things would be like by July, Maou’s ordained deadline for the whole thing, but July meant summer break for Chiho’s last high school year. A time when she’d have to focus the most on her exams. Even if everyone was back in Room 201 by then, they wouldn’t be eating together as frequently as they used to.
“Thank you for calling MgRonald at Hatagaya Station. This is Yusa speaking. Did you want to make a delivery order?”
Nodding at Akiko, Emi turned toward the delivery computer as she answered the call on her headset.
“…All right, and barbecue sauce. Will that complete your order today? …Thank you. Let me repeat your order, just to be sure…”
Chiho was drifting away from Emi’s regular life. It seemed bizarre to consider. But thinking about Emi, sitting here in front of Hatagaya Station, wearing a MgRonald uniform and taking phone orders, it showed that “regular life” had a way of changing all too easily on a person. Emi, for one, changed jobs due to personal reasons (albeit rather unique ones), and since then, she hadn’t been able to see her old work friends, Rika Suzuki and Maki Shimizu, as much. Little changes in life could make people seem that little bit more distant.
“Okay, we should have your order there in approximately twenty minutes… All right, thank you very much! Bye-bye! …Phew. Delivery up. You’re heading for southern Sasazuka, Maou.”
Even with those gloomy thoughts in her mind, Emi kept up the pace, switching her headset to in-store mode and sending orders to Maou, who was on standby upstairs.
“Roger that. I’ll head out. Aki, you take the upstairs counter for a bit.”
Akiko went up the stairs to replace him. She wasn’t a certified barista, but MgRonald Barista was more an honorary title than anything. An experienced staffer like Akiko or Kawata could man the MgCafé space just fine, as long as they knew how.
Heading down the stairs, Maou looked at the address on the receipt and studied the delivery map hanging next to the scooter keys for a few moments.
“Oh, okay, over here. There’s a lot of twisty back alleys down there, so it’s kinda hard to figure out. The apartment buildings all look the same, and stuff.”
Emi absentmindedly watched Maou as he squinted at the map, working out the route to take. She wondered if he knew Akiko was swapping shifts with Chiho, but she resisted asking him—not when he was about to leave. Instead, she silently prepared the pieces of the delivery order she could handle behind the counter.
What would he think if he grew more distant from Chiho? In Emi’s mind, they were closer than ever now that Chiho was going to Ente Isla. If she quit her job to study for exams, it wasn’t like there’d suddenly be this chasm between them.
Emi herself had no plans for her life after the Ignora battle. If she wanted to, she could continue with life in Japan, following in Chiho’s footsteps and preparing for a higher education of her own. But Maou couldn’t. As Devil King, once he was done in heaven, he’d be responsible for commanding his demons. And if he got accepted for a full-time position at MgRonald and decided to try juggling a job in Japan with a job in the demon realm, there’s no way he’d continue the lazy, poor, yet generally contented life he’d led in Villa Rosa Sasazuka up to now.
If it came to that, the question became how he’d want things to be with Chiho…
“…Well.”
Emi shook her head, brushing away the bizarre thoughts taking over her mind. Maybe things were temporarily calmer between humans and demons, but there was still no real détente between the entire human race and the entire demon realm. Maou still hadn’t taken any responsibility for invading Ente Isla in the
first place. But whatever happened with him and Chiho in the future, why was it so easy for her to imagine a future where Maou remained Devil King?
“…I wish he’d get hired on full-time, or do something that’d compel him to stay here for good.”
“Hmm? Did you say something?”
Maou must have heard part of her muttering, because he lifted his eyes from the map and turned her way.
“No, nothing. The order’s all set to go.”
Making sure the burgers and fries were done, Emi placed the cold drinks into the delivery bag and handed it to Maou.
“Thanks.”
He took out his outdoor windbreaker and helmet.
“Oh, and Emi?”
“Yes?”
“You look kinda pale today. Are you sleeping all right?”
“It’s nothing! Get going!”
“Uh, sure. The place is yours.”
The tone of her voice all but pushed Maou out of the store.
Listening to the sound of the engine fade away, Emi let out a little sigh. Maou was just as right as Akiko about the lack of sleep. But she could never reveal to anyone that Maou himself was the cause.
Ever since that night when Suzuno gave her that strange news, Emi had been pressured by Alas Ramus into thinking about what kind of chocolate to give to Maou almost every evening. But perhaps that was shifting the blame. It was Emi, after all, who had planted the thought in Alas Ramus’s mind in the first place.
“…My brain’s coughing up errors again, maybe.”
Why did he have to ask Alas Ramus that?
As explained by Chiho’s friend, if Chiho could give her chocolate alongside Alas Ramus’s own homemade creation, that would take any awkward burden off Maou’s mind. As Emi immediately saw it, this meant she’d have to get involved with the child’s baking. That, in itself, was fine. It was her job to help this tiny child with this messy job, so anything Alas Ramus gave Maou would inherently be a collaboration with Emi. It was a perfectly natural thing for a mother and child to do, and even if Maou accepted it knowing full well Emi was involved, she doubted he would think anything special about it.
But if she did that, she would have to think: What kind of chocolate would make Maou happy? And also: Why did she consider the question at all? Was it simply because she thought Alas Ramus should make something Maou would enjoy? Or was it because she wanted the results to be on par with Chiho’s no-doubt masterpiece, to make the camouflage complete?
Or…
“Ugh… This is so stupid. Stupid.”
Or is because she wanted to do something for Maou’s sake?
“This isn’t funny.”
Her brain was just one big error message. What would thinking any of this accomplish for her?
“What does it matter? If I say Alas Ramus made it, he’ll love it. That’s good enough.”
Saying it out loud—as if that made it more convincing, somehow—Emi switched mental gears and went back to work. A little box on the side of the cash register’s touch panel showed the date as February 13, but she paid it no mind. She didn’t care at all that the following day was Valentine’s Day. Or so she thought.
“Hello! …Oh?”
She thought this new customer would be the perfect way to distract herself. It turned out to be someone she knew well.
“Hey! How’s it hangin’?”
“Hello, Rika. You eating here today?”
“Well, I guess so, in the end.”
Rika Suzuki—Emi’s best friend, and one of the few people on Earth who knew everything about Ente Isla—looked a tad ill at ease. Her caramel-colored long coat and white pants were normal enough, but she also brought in a small, wheeled suitcase, as if embarking on a weekend trip. Emi gave her a look.
“Hey, I don’t see Maou, but he’s here today, right?”
Emi gave her another look. “Huh? Um, he’s out on a delivery right now…but did you need him?”
“Yeah. Well, him and you both. You and Maou work ’til six, right?”
Rika checked her watch. It was four in the afternoon—a bit early for dinner—but why was she aware of Maou’s and Emi’s work schedules in the first place?
“Once you’re both off, there’s some place I want to take you guys to.”
“Me and Maou?”
“Yeah. Oh, um, and I’ll just chill out and have dinner in the meantime, so no need to hurry on my account. Uh, I’ll have a fried-pork burger combo with fries and hot tea, please. I got a coupon for it.”
“Uh, uhhh, oh, thank you. One moment…”
Leaving Emi in the dust, Rika barked out her order, then gave way for the customer behind her. By the time Emi was done handling the line, Rika was already seated at a faraway table.
Maou came back to the restaurant about fifteen minutes after Rika showed up, delivery bag and helmet under his arms. He spotted her right off.
“Rika’s here?”
“Yeah, she came just now. It sounds like she wanted to see us both.”
“Me, too? Really?”
“I guess so, yeah.”
Maou seemed exactly as clueless as her about what it could be.
“Ah, well. We got a bit over an hour until we’re off. Anything else happen?”
“Not in here, no. Nobody went up to the café while you were gone.”
“Ah.”
Maou nodded as he put the keys, helmet, and windbreaker back in place, washing his hands thoroughly before running back upstairs.
“Rika?”
Then, Emi noticed Rika following Maou the whole way with her eyes. When he was gone, she hung her head low, as if exhausted. She had come to visit many times before, but this Rika was like none she had ever known.
Akiko breathed a sigh of relief as she came back down. “Whew! I was worried there’d be some complicated coffee order before Maou came back.” Then, she ran into the restaurant space, looking for work to do.
“…Something’s going on.”
Before Emi’s eyes, Rika was engaged in some truly bizarre behavior. Chiho, meanwhile, hadn’t been acting like herself, either. She pondered this, growing increasingly uncomfortable.
“Ah…nnh.”
She stifled a yawn shortly before it escaped her mouth. Right then, another customer had come in, headed her way, and there was no way could she greet a customer with a full, cheek-stretching yawn. Of course, the cause of that nervous yawn, when you got down to it, was the fact that she had to deliver chocolate to Maou sooner or later. Was she really acting any less strange than Rika or Chiho? Maybe she was the weirdest of all.
“Hello! Feel free to order at the counter when you’re ready.”
It took a mental reset to drum up the energy to deliver that peppy greeting.
“Sorry to bother you guys out of nowhere.”
“No, it’s fine, but where are we going?”
Emi and Maou were following Rika as the three of them took his usual commuter route.
“Um, it’s right nearby. You mind walking a little bit?”
“Sure, but…”
“Uh, wherever we’re going, I’d like to stop by my apartment first…”
Rika turned her head toward Maou, who was already busy griping as he walked his bike along, and nodded. “Sure thing. It’s right by your place anyway.”
“It is? What is?”
“You’ll see, you’ll see. Hey, Emi, is Alas Ramus with you?”
“Huh? Yes…”
Neither Suzuno nor Urushihara were available today, and since she only worked until six anyway, she decided to just give Alas Ramus a bit more time in “fusion” mode than usual.
“Good. Because I’m sorry, um, the person we’re meeting with said not to tell you anything until we all arrived, so…”
““Huh?””
This was making less and less sense to Maou and Emi. If they were headed near Villa Rosa Sasazuka, neither of them could think of any place Rika would know about. Maybe Shiba’s home next to the apartment building? If so,
then why all this secrecy? And what was in that suitcase of hers, making a huge racket as she rolled it down the asphalt? She looked like she was about to board a train for a quick overnighter—there was no reason at all for her to stay at Maou’s deserted apartment building.
So the procession continued, Rika leading the way for the thoroughly perplexed pair, until they reached Villa Rosa Sasazuka.
“Okay,” Maou said as he parked his bike, “so seriously, where are we going?”
“It’s no place bad, I promise. Oh, and we’ll get dinner over there, too, so don’t worry about that.”
“Dinner?” Emi reflexively asked. “Is it a restaurant or something?” Rika was sounding extremely weird to her. If they were going someplace that offered dinner, she would have mentioned that first thing, not right now.
“Not…exactly, no. But I guess they got a lot of stuff you wouldn’t normally get to eat, so…”
Rika put her hands together.
“But save the questions for later and just get ready for me, okay? If you don’t like it, you can leave anytime. I can make up for it.”
“…All right. Whatever!”
Maou looked as confused as ever; however, he was getting a bit sick of all the local restaurants he knew. If he could try some uncommon cuisine tonight, that was as good an excuse to go out as any. Plus, it was Rika inviting them, and he knew Rika wouldn’t hang out anywhere too weird. It wasn’t exactly normal, no, but so be it.
So Maou asked the other two to wait a moment as he climbed the stairs—but the moment Maou disappeared down the upstairs hall, Rika lifted her suitcase and ran up herself.
“Whoa, Rika?”
Emi, in a panic, followed her. But Rika was so far ahead, she even had the time to see if she was being pursued. And before Emi could make it up, Rika was in the hallway and plunging right into Room 201.
“Whoa! Wh-what’re you doing? I told you to wait!”
Maou, about to take a puffy winter jacket off a hanger in his room (a little extra layer for the cold night), gave Rika a shocked look. Emi, following close behind, was astounded to find Rika standing on his tatami-mat floor, not even bothering to take her shoes off.
The Devil Is a Part-Timer!, Vol. 16 Page 11
