Maou – Chapter 8: City in a parallel world

—Holy Light Kingdom: Commerce City, Yahoo.

“The naming sense of this country is terrible, in a lot of ways.” (Maou)

“Really?” (Aku)

The crowd of people coming and going is certainly the appropriate liveliness in a commerce city. This city doesn’t have something that could be called a specialty product, but it is in a geographical position where many trading routes intersect, so it gathers many goods from different places.

There’s people with turbans wrapped around, muscular warriors, women wearing dancer-like clothings that have high skin exposure, an old lady at the corner of the street making suspicious fortune telling, and there’s even merchants riding on big lizards.

“It is impressive how they can ride that…” (Maou)

“That’s called a Sand Lizard, and they are docile, you know.” (Aku)

Aku is speaking happily.

He is normally the one being surprised, so he must be happy being able to teach Maou something. But well, Aku also has practically zero knowledge of the city. The only times he left the village were when his parents were still alive, and that was a long time ago.

Looking at the main street, there were many street stalls, and because each of their respective roofs were colorful, it felt as if there was some sort of festival going on. There’s a lot of poor lands in the remote places of the Holy Light Kingdom, but in contrast, the prospering places are prospering greatly.

(The so called ‘wealth gap’, huh…) (Maou)

Maou had that thought surfacing in his mind faintly. It is true that the qualitative difference in this country was very bad. And this not only affected the area, but people individually.

The descendants of the people that fought against the Devil King together with the Cherub became nobles, and they are now standing at the top of the general populace, enjoying a life of luxury.

Thanks to the religion that worships the Cherub, the country is united as one, but the inside has an incredibly high amount of confrontations. There’s people shouting about removing the noble system, and there’s also others that have fallen into despair towards this society and finally join the side of worshipping the Devils.

All of this internal discord is made possible thanks to being far away from the demon race territory.

In a land where the demon race is prevalent, they wouldn’t have that ‘luxury’.

“We have the gold, so how about buying something?” (Maou)

“That’s the money of the Holy Maiden-sama…” (Aku)

“As if there’s the need for a Holy Maiden that tries to kill people all of sudden… She did look like she was enjoying the spanking. That’s a depraved woman.” (Maou)

Maou approaches a street stall and peeks at the things being sold.

It seems like some kind of meat is being grilled, and there’s a slight pepper-like smell.

Right at that moment, Maou’s stomach rung.

He has only eaten the <<dried bread>> that was stored at the base. Aku ate it in bliss, but for Maou, it was nothing but torture.

“How much is this?” (Maou)

“3 skewers for 5 copper coins.”

“Aku, which one is the copper coin?” (Maou)

“This one! W-Wow…there’s even big coppers. Eh?! Could this be the rumored silver coin?!” (Aku)

With the surprised Aku at the corner of his eye, Maou grabs the copper coin, that is small but beautifully casted, without any care and gives it to the stallkeeper.

Even though it is someone else’s money, he had no hesitation in wasting it.

“Aku, it is my treat. Eat to your heart’s content.” (Maou)

“Uhm, this is my second time saying this but…this is the money of the Holy Maiden-sama…” (Aku)

What Maou is saying is not wrong. No matter the reason, she suddenly tried to kill him, so she had no right to complain if she were to be killed instead.

But in this case, the fact that the opponent was a Holy Maiden was way too out of the ordinary in a lot of meanings.

“If this were an eroge, it would have a title like <<The captured Holy Maiden -I hate making children with you!>> and would be going straight to the sex slave route, you know? Thinking about it that way, I am moved to tears by my own kindness.” (Maou)

“What’s an eerouge?” (Aku) <Don’t google it… Who am I kidding, most of you know.>

“Oi oi, you…those are some rare clothes you got there. You must be an outsider, right? This country doesn’t allow slaves, you know? You can’t say that even as a joke.”

The stallkeeper cuts in cause of the Maou’s way of speaking.

There’s a terrible disparity in the quality of life of the Holy Light Kingdom, but slaves are not allowed in the slightest. If you break this law, no matter how high your position, you will be immediately judged.

“You are talking as if the outside countries do have slaves.” (Maou)

“The north and east do… they are uncivilized there after all.”

(Uncivilized, huh… I think that the tops in this country are plenty uncivilized themselves though.) (Maou)

Maou thought of this but didn’t say it, and instead threw one of the skewers.

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

—Inn ‘Google it’.

“There really are a lot of terrible names.” (Maou)

“Is that so? I think it is cute though.” (Aku)

The name itself is weird, but it is said to be the most luxurious inn of this Yahoo city.

Commoners wouldn’t be able to climb that threshold.

Maou approached the counter and talks to the innkeeper. Even though it is his first city, he had a bold posture. —You could even call it bullshit courage.

He had turned completely deviant.

“Innkeeper, give me the best room you have.” (Maou)

The words of Maou made the innkeeper furrow his brows for a moment, but when he saw that appearance of his, he rethinks it.

It is an unfamiliar attire, but in the eyes of the innkeeper that have been trained in the customer service business, he could tell at a glance that those clothes of his were made from quite the high quality cloth.

“The best room would be 1 gold…”

“Eeeh?! We can’t, Maou-sama!” (Aku)

“M-Maou?”

It was such a high price that it made Aku shout, but the innkeeper sends a dubious look at them when the word ‘Maou’ was spoken.

“N-No, my name is Ma Ou, you see. It is so misleading it troubles me.” (Maou)

“I-Is that so…”  

The innkeeper was making a dubious expression, but he didn’t try to pursue the topic further. He was visibly from an outside country, an there’s different customs depending on the country.

With that innkeeper in the corner of their eyes, Maou and Aku began a meeting with [Whisper].

<<I told you not to call me Maou in front of others! Call me Onii-san!!>> (Maou)

<<Eeeh…I feel like that’s pushing it a bit too much…>> (Aku)

<<Then, something like Aniki, Onii-chan, Senpai, there’s a lot on the table to choose, you know.>> (Maou)

<<H-How about P-Papa…?>> (Aku)

<<Don’t joke around! I am a fresh out of the water bachelor!!>> (Maou)

The fact that he used a word like fresh-out-of-the-water was already enough for this man to lose the qualifications to be called Onii-san.

“A-At any rate, one gold, right? This should be sufficient.” (Maou)

Maou takes out a gold coin from inside the leather bag and gives it to the innkeeper.

Maou held Aku’s mouth shut and Aku was flapping around, but the innkeeper who received the money guided the two to their room with a pleased expression.

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“…Quite the nice view.” (Maou)

Entering a room of the highest class, Maou looks at the view from the window with an air of greatness.

On the inside, he was surprised by the extravagant room, but since he is with Aku, he was playing the cool guy.

“A-Amazing…This is like the house of a noble!” (Aku)

“Hmph… I in time will be making a castle fitting for me.” (Maou)

Maou said exaggeratedly, but what kind of effect will it create in the world when he actually manages to do it? He wasn’t thinking that far ahead yet. No, this man is not even thinking at all about shouldering responsibility for something as vague as ‘the world’.

Who would even think about the effects on the whole world when taking every action in their life? Everyone works for their own sake, eat for their own sake, sleep for their own sake. In the same way as that, this man is trying to regain all his Rights for his own sake.

The result of that may create many a bloodshed, but he might bring salvation.

No one knows what the future will bring at this point in time…

“Incidentally, calling me Maou-sama would be bad in a lot of ways. Is there no other way to call me?” (Maou)

“K-Kunai-sama…maybe?” (Aku)

“Hmm, doesn’t click for me.” (Maou)

He is a hard to please man.

This kind of guys find it really difficult to decide on a place to eat outside or places to go on dates.

“…Isn’t Onii-chan a good one?” (Maou)

“No.” (Aku)

Maou was putting a pointless struggle here, but Aku cut it off cleanly.

Aku must have also matured compared to the time they first met. At this rate, there’s no doubt he could become a nice brake for the Maou that is prompt to run wild.

“Anyways, that meat just now was incredibly delicious!” (Aku)

“Hm? Well, yeah.” (Maou)

The innocent words of Aku make Maou hesitate to speak.

In Maou’s opinion, that meat was definitely not one he would label as delicious. The blood wasn’t properly drained, the meat was hard, and the stink of beast still remained.

That’s probably why they forcefully hid the scent with things like pepper.

Because of things like this, Maou purposely came to the highest class inn. There’s no doubt he wanted to at least eat a decent meal.

“B-But I also like the ‘dried bread’. It is a tint sweet and it brings me happiness.” (Aku)

“Happiness, huh…” (Maou)

Aku’s expression loosens, and seeing this, Maou’s expression darkens for a moment.

That’s basically emergency rations.

It is true that in the setting of the game, the Grand Empire also showed their minuteness in the emergency rations as well, so they did devise a variety of things for it, but in Maou’s opinion, it can’t be called food.

“In that case, let’s go for our next ‘happiness’ and have an extravagant dinner today.” (Maou)

Hearing this, Aku walks to Maou in joy and grabs his hand.

Maou directed his gaze to the painful right leg of Aku for an instant, but he didn’t say anything and simply held up Aku’s body and placed him on his shoulder.

“Before that, let’s do something about your clothes. I don’t know about how it works in this world, but in a dinner, your attire is important too.” (Maou)

“Clothes?” (Aku)

In the head of Maou, he had already forgotten completely that it is the money of the Holy Maiden. He was already using it thoroughly as if it were his money.

There was no sliver of guilt in his eyes.

If Own Goal saw this look of his, he would shout ‘that guy is a true bandit’.

And in this way, the shopping of Maou-sama and Aku began…

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A part of the data is now available.

[Magic]

Controls what is defined as ‘elements’ in this world, and activates it.

The four basic elements: Earth, Water, Fire, and Wind.
The uncommon that are: Light and Dark.
For a total of six.

Among those there’s the higher elements that only people who have overcome the wall are able to use.
The talented ones can combine elements, and there’s even those who are able to control those combined elements.

Depending on the amount of letters in the spell’s name, there’s the first to tenth tier magic, but even the out of bounds Devil King had a limit of sixth tier magic.

By the way, what Luna utilized was ‘gold’.
The higher version of the light element is holy element.
The ‘gold’ that she utilizes is separate from light, and you could even call the element an original one.

Self-Defeat not dying after receiving a hit of it must be because he possessed a special skill.

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