The Melancholy of the Demon Army Officer
Translator: Tsukii
Editor: Geli
Read at Watashi wa Sugoi Desu!
Chapter 029 – Negotiation[B]
“…Eh?”
“…?”
The sisters were stunned, likely because those weren’t the words they’d expected to hear. Leonhart repeated his question. It was an important matter for him.
“Can you cook?”
“…E-er, I can cook… and my little sister can also help with it…”
“…Un.”
The little sister nodded when her older sister glanced at her.
Then there wouldn’t be any problem. Leonhart was pleased with their response and decided on what to do with them.
“Then just cook some meals for me.”
“Hah, e-eh… hah…?”
It seemed that their minds had yet to catch up with the situation. The woman tilted her head as she squeaked out incoherently.
“…What, are you saying you can’t cook then?”
“Eh, ah, no… I can, but… do you mean to ask me to cook for you for the rest of my life?”
“There’s no way that I mean that. You don’t need to worry since I will send you two off to the town when the time is right. It will be during nighttime at the latest… Carol, you can do it, right?”
“Leave it to me, Leonhart-sama! I’ve already mastered how to infiltrate the human town!”
“…”
The sisters turned to each other with disbelieving expressions. Then the elder sister shot Leonhart a conflicted look.
“…Are you trying to make us drop our guard?”
“It’s understandable that you have such thoughts. I’ve had no intention to do anything to you two since the beginning.”
“Be thankful for Leonhart-sama’s mercy! No other majin would do such a thing!”
“I-I see…”
Leonhart gazed at Carol while ignoring the woman, who was having a hard time responding.
“Carol, untie the rope on the other one.”
“Yes! There, she untied!”
Carol quickly untied the rope as ordered. The now free girl ran up to her sister, although she was still confused by the situation; then her gaze wandered between Leonhart and Carol.
“Tha-thank you…?”
“Ah.”
Leonhart briefly responded to the girl who gave her gratitude, and then turned his gaze toward the elder sister.
“Anyway, just stay here for today. The Demon Army is securing the border by now, so I can’t send you to escape at the moment.”
“…O-okay.”
“To be honest, I want to be the one who cooks for Leonhart-sama…”
“Although you have some knowledge, your cooking skill is just average. Although I’m not Galtia, I’ve recently developed a preference for eating tasty food, if possible… All of this is his fault…”
“Muu… too bad.”
“…”
The woman’s mouth dropped as she heard the conversation between Leonhard and Carol. In contrast to the stunned elder sister, the little sister looked at the majin and his apostle and said,
“…They somehow feel like humans…”
“…Eh, yes… you’re right.”
Leonhart could hear them due to his keen sense of hearing as a majin but chose to ignore them. There was no reason for him to go out of his way and explain it to them. However, there was an apostle who didn’t understand her master’s intentions, Carol, who was still here and responded to such a comment.
“Fufuhn! Don’t you know? Leonhart-sama was originally—“
“—Carol, don’t say unnecessary things.”
“Eh… ah, my apologies!!”
“Geez…”
When Leonhart sharply rebuked her, Carol immediately bowed her head. Looking at his apostle, Leonhart tiredly rubbed his brow.
Furthermore, the woman managed to figure out the implications of her words, and while she felt a little uncomfortable asking, she couldn’t help herself from doing so.
“Err… did you used to be a human?”
“…Tch. I wonder about that.”
Leonhart clicked his tongue when he realized that she managed to understand. Although he neither affirmed nor denied her words, he was practically admitting he was by his own attitude.
Although she felt uncomfortable with the mood in the room, she suddenly felt a sense of closeness with him; thus, she asked more.
“Did you hate humanity so much that you chose to become a majin?”
“…It’s not like that.”
“Then why?”
“…Things happened.”
“Fuhn… then how did you become a majin?”
“You’re persistent! Why should I tell you that?!”
Because of the woman’s persistent attempts to dig into his origins, he unintentionally ended up answering harshly. What’s with this woman? There should be a limit to how impudent you could be.
However, even though Leonhart carelessly yelled at her, the woman didn’t shut her mouth and continued to speak.
“Ah, you see-…isn’t it a rare opportunity to talk to a majin? Since I can talk to you, I couldn’t help myself from asking more…”
“O-onee-chan… just stop it… he looks really angry, you know…?”
“Ahaha… ah, then may I ask one last question?”
“…What is it?”
Even the little sister seemed to be troubled by her elder sister’s attitude as she pulled at her sister’s arm to try to stop her; but still, the elder sister couldn’t seem to stop talking. As he saw that, Leonhart felt his hostility dissipate a bit. Considering how she talks to a majin, does this woman have a few screws loose on her head?
Leonhart was dumbfounded by this and continued to openly stare at her, but the woman ignored that and asked with a slightly serious tone.
“…Why are you helping us escape?”
She asked that question. Leonhart looked away from the woman when he heard it. Then, after thinking for a while, he slowly answered.
“…It’s just—a whim of mine.”
“…I see.”
The woman nodded sympathetically at Leonhart’s answer that he just felt like doing it. Leonhart felt an indescribable feeling at her reaction. To be honest, it was uncomfortable. Leonhart stood up abruptly, and moved as if he couldn’t keep them company anymore.
“…Fuhn, I forgot to say something to the demon general. I’ll be leaving for a bit.”
“Ah! Then me too!”
“No, you don’t have to. Just keep an eye on them.”
“Certainly! Have a nice day!”
“…”
They saw him off, and Leonhart felt annoyed at the other gaze on his back that was mixing with Carol’s. What’s there to be thankful for? I did save you this time, but did you already forget that it was also this Leonhart that forced you into this state in the first place? Do you think I’m easy to get along with just because I used to be human?
And more than anything, I’m pissed off at myself that I’m happy that she was so understanding.
“Tch…”
Leonhart clicked his tongue again as he left the house. He bitterly scrunched up his face. He couldn’t show such expressions to anyone. As he tried to dispel his frustration, Leonhart approached the square where the demon generals were gathered.
Unlike when he’d left earlier, the demon soldiers were gathering materials and starting construction work in the village square and in other locations within the village. They worked fast. And there were many of them, so it was more convenient for him. Leonhart then called out to one of the demon generals.
“Is it going well?”
“Mu, oh Leonhart-sama.”
“Ah, skip the greetings. Just continue your work. It’s no matter if you forgo greeting me since you’re busy with work.”
“..Thank you for your consideration.”
He stopped the demon generals and the others from formally greeting him. It would be bad if work was suspended every time he came, and it would make him unable to walk as he pleased. It would also trouble him if it affected their work.
The demon general bowed slightly at his consideration.
Leonhart looked around before speaking to the demon general again.
“…It seems it’s going well.”
“Of course it is. We are now carrying the materials over… More than that, did Leonhart-sama need something from us?”
“…how do you know that I want something?”
“No, I saw that you’d just taken a break earlier… yet you’re leaving your dwelling not long after, so I could only infer that you wanted to ask us for something. I’m sorry if I assumed incorrectly…”
“…I see.”
Leonhart was inwardly impressed and convinced by those words. At the same time, he was amazed by the excellence of this demon general.
He really did need something from him, but… although he wanted it internally, he would never say it outright. He only visited them to gossip for a bit—in preparation to let the two escape.
Therefore, Leonhart lifted a corner of his mouth as he answered the demon general’s question.
“Too bad, but you’re wrong. Well, I went a little bit too far. Sorry, please give me a sack.”
“A sack, is it…? Sorry, but what will you—“
Leonhart answered his question before he could finish speaking.
“The two from earlier—it seems like I already broke them. The house stinks now, so I wanted to ask Carol to just throw them away for me…”
“! So that’s what happened… Then I’ll prepare it soon. —Oi!”
The demon general was slightly surprised when he heard the reason, but he reacted calmly enough. Demon generals were quick on the uptake, so they were also capable of taking care of such things. He called out to the nearby demon soldiers.
A demon soldier hurriedly replied.
“Ye-yes!”
“You heard us, right? Then prepare a sack immediately.”
“Roger that!”
The demon soldier rushed to fetch a sack. Meanwhile, Leonhart was observing his surroundings.
Even if they were busy with work, they should have overheard Leonhart’s conversation with the demon general. However, they quickly shut their mouths as soon as they were called out to by the demon general, their superior.
That just showed how rare it was for Leonhart to kill humans outside of the battlefield. On top of that, he said it in such a way that implied he enjoyed it. They’ve never heard of him doing such a thing.
Therefore, even the demon general aide was surprised by it. Not even he, who’d served Leonhart for a long time, had ever seen him act like this.
Leonhart was satisfied to see that the people around him had reacted as expected.
“I’ll head back after you give me the sack. Also, don’t approach the house unless there’s an emergency.”
“Hah, certainly.”
Leonhart gave such a warning. Inwardly however, he was glad that the preparations were completed.
All that was left was to eat, then to stuff them into the bag before sending them off to the town. He could send them to safety that way.
Leonhart quickly returned to the house as soon as he received the sack to explain the plan to the girls.
“I expected this, but there’s way too many demon soldiers here…!”
The black haired woman, Hunty Kalar, continued to move through the gaps between the surrounding demon soldiers.
However, her surroundings were clearly different from normal. It was hard to describe this space, which was dyed in red and where the overall color reversed.
And more than anything, the clearest difference was—everything around her has stopped moving.
Whether it was the sun, the sky, the clouds, other living beings, and even demons, none of them could move here.
Only Hunty Kalar moved in this world where time has stopped.
This was the true nature of her magic, Instant Movement, which was a magic of the highest caliber.
And the space she was in was another space known as the admiral space. She would phase from the real world to this admiral space, and then would move toward her destination by walking there, before phasing back to the real world. That was how Instant Movement worked.
There was no doubt that it was an amazing magic with tremendous potential, but it wasn’t perfect. There were several conditions that needed to be met before she could cast it and there were demerits as well.
One of these demerits was Hunty’s current source of worry. Not only were the demon soldiers securing the surrounding area, they were positioned around with practically no blind spot for her to exploit in the village. She couldn’t move them or attack them from this side of the space.
This was one of the conditions. She couldn’t interfere with objects from this side of the space.
Admiral space belonged to a different space than reality, and it was a realm where the world has stopped moving. Since it was impossible for her to move the object in reality, Hunty had no choice but to find a gap between the demon soldiers in reality and exit this space through the demons’ blind spot.
In the same respect, she couldn’t enter the buildings. It might be different if the doors or windows were opened, but unfortunately all the doors of the houses were all closed.
“I can’t find the two from this side of the space… it seems I really need to phase back to reality for once…”
After spending some time searching for blind spots in the village, she finally found one. It was an open barrel near one of the houses.
“So I need to enter this barrel and exit, huh… okay.”
There, Hunty escaped from admiral space and phased back to reality. The color of the world returned to normal.
“I’m okay… it seems.”
Hunty peek at the situation outside from within the barrel. However, the important part started now.
After all, she didn’t even know where the two of them were. If she knew, then she could forcibly break through to save them. Due to certain reasons, she couldn’t use Instant Movement to spirit them away, so it would be practically impossible to shake off the demon soldiers. She already knew this the moment she saw the demons securing their position here… but if it were possible, then she wished to confirm the location of the two beforehand.
However, it couldn’t be helped in this case. As expected, she had no choice but to raise a fuss here and to use that as an opening to collect those two. This was because, unless she could create a breach in the demons’ perimeter, it would be impossible to leave.
“Okay…!”
Then and there, Hunty resolved herself. She began to chant. Her aim was one of the nearby demon generals, and the demon captains and demon soldiers who seemed to work on something. She aimed to cause confusion with her first attack.
Hunty finished readying herself and then jumped out of the barrel.
T/N:
Hello again! Since the name has been revealed, we will go for the illustration
Hunty Kalar: https://i.ibb.co/dMwXW9m/Hanty-Younger.png
As for the description, well, you will see her often over the course of the story, so just enjoy the description when it appears!
Want early access to Cannon Fodder, Melancholy of the Demon Army Officer, and I Was a Man Before Reincarnating, So I Refuse a Reverse Harem? Support the translator on Patreon!
