Lord Demon is behind you

"...Carnival? Ah, I've heard of it." The Demon King thought for a moment, "It's a celebration where people from a place get together to celebrate festivals, right?"

The streets are crowded with people, and all kinds of people, men, women and children are interacting very normally.Joking and chatting, complaining to each other, young parents pulling their children, young men and women holding hands...

"These shouldn't be real people, right?"

It should be impossible for humans to exist in the Demon King's City, and Olga wouldn't just arrest a bunch of ordinary people just to set up a checkpoint.

"It is neither meow. In order to create a sense of festive atmosphere, Olga specially locked the festival celebration video of a certain human town a few years ago from the time record, and then projected it in front of you meow! Including passers-by and most shops in the Inside, these are magic images, meow."

"That is to say, can we only watch and not interact here? It seems a bit boring..."

As expected of the Demon Lord, he accepted this setting almost immediately.

"That's true. If you can't participate in it at all, the carnival will be no fun. So Olga and I replaced some of the shops that were conditional to open with real cats, and the same familiar as Olga will be in charge. It works! The Brave One can play casually at the booth that Olga is in charge of, and there is no charge at all, meow!"

While speaking, dozens of familiars with Olga at the door turned to this side at the same time, and bowed in unison, with a crisp voice: "Master Brave, please come in, let's have fun!"

After speaking, they dispersed separately, not knowing which stall or store they went to.

At the end of the magic image, Olga also seemed to be particularly excited.

"What do you think? Are you happier? Well, come and have fun and forget about the unpleasant things!"

"..."

To be honest, the brave man is not in the mood of "playing" now, so he is quite at a loss when faced with Olga's invitation.

Until a long time after the magic image was turned off, he still stood there in a daze.

"Brave," the Demon King pressed his shoulders, and suggested thoughtfully, "If you don't want to go in, let's take a detour? Didn't the cat girl say that this is a special additional level, maybe you can pass it without going in?" Passed."

"No, no need," the brave man settled down, "let's go."

The Demon King sighed.

"Don't force yourself, Brave. Although I don't know why you are unhappy, but...Some negative emotions can't be forgotten after a carnival, right? If the matter can't be resolved, it's pointless to numb yourself with entertainment—more What's more, you are not the kind of person who can paralyze yourself. If you force yourself to hide your emotions, you will be even more unhappy, right?"

This kind of behavior is like when someone’s family member is seriously ill, others persuade him to anesthetize himself by drinking and chatting—since the matter is too serious to be ignored, deliberately forgetting will only lead to further anxiety.

"But, this is specially prepared by Olga—"

"Well, you don't have to think too much about that cat girl's emotions, Brave. Demons don't have empathy at all. Even if she feels your unhappiness, she won't be able to understand it fundamentally. So... "

The devil hesitated to speak.

Near the gate, there are several sets of empty tables and chairs—it seems to be a small open-air shop selling cold drinks and snacks.The two of them sat down here first.

This is a corner away from the crowd, and will not be disturbed by too many magical images, so you can talk about things more quietly.

The Olga-type clerk with cat ears ran over cheerfully and handed over the menu in the most standard attitude of a vigorous maid. The price of all the drinks on it was "0".

The two temporarily stopped the previous topic.The Demon King carefully studied the menu in front of him and asked an unexpected question.

"'Coffee'...I've heard of this drink, but why does it take up a whole page for just one drink? Black coffee, white coffee, espresso...they're all brewed with the same thing, right? Is there any difference between each other?"

"Sorry, I don't know."

The brave man could only shake his head.He rarely had the opportunity to sit in this kind of place - he always felt that coffee and the like, which were closer to the pastime of rich people, were not very suitable for him.

"Then—that's it," the Demon King cheered up suddenly, "Everything on this page comes with a copy!"

Hearing this, faint blue veins appeared on the clerk's forehead.

"Let me refuse, meow! Generally speaking, this place was originally a place to serve the brave man, and the previous generation was just a piggyback. Please stop in moderation, meow!"

"...Don't trouble others."

The brave man took the menu away and tapped him on the head lightly.

"And order so much, you can't drink it at all, right? It's not a good behavior to waste food."

"……sorry."

The Demon King covered his forehead, and his momentum suddenly weakened.

After the clerk left, the brave man reorganized his thoughts and told the information he got from Olga the night before.

"So that's what happened. Well, I understand why you, Brave, are in such a bad mood." The devil clasped his hands together, "According to your way of thinking, you must be blaming yourself endlessly now."

——I kept thinking "It's all because I wasn't careful enough" "My companions did this because they were worried about me" and so on.

"However, regardless of the issue of attribution of responsibility... I have long thought that it is strange that they, a few human beings, can know how to convert into demons, right?"

"……Hey?"

Before, I always felt that after all, the matter had already happened, and it was meaningless to pursue the cause, so the brave man just took this as an established fact and directly accepted it; now that I think about it, it is indeed the case——

Why are humans able to convert into demons?

The catgirl waiter served soda water, and the two paused their conversation, each thinking silently.

"Actually, the Demon Realm occasionally accepts humans." After a while, the Demon King said, "Some humans do not agree with the rules of the Human Realm, or are rejected by the Human Realm, or simply yearn for the Demon Race, so they will flee to the Demon Realm to seek Asylum - in this case, they will be transformed into 'acquired demons', that is, existences with the same nature as those ten women."

"In other words, is there really such a secret method?"

"Yes, there must be. But it stands to reason that the transformation ceremony needs the guidance of the superior demons. There is no reason why humans can do it by themselves. What about gathering ten girls... This is too outrageous."

After drinking all the water in the cup in one go, the Demon King came to a conclusion.

"I smell a conspiracy from inside!"

conspiracy?Does it mean that there is a mastermind behind it?

"Impossible. Creating a new demon king and messing up the world, who would benefit from such a thing?"

Besides, Her Royal Highness has the right to freely enter and exit the kingdom's magic treasure house, where the crystallization of human civilization and wisdom for thousands of years is preserved.Maybe there is a treasure left over from the past hidden in it, which happens to be able to transform people into demons, and she just happened to find it.

"It might just be a coincidence. But, brave man..."

He held his forehead pretending to be deep, "This series of events is indeed full of strange things, there is nothing wrong with being more careful!"

"Such words... are not convincing at all when they come out of your mouth."

——If you want to talk about strange things, the Demon King himself in front of you is probably the strangest.

From the beginning of suppressing strength and easily admitting defeat, mingling with the brave man and then suddenly confessing, the witches suddenly became companions after appearing, and fighting with the brave man-everything is very strange.

Even though we have gone through a lot of incidents together now, the brave man is willing to believe him.

"Me? I'm very ordinary. Everything I do is to get the hero."

He bit his straw and mumbled.

...The strange thing is here.

After going around and around, I returned to the question of "why do demons fall in love with humans".The brave man felt that if he didn't understand this point, he would never be able to truly understand the other party.

...There is no need to understand it.It's just a temporary companionship anyway - he thought deludedly.

However, after hearing the hypothesis that "there is actually a mastermind behind the scenes", his mentality has indeed improved a lot.Human beings are probably such a sad creature: when the responsibility on themselves can be shared, they will instinctively choose a more relaxed assumption.

The two then started walking slowly down the street.

It is really a strange feeling to be among a group of three-dimensional images constructed by magic.There are human postures and human voices on the front, back, left, and right, but they can't feel any breath of living people; past……

Everything is completely weird, like the meeting of two different worlds.Opposite is the human world, and here is the meeting point; standing here, I can only observe everything quietly.

The brave man let out a breath of foul air.

The noise and prosperity in the image further accentuated the loneliness in reality.Olga's original intention of projecting this scene was probably to make the scene more lively, but judging from the results, it seemed to have the opposite effect.

The Demon King is full of energy—probably because he has long been used to the behavior of observing from a distance.This time it was rare to get a closer look, so I was very excited, and ran to a certain store from time to time, yelling at some ordinary things.

"Brave man! There is actually that toy sold here, what is it called, whack-a-mole?"

He pointed at the counter of a certain toy store and shouted from a distance.

"But the big toy next to it seems to be more popular. Does this thing have a name?"

"Uh..." The brave man took a look, "It should be called, claw machine...?"

I remember that it was a new type of machine in the past two years. It was driven by a magic power source injected at regular intervals. The player could manipulate the metal clip above to move the position and pick up the small doll below.Many toy stores will put it outside the door to attract customers.

"Human beings really know how to play." After watching many young people fail to hold dolls, the Demon King sighed sincerely, "This kind of thing is very interesting just by looking at it... Doesn't that cat girl plan to open a shop that can play with it? "

"No no, no matter how powerful Olga is, it is impossible to make meow from a claw machine." The Olga-type clerk behind the barbecue booth next to him replied, "Don't look at this as a toy, but it uses A high-tech product made with the latest magic technology, meow! Don’t underestimate the wisdom of human beings in the previous generation, meow.”

"Speaking of it," she immediately raised the small shovel in her hand, "Master Brave, do you want some fried squid meow? I remember that Master Brave likes this meow very much."

"Ah, thank you."

The brave man took the food wrapped in oil-absorbing paper.

"I have an impression of this thing! It is the one that the brave will buy on the street every time!"

The Demon King immediately said, "I want to try one too—hmm."

The cat's ear's familiar pushed the stall away, completely ignoring the demon king's appeal.

"...I don't think you will like this kind of food."

Even though he said that, probably because the Demon King's expression of disappointing expectations was too pitiful, the brave man still handed over the share in his hand.

The devil carefully tore off a piece, and when he chewed, he really showed a subtle look.

"It can't be said that it's not delicious..." Probably worried about the preferences of the brave man, he finally commented with reservations, "I feel that the taste of the seasoning is stronger than the taste of the ingredients. It doesn't seem very healthy."

"Ah, because it's junk food in the first place."

Olga should still be cooking in a relatively healthy way, but in those small stalls in the streets and alleys of the world, most of the similar foods are fried with low-quality cooking oil.

Looking at the fried squid missing a whisker in his hand, his eyes were a little empty.

"But even this nutritious junk food sometimes..."

"...Hero? What's wrong?"

The brave came back to his senses.

"fine."

He raised the food in his hand and bit down normally.

The author has something to say:

...why do I feel like a date for no reason==