The Devil Is a Part-Timer!, Vol. 7 Read online

  Copyright

  THE DEVIL IS A PART-TIMER!, Volume 7

  SATOSHI WAGAHARA, ILLUSTRATION BY 029 (ONIKU)

  Translation by Kevin Gifford

  Cover art by 029 (oniku)

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  HATARAKU MAOUSAMA!, Volume 7

  © SATOSHI WAGAHARA 2013

  All rights reserved.

  Edited by ASCII MEDIA WORKS

  First published in 2013 by KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo.

  English translation rights arranged with KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo, through Tuttle-Mori Agency, Inc., Tokyo.

  English translation © 2017 by Yen Press, LLC

  Yen Press, LLC supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact the publisher. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Wagahara, Satoshi. | 029 (Light novel illustrator) illustrator. | Gifford, Kevin, translator.

  Title: The devil is a part-timer! / Satoshi Wagahara ; illustration by 029 (oniku) ; translation by Kevin Gifford.

  Other titles: Hataraku Maousama!. English

  Description: First Yen On edition. | New York, NY : Yen On, 2015–

  Identifiers: LCCN 2015028390| ISBN 9780316383127 (v. 1 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385015 (v. 2 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385022 (v. 3 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385039 (v. 4 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385046 (v. 5 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385060 (v. 6 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316469364 (v. 7 : pbk.)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Fantasy.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.W34 Ha 2015 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015028390

  ISBNs: 978-0-316-46936-4 (paperback) 978-0-316-47262-3 (ebook)

  E3-20170320-JV-PC

  THE DEVIL PLEDGES TO STAY LEGITIMATE

  Perhaps it could be called the ultimate move of self-sacrifice, the equivalent of cutting his own throat in order to save the team. He was defeated in battle, unable to turn the tides of war; he was surrounded, with only a meager crew of fellow warriors. His master’s life was gradually being chipped away, too, under the unwitting spell of one of his own corrupted generals.

  He knew the time had come to make a decision. To turn the tables on this desperate scene, he knew he had to take action on his own. He bowed his head to his master as the man dined even now on the tainted food the enemy had provided.

  “…My liege.”

  “Mm? What, Ashiya?”

  Sadao Maou turned to him, his eyes clouded and bleary. His master had been tortured by his foes, beaten down until he was at the bottommost dregs of his energy and motivation. He was being fed far, far more than his stomach ever had a chance of storing. The pall of death was coming into focus on his face even now.

  “I would most humbly ask you for some time off.”

  “…Huh?”

  “Wha?”

  “What?!”

  “Uhh…”

  “Yawwn…”

  For the group piled into the narrow confines of Devil’s Castle, aka Room 201 of the sixty-year-old Villa Rosa Sasazuka apartment building, each had their own reaction as they stared agape at the kneeling demon named Shirou Ashiya.

  “Wow,” Emi Yusa—better known as the Hero Emilia and the Devil King’s One True Enemy—said with a blank stare at Ashiya. “Can I take this as a sign that the Devil King’s Army is collapsing?”

  She had been in the process of taking up the collar of one Hanzou Urushihara—formerly known as the fallen angel Lucifer, and now more properly known as an unemployed freeloader—in order to toss him out the window. Her attention, diverted by Ashiya’s sudden bombshell, made her grip loosen to the point that Urushihara fell limply to the tatami-mat floor instead.

  “Yowch…,” he murmured as he passed out, a hairbreadth away from asphyxiation.

  By mere seconds he had avoided his final punishment: His mortal enemy had discovered the tracking device he had snuck into her bag. In many ways, he should’ve been glad to survive with his life.

  But it was Ashiya’s master, Sadao Maou himself, who was the most thrown by his faithful assistant’s request for leave.

  “Time off? What do you mean…?”

  Compared to the glory days, when he had led the combined forces of the demon realms to a breathtaking conquest of every inhabited corner of Ente Isla, even Maou had to admit that he hadn’t done much devilish in nature lately. But was that really enough to make Shirou Ashiya, his Great Demon General Alciel and most trusted of confidants through decades of political intrigue and bloody battles, wish to part ways with him?

  Maybe this was about him using all the demonic power he’d gained in the battle against Sariel to repair the collateral damage done to Tokyo’s infrastructure. But he thought that was water under the bridge by now; he’d spent a good hour pleading his case to Ashiya, convincing him that it was the best thing he could have done under the circumstances.

  But it was Chiho Sasaki, the only normal human being currently in Devil’s Castle, who spoke up nervously in response.

  “Um… This isn’t because I overstepped my boundaries or anything, is it?”

  She was part of the crew at the MgRonald fast-food joint in front of Hatagaya rail station. She was also the only person in the world who knew the truth behind the Devil’s Castle denizens and the world of Ente Isla itself—and despite that, she still took a liking to Maou, Devil King or not. She was here to provide him with a home-cooked meal, in fact—something she now did on regular occasions.

  “I…I mean, if me and Suzuno cooking for you guys is taking work away from you, Ashiya, I could totally…”

  “Er, no,” Ashiya hurriedly replied. “It’s nothing like that, Ms. Sasaki. In fact, getting to share in your kindness has been tremendously…helpful to me.”

  Ashiya’s responsibilities in Devil’s Castle mainly revolved around housework—cooking, laundry, cleaning, and balancing the checkbook. And, inevitably, when a househusband stays on the job for long enough, he can’t help but grow bored of his own cooking. Along those lines, Chiho’s cuisine was one of the few things spicing up his life at the moment.

  “Then what kind of nonsense is this?” asked a dubious Suzuno Kamazuki—aka Crestia Bell, cleric of the Church that dominated politics in Ente Isla’s Western Island, and now living in Room 202 down the hall—as she stacked up the empty plastic containers she had brought her food over in. “Both myself and Emilia would welcome the idea of the Devil King’s Army falling apart and being scattered to the four winds, but doing so without any reason strikes me as…unusual.”

  Suzuno might have been providing food
to her neighbors, but she was every bit the demons’ enemy as Emi was. Thus, she fed them dishes made with Church-sanctified ingredients, just as harmful to them—perhaps even more so—as processed sugars and trans fats. It did wonders to keep the Devil’s Castle budget in the black, but Ashiya always greeted the act with a resigned sneer.

  Amid the silence, the Great Demon General took a quick look at Chiho, then Emi, before sadly shaking his head.

  “…I apologize, my liege…”

  “Whoa, are you serious…?”

  Maou, slowly realizing that Ashiya was being deadly serious with him, rose to his feet. His stomach, distended by Suzuno and Chiho’s dual-pronged gastronomical attack, grumbled at him for it as he walked up to the kneeling Ashiya and grabbed him by the shoulders.

  “Wh-what aren’t you happy about?! Is this about the hot dog I bought from the convenience store on the way home from work the other day?! Or the store receipt you asked me to hang on to that I lost? Oh, man, I told you I bought that two-ply toilet paper by accident!”

  Emi, watching behind Maou, gave him a forlorn look. That was all the frantic Devil King could think of? “If that’s enough to make your Great Demon General want to leave,” she remarked, “you should’ve demoted him long ago.”

  “No, Your Demonic Highness. I have no complaint with you, nor my work environment.”

  “You don’t?”

  To Emi, the fact that his master was in a panic about a hot dog—and the fact that he was making his top general toil as a househusband for the foreseeable future—seemed like ample cause for complaint.

  “It is just that…I fear our demonic forces will face ruin before long if this continues. My retiring from the front lines may allow us the chance to avoid this…”

  “What are you talking about?!” Maou’s gaze drilled into Ashiya’s head. “I don’t get it, man!” The two of them, master and servant, gave each other deeply troubled looks before Ashiya bowed his head in defeat.

  “…Allow me to explain outside, my liege.”

  As the two of them left, the remainder of the group—save the unconscious Urushihara—looked at one another, puzzled.

  When they returned through the door a few moments later, however, Maou was suddenly far more composed.

  “Yo, Emi. Chi, too.”

  “…What?”

  “Y-yes?”

  “Sorry, but do you guys mind heading home? I’ll explain later, but…for now, we need to be alone.”

  There was no longer any of the carefree breeziness that generally defined Maou’s expression. In fact, there seemed to be a twinge of sadness to it.

  “Sure, sure, whatever,” Emi snorted. “Let’s go, Chiho.”

  “B-but, Yusa…”

  “Chi,” Maou offered to his confused comrade. The single syllable conveyed that there was nothing to worry about.

  “A-all right, but…” Chiho couldn’t resist asking the question anyway. “Ashiya…you won’t leave for good, will you?”

  “…Don’t worry,” Maou replied, Ashiya himself apparently not in the mood for speech.

  “Are you sure?” Emi interrupted. “Because if you’re forming a guerrilla commando unit or something, I’m gonna kill you.”

  “Will you just go already?!” Maou said as he pushed his nemesis along, though he gave a quick, reassuring nod to Chiho along the way.

  Ashiya was waiting by the front door, still silent. He received a small bow from Chiho and no acknowledgement whatsoever from Emi as they walked by. He sighed deeply as he watched them go.

  “…Well. Quite a strange turn of events, this,” Suzuno commented. As a Villa Rosa Sasazuka resident, she was the only visitor left in the room, although recent developments made her presence seem supremely awkward. “Right, then,” she added as she began to stand up—only to be stopped by Ashiya stepping back inside.

  “Wait, Crestia Bell. You are to stay.”

  “…What?”

  Turning back, she found Ashiya giving her a glare as hard as his words, and Maou matching it.

  Suddenly, she found herself in a far less secure position than before. Instinctively, she readied her body and removed the hairpin from her head. There was a flash of light, and then the hairpin was a massive hammer, one that seemed impossible for the slight woman to wield.

  The cross-shaped hairpin was the agent she used to summon her Light of Iron magic, and the resulting warhammer was powerful enough to smash the giant electrical transformers that powered Shinjuku station. It could have flattened three destitute, powerless ex-demons like gnats, but being surrounded like this still made her nervous.

  “Enough of this act,” she said, attempting to keep them from making the first move. “Even alone, I could easily destroy you all.”

  “Silence, Bell,” Ashiya continued. “We are seeking your assistance. You have no right to refuse.”

  “Such nonsense! I have no right, you say? With your puny powers, how could you ever support such a demand?”

  “It’s nothing like that,” Maou said, crossing his arms as he shot a glance at the still-unresponsive Urushihara. “You simply have no choice, is all. The forty thousand yen Urushihara sucked out of our bank account for the tracking device… You’re kind of at fault for that, too.”

  A garbage collection truck passed by the apartment building, offering garbled advertising guidance through a tinny speaker on its side.

  “…Forty thousand?” Suzuno said, body still steeled for battle.

  “Yeah. That’s how much he spent on that gadget we used to find Chi and Emi after you and Sariel kidnapped them.”

  “That…gadget?”

  Suzuno shot a surprised look at Urushihara. She had been wondering about that. How did Maou find her, doing Sariel’s bidding on the tippy-top of the towering Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building?

  “Is…is that even possible?”

  “At any rate, you understand now, do you not?” Ashiya interjected. “Why you cannot turn down our behest, Bell?”

  “Starting tomorrow, Ashiya’s gonna go out and earn some money, so we can make up the forty thousand yen we spent on that thing for Chi’s sake. That’s why he asked me for a break. Even if I took on extra shifts at work, forty thousand’s just an astronomical number. I could never make that up by myself.”

  “…Ugh.”

  Suzuno winced.

  “I won’t ask for half, but you’re, like, at least a third responsible for this, right? Especially given how you’re the one who kidnapped Chi.”

  “That…I…”

  Suzuno attempted to counter, but found her spirit flagging. Her hammer fell helplessly to the tatami mats.

  Several days before, Sariel descended from Ente Isla’s version of heaven in search of the Better Half, the holy sword Emi housed within her body. The ensuing conflict almost resulted in a one-way ticket to another planet for Chiho. And Suzuno, in no position to defy the orders of an archangel, was the one who had lured Chiho to him.

  In the end, the day had been saved by Maou’s storming up the skyscraper and rescuing the trapped Emi and Chiho, neatly relieving Suzuno of her Ente Islan obligations along the way. The only reason he knew where to find them was because he followed the tracking device Urushihara had hidden inside Emi’s bag.

  “I can’t really fault Urushihara for wasting our money this time, either. I mean, really, if it wasn’t for that transmitter thingy, we’d have no idea what to do, and Chi and Emi would’ve been taken away from Earth long ago.”

  “Very much so, my liege…although I still question the need to spend forty thousand all at once.”

  “Well, hindsight is twenty-twenty and all that, isn’t it, Ashiya? I know we need to teach Urushihara a lesson about his spending habits, but for this time, at least…”

  Maou’s eyes were on a now thoroughly despondent Suzuno.

  “And that is why you sent Emilia and Chiho away, then?”

  “Indeed,” Ashiya nodded. “If we told Ms. Sasaki about this, you know how she woul
d react. She would blame herself and offer to pay the entire sum. And we could not possibly accept any aid from Emilia. We used that device to rescue Ms. Sasaki, after all, not the likes of her. But there will be no palming responsibility for this off on Ms. Sasaki. We are the ones who got her involved with events on Ente Isla, after all.”

  A few moments ago, when Chiho spotted “Card payment: 40,000 yen; User: Dumbassyhara” in the Devil’s Castle financial notebook, Ashiya made sure the subject remained firmly focused on Urushihara’s extravagant shopping sprees mainly so Chiho wouldn’t pick up on the truth and feel all guilty about it. It made things smoother all around if she and Emi just assumed Urushihara blew the money on the tracking device for no particular reason—none beyond the voyeuristic opportunities it allowed him. As a result, all Chiho was aware of was Urushihara’s blatant invasion of Emi’s privacy—something Emi subsequently half-murdered him for.

  “…You are being remarkably thoughtful for a pack of horrid demons,” Suzuno bitterly whispered. “So, what of it? What do you want from me? You wish me to repay some percentage of the cost?”

  It seemed like a reasonable offer. Maou and Ashiya greeted it with abject scorn.

  “Hah. You belittle us. We are the proud Devil King’s Army! We would never accept the filthy lucre of the church we are destined to destroy!”

  “Ashiya, you’re talking crazy again.”

  “I am more than capable of making up for Urushihara’s foolishness! But to achieve that, I will have to leave Devil’s Castle for a few days. Crestia Bell! While I am gone, you will cover the entire food bill of this domain!”

  “Huh? Why?!”

  It was not Suzuno, but Maou, whose voice rose up in protest.

  “What is it, my liege?” Ashiya replied coolly.

  “No, uh… I mean, why make Suzuno cook for us? Couldn’t you just, like, make a few days’ worth and leave us with that?”

  “Whatever are you talking about? Ignoring the holy sanctification she places upon it, Suzuno’s cuisine is both nutritious and delicious by homemade standards. It would save us a fortune in food bills.”

  “Oh, um…I am hardly that exceptional at it…”

  “Don’t compliment her, man! And you—don’t accept the compliment, either! Besides, that makes us sound like a bunch of hoboes. Why can’t we just take her money and—”