Chapter 37

“Art thou the one who hath disturbed my slumber?”

The demon girl, who looked about four years younger than me, glared at me intensely. She looked like she could be a first-year student at the magic school. She didn’t look particularly scary, but I knew she was a terrifying demon…

“Yes, that’s me… Are you the ‘Indescribable Ancestor of Nightmares’?”

“Indeed, I am the ‘Indescribable Ancestor of Nightmares.’ It seems thou hast a certain level of resolve to call upon my presence… Ugh, this way of talking is a pain, let’s just act normal. Yeah, I’m the ‘Indescribable Ancestor of Nightmares.’ Some people call me ‘Nightmare.’ Anyway, just call me Mary.”

She’s actually pretty frank!

“M-Mary-san.”

“Just Mary is fine. Even if I’m past my prime, you’re the one who summoned me, so you can skip the honorifics. What’s your name?”

“I’m Franz, Mary…”

Apparently, she’s a character who doesn’t care much for formalities, but being a high-ranking demon, her overall attitude was quite haughty.

“Good grief, I felt like I was finally going to get a good sleep for the first time in a hundred years, and then you go and summon me… I have insomnia, you know.”

Mary let out a huge yawn.

“You can’t sleep even though you’re called the Ancestor of Nightmares?”

“Whenever I sleep, I immediately have a nightmare and wake up.”

You’re the one having the nightmares?! I wanted to snap back at her, but I desperately held it in for fear of making her angry.

“A-Ancestor of Nightmares, and yet you have nightmares yourself… How interesting…”

Cerulia timidly poked at a topic that seemed risky to touch.

“Whenever I sleep, nightmares are born in various worlds. That’s why I’m the Ancestor of Nightmares.”

In that case, she’s a nuisance; I’d prefer it if she never slept again. Still, this demon didn’t seem like a particularly dangerous character. Maybe I could just deal with her casually and have her go home. I wasn’t sure where she came from—the Demon Realm is a mystery—so I didn’t know the protocol.

“Anyway, so where is it? I want to finish this quickly and go home.”

Mary began looking around restlessly.

“I’m sorry, where is what?”

“Since you summoned me, you must have a town or two you want to destroy, right? Tell me which ones, and I’ll destroy them. I’ll turn them into nothing but sand and ash with my army of sixty-six thousand six hundred.”

Okay, she really is terrifying!

“Um, I’m sorry… I just summoned you on a whim. I don’t really have any towns I want to destroy… In fact, please don’t destroy anything.”

“No way. No one summons me on a whim. Usually, high-level Dark Mages gather and summon me under strict security.”

Mary laughed with a look that said, Stop joking.

“Wait… but there really is only you here…”

“I tried out what was written in this book, and you just… appeared…”

I showed her Basic Knowledge for Dark Mages: New Member Support Edition. For a while, Mary flipped through the pages, tilting her head.

“Hey, are you by any chance the intended reader of this? You know, a new member of the workforce?”

“It’s my second month at the company.”

“ARE YOU SERIOUS?!!!!!”

She was incredibly shocked. Her voice was so loud that several flying Imps nearby actually fell out of the sky.

“Wait, wait, wait… To be summoned by a rookie… I’m not that ‘cheap’ of a woman. This is embarrassing…”

“I’m pretty troubled by it too.”

“Don’t say that after you’re the one who called me!”

She had a point… My reckless behavior might have led to something disastrous.

●

Given the circumstances, I left the rest of the work to the Imps and rushed back to the company. Mary followed along without complaint. Since she floats constantly, traveling seemed easy for her.

Even President Kelkel was stunned, exclaiming, “You called that thing?!” She even hid behind a curtain at first. I really wasn’t supposed to call her…

“It can’t be helped… We will hold an emergency meeting in the conference room…”

This had become a big deal. Man, and I’d been working so steadily up until now…
The conference room was generally dim, but apparently, that was just for atmospheric effect. Since it was inconvenient for taking notes, they eventually lit some candles.

“—And so, Franz-san possesses such extraordinary talent for Dark Magic that he is far beyond the level of a new employee. In particular, he seems to have a great affinity for summoning magic, having called the Succubus Cerulia-chan right off the bat.”

The President explained the situation to Mary.

“Even so, he’s just a total newbie, right? A legendary calamity summoned by a rookie… my reputation is going to be in tatters. What are you going to do about this? This is going to be used as a joke at my expense forever, you know? Like, easily for ten thousand years. You understand?”

It felt like we had accidentally invited a famous artist or intellectual for a bargain price, and now the guest was offended.

“I just did it on an impulse, and you were summoned. I’m sorry.”

I apologized. It felt unusual to bow my head to someone I had summoned, but since I called her without considering her circumstances, it couldn’t be helped. I’d be mad too if I was called to another world while I was on the toilet.

“Anyway, how did a rookie manage the incantation? You shouldn’t have been able to pronounce it, right? Weren’t there lots of words you didn’t know?”

“I relied on my intuition for a few parts.”

Even if I could make an educated guess based on my knowledge, intuition was still intuition.

“ARE YOU SERIOOOOUSSSS!”

I guess when tragedy strikes, it’s usually a chain of unexpected events.

“Fine. For now, we’ll say you are ‘the descendant of a legendary Dark Mage who was executed for plotting the destruction of the nation a thousand years ago.’ Got it?”

“No, I’m just the son of very ordinary commoners.”

“Just inflate your backstory a bit! Otherwise, I have no dignity left for appearing like this… Save my face. Please… image is important in this business…”

Mary was pleading with me while acting angry.

“Alright… If anyone asks about my lineage, I’ll say I feel like there might have been a family tree in our shed saying I’m ‘the descendant of a legendary Dark Mage who was executed for plotting the destruction of the nation a thousand years ago’…”

“That will do for now. I’ll think of some more powerful-sounding settings for you later.”

I felt like she was going to add all sorts of unnecessary “fins and gills” to my story…

“Then, I suppose that settles it,” President Kelkel said with a smile as she clapped her hands, though her face was twitching slightly. Even the President was scared…

“Well then, please head home safely! Good job today!”

She was trying her best to get her to leave!

“No, now that I’m out, I can’t go back without fulfilling some kind of role. If I just go home after doing nothing, it’ll hurt my brand. I trade on my name, after all.”

This Mary kept making comments that sounded like she was a veteran in the entertainment industry.

“So, just tell me two small places. Towns you want to destroy. I’ll rot them from the soil up so thoroughly that they’ll be cursed lands for the next thirty years. I won’t demand the souls or lives of your companions, so just pick somewhere casually.”

“We cannot do that! Our company is a ‘3C’ workplace: Clean, Comfortable, and Clear!”

President Kelkel argued back.

“I see… Well, I can’t go back for the time being, so I’ll just endure it. I’ll live with positive thinking, figuring I can sightsee the human world for the first time in a while. There might even be a good pillow in this world that’ll let me sleep peacefully.”

Mary nodded while still clutching her pillow.

“I live much longer than humans, after all. I’ll just treat this like a little vacation.”

Thank goodness, she seemed to have a relatively gentle personality.

“I’m sorry for the trouble.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine. Stuff like this can be used as a funny story once enough time passes.”

For now, it seemed she wasn’t going to destroy towns for no reason, so I wouldn’t have to worry about becoming a criminal. I’ll make sure my future summons are planned more carefully…

“Anyway, Franz, was it? Take care of me. I’m staying at your house starting today.”
And there it is.

“Um, my house is just a very ordinary home. It’s not really suited for hosting a great demon…”

“I would also recommend somewhere else… A place like an ancient castle would be much more appropriate for Lady Mary to live in…” Cerulia added.

Cerulia and I both tried to appeal to her not to come. And I could see Cerulia’s subtle intent to try and push her into living at the company instead. She’s sharp.

“No, you summoned me, so take responsibility. It’s a matter of a man’s duty, right?”

Seriously? Is that how it works?

“Ahem… Franz-san, you might be able to learn something by interacting with Mary-san. Shall we settle on you living together?”

President Kelkel dumped the responsibility on me…

“It’s a fact that Franz-san has the talent to summon such a troublesome… I mean, such a great demon. I think it would be good for his skill-up to understand various things while living with a super-high-ranking demon.”

I see. That made sense, but President… you were about to say “troublesome,” weren’t you?

“Don’t worry, I won’t do things like ‘I got annoyed so I turned a village into an uninhabitable wasteland’ anymore. I’ve mellowed out.”

Good. She seemed more reasonable than I expected.

“Right after my ‘Nightmare’ debut, I was pretty wild. I thought it was all about rampaging, and I felt like having the summoner be cursed for life was a badge of honor. but I’ve been doing the ‘Nightmare’ thing for a long time now, so I’ve become more sensible. Though it still irritates me when people say, ‘You’ve been quiet lately.’”

She really sounds like some kind of temperamental artist.

“I used to look much flashier, too. I’d intentionally let blood drip from my claws and stuff, but lately, I respond to summons in my everyday clothes. I guess you could say I’ve mellowed out in that regard too.”

She looked younger than me, but she spoke with the air of a seasoned veteran.

“So, take me to your house! ♪”

And that was how I ended up living with Mary.