“What, dude? I’m scared! She’s the niece of the lady from That Photo!”
“B-But she sounded kind of young over the phone!”
“There is no need to fret over it. We are committed for the long term. We must do everything possible to face our fates…no matter what they may be.”
“Yeah, but how? We haven’t even seen her place yet! …Oh, hey.”
Maou’s phone began to ring.
The three demons stared at each other for a moment. A beat, and then Maou answered the call.
“Hello?”
“Oh, hey, Maou. I’m in front of the station now. The white van!”
The moment of truth was here.
The three demon nobles took a deep breath, composing themselves in anticipation for whatever might come next, then warily strode into the sun-drenched forecourt in front of Inuboh station.
Chiho and the ladies followed behind, walking up to the tiled front area.
There they saw a long-bodied commercial van idling, its color less white and more a well-worn shade of cream.
Maou swallowed nervously just as the person in the driver’s seat noticed them. She removed her seat belt and exited the vehicle.
When the figure stepped out into the bright sunlight, Maou’s, Ashiya’s, Urushihara’s, and Emi’s eyes shot open.
“You Maou?”
“Um, yes. Yes, I am. You’re Ms. Ohguro?”
“Sure am! Thanks for making it all the way out here. Welcome to Inuboh!”
In a word, she was beautiful.
Her long black hair was tied up carelessly in the back, framing her black T-shirt, a well-worn green apron, some heavily-chafed jeans, and a pair of sandals. A rough exterior, to be sure, but Maou could still tell that her proportions could easily give Kisaki a run for her money.
She had no makeup on, but her eyes, and the brows that arched over them, told the story of a woman with boundless willpower. They were a perfect match for her healthily bronzed skin, almost evoking the chiseled looks of some long-ago warrior princess.
This girl was really Amane Ohguro? The niece of that landlord?
Apart from the fact they were both vertebrates and females from their respective species, she had absolutely nothing in common with Miki Shiba.
“Bet you’re thinkin’ we don’t look too much alike, huh?”
Maou must’ve stared in silence at her a little too long to be tasteful. Amane Ohguro looked at him, a tactful smile on her face. Maou snapped out of it and…
“Um…”
…had trouble figuring out whether to nod or shake his head.
A woman of her sensitive age, would it be prudent to say she resembled that landlord? The question required serious debate.
“Ha-ha-hah! Sorry, sorry. I guess you’d never really know anyway!”
“Um…yeah…”
“Aunt Mikitty and I look pretty alike once she takes off her makeup. If you saw some of her photos when she was more my age, she’s practically a dead ringer.”
If that was true, time was such a cruel mistress.
As rude as Maou knew it was, imagining his landlord without any makeup on reminded him of the skin of a 65-million-year-old dinosaur.
“But anyhow, I’m Amane Ohguro, more or less the girl who runs Ohguro-ya. Nice to meet you.”
“Oh, sure, um, my name’s Sadao Maou.”
Ashiya stood straight up, following close after Maou. Urushihara, despite the signs of excitement he betrayed a moment earlier, played it far cooler.
“And I am Shirou Ashiya. Thank you again for your generous offer.”
“…Hanzou Urushihara.”
“Ashiya and Urushihara…and…”
Amane Ohguro’s eyes focused on the women behind Maou and his cohorts.
“Sure are a lot more of you than what I heard!”
“No, that, um, it’s just us three guys…”
Maou hurriedly tried to come up with an excuse. After a day of being pushed around and bothered on the train by this posse of unwell-wishers, Maou wasn’t about to let them screw up his job offer.
“The rest of them…uh, they’re just kind of following along by themselves. Yo! How long you girls planning to shadow us, anyway?!”
“My name’s Chiho Sasaki! I work together with Maou back home, so I thought we’d tour around and check out the place he’s staying at over here.”
Chiho bowed politely, saving Maou from having to explain things himself.
“Uh, Chiho? Did you hear my question or anything?”
The other two girls approached, paying Maou no mind.
“I am called Suzuno Kamazuki. He is my…neighbor, one could say.”
“Emi Yusa. And this little girl is Alas Ramus.”
He was hoping they would step up to dispel Chiho’s claims, but they did nothing of the sort.
The six of them had collectively decided a while ago not to make up a more authentically Japanese-sounding name for Alas Ramus when introducing her to others. The girl was far too young to understand what the ruse was for, and besides, she didn’t look particularly Asian anyway. So far, at least, nobody called them out on it. Amane didn’t, either, nor did she seem offended at the women butting in on Maou.
“Wow! You sure brought a variety pack along with you, huh? Who’re the lucky parents?”
Urushihara pointed straight at Maou. Chiho and Suzuno drew a finger toward Emi. Ashiya stared into space, pretending he was somewhere else.
“Hey!!”
The lucky parents’ response came in perfect harmony.
“Well, I can’t blame you for having all these hangers-on. It’s what you get for working in paradise, huh? Tell you what, how would you all like to check out my place before we open it up? You can go swim out on the beach if you like, long as you stay within eyeshot of me. I could tell you what to check out around Choshi, too.”
Amane’s eyes turned toward Emi.
“…And, I’m sure you’d like to see where your husband’s working, right? Boy, Maou, you could’ve told me over the phone that you had a pretty little thing like that! I thought you were coming alone!”
“N-No! No, it’s not…like that…!”
It was their mission, and Chiho’s curiosity, that made them want to examine Maou’s workplace. But neither of the “parents” were at all interested in being treated like family.
Emi protested from the bottom of her heart, but Amane paid it little notice.
Everyone except Urushihara found their eyes attracted to Emi and Chiho. Emi had an annoyed scowl on her face, but Chiho, oddly enough, had her normal smile out for the world to see.
“All right, well, how ’bout you guys hop in the van? No point baking out here. And you too, ladies. Oh, lemme go set up the child seat first, okay?”
Amane took the child seat out of the rear storage space, as if she’d known all along to expect an infant, and strapped it into the front passenger seat.
The six of them exchanged distinct glances with one another as they piled into the van.
With Alas Ramus up front, the women took up the entire second row, the three demons crammed in behind them.
After tossing all their baggage into the back, Amane made one final announcement before climbing in.
“Great! I’ll try to be careful with the kid ridin’ shotgun, okay?”
Then she cranked the starter motor, which belied its age as it creakily powered up the engine. Soon, they were away from Inuboh station, the suspension already rattling everyone’s rear ends.
The first sight along the road was a gaggle of signs advertising the nearby hotels and resorts. None of them had seen any sign of water since departing Chiba, but—just as Amane promised—the view opened up significantly after just five minutes’ driving.
The moment they turned onto a road running along the coastline, the Pacific Ocean suddenly loomed to their right.
“Wowww!”
Chiho all but cheered.
“I’ve never seen the sea over here…
It’s so blue.”
Emi sighed, her voice soft. Even after her end-to-end journey across Ente Isla, she’d never witnessed a shade of blue as beautiful as the one the Pacific sported.
“Such a graceful blue, is it not? We never saw anything of the sort in our homeland.”
Suzuno was just as profoundly moved. Both of them took care not to have Amane overhear them.
“Mommy! Blue! All blue! All Kehsed!”
Alas Ramus, meanwhile, shouted out in glee, blurting out the name of the Sephira who ruled over the color blue in the process.
“This is Kimigahama Coast. If you look back to the right a little, you’ll see a cape, right? That’s the Inuboh-saki Lighthouse.”
Craning their necks back as instructed, they saw an impressive chalk-colored lighthouse standing atop a craggy bluff, surveying the ocean like some giant creature as it was framed by the deep blue of the sky behind it.
“What’s that in front of the cape…?”
“Oh, you spotted it? That’s Ohguro-ya, right there.”
There was a building smack-dab in the middle of the wide beach that formed Kimigahama Coast.
At first glance, it looked like just another old one-story house.
The moment they realized what they were looking at, Amane turned off the road and entered an open clearing that apparently served as the beach parking lot.
Ashiya peered ahead from his seat.
“Hmm. There aren’t as many people as I pictured.”
Amane had promised them a busy two weeks, but only a few cars dotted the lot she just pulled into.
Given that their only experience with the beach was opening up travel guides and marveling at how every square inch of sand was filled with people, beach towels, or both, this was something of a disappointment.
Amane shut off the engine, removing her seat belt as she did.
“Yeah, that’s because the beach doesn’t open ’til tomorrow. Right now, there ain’t gonna be much besides a few surfers.”
Maou accepted this, otherwise unaware of how beach access rules worked around here. Chiho, however, put a hand against her forehead as she surveyed the empty beach from out the car window.
“Tomorrow…?”
She sounded dubious before spotting something bobbing in and out of sight between the waves.
“Oh, I see them. Offshore a little ways…”
“Ms. Sasaki? What’s up?”
The way Chiho kept trailing off caught Ashiya’s attention. There was something awkward about it.
“…Oh, nothing.”
She declined to explain. He dispelled the question to the nether regions of his mind.
“This beach is pretty popular with joggers and people coming over to see the lighthouse or the sunrise. We still get a pretty decent stream of folks even before the beach opens up.”
They began to notice a few more people on the beach. Some dogwalkers, along with a handful of men and women tanning themselves on top of wide beach blankets.
“Anyway, we better get your bags inside. Lemme show you the guest quarters first.”
The group headed downhill, toward the beach and the house they had spotted earlier.
Amane led them as they left the car, each one exhibiting different levels of excitement, and arrived at a semi-eroded wooden door at the rear of the shop.
“There’s pretty much nothin’ in here except some futons, but hopefully that’ll be enough for you after you’re done workin’.”
Amane opened the door as she spoke, revealing a sight that made Maou’s, Ashiya’s, Urushihara’s, and Suzuno’s eyes bug out.
“…This is nicer’n our place, isn’t it?”
Urushihara’s hushed whisper summed up everyone’s impression.
The room was maybe around 150 square feet, counting the closet and a kitchen space similar to the one in Devil’s Castle. The sun pouring in through the large window lit things up brightly, but the space was still invigoratingly cool.
“Dude, I wanna hole up in here forever.”
Urushihara’s eyes were fixated on a point near the ceiling.
An air conditioner.
It had an air conditioner.
It was an old one, yes, but the small box whirring above their heads was unmistakably a running AC unit.
“The humidity on the beach tends to make the tatami mats on the floor go all warped and uneven, but hopefully you won’t mind that too much.”
Compared to the glory of the AC, this was the minutest of details to the three arch-demons.
She might have said there was nothing in here except futons, but that was still more than the Devil’s Castle was equipped with.
For a moment, the lure of this new living space made Maou forget all about MgRonald.
“It’s probably freezing in here come wintertime, though.”
Ashiya’s pointed rebuff of Urushihara’s reverie was enough to make Maou snap out of it, too.
Beachfront restaurants like these were, after all, seasonal affairs. Once summer was over, so was their employment here.
“Well, I’m glad you all like it! I usually head back to my own place once we close, so don’t forget to lock up at night, okay?”
Leaving the entire building in the hands of these raw hirees indicated the level of trust their boss had in them. That must be how much Amane valued a recommendation from Shiba, Maou figured.
“Right. Well, I wish I could let you relax, but once you get your stuff all set up, you all mind coming out front for me? I got a job for you.”
Urushihara was the only one to wince in protest at the mention of the word job. One of his companions was keen to pick up on this.
“I’d be more than happy to put your stuff away, guys. You can go ahead and start work!”
Chiho, beaming like the sun above her as she all but wrested the traveling bag from Ashiya’s hand, turned around just long enough to make eye contact with Maou.
He nodded his thanks and, without any further discussion, he and Ashiya each grabbed one of Urushihara’s arms.
“Wh-Whoa! Dude! I didn’t even say anything yet!”
The Devil King and his right-hand man showed off their practiced teamwork as they dragged Urushihara up, ignoring his objections.
Amane, to her credit, declined to comment on the display as she walked out the door and toward the coastline just outside.
Emi, Alas Ramus, and Suzuno meekly followed behind.
The so-called guest quarters was connected to the restaurant by a simple connecting corridor, allowing Maou and crew to enter the shop from the back if they wanted.
There was something about a brand-new workplace that summoned a whirlpool of emotion, just by setting foot inside it for the first time.
Maou and Ashiya were feeling it now, that mixture of nerves and anticipation, as they stood in front of their new job site.
All that raw emotion went limp once they set eyes on the exterior.
“…Huh?”
It literally took the words out of their mouths.
Ohguro-ya, a one-story wooden house on the beach, had a fairly decent-sized restaurant and store space. If you took Mr. Hirose’s bike shop, wheeled all the bikes out, and roughly doubled the indoor space, it would be about this large.
But the place was…less than spotless. Dust ruled this kingdom, from corner to corner.
A patio-like space jutted out toward the beach, containing a weather-beaten table and set of benches whose splinters made them a less-than-exciting beachfront hangout.
A set of narrow doors lined one wall—shower stalls, probably, judging by the spigots they could see inside. A sign, half-rusted by the salt breeze so it was impossible to tell when it was made, read 10 MINUTES 100 YEN.
The bathroom featured a full-on flush toilet, at least—about the most modern appliance in the whole place—but it was a toss-up whether the creaking coin-operated lockers worked at all any longer.
The sign out front—the beach house’s public face—was thorou
ghly rusted out by years of wind and rain. The cushioning on the backless stools was torn and eroded, revealing the top panel of the chair below. The brass pipes that Maou surmised were a set of beer taps were all equally green with rust.
A vertical ice chest for holding drinks sat next to the cash register, almost empty except for a few achingly lonely cans of Kola-Cola. The fact that the iron griddle used for frying up yakisoba and such wasn’t just as rusty was one of the place’s few saving graces.
The several-generations-old anime characters printed on the inner tubes and beach balls hanging down from the walls only added to the forlorn scene.
There was old, and then there was old. No matter how inexperienced Amane was with running a beach house, why did she abandon it this thoroughly?
The place has to be shutting down next year. That was Maou’s first impression.
And it was Amane’s father’s place, even. The sight made Maou wonder if the family had any real passion for business at all.
An indescribable storm of apprehension raged across the hearts of everyone on hand.
“Grooooossss!”
Alas Ramus, always eager to say exactly what was on her mind, innocently lobbed a fastball right down the middle, eloquently expressing what everyone was thinking in one word.
“Um… Ms. Ohguro?”
Amane flashed a thumbs-up sign at Ashiya’s probing question.
“Jeez, Ashiya, I’m not running a funeral home! Call me Amanecchi! That’s what everyone else does!”
They would gladly call her any dumb nickname she demanded. That wasn’t the issue. The issue was that now, at least, they were sure she was linked by blood to Shiba.
Ashiya soldiered on, wearily:
“…Amane. When did you say the beach opens to the public?”
That was all he ventured to ask. His tone indicated to Maou that he had a similar impression of the space.
“Tomorrow!!”
The breezy response thundered in loud and clear.
“So, uh, you know, I’m kinda in panic mode here!!”
“Yeah, uh, I don’t think we can make this into a sunny family fun zone that quick…”
For once, Urushihara was exasperated. The layer of grime covering every inch of the building offended even his tastes.
The Devil Is a Part-Timer!, Vol. 4 Page 11