“Um, Fujiko...”
Junko unhappily went to draw her sword, before freezing when she saw how the classmates reacted.
“I knew it.”
“I hate to say it, but he can marry both Fujiko and the class rep if he wants...”
“I wonder if I could marry Sai, too.”
The students were all talking amongst themselves.
“That’s ridiculous...” Junko’s mouth fell open.
Akuto looked at Fujiko. She just wrapped her arms around him and whispered into his ear.
“This is true. You’ve been given permission to marry more than one person, which is very fortunate for us. As long as you’re willing to marry me, we can be truly husband and wife. We can live together with nobody bothering us.” Her voice was husky and seductive, and made it clear how much she’d been waiting for him.
“Students need to live a very dignified married life, you know.” A voice interrupted.
It was Yoshie, pushing past the other students. She wore a lab coat over her suit, and it was plain that she’d been busy working. The other students thought that she was a genius who’d skipped grades to graduate, and was already working as a priest.
“Kita,” Akuto said, grateful for an opportunity to distract Fujiko. He waved at her.
“Don’t call me that, it’s so formal. We’re about to get married, you know,” she grinned.
When she’d said “Things were different” the other day, this was probably the biggest thing that she’d meant. Akuto and Junko were caught so off guard that they forgot they were supposed to be keeping their unique memories a secret from the other students. They both yelled.
“MARRIAGE?”
“Did you forget the date? Haha. Akuto’s only here to get what he needs to graduate, anyway. Just take the test and be done with it. Any of the temples would be glad to have you. They’re also looking into making a special position for you that’s not restricted by faction,” Yoshie said, catching him even further off guard.
Akuto couldn’t keep up with it all, but he realized that this was everything he’d ever dreamed of. It still didn’t feel real, but compared to everything that he’d gone through, doing the job he was given and maintaining the happiness he had seemed very simple.
—This was my dream from before I came here... from before I was told I was the Demon King...
Everything he ever wanted was in front of him. He could be of service to others, too. He had more than enough power to do it. And he had three girls who truly understood him and loved him... What more could he want?
“Is this really... okay?” Akuto said, to no one in particular.
“It is.”
“It is, of course,”
Yoshie and Fujiko smiled and nodded. When she saw this, Junko’s frown gradually started to turn into a smile.
“H-How do I say this... Stop it, guys. It’s kind of embarrassing.”
Junko buried her face in her arms. She was shaking a little.
“Don’t cry. You look like you’ve just found happiness,” Yoshie said, grinning mischievously.
“W-Well, I don’t think there’s anything I can say about this either...” Akuto said with a blush.
One of the classmates surrounding them started to clap, and the clapping spread out into the hallway. It was like he was a popular singer who’d just stepped out on stage.
“Oh, that’s right. I came to tell you that our new home is ready.” Yoshie motioned with her thumb for them to leave the room. The crowd parted to let them pass, and smiled as they walked by. If this wasn’t a school, they’d be tossing flowers at them.
They passed through the arch of people, and headed out into the courtyard. There was a surface car waiting for them there. As they walked over to it, a gang called out to them. “Gang” was the only word that could describe it. Their uniforms were breaking the dress code in all sorts of ways, and they had haircuts that could only have been intended to try and frighten the other students. They were all male.
—So I guess it’s not all happiness, huh? Akuto thought to himself as he looked at the biggest of them, who seemed to be their leader.
The leader stepped forward, walking out in front of his gang of thugs.
“You know, we don’t like people like you. We just don’t. People like us don’t have anything. And we don’t like people like you, who have everything.”
Akuto remembered the man whose gruff voice he was hearing.
—It’s Takeshi... I remember him.
He was one of Fujiko’s servants. The first person to ever pick a fight with Akuto.
Akuto looked at Fujiko.
“We’ve got no connection at all here,” she whispered to him.
“I see. You want to fight, huh? I bet you do,” Akuto said, with a gleeful smile.
“Now, do I remember how to hold back?”
It felt good, strangely, to know that he had enemies here. Things were going so well he was getting uneasy. There were probably all kinds of fights waiting for him, and setbacks too. But that, he knew, was something he should feel happy about.
“The hell are you talking about? We’ve gone through a hell that spoiled rich brats like you can’t imagine. You won’t beat us by trying to have a stand-up fight.”
Takeshi didn’t seem to think it was possible for him to lose. He wore a cruel smile.
—Oh, he’s got a special nightstick and an incantation gun. The others are ready to jump me on his signal, huh? Two have knives, and the rest all have bats and wrenches...
In a single instant, he’d seen through their clothing and read their minds, and also knew exactly how powerful their magic was, too.
He smiled at Takeshi.
“I don’t want to go into details, but let’s not fight. It won’t do either of us any good.”
Takeshi just laughed and began to slowly walk towards him.
“It’ll do me good. But it’ll be all bad for you.”
The rest of the gang laughed. And then Takeshi jumped on him without warning. It was a surprise attack, but Akuto managed to dodge just by tilting his head.
“That’s dangerous, you know.”
His lack of fear just made Takeshi angrier.
“Maybe you’re not as wimpy as I thought...”
He jerked his head in the direction of his gang. The rest of them began to form a circle to surround him. They were all going to jump him.
“How cowardly!” Junko shouted.
The thugs looked at her and got nasty grins on their faces.
“Oh, hey, you’re cute!”
“Don’t be scared. We don’t hit girls, we make them feel good.”
Junko’s face turned bright red as they laughed. She looked like she might reach for her real sword, not her wooden one. Akuto shook his head.
“Don’t hurt them. Leave it to me.”
From the look on her face, not only would she beat them all, she might kill them.
“But...” she mumbled.
“It’s fine. I’ve learned a few things. Even if you beat them up, they’ll just hate you more. Which means...”
As Akuto kept talking, Takeshi seemed to reach the limits of his patience.
“Stop talking so damn much!”
He yelled and swung his right fist. It was an easily-dodged hook. But it was a trap. The punch was a feint. The real weapon was the nightstick hidden up his sleeve. If Akuto tried to dodge by moving his head again, the nightstick would slip out and strike him head on.
Akuto knew this from the start, however, so he just took a step forward and grabbed Takeshi’s arm, and then easily flung him into the air.
Not just his arm.
He flung Takeshi’s whole body into the sky.
“Hyah?”
Takeshi let out a strange scream as he flew through the air. Flight was one of the more difficult skills for students at the academy to master. And a thug like him, who never paid attention in class, would have no way of dealing with something so unexpected. Takeshi�
��s body flew off into the sky, like a beach ball tossed up during a dolphin performance.
“Huh?”
His abrupt flight distracted his flunkies for an instant, and that one instant was all it took. Akuto was on them immediately, striking them each firmly in the solar plexus. He’d held back quite a bit, but it was still enough to make all of them scream in pain.
By the time Takeshi landed, all eight of them were squirming on the ground. And after he hit the ground, Akuto grabbed Takeshi by the collar and flicked him in the jaw with his index finger. Takeshi’s head flung backwards, and his brain shut down for an instant, unable to handle the violent impact. In other words, he passed out.
Akuto tossed him on the ground in front of his comrades, and nodded, satisfied.
“I’m glad you didn’t kill them... but they’re still all going to hate you now, right?” Junko asked in exasperation.
“Maybe, but they’re not going to want to fight me now. Also, I’ve decided on how to deal with them in the future.”
“Deal with them... how, exactly?”
“A religion, I guess? One of the old ones. They lack sympathy for others. They don’t think about the future. For people like that, all you need to do is give them a goal in life. As long as they have some kind of goal, they’ll blindly dedicate themselves to it. Ultimately, the traditional religions exist for the sake of people who can’t think, and can’t accept that their suffering is their own fault,” Akuto said, a cold edge to his voice.
“Is that really enough?” Junko asked, flinching at his harsh statement. She still hadn’t gotten used to the fact that sometimes he could be very cruel.
“There were people who believed in the old systems. Really believed. But now we can feel the existence of a real god, right? Someone had to have built this afterlife, after all. So they can study theology.” He opened his student handbook to call Lily.
“What? You want me to ask my dad to make a new department? And then put you in charge of it?”
Lily’s father was a high priest, and had the authority to do it. Using the old data, and the methods of governance used so far, it would be easy to recreate a traditional religion. Akuto nodded, satisfied that he’d found something to dedicate himself to.
“I don’t know how time works here, but it’s going to take years to educate people,” Akuto said. His words sounded prophetic.
They weren’t, however, a prophecy, but a prediction. Though that didn’t make them any less accurate.
“Several years? If we spend that long here, won’t we graduate?” Junko asked.
“Oh? Wasn’t Akuto already planning on graduating? And that’s when our new life is going to begin, right? Come on, our new home is waiting.” Fujiko jerked her head in the direction of Yoshie.
“That’s right. Let’s get going.”
Yoshie began to lead the way.
They got on a train at the school’s station and rode two stations down. Yoshie led them to a high-rise near the city center. Security was tight in the building’s lobby, and there was an automatic lock that kept out the lower classes. This was a living space that was only open to the chosen.
“The whole 60th floor, the penthouse, is ours,” Yoshie explained, as she pushed the button for the elevator.
Akuto looked around the lobby. There was a shopping mall with a boutique, a cafe, a jewelry store, and other tenants. A whole floor of this building would be quite sizable.
“The whole thing?”
“It’s less blatant than building a mansion somewhere. And we won’t have to go up and down stairs, too. Our garden’s going to be artificial, but there’ll be aquariums and flower gardens, too. We could keep some animals if we wanted.”
The button for the top floor was locked so that nobody but Akuto and his friends could get inside. Yoshie led the way, opening the door to their new home. It was sleek and modern, the style that they were all most accustomed to.
“We each have our own room, separate from Akuto’s. They all have their own closets and bathrooms, so you can spend all your time in there. But we’ve also got a living room, a garden, a big bath, and a pool, so I’d prefer you spend your time there. And then there’s...”
After showing them most of the room, she grinned mischievously as she put her hand on the last doorknob.
“The bedroom.”
There was a double bed with a rococo-style canopy. In the back, there was a glass shower and sauna. The ceiling was mirrored, and the whole room was lit up with orange indirect lighting.
“This is, um...” Junko blushed and murmured to herself.
“Well done! So this is Akuto’s personal bedroom, right?” Fujiko let out a scream of joy.
Yoshie, however, shook her head.
“This belongs to everybody.”
“Everybody?”
“Yeah. It’s for anybody who wants to use it.”
“For a foursome?”
“If you’re feeling up for it.”
“I... I definitely am.”
“Yup. I sure am.”
“...I’m not, I don’t think. I want Akuto to be mine and mine alone.”
“Well, we can work out some kind of reservation sheet, or a rotation...”
Fujiko and Yoshie began to discuss specifics, but Junko shut them down.
“H-Hey! What are you talking about?”
“We’re talking about how we’re going to have sex. Our situation is unique, and that’s why we need to discuss things...”
“Don’t be so stuck-up. I know you want to get laid too.”
Yoshie and Fujiko both looked at her, annoyed.
“B-But that doesn’t mean...” Junko tried to come up with some kind of answer, but then she saw that Akuto was trying to sneak away, and yelled.
“...This is what happens when you can’t make a decision! We’re going to have a wedding for everybody! Anything that happens after that is fine!”
Both Fujiko and Yoshie’s expressions changed. Their mood shifted from “horny” to “romantic” in an instant.
“A marriage!”
“A wedding!”
“Wedding!”
“Wedding! Wedding!”
Everybody except Akuto began to run towards the living room. Akuto followed, wondering what they were doing. When he saw that the three of them were already picking out spots to hold the wedding, he sighed, shrugged, and went back to close the door to the bedroom.
Starting that evening, a strange, but somehow peaceful, life began.
During the day, he worked and studied to build what he called “The Pure Church”, and in the evening, the three of them were there to see to his needs. He knew them all very well, but actually living with them taught him some new things.
Yoshie was friendlier than he thought. She had a habit of pressing her body up against Fujiko and Junko too, not just him. She was also selfish and easily distracted. When she got excited about something she was working on on her computer in her room, she wouldn’t come out when anyone called her. And when Fujiko tickled her neck to break her out of her concentration, she got seriously mad.
Fujiko was just like he thought, but once she’d opened up to someone, she had a habit of oversharing, and getting lazy. She would do the cooking, cleaning, and washing if she felt like it, but if she didn’t, she’d just leave it to Junko. She also had a nasty habit of leaving half-eaten bags of potato chips and other snacks lying around. When you threw them out, she’d get mad, too, saying that she was planning on eating the rest of them. Akuto, however, was required to be perfect at all times. And since Akuto would try his best to be perfect when she demanded it, Yoshie and Junko were constantly getting mad at her.
Junko, for her part, let her clean freak flag show early. She complained that she was the only one who did any chores, but she was never satisfied if things weren’t perfectly clean, and refused to even use maids or other cleaning services. Anything that needed doing, she’d do it herself before they could arrive.
She didn�
��t like ordering out either. It was “unhealthy”, she said. Instead, she would even go out and buy the ingredients herself. However, she seemed to have trouble opening up to others. Whenever Fujiko and Yoshie were getting a little too close to Akuto, she would try to pull them off. She would never, however, try to take their place. But even as she kept her distance from Akuto, she would be constantly staring at him (and sometimes panting), like some kind of indoor stalker. Of course, Fujiko didn’t like this, and would try to bring them both to the bedroom, but Junko would always pitch a fit and run. Lately Fujiko had mostly given up.
Despite all these flaws, though, Akuto was very happy with his situation. Why? Because he could improve things over time, if he put his mind to it. He managed to spend more time with Junko without upsetting her by helping her with the chores. He managed to deal with Fujiko’s laziness by giving her jobs to do outside of studying. And he managed to avoid any discussions of sex by having conversations with Yoshie late at night that the others couldn’t follow.
Normally, doing all this would drain a man of energy, but Akuto could do it. Thanks to that, his days were peaceful. The marriage ceremony was a huge deal. They weren’t sure what religious elements to incorporate, so they ended up using them all.
They rented out the whole event hall the day of the ceremony, and the three came in wearing their wedding dresses to the sound of a live band. The ceremony was only open to relatives and people they knew, but the seats were packed anyway. Everyone there was awestruck by the beauty of the brides.
The biggest moment was when it came time to kiss the brides. Yoshie’s kiss was brief, and Fujiko’s was passionate. But Junko hesitated when the moment came.
“You want me to do it in front of all these people?” she said. Fujiko just glared at her, and even Akuto felt like it was time she made up her damn mind.
In the end, it was Akuto’s words that convinced her.
“I know it’s your first kiss. And that’s why I wanted you to have it at the best spot in the world.”
When she heard that, Junko closed her eyes and quietly accepted his kiss.
Demon King Daimaou: Volume 13 Page 3