Chapter 03 – Upside Down

"A slave? Are you kidding?" I cried at Souta. I couldn't believe to what he was telling me. Kei was our slave? He was eying me cautiously and then continued carefully.

"Everyone who can afford some has at least one. There's nothing strange about it. You really must have hit your head hard. Kei lives here just for a while but before her there was another for several generations." I looked at him unable to say anything. Slaves? The demons are here the slaves of humans? How could that happen?

"So all the demons are slaves of humans?" I asked confusedly and he shook his head.

"No. Not all demons. Just those who were trying to offense the Lord. They are sent to the preparation camp where they are turned to slaves. I don't know how exactly it works, but when they leave the preparations they don't remember anything about themselves. It's important because if they remembered who they were, they could become dangerous." So they are just puppets manipulated by the others. No wonder mum was acting to Kei like she did. I internally commented the information I gained from Souta.

"The Lord says that for a demon who thinks too much of himself, this is the best punishment." Souta continued and I sighed.

"Seems like he's the one to talk." I uttered but I was taken aback when Souta covered my mouth with his hand and looked at me with terrified expression.

"You mustn't talk badly about the Lord. If it somehow reached his ears, he could send for you and no priestess who met him in his palace ever returned." I stared at him shocked. So this Lord, whoever it was, was turning his demon enemies into the slaves and he probably had the pleasure with killing humans. Or maybe just priestesses, but in the end there wasn't such a big difference.

"Tell me more about the Lord and his habits." I asked him and he nodded reluctantly.

"He is a strong demon." He started slowly. Well, that could be expected. I doubted that a human would be capable doing such things.

"He is quite permissive to everyone who follows his rules but he is really cruel to everyone who doesn't." It was logical. If he harmed some of his faithful followers without proper reason, the people could revolt against him. But if he punished only those who disobeyed him or tried to attack him or anything else what would be against his rules, he would just strengthened his power and obedience of the rest of the people.

"The demons are sent to the preparation camp to become slaves and humans are sent to the hunting field where they become the prey of men-eating demons. We went there once with my friend because we were curious what is it like there, so we spied on them. I had nightmares for half a month after that. You was the one who told me I have nothing to worry about that I wouldn't be sent there." Even now he was shaking a bit, just thinking about it.

"Why would I tell you that?" I continued in my questioning. This was getting more confusing with every further information he told me.

"Because you are the priestess, and families with priestesses are treated better than ordinary humans." I would have thought that as a demon he would want to get rid of us. Why would he cherish us? It's not that he would have to be scared. Moreover, Souta said before that each priestess who met him in his palace was never seen again.

"Why is that?" I asked but he just shrugged.

"I don't know. He never said the reason."

"You talked with him?" I exclaimed in surprise. This was starting to be too much for me to handle.

"No, but he appears in the TV often. He has one entry today too. We all will be watching it." He stated simply.

"Don't tell me that it is commanded to watch it." I frowned.

"No, it's not ordered, but he is always saying something important so it's better to watch it." I nodded to him. I wondered what important things he could say, but I was more curious about what kind of demon he was. If he really was as strong as he seemed to be then he must have lived even 500 years ago so there's the possibility that I have met him before.

I decided that I've got enough information from Souta for one day and told him that I would like to be alone for a while. He didn't protest. He seemed to be glad for that actually. I was sure that he didn't like to talk about all these things and he must have been thinking that I've gone mad.

This situation reminded me of my first experience in the feudal era. The people there didn't know either what to think about me, but for them I was a stranger. Here I was supposed to be at home, but this place didn't feel like home to me anymore.

Most of the things were the same, but the differences were too much for me. Slaves. Demons. Nothing like that should be in my era. Something must have happened in the past and I had to find out what. For now I decided to watch that entry of this Lord and then I would return to the feudal era to figure out what happened.

I was waiting impatiently in front of the TV in the living room. I needed to know if the demon responsible for changing my time into this mess was someone I knew and if there was any chance to return everything back to normal. I was just mindlessly browsing through the channels as all the members of my family came to the living room one by one.

At first grandpa, who spent all day in the shed, checking his treasures and charms. I was glad that at least this didn't change, even when the world was actually full of demons. Though his charms were as useless as always.

Then came Souta, holding Buyo in his hands and finally mum, who came from the kitchen and who took the remote from me. She changed the channel to the one where the Lord was about to appear and we waited.

A huge opulent room appeared on the screen and in the middle of the room stood the Lord. He started to talk but I didn't hear him. Not that the TV would be muted, I just wasn't able to make my brain work to process the words. I could think only about one thing.

How can this be?