Kazuma's turn

I'd been lost for ideas all night on how to take Iris up on her offer. Sure, I could have just started doing what I was told, and I would. Mostly. But that just seemed…well I was the last person to sing the virtues of hard work for its own sake. 'The hardest worker is the biggest loser' had been my motto for years, and given what I'd seen waiting for me at the time I still couldn't say I was wrong.

But with a goal that I couldn't resist right in front of me? That demanded better than just paying attention in class and shanking crippled monsters. For once, my NEET skills came in handy outside of a boss raid. I'd spent all night pacing the room trying to remember and write down anything that seemed even vaguely profitable. Pretty quickly I'd hit on cuisine, given how much Iris had liked the food on our lunch date.

The one really parental thing my father ever did for us was cook breakfast Saturday mornings before he went in for a half day at work. Sometimes traditional miso, rice, and grilled fish. Others western style like cinnamon toast, eggs, and bacon. But my favorite had always been waffles. I'd loved waking up to oil and butter in the air on those mornings. And from what I'd seen of the food so far they should do just fine here.

So I'd gone down to the kitchen well before sunrise with the beginnings of a plan, looking for the spirit of the house.

To ask to borrow the kitchen to make an experimental food she'd never heard of. But, first could she teach me how to cook?

When I put it that way it's kind of amazing she didn't throw me out on the spot.

Still, mission accomplished! After Iris left to change, and Yunyun and Benny to make the rounds of the village, I was left with Rain and her review course.

So as our lunch break came around I found myself reciting the kingdom's geography so I wouldn't make a fool of myself having to ask where some count's turf was.

"That will do for this morning I believe," Rain announced once I'd finished more or less correctly. "Even Lady Claire and I would be hard pressed to name any but the most prominent baronies, but most lower nobility will specify which county they hold fief in for that reason."

"Thanks, I'd been dreading that ever since I saw the stack you carried in with you," I joked. "I'll be back next bell then?"

She nodded. "Do be a dear and get me a turkey sandwich from the pub on your way back?"

Agreeing, I stepped outside and left her to her real job for a while.

The village blacksmith was near the edge of town, not surprisingly. Even standing outside the place the heat was beginning to stick my shirt to my chest, the idea of spending all day every day in the middle of that made me wonder if smiths were human.

Bracing myself, I stepped through the open doorway and rang the heavy brass bell on the counter.

Thankfully, during my past few days wandering the village dodging work I'd already met the owner. When the girls did the whole self introduction thing I could at least appreciate it. But having a scarred, half bald bruiser older than my dad go on about 'chaining souls to power his ancestor's forge' was a lot to take on an empty stomach.

"Well met! What brings you to the finest smithy for twenty leagues?" The man himself asked as he bellied up to the counter.

"Morning, Luhan," I replied, taking out a folded piece of paper from my pocket and spreading it out. "I've got a custom job for you, nothing big though. I'd like a pan about this big, with this pattern cast in the bottom…"

Maybe 30 minutes later, the deal was struck and I was on my way. Half of that was letting him convince me the waffle iron really needed relief carvings of wheat on the handles and a howling wolf motif on one lid and screaming eagle on the other. Apparently even cookware the Queen would never lay eyes on needed to be works of art, who knew?

That side job done, and the little list of projects that much shorter since I'd handed off a sketch of the pizza stone, deep dish pan, and an all corners lasagna/brownie pan while I was at it, I headed off to the most misleadingly named pub in the kingdom.

Over a pint of lager and some roast pork, I mulled over the other thing that had been on my mind.

I felt like a tween age girl just thinking it, but kissing Iris had been one of the biggest events of my life, and it didn't seem to matter to her at all.

Not that she seemed to have hated it, as best I could tell. And it wasn't as though I'd expected her to announce it at the breakfast table or anything. But…damnation I'd expected something. A flirty wink when no one was looking maybe, or some 'accidental' brushing hands passing dishes. Like the girls in class used to gush about in their dramas or mangas.

Of course I'd be lucky to be 'background character A' in any of those stories, so maybe I ought to be happy with what I had. Any real romance story events would probably summon a real romance hero that would kick me out of the running faster than you could say 'the moon is beautiful'.

On that cheerful thought, I realized I'd finished my beer and boar without ever really tasting either. Waving to Nerimaki on my way out, I was about to head back to the Chief's house with Rain's sandwich in spite of it being almost an hour before I was due.

Which reminded me. Frowning, I tried to push past the slight fuzziness I hadn't quite been drinking long enough to get a tolerance to. Rain. She was a girl. Well, woman. So was Yunyun, plus a wife and mother too. That was a 200% increase in the number of women willing to talk to me for more than a few sentences. 300%, with Komekko. And the first thing an Adventurer learns is that you should use ALL of your assets. If I wanted to know what was going on with Iris, some reconnaissance seemed to be a good place to start. Rain and Yunyun both had real jobs, so I'd wait for later on them. That left Komekko, but she might be the better place to start anyway. Sure she's crazy, but she's also more or less our age and was probably the least likely to report straight back to Iris.

My plan complete, I set my course for Komekko's house.

She didn't answer the door, but I did hear activity from around the back so I rounded the side of the house to find someone hard at work hanging up bedding to dry.

She had her back turned to me, but I was sure I hadn't seen her at the laundry tornado, and she had the kind of figure I'd remember. Long legs under a black miniskirt, tanned skin, tight waist, and long curly blonde hair hiding most of a white tube top.

And hand sized purple bat wings poking out from either side of her head.

Time stopped, like I'd stepped into the Matrix. In that moment, I felt like I could dodge bullets, if only I could make myself move.

The one good thing about my lazing around the last few days is it gave me a lot of time to chat up the adventuring parties training here. I'd learned quickly that for a few drinks and some conversation most of them were happy to show off what they could do to an easily impressed noob, and my Adventurer Card had filled up with skills faster than I could say 'I'll buy this round.'

With the advanced skills you actually had to study to know what you're doing, which is why the Crimson Demons even bothered having a school at all instead of just a big magic swap meet once in a while. But the basic stuff? That you could get working for you instantly.

"BIND!" I shrieked manfully, grabbing the clothesline full of bedding and dumping my entire store of mana into it. The whole assembly writhed to life like the world's freshest smelling tentacle monster, wrapping the girl shaped hellspawn up like a cocoon from the nose down with a quickly muffled shriek.

Breathing heavily from the mana dump, I stared down at the neatly wrapped package at my feet as I stumbled up. 'She' stared back, eyes tearing and making increasingly frantic sounding muffled noises.

Before I could start asking questions, I heard something BIG crashing through the forest heading this way. Deciding my curiosity could wait, I booked it in the other direction.

"CHIEF! YUNYUN!" I bellowed as I half stumbled, half ran down the street and swerved into the yard in a panic a couple minutes later. The woman in question looked up with a start from where she and Benny had been sharing lunch on the back porch.

"Kazuma? What in…" she began quizzically. "Here, drink. Breathe. No, breathe slower," she chided as I nearly hyperventilated.

"Demon in the VIllage at Komekko's, barely got away," I gasped after doing both. "Looked like a hot girl, but something big started coming through the trees after I got it with Bind, no idea if that's what it really is." I finished in a rush.

Her expression clouded, eyes beginning to glow ominously. "Did you now? Well, let's go see about that then," she snapped, tossing her napkin down beside her plate.

After a much slower, though still pretty brisk, walk back the way I'd come the three of us found ourselves behind Komekkos's house, the scene mostly as I'd left it.

One cocoon girl, still whimpering? Check

One huge, black, bat winged, monster almost as tall as the house. Pretty much what I expected was coming to eat my face? Check

One heaping portion of gratuitous magical violence? Still pending, but it sounded like the Chief Couple might be down for it on the way here.

"Oh, 'ey! Glad you came back!" The bigger demon greeted me cheerfully with a wave. "You did a number on this Bind, and if I try to cut her loose with these I'd open her up neck to knees," he showed the steak knife sized claws on each fingertip. To the sudden, awful silence of his gift wrapped partner.

"Hoost," Benny nodded back. "I thought we had this talk already. No coming near the Village before dark when it's tourist season."

"Hol' up there! I'm an innocent bystander, all I heard was Carla here scream and came running. I wasn't anywhere in eyeshot of the place," the probably really high level demon protested with open hands. "Ask her what the problem was, all I know is I'm gonna have to start all over tracking that bear down I was eyeing for dinner."

"Good, you've been out here enough times I hated to think you were slipping," Yunyun breathed a sigh of relief. "We'll take it up with Carla then, good hunting to you."

"Much obliged," Hoost raised a hand in goodbye, and padded back into the tree line a lot more stealthily than something his size ought to be able to.

"Ah," I began. "I've gotta ask before we go any further here. Am I about to be, like, guilty of treason or something? Please, please tell me Iris knows about all this. I'd never survive prison even back home, never mind here."

"Right, well. So much for our secret weapon," Benny grunted, lifting the bundled demon onto one shoulder and carrying her inside. "Don't worry, you're not going to prison." He turned to grin over one shoulder at me. "We don't imprison traitors here, they get staked out near a monster colony and we let nature take its course. Free tip, if they give you a choice pick anything but the Mimics. The paranoia will drive you insane long before something comes along and actually nibbles on you."

"Stop it," his wife shushed him as she let us in. "No one is getting eaten today. The number of people who know about our visitors fits on your fingers, but her majesty is one of them," she assured me. "If you would?" She asked after we were inside and Benny set Carla down.

"Oh, sure," I released the Bind, and the various sheets and clotheslines fell away from the demoness with a 'whump' on the wood floor.

It was my first time inside a home that wasn't the Chief's and it was pretty much what I expected of this village.

Creepy sigils lovingly carved into the crown mounding, a tapestry on the wall opposite the windows that seemed to show a mushroom cloud over some poor doomed encampment and a red clad figure in the foreground probably responsible for it. Dark stained wooden shelves full of tomes that looked worn, ancient, and for all I knew contained nothing but baby photos.

The furniture was pretty standard though, so we sat at the table while Carla rubbed some feeling back into her limbs, glaring balefully at me all the while.

"I'm going to have to go back and wash those, jackass," she began petulantly. "I'm not a meathead like Hoost, and don't have the Strength stat to enjoy dragging all that all the way across the village twice."

"Young lady, you've got bigger problems than having to redo your chores," Yunyun corrected her grimly. "And I don't care how many centuries old you actually are when I say that. You're luckier than you deserve that it was Kazuma that saw you and not one of my Clan or a tourist, and that he had the sense to come to me instead of calling a general alarm. If either of those things hadn't happened there wouldn't be enough of you left to scrape off a boot!" She snapped. "Which is why I'm sending you straight back to Axel for Beth to deal with!" That said, she did just that with a cast of Teleport before the target could make a sound.

Benny raised his eyebrows, turning from the empty seat to Yunyun.

"Awww. Now I've gotta deal with this mess," a different voice came from the door before he could comment. Its owner rounded the corner from the entryway, frowning at the misshapen pile of linens and line.

"Komekko. So when you told me about 'recruiting staff' that was a code for recruiting double agents," I nodded to myself. "You really had me fooled there."

She looked away quickly, finding the view out the window suddenly fascinating. "Ah…no. No, I told you the honest truth. Hoost has been bringing me dinners off and on for years, and other demons rotate through once in a while," the shortest archwizard in the room admitted with uncharacteristic awkwardness. "Carla was pretty new though. Sounds like she didn't work out?"

"She was outside hanging laundry without any disguise at all, so no," Benny informed her. "We just sent her back to Axel, so unless Hoost is better than I think at the job you'll need to handle your own drying tonight."

"Wait. So you've really been summoning super powerful demons…to do your housework?" I asked, stunned. "Are you for real?!"

"What?" Komekko snapped back, leaning forward belligerently with her hands on her hips. "She was a succubus, that's not even a mid level demon, never mind a powerful one. And I've known Hoost since I was six, he's practically family! Plus, you've been eating meals provided by a greater spirit anyway! What's the difference?"

"Bee isn't being asked to overthrow the Spirit Kingdom, for one."

"Enough, both of you," Yunyun interrupted. "I'll be the first to admit I was…skeptical when I heard what was happening." Komekko coughed loudly. "Fine, I said you were insane even for one of us. My point is, against all odds it seems to be working. Being a lower level demon is a hard life, even mid ranking ones have little say in their fates. Komekko might ask some nominal service from them for form's sake, but they're otherwise left to live their lives as they see fit. Something demons of their status would never receive at home. Between that and her natural affinity for summoning you have an opportunity to split the Demon King's forces we can't possibly pass up."

"And I haven't cleaned or cooked since I was 12. So everybody wins!" Komekko added cheerfully. "Though it has been tough to recruit many higher ranking demons besides Hoost. They've got too much to lose, I guess."

That made sense. Why rock the boat when it wasn't sinking, or something like that.

"And of course the minute the Demon King even suspects we've been seducing his minions away, anybody even remotely disloyal looking is dead." I nodded understanding. "I'll keep quiet, no problem."

"Good, we've been at this long enough as it is and it's almost the fourth bell," Benny noted. "Time we all got back to work, I think."

Speaking of whom, Rain never did get her sandwich that day. Which surely had nothing to do with my having to spend an hour the next morning learning the largest lakes on the continent alphabetically.