What?
A hoard of demons, tomorrow?
“How, what… I won’t have enough time to fortify the town against a wave of demons by then!”
Her statement about being ‘just animalistic savages’ made Noth pull a face, feeling as if she’d just said something bigotted, but he let that go. That wasn’t important right now at all. What was important was figuring out how he was going to deal with this situation.
“You really think I’ll be enough? Do I just... sit at the edge of the Lang thicket and wait for them to come, then?”
Serris turned and hugged Noth’s arm, shining her wicked looking smile directly towards him. Her embrace felt strangely chilling somehow.
<-What was it that you said about those people that you teleported away? That they were 'still your responsibility' even if they made you mad or somesuch? Well I have good news! Your wonderful subjects should be arriving back to town during the next few days! Or at least, they would be if they weren’t going to be ambushed by the demons that are coming to attack you.>
Noth’s face hardened as he realized what she was saying. If he wanted the people he’d sent away to return safe and sound, he’d have to proactively deal with the demons that were coming their way first. There was no way he could just wait inside the town and let the ex-servants wander into an approaching hoard of death.
“...So it seems the only answer is to intercept them before they make it very far. But will I really make it in time to save the returning townsfolk?”
“Good point.”
It was as good a plan as any other he could possibly come up with, so long as the angel led him out at the right times. Was there any reason to doubt that she would help him? She could be mischievous at times, and he knew that she didn’t really like that he’d let the servants who’d disrespected him go with such a light punishment. It wouldn’t be the first time that she’d misled him into something. But then again what if that was the case? What could he do to possibly change anything even if she was plotting something underhanded? In the worst case scenario there was actually very little stopping her from just straight up killing the people she disliked if she truly wanted them dead, as far as he knew. It was a bit upsetting to realize that she could have created this whole incident just to have some fun with their deaths, but at the same time he knew that she’d never done something to cause him pain on purpose, so he’d just have to trust her on this one.
However, it wouldn’t hurt just to ask and be sure.
“Ease my mind. You’re actually going to help me save them, right?”
Serris’s smile, which had previously held an unmistakable evil to it, melted down into a much softer and warmer look. Although, of course, it still carried a hint of a tease to it.
Noth’s lips quirked up in a wry way, but he could tell that a good bit of his worry over the situation had been alleviated.
“That beginning part’s not nearly as reassuring as the rest of it.”
The angel only hugged his arm a bit tighter and giggled in response.
~~~
An hour later, Noth, accompanied by his family a few paces behind him, had gone to the town square, and used one of his wishes to amplify his voice so that it could reach every one of the townsfolk. His trek to the center of the town had already caught the attention of a sizable crowd, so the teen had to make his announcement with a large amount of uncomfortable gazes boring into him.
“Townspeople of Sleekka. This is your Lord, Count Noct Keiran speaking. I’ve come with a warning for you all: A large amount of Demons are headed our way. Do not leave the safety of the town for the next few days until I announce that it’s alright to go out again. Should you decide to ignore my warning, I will not be able to stop what may happen to you. Know that I will be journeying out each day to stop our attackers before they can reach the town. I promise to keep each and every person here safe. We will get through this unscathed. Until you’re all free to forage outside the town again, I will be providing sandwiches in addition to the soup that’s handed out each day, in an attempt to make up for any meat or grains that you may no longer have access to.”
There was murmuring from the surrounding crowd. A few people who had previously been in their homes had trickled out to join them when the speech had began, so now the crowd was even bigger than it had started out as. Noth glanced back at the kids to make sure that they weren’t unnerved by the sheer amount of people surrounding them, but they looked surprisingly fine. Even the sensitive Ren didn’t seem to be batting an eye over it. The teen cleared his throat, trying to cover up the slight disappointment he was feeling from the fact that he was so much more perturbed by all this than they seemed to be. The wish was still broadcasting his voice, however, so the sound recaptured the surrounding crowd’s attention. Noth panicked for a quick moment over what else to say.
This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.
“Ah, while I’m outside the town my family will be acting as my representatives. If there’s any news or issues that I need to be informed of then please tell it to any one of them. You should have all had a chance to meet at least one of the four of them during the rebuilding of everyone’s homes, so don’t feel shy to inform them if something important should crop up. And of course, you all should treat them as you would treat me, as they will be representing me in my absence. Any disrespect to them is disrespect to me.”
As Noth levelled a stern look on the crowd to nail in his point, Elillith and the children stepped forward, so that the crowd could get a better view of them now that they’d been brought up. The townsfolk had all heard gossip about the people who disappeared after mistreating the Count’s precious family, so they readily nodded their heads in assent. Seeing that everyone seemed to be going along with his declaration, Noth ceased his voice amplification and began to walk home with the rest of his group. On the tail of the cold gaze he’d given them, the crowd didn’t make a move to leave until he was out of their sight.
It wasn’t until halfway to the mansion that one of the children suddenly broke the silence.
“Noth.”
“Yes, Jean?”
“I think it’s for the best if I go fetch the girl who’s been in charge of the soup and bring her to the mansion. She’ll need to know about the extra food she’ll be serving.”
"Oh..."
To tell the truth, Noth hadn’t even thought about that. He’d completely forgotten that someone might still need to be in charge of serving the food to the masses and putting it away at night. The fact that anyone had been keeping up with it after he’d fired everyone was quite the surprise, but the other surprise that Jean knew who this person was offered up its own explanation. Jean must have been the one to help these little things he’d let slip his mind run keep running smoothly so far. Perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad idea to enlist her help with this overall. Noth gave Jean a meaningful look and then nodded.
“That sounds fine. I’ll leave you in charge of her.”
Jean gave a dutiful nod like a loyal servant, and yet her cheeks still blushed with how proud she was about being recognized like this.
~~~
The rest of the afternoon passed by without too much incident, luckily. It seemed that Jean had a tight grip on the ‘Gilt’ woman who had been serving the soup to the townspeople, so although Noth had been a bit wary and aloof while speaking to her, he was sure that things would be handled correctly. He felt a bit guilty for keeping a distance from her, but he still wasn’t quite ready to trust any of his old servants yet. He also did his best to not allow her to ask questions about where the sandwiches that she would be serving had coming from, past explaining to her that the box she would be serving from would never run out so long as it was replenished once a week, just like the soup. Once he was sure that everything had been properly conveyed, he quickly wished up the crate full of endless sandwiches and sent Gilt back, eager to stop feeling so uncomfortable from her presence.
They all had an early dinner inside the mansion, knowing that Noth might have to wake up at any moment to go defend against the oncoming demons. Not a single person brought up anything to do with the danger that was approaching, and they all acted as if nothing could possibly be wrong. And yet somehow there was still an odd sense of doom that radiated throughout the room in the background.
Once dinner had been finished and everyone had said their goodnights, they went their separate ways. Noth headed to sleep in his old room, and Helt went along with him to the villa for silence away from his [Gift]; All the others went to their respective rooms in the mansion. Noth was actually quite surprised that the needy Ren who usually followed along everywhere after Helt and Noth would want to sleep in a different building than them. Sure, Jean may have been her friend too, but statistically more of her friends were going over their way than hers, so it was quite an odd decision on her part. And for the record, Elillith didn’t count in the friend category considering, in Ren’s words, that she was more like a mom than a friend.
Noth sat on his bed and pet a random cat he’d grabbed out of the hallway for a while to calm himself down. His angel nuzzled her cheek against the top of his head as she loosely hugged his neck. And yet, for some reason, Noth couldn’t get his mind to calm down and stray away from what he’d have to do tomorrow.
“Serris?”
“...What am I even supposed to do against a whole group of demons at once?”
“Of course it is, but how? I don’t really know how to wish up what you did to them last time, and I feel like if I try to ask you to do it again to all of them that it’ll use up way too much of my power.”
Serris brought up one of her hands to pet the side of Noth’s head as he thought it over. As usual she didn’t seem to have any inclination to offer up answers to his worries. He ran over all the possible things he could do to try and defeat the demons, but once again he wasn’t sure what all it would take to actually kill one. Would a certain attack be too weak, or would he be overkilling them and wasting his wishes? Would it be worth it to try demands against them and convince them to attack each other, or maybe would the angel’s madness ability work on them?
Suddenly a realization crossed Noth’s mind.
The teen’s eyes swivelled up towards the angel on his head.
“If I can use your angel of madness abilities, does that mean I could also use your calamity abilities as well?”
Serris’s petting seemed to slow down, and her eyes suddenly narrowed with a steely look as she muttered.
Noth pretended like he didn’t hear that last part.
“Alright, so then if that’s off the table, what would even work? I wish I was starting off fighting just one of them instead of a whole bunch at once so I could at least test a few theories. Damn this hoard’s timing.”
Serris put on a thoughtful look and continued petting Noth’s hair, but she refused to let their eyes meet even when he pulled away and tried his best to look her in the eyes. Eventually she broke down laughing from the teen’s desperate attempt to meet her gaze. After wiping a few tears away she put on a taunting, almost threatening face.
“...What? You want me to… pray?”