The smell drifting from the little wooden structure made my mouth water. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d eaten. Forgetting whatever reservations I may have had, I rushed forward.

The simple curtain of dried leaves that served as a door hung open and I peered inside. Junivan stood with her back to me, stirring a pot hanging over a fire. Not wanting to be rude, I knocked on the wall.

Junivan looked over her shoulder at me and smiled warmly. Even that minor show of kindness warmed my heart in this world that had so far been little more than terrible and bewildering.

“Come on in,” she said, “dinner’s almost ready.”

I did as I was told and sat down at the little table by the fire. It was only big enough for two people at most. The Demon Lord really had fallen low if this was where she lived. There was almost no other furniture in the room, two bedrolls and a chair. My dorm room back on Earth hadn’t been great, but it was a palace compared to this.

I heard someone clear their throat behind me and glanced back. The impoverished Demon Lord I’d been forced to serve was glaring at me. “That’s my seat,” she said.

I grudgingly gave it up and sat on the ground. “This place is even crappier than I thought.”

“Mind your tongue,” the Demon Lord said. “You can sleep outside if you don’t find the accommodations up to your standards.”

I lowered my head. “Sorry.” This place wasn’t great, but it was still a lot better than sleeping outside in the forest. Especially given the unknown and presumably hostile nature of said forest, based on what I knew of this world so far.

I’d seen only a tiny fraction of it so far, but it hadn’t seemed too hospitable so far. Arriving somewhere drenched in blood and being forced into the service of a demon wasn’t exactly my idea of a good time. And that’s without even mentioning the Paladin.

I shivered at the thought of running into him again. The last two encounters had been enough to last me for the rest of my life. “We are safe out here, right?”

The demon sitting in the chair beside me shrugged. “For now.”

I swallowed. “Then you mean the Paladin who attacked us earlier might still track us down?”

“Quite possibly. But we won’t be staying here long.”

She seemed awfully nonchalant about this whole thing, as if it were someone else’s problem. “Shouldn’t we be a little more worried?” By we, I of course meant her. I was plenty worried as it was. “He nearly killed us not that long ago, in case you forgot.”

“Be that as it may,” the unconcerned demon said, “it’ll be a while before any of the humans have the free time to venture this far out from the city.”

I wasn’t sure if I should admire her courage or doubt her sanity. Okay, that’s a lie. I definitely doubted her sanity. “How can you be so sure?”

“Because I do have some measure of good luck. The demons are assaulting the city as we speak. They shouldn’t be able to spare anyone to hunt us down for at least a day. More than enough time for us to get out of here.”

I was surprised. She’d thought this out a lot better than I assumed. Maybe serving her wouldn’t be so hopeless after all. Junivan brought out a spoon and bowl for her mistress and I. She filled the bowls with the contents of the pot and handed us our portions.

The stew was watery, with just a few vegetables and a bit of meat. Objectively speaking, I can’t say it was particularly good. Not something I’d have been happy to be served back on Earth. But in that moment, hungry as I was, it was delicious. And more importantly it filled my stomach.

I wolfed it down with relish and set my bowl down with a contented sigh. The demon beside ate more slowly, with some semblance of decorum. Once she was done, I turned my mind to more pressing matters. Now that I’d eaten, it was time to think about what came next.

“What’s this equipment you mentioned anyway?” I couldn’t see anything like that in their little shelter.

The Demon Lord walked over and unwrapped a bundle in the corner. It was a large sword, almost as long as I was tall. With a grunt, she slid it out of the battered leather sheath. The blade was chipped and covered in rust. “I’m supposed to use this? Isn’t it kind of too big? Besides… It looks like a piece of junk.”

The demon glared at me. “This is Shotensho, the ancestral sword of my family. I will not tolerate it being described as ‘junk’.”

“Sorry.” I grinned at her. “I was just saying how it looks.”

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She mirrored it with a nasty grin of her own. “Why don’t you try holding it then? I’m sure you’ll appreciate it more then.”

Junivan tried to step in and say something, but the demon silenced her with a gesture. Seeing her act like that gave me a bad feeling about the sword, but I could hardly back down now. I took a deep breath and gripped the hilt with both hands. I heaved, not sure if I’d even be able to get the sword off the ground.

But despite its size, it proved much lighter than I’d thought. I weighed it in my hands; it couldn’t have been more than a couple of kilograms. Seeing the demon staring intently at me, my unease only grew. “What is it?”

Then it hit me. A chill, spreading from where my hand touched the sword. It moved through my body until it was like I was submerged in a bath of ice. Shocked, I tried to release the sword, only to find that I was frozen in place. The Demon Lord opened her mouth in slow motion as time ground to a halt.

My vision darkened as a figure appeared before me. Indistinct, they appeared as a huge shadow, taking up most of the room. Like a needle piercing my mind, a foreign consciousness invaded my own.

“You dare?” The voice, neither male nor female, spoke in a whisper. Yet that whisper reverberated through my skull until it felt like my head would burst open. I tried to brings my hands up to my head, but they remained unmoving.

“I didn’t mean to offend you, I was just doing as I was told. The Demon Lord is the one you should be getting upset at, she’s the one who told me to grab the sword.”

“Then you accept none of the responsibility? Pathetic.” The words had an edge to them, I could practically see the foreign presence sneering at me.

“You can’t expect me to take responsibility for something I had no say in.” I didn’t know what this thing was, but it wasn’t being the slightest bit fair.

“Oh? Should one not take responsibility for their actions? Regardless what someone told them to do?”

I hated to admit it, but they had a point. “Fine. It was partly my fault too. So why shouldn’t I touch this sword? Seems a bit useless to have a sword no one is allowed to use.”

“I am no mere sword, I am Shotensho. Once the companion of Lord Sarinknell, Demon Lord of the Fourth Circle. As he has fallen in battle, I am willing to consent to a new wielder. But not one such as you.”

I was blown away by the sheer discrimination, was because I was human? Well, I suppose I wasn’t technically human anymore but it was close enough. “What’s your problem? You don’t know anything about me.”

“Oh, but I do. I know everything worth knowing about your pathetic existence. I knew it the moment you dared put your hands upon me. You are weak. In mind and body. Without an ounce of loyalty to the Lady or her cause.”

“Well duh. Why would I have any loyalty to her? She dragged me into this crappy world against my will. All she’s done for me is ruin my life and practically enslave me.” I hadn’t really had a chance to think about it before, but now that I did I found my circumstances to be truly awful. Surely this sword should be denouncing her if anyone.

“You will find no sympathy from me. The Lady did what was necessary, it is not for you to question her will.”

“That right? Well I do question it. I question her will, her intelligence, her sanity, her morality and her status. But hey, I guess she’s not bad looking, if you’re into monster girls.”

I was hit with a mental backlash, sending my mind reeling. The sword had given me some sort of mental slap. “Speak ill of the Lady once more and I will end your life here and now. Is that clear?”

“Yeah, yeah.” I was beyond caring about death threats, it seemed like I was doomed to die in this stupid world anyway.

“Keep that in mind. I will not warn you again.”

I was tempted to tell them they could shove their warning up their incorporeal ass, but I wasn’t in that much of a hurry to die. It was hard not to think they were capable of it when they’d stopped time like this for me.

“If you care so much about the Lady, shouldn’t you help me? Like it or not, I still have to help her in trying to retake her home, as suicidal as that sounds.”

“Should? Perhaps. But I will not. I may have my duty to her, but I still have my pride. And I will not serve someone like you.”

Much as this stupid sword was getting on my nerves, I did need their help. Especially since there didn’t seem to be any other weapons available. “Look. I get that you don’t like me. You’ve made that abundantly clear. Isn’t there a way we can come to some sort of arrangement?”

“I am not some merchant to be bartered with.”

“Fine, my bad. Put it in whatever terms you want. There has to be some way you’d be willing to help.”

“I could, perhaps, allow you to use me if you are willing to swear an oath.” The tone had lost some of its haughtiness, it sounded slightly abashed. “However, any alliance between us would be only temporary.”

Swearing an oath to the sentient sword of a dead Demon Lord seemed like a terrible idea. But hey, things couldn’t get much worse, right? I decided that I may as well go all in, no point fretting about when I was already shackled to the whims of a sixteen-year-old Demon Lord. “Fine. What’s this oath?”

“You will swear to follow Lady Sarinknell wholeheartedly, even at the cost of your own life. You will swear never to desert her or flee before the enemy. Finally, you will swear to uphold her honour and act in a manner befitting of your master’s station. If you can swear to that much, I will allow you to wield me.”

The sword sure was asking a lot, especially for a mere object. But none of it seemed that out of line with what I was going to have to do anyway.

“Okay. I swear.”

“That’s not good enough, you have to recite the oath you’re swearing. Repeat after me.” They repeated the oath, pausing for me to repeat it back to them. It was only when I was done that I realized I’d been speaking out loud.

Whatever had been holding me frozen in time had vanished without me noticing. The Demon Lord and her servant were both staring at me. Junivan had the same warm smile, while her master was doing her best to look indifferent.

But I could make out a slight reddening of her cheeks. Good, you should be embarrassed. No one should have to say something so ridiculous. Was this what my life was going to be like here? Maybe I’d have been better off letting the sword kill me. I shook the stupid weapon still in my hands. “Is that good enough? Are you going to let yourself be used now?”

I didn’t hear any reply. Instead, I felt a sense of grudging acceptance coming from the sword. Not wanting to face the Demon Lord after that display, I informed the room at large that I was going out to practice with my new sword. It was time to see what it could do; it better have been worth humiliating myself with that ridiculous oath.