“Ah…Agh….”
While Lucifer flailed about in an attempt to close his dislocated jaw, Hess carefully examined the fruits.
‘I had already decided long ago which fruit to feed him. The reason I made them bring every fruit, though, was….’
Because I did not know the name of the support-type fruit.
According to the novel’s description, that fruit was white and had a wing drawn on it.
‘…This is it!’
Hess picked up one fruit and climbed onto the altar.
“Agh! Ahh….”
With his jaw still dislocated, Lucifer struggled to avoid Hess. But whenever he did, the Sealing Chains appeared and pulled at his limbs.
“Lord Hess…?”
“Hold still, you demon…Huh? I am a little busy right now. Saya, we will talk later.”
“To my knowledge, that fruit seems to be incompatible with demons….”
Saya wore an expression of utter incomprehension.
“Everything has its use. Hey, hold still, you demon bastard!”
Having finally put the fruit inside Lucifer’s mouth, Hess said,
“Swallow!”
He kicked the fruit deep into Lucifer’s throat.
“Ghack…!”
“Phew…That is done. I look forward to working with you.”
When Hess climbed down from the altar, Lucifer’s body began to shine a brilliant white that did not suit a demon at all.
SCREEECH!
Once the light completely enveloped him, the cries of pain he had been making faded away.
Then the light itself began to shrink.
The light that had once been twice Hess’s size gradually shrank to Hess’s height, then to Saya’s, and finally to roughly the height of Saya’s calves.
“Lord Hess, I have never seen a record of anyone feeding that fruit to a demon….”
“If you want to leave it in the records, then do so.”
Soon, as the light gradually dimmed, Lucifer’s transformed appearance was revealed—the effect of the fruit.
“What is that? Pfft.”
“…Pfft.”
While Hess and Saya failed to hold back their laughter, Lucifer regained his senses and looked over his arms and legs—no, his four legs.
“Wh-What happened to me?!”
A bright-red cat.
“I, Lucifer!”
His proportions were different from those of an ordinary cat. Its body was a little shorter, and its head was larger.
“This cannot be!”
Even his voice had changed. The sound that had seemed to echo through a cave in Hell was gone, leaving a voice that anyone would simply hear as a cat’s.
“The contract is invalid!”
Only his bright-red fur and yellow eyes remained as traces that he had once been a demon.
“Invalid, my foot. The fact that you changed like this means the contract has begun.”
HISS! “How could this happen?!”
I had expected that eating the fruit would change him into a form suited to a supporter.
I could not keep him at Lloyd’s side in a demon’s form to begin with.
Still, I had not expected him to change this much.
“Saya, this is truly worth recording.”
“I will record it.”
“Do not record it!”
Lucifer stood on his hind legs and flailed as he tried to swing his forelegs, but it was not easy.
MRAOW!
“Calm down and adapt quickly. You cannot undo it anyway.”
“…GRRR….”
After growling, Lucifer soon plopped down where he was.
“…Damn it.”
“I will tell you the precautions.”
“What kind of damned precautions are those?”
“Only Saya and I here know that you can speak.”
“…?”
“You must never speak in front of anyone else. You are to act as though you are an animal that cannot talk.”
“Ha!”
Sitting with his hind legs stretched out, Lucifer crossed his forelegs as though he were utterly dumbfounded, then sharply turned his head away.
“It is for your sake. An animal that can use support skills is unusual enough, but if it can speak too, it will draw too much attention. Everyone will try to talk to you. Would that not be bothersome for you as well?”
“…Hm.”
As Lucifer fell into deep thought, his ears twitched little by little.
“Hm…. That may be true.”
“You may speak freely when you are alone with me, so it will not be too suffocating.”
“Then how will I communicate when other humans are around?”
“Meow! Or mew! Put feeling into sounds like that. You will be able to convey the rough meaning.”
“…I will simply give up on communication.”
“Do as you please. You are the one who will be frustrated.”
GRRR.
Only a moment ago, Lucifer had been looking down at Hess and Saya. Now he had to crane his neck a great deal just to look up at them.
“Saya, this is a secret.”
“Yes. Still, this demon has become quite a cute cat….”
“Do not treat me like that! HISS!”
Neither of them paid Lucifer’s reaction any mind.
“But?”
“Are you truly all right with this? A demon without destructive power….”
“It is fine. On the contrary, he can make up for what I lack.”
It was true. The only thing versatile Hess lacked was support.
The process of acclimating the body to the flow of Mana needed to use healing or buff skills interfered to some extent with the flow of Mana specialized for attack magic.
To draw out the efficiency of attack magic to its utmost limit, Hess had learned as few unnecessary spells as possible.
‘At this point, it is much faster to feed Lucifer a fruit than for me to start learning them.’
Seeing the satisfied look on Hess’s face, Saya decided not to ask any more questions.
“It will be easy to maintain the secret anyway. I will use Lucifer for activities outside, so there will be no reason to see him within the hideout.”
“Understood. You seem to be very busy during the day lately as well.”
“There is a mountain of work.”
The hideout’s repairs were finished, and I had obtained Lucifer. Now I should quickly teach that bastard Lloyd swordsmanship and get it over with.
“I will be going now, so make sure no one can enter the basement.”
“Yes. Travel safely.”
“Ah, one more thing. Even if you happen to see Lucifer outside, you saw nothing.”
“I will remember that.”
***
As Hess hid Lucifer inside his clothes and left the hideout, the quick-witted demon roughly caught on to what was going on.
“Hess, you are an executive in an underworld guild.”
“The Leader of the Dark Order is the only person above me.”
“That is quite a high position.”
“The Leader of the Dark Order is Nightmare.”
“Ah, I get the general idea. If that bastard dies, I will be free too.”
“That is right. When the Demon Contract ends, the fruit’s effect will end as well.”
“Then this shitty form will be gone too.”
After they had moved quite far from the hideout, Hess began rubbing his ring.
“Lucifer, this is usually the appearance you will see me in from now on.”
“Hm?”
SHHHH—
Hess’s silver hair slowly changed to blond, and his murderous gaze calmed as well.
“Ho?”
“My name in this form is Henrik. You must know that precisely, just in case. It will be a serious problem if you confuse it.”
“Do not worry.”
“What did I say my name was?”
“…You should tell me twice. Do not be so heartless.”
“Henrik.”
“Henrik. I will remember it.”
Since he could not speak in front of other people anyway, it would not matter much even if he confused my name.
Still, one never knew what might happen.
“You operate under a dual identity?”
“You are the only one who knows. I did not want to tell even you, but I have no choice if I am going to make use of you.”
“Does that human called Saya not know either?”
“She knows that I possess the Ring of Dantalion. Saya modified the ring, after all. But I told her not to ask beyond that.”
“A loyal subordinate. And she even has Hellfire hair. I like her very much.”
Judging by the content of what he said, Lucifer was still Lucifer, but it was hard to get used to him speaking in a cat’s voice.
“By the way, is the equipment you use to transform perhaps the Ring of Dantalion?”
“Indeed. As a demon, there is no way you would not know.”
“I believe you said just now that the ring had been modified…. Did you make it yourself? With a Crafting Scroll?”
“That is right.”
Lucifer let out a “Mraow!” Hess assumed it was a cat’s expression of admiration.
“…It seems I have formed a contract with an extraordinary human. To think there is someone who gathered all those insane materials. You are probably the first in human history.”
“It seemed easier than infiltrating the depths of Hell, twisting Dantalion’s wrist, and taking the ring away.”
After continuing to exclaim in amazement, Lucifer suddenly had one question.
“But if you made the ring yourself, that means you personally engraved the appearance you transform into as well?”
“That is right.”
“You must have brought in the original owner of that appearance to do the work?”
“I struggled a little.”
“Is the name of the appearance’s original owner Henrik as well, by any chance?”
“That is right. To make a perfect false identity, I use both Henrik’s appearance and his name.”
That demon knows quite a lot about rings.
“But for the ring’s effect to continue, the original owner of the engraved appearance must stay alive, correct?”
“Of course.”
Lucifer let out a vicious, catlike cackle.
“Then it seems you have locked up the real Henrik somewhere he cannot die?”
“It is complicated to explain. In any case, the village is close. No more conversation from now on.”
Once in the village, Henrik headed straight for the inn. Lucifer was so busy looking around at the human world, which he was seeing for the first time in a long while, that he had no time to spare.
The people, on the other hand, found Lucifer strange. A bright-red cat, of all things.
Most people eventually concluded, ‘Its master must have dyed it because he has strange tastes,’ and went their separate ways.
After a little over ten minutes, the inn came into view.
‘That bastard Lloyd is unexpectedly diligent.’
Lloyd was doing squats by himself in the inn’s back courtyard, even though no one had told him to.
‘It was his first time doing them yesterday, so his legs must have been wrecked today.’
Certainly, he could only endure for a much shorter time than yesterday.
But what mattered was that he was still trying doggedly.
‘He has a desire to improve. That makes him worth teaching.’
As Henrik approached, Lloyd sensed his presence as well.
“Henrik, you are late. It has already been well past lunchtime—hm?”
His gaze shifted from Henrik to the unfamiliar bright-red cat below him.
Henrik did not notice at all, but both of Lloyd’s cheeks flushed a little red.
“You are exercising well even without being told. How is it? Is it manageable?”
“…A cat is following you?”
“Of course. It is my cat.”
“…Your cat?”
On trembling legs, Lloyd approached the cat as though bewitched.
Lucifer was soon seized by an ominous premonition.
Unable to know the cat’s inner thoughts, Lloyd crouched in front of him and reached out without hesitation.
HISS!
“Ah…!”
Lucifer instinctively thrust out a forepaw and scratched Lloyd’s hand.
“…That hurts.”
“This cat is a little wary of strangers. Now, be good, our Lucif….”
“…What did you say the cat’s name was?”
Damn, I had not thought of an alias. Even if he looked like a cat, Lucifer was far too obvious a demon’s name.
“Well, that is…Luci….”
“Lucy?”
Yes, that was it.
“Yes, yes. Lucy.”
“Lucy…. It is a cute name.”
Despite how recently he had been scratched, Lloyd reached out again.
At that, Lucy’s forepaw tensed again.
SQUEEZE—
Henrik grabbed Lucy by the scruff of the neck.
“Be good, Lucy, okay? Don't scratch Lloyd, all right~?”
GRRRR.
Lucy held his head stiffly high and resisted.
Pressing down firmly on the hand that held the scruff of Lucy’s neck, Henrik spoke through clenched teeth.
“Be good, Lucy…?”
Lucy, who had continued to resist, finally surrendered at Henrik’s words.
“……Meow.”
That is right. Good job.
“……Mew.”
Henrik stroked Lucy’s head and gestured to Lloyd to try as well.
“…Good.”
Lloyd cautiously reached out again. He slowly brought his hand behind Lucy’s ears, then began to stroke him gently.
“…You are warm, Lucy.”
Lloyd’s hand trembled faintly.
Lucifer had not used a single skill yet, but Lloyd had already forgotten the pain in his legs.