I Was Supposed to Be Feeding the Pigeons, But Somehow I Ended Up Feeding a Beautiful Demon Lord Instead - 14

Chapter 14

The incident in the park yesterday had been filed away in my memory as “just a little mishap.”

A young man named Leon, who was aspiring to join a theater troupe, had gotten way too into character and started shouting loudly. I casually calmed him down and sent him on his way. That was all there was to it.

But for Bel, who had been sitting right next to me, it apparently wasn’t that simple.

Today, Bel seemed a little off. She sat deeply on the bench as usual, but her hand had stopped turning the pages of her paperback.

Every now and then, she peeked at me through the gap in her hood.

“…Um, Bel-san?”

“…Hm? What?”

“Has something been stuck on my face this whole time? Maybe a sesame seed from an anpan or something?”

“…Nothing is there. I’m just looking.”

Bel turned her face away with a huff, but her ears looked slightly red.

She must still be bothered about yesterday. She was an official, after all. Even though it was outside of work hours, being protected by an ordinary citizen might have bruised her pride.

“If it’s about yesterday, you really don’t have to worry. I just butted in on my own.”

As I took a drink out of the basket, Bel quietly shook her head.

“…No. I have to thank you.”

“Thank me? Come on.”

“Kazuya. You are… far too defenseless.”

Bel spoke in a serious tone and turned fully toward me. Her eyes held an intensity I had never seen before — less like strong determination and more like the urgent worry of an overprotective parent.

“There’s no telling when someone like that man might show up again. People like you, who walk around in a complete peacetime daze, are the first ones targeted on a battlefield.”

“Peacetime daze… Well, I can’t really deny it.”

“That is why I will personally place an ‘insurance’ on you.”

With those words, Bel slowly raised her right hand and held it out toward my chest.

“…Stay still.”

“Huh? What is it? Some kind of purification?”

“…Something like that.”

From the tips of her fingers, a reddish-black geometric pattern of light poured out and sank straight into my heart.

Thump. I felt my heart give one big, heavy beat deep in my chest. At the same time, a warm, membrane-like sensation wrapped around my entire body, bringing a strange sense of security.

“…It’s done.”

Bel lowered her hand with a satisfied look. A faint sheen of sweat glistened on her forehead. For a simple charm, she had put in an awful lot of effort.

“With this, all physical interference, magical attacks, and conceptual curses will pass right by you. …Rest easy.”

“Wow, it sounds like it has some serious benefits. Thank you. I’ll treasure it.”

“…Yes. Keep it close to your body at all times.”

I laughed lightly with a “Yeah, yeah” and brushed it off.

◆

On the way home that day, I ended up experiencing the effect of Bel’s “charm” firsthand.

I had just passed through the shopping street and turned into the narrow alley that led to my apartment.

It was dusk. Because of last night’s rain, small puddles still dotted the dim road.

I was walking while thinking about what to make for dinner. My attention must have been drifting.

My leather shoe slipped on the wet moss.

“Ah—”

By the time the sound escaped, it was already too late. My body lurched wildly off balance and headed straight into a dive toward the roadside ditch.

The cover of the ditch had come off, and inside lay thick, black sludge and filthy water.

I was done for. My vision tilted in slow motion.

My favorite clothes. My brand-new leather shoes.

And above all, the mental damage. I braced myself and squeezed my eyes shut.

Splash! …did not happen.

Instead, I heard a soft, silly “poyon” sound, followed by a gentle floating sensation.

“…Huh?”

I cautiously opened my eyes. I was inside the ditch. My body lay perfectly horizontal, my face hovering just above the surface of the filthy water.

A few centimeters from the tip of my nose, the ditch water — the kind where mosquito larvae would thrive — swayed gently.

But I wasn’t wet.

Between my body and the filthy water was a clear, invisible gap, as if an unseen sheet of glass were holding it back.

My back should have been submerged in the ditch water, yet I felt no cold, no wetness. Not a single fiber of my clothing had soaked up the sludge.

“…What… is this?”

Using my abs, I sat up and crawled out of the ditch. I stood on the roadside, patting myself down.

Not a scratch. Not a speck of dirt. Not even a splash of mud. My shoes somehow looked shinier than before I fell.

I fell into a ditch and came out unscathed. No way that was possible.

I peered back into the ditch. Yes, the filthy water was still there. I looked at my clothes again. They were as clean as if they had just come back from the dry cleaners.

After a few seconds of silence, one conclusion popped into my head.

“…Lucky.”

Right. I just got lucky. The angle I fell at must have been perfect, the surface tension of the water did its thing, and the water-repellent treatment on my suit went beyond its limits.

Some kind of nanotechnology in the synthetic fibers must have protected me from the grime.

“Well… it’s a world with magic too, so stuff like this can happen.”

I brushed the dust off my clothes with a couple of pats and started walking again as if nothing had happened.

Thanks to Bel-san’s “charm,” I was on a roll today. If I went to the supermarket, the pork was probably half off.

Behind me, the filthy water in the ditch I had fallen into bubbled and fizzed, evaporated completely, and dried up as if terrified — but I never noticed.

◆

At the same moment, in the office of the Demon King’s castle.

In front of a massive crystal ball, Bel rested her cheek on her hand and lifted the corners of her mouth in satisfaction.

“…Heh heh. Did you see that, Zest?”

“Yes, my lady. I witnessed it.”

Her aide standing behind her — one of the Four Heavenly Kings, Zest — wiped cold sweat from his brow as he answered.

What he had seen was his master pouring every last drop of her magical power into activating a myth-class defensive spell: “Absolute Inviolable Domain” — and using it in the most wasteful way imaginable.

“Lord Kazuya… fell into a ditch and still didn’t get a speck of mud on him. The magical barrier placed on him had the strength to deflect even a dragon’s breath without a scratch.”

“Of course. My ‘contractor’ cannot be allowed to be dirtied by something as trivial as a ditch.”

Bel swirled her wine glass and gazed dreamily at Kazuya in the crystal.

“And look at that reaction. He just says ‘Lucky’ and moves on. …As expected, Kazuya is no ordinary man.”

“…No, isn’t he simply incredibly dense?”

“Dense? No. That is the composure of a king. To accept the miracles hidden in everyday life as a matter of course — that is exactly the magnanimity befitting the consort of a Demon King.”

“…Right…”

Zest looked up at the ceiling.

It was hopeless. This Demon King had completely fallen into the filter of love. Calling a man who fell into a ditch and grinned about it “the composure of a king” was a serious case.

“What should I protect him from next? Heh heh. For Kazuya’s sake, I wouldn’t mind rewriting the physical laws of this country… no, of the entire world.”

Bel laughed happily. And so, an overwhelmingly powerful — and far too overprotective — guardian took up permanent residence around Kazuya.

Without Kazuya ever knowing, his “everyday life” had been transformed by the Demon King’s power into an impenetrable fortress.