56 Chapter 8 (13): How NOT to keep a low profile, part 11

I sighed and swore when someone hidden with magic jumped onto the driver's bench from a carriage also hidden with magic, someone who then pointed a sword at me. I'd noticed the carriages that were hidden, and known who was probably with them, however, I figured they would pass right by us and wouldn't be a threat to anyone in the future.

"Those who disrespect her majesty's name, and who hear said disrespect, must be purged!" (Hidden person)

He dropped his stealth magic to speak, and I saw the horns poking out of his head, despite the hood that covered them attached to the cloak hiding his wings... no, that's a female, half demon, half elf. A dark elf, I guess. The cloak had a familiar crest on it, but I couldn't place it.

"What a surprise. It's a demon. It's time for more of those bastards to die!" (Tharios)

"Stop. BOTH of you... no, all five of the demons here AND all three of the humans drawing their weapons should stop, and to the one with a bow, if you fire that arrow, you'll die without the arrow doing anything" (Ryuu)

"Geh... she found us out?" (Demon)

"Why are you here? Hopefully it's not to violate Miryuu Maou's orders to not antagonize those in the human lands. If that's your goal... I'll be the one purging you" (Ryuu)

Another carriage appeared, this one blocking our path, and someone stood up from the driver's bench. And as soon as that carriage appeared, so did several others, and those caused everyone on our side to stop. Some people looked confused, but I didn't care. The female standing on the carriage in our way was a demon, one kinda familiar to me.

"Mare! Aura! What are you doing? We don't have time for this. We need to GO!" (Female Demon)

"Levia Leviathan. I should have known from the crest... why are you here? I thought that you, being a moderate, would be following the guidelines laid down for you half a year ago" (Ryuu)

"Eh? Your majesty? Why... are you... oh... shit" (Levia)

"Both of you. EXPLAIN. NOW. Who are you, why are you here, and how do you know one another?" (Tharios)

"Well, to put it bluntly, I and my entourage are fleeing from the Sangen Corporation after I tried to arrest their sub-leader for making preparations to wage war against the human lands" (Levia)

"Ah, that was a stupid move. They have at least three SS ranks and an SSS rank under their thumb, as well as a surprising amount of influence over several of the demon generals. Of course you'd have to run from them, if they set the SSS ranked Touya on you. So, how far behind you are they?" (Ryuu)

"They'll be here in about... now, actually" (Levia)

"I'll deal with them. They can't violate my orders, at least. Oh, right. Explanations... I'm the one who has decided what the next national anthem for the demon lands is. In other words, I'm the Demon Lord" (Ryuu)

With those as my parting words, I looked ahead, saw a group of horseback riders remove their invisibility, and smiled, before spreading my wings and flying to the road between us and them. Using wind magic, I made my voice be heard

"I've heard the reason for you to be here. Leave, be arrested, or die. Choose now, and choose wisely. Even Touya must pick one of those three options. By the name of - Well, since he shot at me, I'll assume Touya, at least, is the kind of idiot who would pick the third option. By the name of Miryuu Maou, judgement has been passed. How to do the execution... I think we'll go with the new national anthem of the demon lands, Shocking Sonata, and its accompanying anthem magic, namely, Thunderclap Anthem" (Ryuu)

With that, well over a hundred bolts of lightning appeared from a magic circle in the air, all streaking towards a horse and its rider, in sync with an easily recognizable melody sounded out by the accompanying thunder. Also, I must say sorry to the horse whose name I don't know. I wish I could have spared you. Ah, wait. I did, kinda. The rider, an SSS rank named Touya, used some magical item to guard against the lightning. Let's see just how long that will hold out against this onslaught of magic that gets stronger over time, shall we?

Three minutes later, the shield cracked, and so he jumped off of the horse to run on his own, since the horse was petrified... I guess he thought the bolts wouldn't follow him? Regardless, the horse was now safe, and...

"Ver, that's overkill. You don't need to join in on the fight" (Ryuu)

[Mou... you have all the fun. I haven't had a chance to stretch my wings in combat since that time with the dragons, and that was just one tackle. This guy should be able to entertain me for a while longer] (Ver)

It truly was overkill to have Ver, in wyvern form... no, Wyvern Lord form, I guess... to have Ver chase that guy down was overkill, let's just say that. Even so, I assented to her request, and cut off the creation of any more lightning. The other guys in the Sangen Corporation's force watched in horror as the SSS rank tried to fight a lone, young, inexperienced greater wyvern and failed miserably. Most greater wyverns never learned how to use magic stronger than what would create a few fireballs, after all. As if to spite that norm, Ver was pelting him with powerful magic of several different elements... actually, if you counted them all, she used ten elements to attack him, proving her total number to be at least 15, as she used things like shadow and void without using light, dark, or spatial magic, the same true for not using earth or wind magic but using dust, among several other combination elements. The only ones they couldn't be sure that she had would be healing and curse, but... well, I doubt that anyone was paying attention to what all elements she used. Probably nobody even counted the number of elements, let alone tracking the specific ones.

After about ten minutes, she got bored and lunged at him herself, biting off his head in one motion. Well, I say his head, but it actually included much of the right half of his torso. Regardless of how much she bit off, she spit it all out a second later, a disgusted look on her face.

"Is this... the power of the Demon Lord's pet? To toy with an SSS rank, and then kill him in one attack? How strong must the Demon Lord herself be? Able to ignore an SSS rank? Kill him by stepping on him accidentally? By rolling over in her sleep?" (Sangen Co's forces)

[I heard that. While she may be my master, I'm not her pet] (Ver)

It's all coming out into the open here... may as well get it over with.

"Indeed she's not. Try friend, lover, companion, party member, fiancee, and, oh yes, divine beast" (Ryuu)

Everyone's brains stopped working for a moment due to hearing lover before anything suggesting she could assume a humanoid form... though Baron Istal, who could hear everything from where his carriage sat, was quick to recover and use wind magic to have his question be heard by me, and it was also heard by everyone else, which I learned later.

"Wait... does this mean that the third princess, Haruveritat el Isala, is going to marry the Demon Lord?" (Baron)

"Why, yes, I am. So is the rest of my party, the S ranked party known as 'The Demon Lord's Harem', because that name reflects reality. It truly is the Demon Lord, and her harem" (Haru)

While they were talking about that, Levia was using her water and ice magic to barricade in the remaining pursuers from the Sangen Corporation. Afterwards, I helped her interrogate them, learning... basically nothing. The Sangen Corporation is very much a backbone of the radicals, and thus a thorn in my side I'll need to deal with at some point, but... I've got another problem to deal with now, in that everyone here knows I'm the Demon Lord. Now, I can and will ask them to keep it quiet for a while, but that won't work for very long at all. I'm going to have to finish up this trip quickly, then return to the capital. While I was thinking about that, Levia approached me.

"Miryuu, could you listen for a bit?" (Levia)

"Sure, what about?" (Ryuu)

"Well, the reason they were chasing me was because I found out that they were making preparations for war to break out, yes, but also because they were causing strife between the the human and demon lands, by conspiring with the Church of Lars. They also have planned to pin the blame on Takigawa Lars, should their attempts to create war go south. I've got the evidence with me, if you'd like to look over it" (Levia)

"I would, thank you..." (Ryuu)

I went with her to her bags, where she opened one and pulled out some papers that I read over, then read again.

"Ah... this... I need to get this to the king. If the church is conspiring with the radical faction, that explains a lot, and is... rather treasonous, I'd think" (Ryuu)

"If that's true, it is treason. Sorry for eavesdropping, I came to say that we're going to leave soon" (Haru)

With that, she turned and left, my next words chasing after her.

"Ah, thanks. Be right there... by the way, do you not have spatial magic? Couldn't you store this there?" (Ryuu)

"I don't want to risk them getting lost if I die, after all. I was being chased" (Levia)

"Then why not have me hold onto them? I'm not dying anytime soon, as Touya so helpfully showed in his death. I'm also someone who can take action based on the evidence they contain" (Ryuu)