The Demon Lord Is An Angel

Chapter 518: No Longer A Guest

"Your training starts tomorrow."

Owyn was rendered speechless by a combination of stuffing his mouth with the delicious food spread before him and the blue-haired man who came in to take a seat at the head of the table. The seriousness with which Rainier spoke was completely at odds with the hospitable demeanor he’d seen from the angel when he’d been captured.

"Dad, at least say ’Hello’ before you throw him into the fire," Arc spoke up for Owyn, her annoyance clear. It was just the three of them at dinner. The rest of the household was apparently busy elsewhere, and Cassiel had stepped out to bring dinner to someone elsewhere.

Owyn swallowed his bite of steak, hoping to come up with a dignified response, but the first thing that came out of his mouth was...

"Huh?"

Rainier had the grace to look a bit contrite as he started over. "Apologies. Owyn, you saw the announcement, right?"

"Yeah," Owyn replied.

"Pretty sure everyone in the city saw it," Arc interjected.

Rainier looked at his daughter, "If you saw what came after, it means New Heaven might be active again." He looked back to Owyn, "That means you are in danger."

"What do they have to do with me?" Owyn raised an eyebrow. "I just got here."

"New Heaven targets outsiders. For the first few years behind the Veil, they went to great lengths to frame them for crimes and scapegoat them for a lot of woes... Especially theft and murder. If they’re active again, you need to know how to defend yourself. So I would like to offer you the chance to train here before starting at the Academy."

"Is it not safe at the Academy?" Owyn’s eyes flicked over to Arc, who was pecking at the tiny bites of food on her fork.

"They target demonkin too," Arc murmured.

"The Academy is quite safe, but not completely so. And if students find out you’re an outsider, there may be some prejudice against you that could tempt you to do something rash."

"So no different than visiting a city then," Owyn shrugged and poked into another steak off a plate piled with them, bringing it to his own dish. He popped the little wooden ring out of the center, wondering why they replaced the bone with it. "I can hold my own in a fight."

"No offense, but I don’t think you can," a new voice spoke, and the dark angel, Malzkael, entered the room, letting her wing disappear before she sat. "You couldn’t even dent the shield of a street punk."

Owyn found himself locking eyes with Arc and blushing. "I-I was going easy on them," he stammered, trying to save face. "They couldn’t really attack me either."

"Street punk?" Arc asked Malzkael.

"The short version is he broke out of the hospital and ran into some of the local flavor before you met," Malzkael said.

"Darklings, right?" Rain asked.

"Ugh, don’t remind me," Malzkael skewered and retrieved a steak before heaping vegetables on her plate, cutting so vigorously it looked like she intended to mince everything.

Rain chuckled. "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery..." he teased.

"Shut it," Malzkael pointed at Rain with her fork.

Rain’s chuckle became a chortle as he looked back at Owyn. "The point is, you might know how to fight out there, but Norneau has its own rules. I can’t make you learn, but if you accept the offer to train here, we can at least bring you up to a survivable level. Otherwise you’d do well to petition the Chancellor for a guard or two."

"You don’t have time to muck around sparring and teaching battle magic. You’re supposed to be working with Amarena this week," Malzkael reminded Rainier. "And I have to check on the tree ranches."

Owyn’s eyebrows quirked at the mention of "tree ranches" but he held his tongue since Rainier’s eyes were still boring into him. When he thought about it, this was the opportunity of a lifetime. A chance to get stronger both magically and physically, in ways he never would have had access to outside the tribe, and might not even have access to in this Academy he was being sent to. After a moment to sip from his flagon of water, he answered, "I accept your offer... but if you won’t be training me, who will?"

Both Malzkael and Rainier looked at Arc, who paused mid-chew of her honey-glazed carrot.

"Me?"

"You’re in charge of him," Malzkael said. "And stars know you take after your father with all the punching and kicking."

Rainier made a slightly grumbly sound and muttered something about Arc not liking swords, which was difficult to parse because of the indignant noises coming out of Arc.

"But I need to get ready for the Academy!"

"Please, you’ve known what you wanted to bring to the Academy since you were eight," Malzkael countered.

"What about uniforms?"

"Cassiel’s making them for both of you, and you can embellish yours all you want within the rules. So stop making a fuss, because this is just an extension of your responsibilities." Malzkael’s tone grew snippier towards the end.

"Arc, if you’re going to be a Dragon Knight one day, you need to learn to accept responsibilities, even for things you don’t want to do," Rainier said.

That seemed to get through to her, and Arc only pouted a little before she had an epiphany. "Responsibilities come with rewards, right? I want a dimensional bag."

Rainier started to massage his temples with a thumb and forefinger. "Why do you want a dimensional bag?"

"E-Everyone’s going to have a storage tattoo," Arc said quickly, her voice hitching over in pitch just enough that Owyn suspected she was hiding something. "I don’t want to be the only one who has to carry all her books."

"I know for a fact that all your books are going to be on a Net tablet," Malzkael’s eyes narrowed suspiciously, her tone brooking no further beating around the bush, "So what do you really want the bag for?"

In a tiny voice that Owyn barely heard, Arc confessed, "I want to bring my gun to school..."

""Out of the question!"" Malzkael and Rainier raised their voices at the same time.

"I’m allowed to bring a personal defense item!" Arc argued.

"A gun isn’t for ’defense,’" Malz said. "And if you get into a fight, there’s no non-lethal option."

"If I get into a fight, I’m going to be paste unless they want to use fists," Arc shot back. "I don’t want to have to come back home every time I need to practice."

"You don’t need to-"

"Hold on," Rainier said, catching Malzkael’s eyes with his gaze. A brief silence followed, with only the emotions on both their faces shifting. Finally, Rainier turned. "We can store your gun in the Squire’s Armory. But only so you can practice at their range."

Arc pouted back into her seat, crossing her arms. "Fine," she said. "Can I still get a dimensional bag?"

"Yes," Rainier said, "but only if you train him like your father and I trained you." He started smiling a little as Arc perked up. Only a moment later, Arc deflated as a four-armed demoness entered the room. The demoness was dressed as a maid and held Smoke by the stock and barrel in her two lower arms, along with four of what Owyn had learned were called ’magazines’ in one of her upper hands.

"I brought the weapon, as requested," the maid said. Her rather jovial and friendly tone was completely at odds with her outfit.

"Thank you, Anko," Malzkael replied. "Please take it to the Squire’s Armory, and let them know it’s only to be used at the range."

"You got it, Malz." The maid nodded her head and left.

"I thought you said she wasn’t in your bond," Arc complained.

"She isn’t," Cassiel said as she entered the room, wiping her hands with a towel which she then sent floating away with one of her Hekatoncheries. "Your mother asked me to ask her. I think it’s perfectly reasonable."

For a few more minutes, the dinner passed in relative peace. Arc sulked, but seemed to steel her determination after a few more bites. A catkin entered and climbed up to sit next to Rainier, and Owyn had to do a bit of a double-take to convince himself that the catkin was male, given how he was dressed.

He was still in the middle of his confusion when Rain’s voice snapped him out of it. "You there, Owyn?"

"Huh? I’m here."

"This is Ferro. He’s offered to help you with your magic in a couple of days."

"Hello!" Ferro greeted enthusiastically, "You didn’t tell me he was cute." The catkin elbowed Rainier, receiving a hard pet between the ears.

"Ugh," Arc rolled her eyes and viciously bit another carrot.

"Size queen," Malzkael muttered in an accusatory tone, which made Ferro’s ears flick with what seemed to be fake annoyance.

"Um... nice to meet you," Owyn said politely, not understanding what was going on but acutely self-conscious all of a sudden.

The rest of their introductions went without further incident, and by the end of the dinner, Owyn found himself feeling rather at home for the first time since arriving in this strange place behind the Veil. A memory stirred within him of sitting with his parents for a meal as a child. He couldn’t remember their faces, but he could remember that at one point in his early life, times were good. As he remembered them, Arc grew indignant that her Dad had some kind of celebrity knight over without telling her or inviting him to dinner, which brought out laughter from everyone around.

And for the rest of the dinner, he lost himself in good food and good conversation, explaining details of the outside world and learning more about Norneau with every sentence.

The first person to excuse herself was Arc, whose chair scraped the floor as she stood.

"You might want to take Arc’s lead and get to bed early," Rainier warned.

"Why?" Owyn asked.

"Let’s just say her father and I didn’t go easy on her training."