Chapter 20: DON’T YOU DARE UNDERESTIMATE CHUUNIBYOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!
And thus, after the supremely exalted Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama graciously bestowed upon us our true names—Ein for me, and Zwei for Meiko—our first day as her retainers officially began.
For example—
inside the classroom for Classical Literature Theory, which we entered with magnificent shamelessness several minutes late.
“Hmph. Ein, Zwei. In my stead, invoke the automatic transcription sorcery upon the Tome of Wisdom.”
“Ha! As you command, my master. Zwei?”
“Yeah, yeah. I just need to lend you my notes later, right?”
For example—
inside the university cafeteria we visited for lunch.
“Select suitable offerings for the Feast Beneath the Sun. Perhaps the sinful banquet of infernal flames shall suffice. Keep the change. I have no need for mortal currency.”
clink
(A five-hundred-yen coin landed atop the counter.)
“Ha! As you command, my master. Zwei?”
“She wants something spicy, so curry should be fine, I guess.”
For example—
inside the Calculus classroom, where the western sunlight had begun spilling through the windows in burning orange streaks.
“What an irritating sun. I understand it wishes to sear my figure into its gaze, yet regrettably, my heart is swayed only by the darkness of night. What say you, Ein?”
“Ha! Zwei?”
“She says the sunlight’s too bright and wants someone to close the curtains. Which I already did.”
For example—
during a brief respite before heading home after the day’s lectures had ended.
“Hmph. Though masquerading as humans has its occasional amusements, I confess fatigue has begun to take hold. Prepare the afternoon tea.”
“Ha! Zwei?”
“She means go buy her bottled tea. Right, right.”
For example—
standing before the supermarket’s discount section.
“This evening’s feast cannot be accomplished through my power alone. Therefore, I command you to offer up your strength unto me!”
“My apologies, Master. I too can barely afford my own provisions. Zwei?”
“Sorry, same here. Eggs are only 140 yen a pack today. I’m powerless before that temptation. Sorry.”
“…………”
And then—
outside the supermarket after we finished shopping.
Meiko and I were happily stuffing discounted egg packs into our respective reusable shopping bags, basking in the simple satisfaction of victorious bargain hunting, when Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama spoke with deep wrinkles furrowing her brow.
“…Tell me, Ein. Are you truly sworn to my service?”
I paused to reflect upon my conduct throughout the day.
I had remained constantly at my master’s side.
Whenever she spoke, I answered immediately.
And every objective my master desired had been accomplished flawlessly.
With the sole exception of the discounted eggs incident, our mission completion rate had reached a perfect one hundred percent.
Thus, I nodded proudly.
“As you can plainly see.”
“Then doesn’t that mean you aren’t loyal at all!?”
“For what reason?”
How strange.
Even looking back upon it objectively, I had surely spent the entire day faithfully carrying out my duties as Ein, the loyal servant of Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama.
I had devoted all my abilities toward fulfilling my master’s wishes.
“You threw every single one of my commands at Zwei!”
“However, Master. If I cannot understand what you are saying, then entrusting interpretation to one who can is the only rational course. So long as your objective is achieved, the result remains unchanged.”
“At least try to understand meee!!”
Well… admittedly, somewhere midway through the day I had stopped trying to decipher her myself and simply outsourced all translation duties to Zwei.
Still, wasn’t the real issue the sheer incomprehensibility of Kumamoto dialect?
Ordering a native Japanese speaker around in Sinhala and demanding they “listen properly” would be unreasonable.
Likewise, Kumamoto dialect posed a similar challenge to ordinary Japanese people.
“Zwei, you too! You were completely taking orders from Ein instead of me!”
“Ehh, well… ahaha…”
At last, our master’s wrath turned toward Zwei as well.
Which was understandable.
Zwei herself had never acted proactively. She only moved after I told her to do something, and even then with the exhausted resignation of someone fulfilling unpaid overtime.
While she did complete tasks properly, perhaps from Goetheschwarz-sama’s perspective, she lacked the proper familiar-like atmosphere.
“But originally my role was kind of more about taking care of Gouto-k— I mean, Ein in the first place? So, um… it sort of naturally turned into serving both of you together…”
“So in the end, you’re not my familiar at all. You’re simply Ein’s familiar.”
Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama muttered those words weakly, shoulders drooping with visible despair.
Naturally, it was the duty of a loyal servant to immediately support his master in her hour of distress.
“Please rest easy. I, who swear loyalty to Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama, am in turn served by Zwei, who swears loyalty to me. Thus, loyalty has been perfectly consolidated into a single chain, my master.”
“UGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!”
Oh.
Our master appeared greatly agitated.
Quietly, I consulted my hallucination regarding the true feelings hidden within Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama’s heart.
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『Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama』
Inner Thoughts:
“WHY IS THERE SUBCONTRACTING IN THE LOYAL SERVANT BUSINESS!? That middle contractor is obviously skimming loyalty off the top!!”
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“However, my master. This is the age of outsourcing. Proper allocation of labor is essential. Even requests from one’s master should naturally be delegated to the most suitable personnel.”
──────────
Inner Thoughts:
“The familiars from my chuunibyou notebook shouldn’t be discussing realistic workplace efficiency!! Familiars are supposed to obey their master directly! Even when they don’t understand or can’t do something, they’re supposed to desperately struggle through it anyway because that’s what makes them precious! And since they’re unfamiliar with the human world, they fail sometimes too, and then I gently comfort them afterward—that’s the entire appeal of the relationship between the master and her handsome retainers!! Got it!?”
──────────
“Those are merely decorative retainers lacking practical utility. You made the correct decision hiring me, Master.”
──────────
Inner Thoughts:
“DON’T YOU DARE UNDERESTIMATE CHUUNIBYOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!”
──────────
Apparently, my performance as a servant had failed to align with Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama’s ideals.
At this point, she no longer even bothered voicing her complaints aloud.
She simply hurled the contents of her heart directly into my hallucinations instead.
…Humiliating.
I had sacrificed my own normalcy to serve her.
And now she claimed that even that was insufficient…?
“Meiko. Forgive me. It seems my inadequacy has angered our master.”
“Well, yeah. I figured this would happen eventually. Gouto-kun, someone who barely understands normal people in the first place understanding chuunibyou—which is basically an advanced evolved form of normal social behavior—is… pretty impossible…”
“But even if today failed, there is always tomorrow. We can simply identify our shortcomings and improve accordingly.”
“This absurdly unbreakable mentality of yours might honestly be the single most effective anti-chuunibyou weapon imaginable. I’m already scared for tomorrow.”
For some reason, Meiko gave me what sounded suspiciously like an official endorsement.
In any case, if I wished to better understand my master’s feelings, then perhaps the first step was learning Kumamoto dialect properly.
More importantly—
I needed to understand all the nonsensical terminology from the chuunibyou notebook that I had previously dismissed as meaningless noise.
Things like:
“Holy-Demonic Fusion Arts.”
“Dragonic Circuit.”
“Lucifer’s Blessing, the Demonic God’s Grace.”
“Jewelry Heart Box, the End of Distorted Dreams.”
And countless other absurd phrases.
Every single one of them.
Until I fully understood them from the conceptual level upward, I would force Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama to explain them in exhaustive detail.
No escape would be permitted.
Absolutely none.
That said, I had assumed today’s activities were finally coming to a close.
However—
judging by the dark gleam in Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama’s eyes, it seemed she had no intention of allowing the day to end just yet.
“Hmph… kukuku. Very well. Educating one’s familiars is also the duty of a master. Ein, Zwei. You are prepared to dedicate this night unto me as well… are you not?”
“Ha! I have no scheduled obligations!”
“Unfortunately… yeah, I’m free too.”
Apparently, Goetheschwarz-sama had something she wished to do tonight.
Originally, I had planned to spend the evening studying.
But if my master issued a command, then naturally her will took precedence.
For I was her loyal servant.
“Excellent. In truth, there exists a land of calamity I have long believed necessary to visit, if only to test the extent of my power.”
No, according to the hallucination, Master possessed no powers whatsoever.
I nearly pointed that out—
but Meiko silently shook her head beside me, and so I swallowed the words.
“A clear anomaly has appeared within Asgard, once a realm of peace. A holy-demonic force that calls aberrant beings unto itself. We cannot permit such a phenomenon to remain unchecked. I must personally witness it and determine whether eradication is necessary. However, should I go alone and encounter danger, there would remain no means to warn the world of the coming catastrophe.”
“Zwei.”
“In Kumamoto dialect, that means: ‘There’s this place that’s been getting a lot of attention lately, and I’ve wanted to visit it once. But it felt awkward going alone.’”
It was an unspoken rule that we were not supposed to point out that there was nothing stopping her from going by herself.
Meiko and I exchanged a knowing glance.
Then, as though seeking to erase all prior disgrace from our records, we dramatically bowed before Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama.
“Ha! This Ein shall accompany his master anywhere—even through purgatory itself, through raging waterfalls, through any land no matter how perilous!”
“Ehh… ha! This Zwei shall do likewise.”
“…Very well.”
Having secured our agreement, Sansen Sanbyaku Sanjuuin Goetheschwarz-sama smiled happily.
And then—
at long last—
she revealed tonight’s destination.
“Then let us depart! To the accursed land that may perhaps ensnare even you, my loyal servants—the throne upon which the ‘Holy Sword’ has suddenly manifested within my territory!”
“Eh?”
“Huh?”
“Fueh?”
…I see.
Kuwajima wanted to go see the “Holy Sword.”
I glanced toward Meiko.
She merely wore an awkward, indescribable expression and remained silent.
Apparently—
this was one of those moments where saying absolutely nothing was the correct answer.