Editing Shinmai Maou no Keiyakusha:Volume 7 Chapter 2 (section)

===Part 10===

In the dead of night in the Current Demon Lord Faction’s stronghold of Lundvall City.

Lars came alone to ‘a certain shop’ in the city below the castle. It was a boutique store exclusive to female members that specialised in selling women’s clothing, underwear, shoes, socks, and even cosmetics products. Its customer range was targeted towards noble high-class demons, but in fact, the majority of customers were actually ladies and maids who wanted to satisfy the requests of their masters. Because these nearly uncontrolled requests came at all times of the day, in order to meet these needs, this shop was almost open all year round. The interior decoration of the store was uniform, and full of artistic style; placed upon shelves were a selection of high-grade products.

“—Sorry for making you wait.”

A male clerk took something from the back of the store, and came up to the counter in front of Lars. It was a small wooden box. The store clerk placed it on top of the counter, and opened the lid to show its contents — an eye-catching glass bottle with a carved golden lid, and a transparent liquid within the bottle.

“Is this the one that you wanted?”

“…Yeah, help me wrap it up.”

After Lars nodded, the store clerk placed the bottle back into the wooden box, began to pack it, and then said

“You know, I was really quite surprised. It was announced not long ago that this fragrance was going to stop production and would be recalled, so those who know that it is still in production are among the very few.”

“…I heard that there was a problem with the raw materials of the fragrance, so it was just a temporary stop in production.”

“Yes…I beg your pardon, could you please tell me where you heard about this news regarding the perfume?”

Towards the store clerk who was looking at him side on, Lars took something out of his pocket as a reply. It was a finely carved silver pocket watch. As soon as he saw the coat of arms engraved on the cover, the store clerk widened his eyes in shock.

“Isn’t that something only His Majesty Leohart…”

“If you tell anyone that I bought this bottle of perfume, it would cause trouble for His Majesty…it would probably cause the most trouble for this store, as well as yourself.”

''But—''

“As long as you remain tight-lipped, and don’t ask any questions, then nothing will happen, and you won’t have to worry about anyone getting angry. When you do the books, discreetly write the date that this bottle of perfume was bought before the recall date, and then forget about this. This is for the good of yourself and the store.”

“……I understand.”

Lars took the paper bag from the store clerk with a tense facial expression as he paid for it, and then left the shop.

“Seriously…why am I doing something like this.”

He then sighed in complaint as he stepped onto the road outside the shop towards the castle. Basara had requested the maids supervising the guest house to obtain for him — the bottle of peculiar perfume that was no longer available for circulation on the market that was now in Lars’ hands. The problem was, as a human, Basara was unlikely to be able to understand the perfume of the Demon Realm; Maria or Zest had a possibility of knowing, but if that was the case, they would have specified the correct item. Moreover, Basara’s request itself was very strange — as long as the shop previously sold the incense that was used in Zolgear’s playground, or the perfume that was used by the women inside, then he wanted to buy the perfume that suddenly halted production after Zolgear died from them — that was the request that he had mentioned. Normally speaking, the Current Demon Lord Faction had no need to satisfy their enemy’s request like this, but Basara and the others were currently VIPs under Leohart’s hospitality. He had also said previously that they should freely mention if there were any inconveniences; such as preparing anything that they needed, so they feared disgracing themselves now. Balthier was correct, Lars, who had long been seeking revenge against Zolgear naturally performed a detailed investigation of his playground; so he not only knew of the store that satisfied the requirement, but also joined as a member during his investigation. Originally, Balthier was reluctant to let Lars fetch the item that Basara wanted, worried about contact between them, but that was all he could do. Lars joined the membership in order to investigate Zolgear; using his real name would allow him to be found easily, and falsely using the name of another noble could spark further investigations between them, so he registered with a pseudonym. If this wasn’t left to Lars who had made transactions with them in the past, and he simply sent maids or other subordinates, it would likely arouse the store’s wariness, and they might have refused to bring out the problematic goods which were urgently recalled. But—

''…What is that guy Basacchi trying to do?''

Lars stepped onto the stone pavement as he thought about the true intentions of Basara. Basara had a Master-Servant contract with the others based on the succubus’ magic, and they could increase their combat strength by deepening the relationship between master and servant. Basara should be busy with the final sprint right now, causing Mio and the others to be more submissive, so perhaps he wants to use the special items that were used by Zolgear as a symbol of lust to add to the fun — that was the speculation that Luca made after hearing about the matter. The probability of that was indeed not zero. When Lars cooperated with Basara to defeat Zolgear, he had seen him at the time with eyes as cold as absolute zero; he knew that once he was set on particular goal, he was someone who would do anything.

''…But.''

No matter how he thought about it, he didn’t think things were so simple. Zolgear was the enemy that Mio hated, so using the same items that he used, let alone making Mio submit, he was afraid that it would actually have serious adverse effects. Although he may have wanted it to provoke an even stronger curse effect, making her yield even more thoroughly—

''…No.''

By using Zolgear’s items, it was likely to even cast a shadow across Zest’s mind whereby she would recall the past. She currently had a Master-Servant contract with Basara, so she would definitely have wanted to forget everything about her past with Zolgear — and would even want those memories to be erased, so Basara probably wouldn’t want her to remember those kinds of things.

''…Moreover.''

Even if he really chose to do that, if he needed the help of that item no matter what, then Zest should be able to understand his request; and Sheera would be able to use the information that she provided to produce an identical product. Because — the incense and perfume that Zolgear used in his playground was a product that was prepared many years ago by the succubus with the greatest reputation, Sheera; if there really was a need for it, he would have asked Sheera to prepare it for him before they set off. After coming here willingly, and taking the risk that it could be mixed with poison by the enemy, it shows that—

''…It can’t be wrong.''

That was the message that Basara sent out — but the target was not Lars, rather, it was Takigawa Yahiro whom he previously cooperated with. However, the deliberate designation of ‘perfume no longer in circulation’ made Balthier think that this request was related to the decisive battle the day after tomorrow, so it was highly unlikely that Balthier would allow Lars to give the perfume directly to Basara; moreover, the components of every drop would be thoroughly examined before it was handed over, in order to investigate the ideas or intentions of Basara and the others, and whether or not Lars could be retained as an undercover spy.
''
…But.''

Basara should also have known that something like this would happen. In this way, his true purpose is…

“—Oh?”

Just when Lars began thinking about it more deeply, he suddenly felt a weak magic response from his breast pocket, so he put his hand into his breast pocket. What he removed, was a black mobile phone. Because there was a special magic chip installed into the battery, it could also be used normally in the Demon Realm. Balthier had asked him to hand it over so as to prevent him from contacting Basara, so in the end, what he handed over was a disguised counterfeit. Although Balthier immediately saw through it, for Lars to surrender his real mobile phone—

''…But how could I show the real thing in front of him.''

Lars had prepared another fake phone on him, and by handing over that second phone, he was able to evade any further questioning from Balthier. The one in Lars’ hand right now was the real mobile phone that he used to contact Basara with. Upon the LCD screen, it was evident that he had received a text message, and there was no need to look to even know who the sender was. After all, Basara was the only one who knew this number; and Basara also clearly knew, that only when the surroundings in every direction were clear, that Lars would look at his phone. Most of the contents of the short message was a request for help.

“Unfortunately, Basacchi…I don’t care what you want right now.”

Lars closed the mobile phone, and a bitter sounding voice naturally flowed out of his mouth. His current self was not Takigawa Yahiro…since he had already taken revenge on Zolgear, there was a limit to the benefits of continuing to cooperate with Basara, so it was better for him instead to lend a hand as Leohart’s comrade-in-arms. Because helping this young Demon Lord would also be an act of revenge for his parents, and to achieve a complete reform of the Demon Realm’s ambition, this was the shortest way to accomplish Lars’ current aspirations. To eradicate the Council — to eliminate all of those old bastards like Zolgear in one clean sweep, Leohart wasn’t the only one who desired this. The scum who was even far worse than Zolgear — Belphegor, it was not possible no matter how brutal the method was. If he continued to stay with the Moderates Faction, he was afraid that it would be difficult to do so. —So right now, that’s why Lars was here. He had just seen Basara’s short message. So now he could tell Leohart about its contents, and give him an advantage in the battle the day after tomorrow.