Demon King and Hero

Volume 3 Chapter 1

"There's a festival in the neighbouring village!"

"What?"
The demon king asked, yawning from the after effect of a very comfortable nap.
With big, bright eyes, Yuria shouted,

"A festival! A festival, I'm telling you! I went shopping earlier, and apparently, there's a festival happening tonight in that town!"

"Aahh, it looks like rice planting is over then."

This continent had three main festivals in a year.

The first was in the spring.

To celebrate the passing of winter and welcoming the new year, it was quite a grand festival.
The second was this current one in the summer, to celebrate the end of rice planting, in the meaning of partying hard one last time before the real work began.

The last was in autumn, following the end of the harvest, the greatest of the three festivals in terms of pure size and scale, to the extent that high ranking nobles or even royalty would sometimes sponsor the festival.

Winter was the time when gear was fixed and maintained. Tools and other daily necessities were made in the comfort of the home, and thus, there was no winter festival.
When the demon king explained this to Yuria, with even brighter eyes, Yuria said,
"We were involved in rice planting as well!"

"So?"
"Let's go to the festival too!"
"Were you the one planting? More like wrecking."

"Urgh... As a man, why are you being this petty!"

"Now you realised? The pettiest demon in the demon world is me."
"Uuuuu...."

With her lip curled over, Yuria took sneaky glimpses of the demon king.

One of the typical patterns when she sulked, the demon king saw this quite often.

"In that case..."
"Hm?"

Yuria dropped a tiny bombshell onto the argument.

"I'm cooking dinner tonight?"

"Kgh!" (Stranged/choking SFX)

Yuria's face reddened, the person in question knowing full well what she was doing.
Cooking not in the context of a newly-wed wife, but the fact that she was using her cooking to threaten the demon lord embarrassed her a bit.

And to this, the demon king had no choice to initate a counter of his own.

"Haa, I get it. No need to risk my life over not going to a single festival."

"What do you mean by that!"

Yuria shouted, blushing again.

'No matter how bad my cooking is, your life is... kinda...'
In the end, the one who folded first was Yuria. Even she knew exactly well the limits of her cooking skills.

'It, it's not that bad!'

Just that the person in question refused to acknowledge it.

****

"Wow..."

With sparkling eyes, Yuria took in the surroundings.

"What are you, a country bumpkin? You lived in the palace before this, is this your first time at a festival?"

Not even aware of the demon king's pitiful look, Yuria eagerly nodded her head and said,

"The palace doesn't actually bother with festivals unless it's something really big. Plus, whenever there was one on, I was always on bodyguard duty anyway, so I never had time to look around."

Even when she had gotten to wander, she'd always been grumbling. Especially, the noble youths that had continually clung to her had worn down her nerves and patience to the very limits. (1)

"There, there, try out everything you want to."

As soon as the demon king said that, Yuria pointed towards a stall and shouted,

"Can I try that?"

The demon king turned his head to where she was pointing.

"Are you a kid?"

That stall was one that offered goldfish scooping, primarily for children.

Ignoring him, Yuria had already taken a seat and started playing.

"Do as you want, then."

The demon king muttered, looking at the sky.

The hero was his anyways. This much of a holiday he could afford to grant her anytime.

Translator's Notes:

(1) Okay, in the original, these two lines were ridiculously ambiguous about whether she was referring to the past or present. The latter was certainly referring to her memories, the former much less clear-cut. I decided through translator privilege that both lines were referring to her memories.

TLN: Ah, the festival episode. Truly, it never fails to deliver in its daily dose of saccharine.