the girl and the demon meet

Once upon a time lived a girl with a dream, until, one day, she grew up. No longer could she tell where the dream began or ended, nor would her rags ever transform into a dress. Instead, she wore a waitress’s attire.

The day aged, and died, and other jaded adults showed up to the tavern Reem worked at. These were trying times—inflation, neo-feudalism, the end of the world—and things got especially bad around this time of the year, when Sun’s Edge honored its name the most.

One of said jaded adults was a man who, disregarding common etiquette, wore the hood of his black cloak over his head. He stopped by the bulletin board at the entrance, pinned a job offer, sat at the back of the bar, alone, and ordered chocolate milk with whipped cream and sprinkles. It was around that time that regulars stopped taking him seriously. By the time he took out a book, nobody cared anymore.

What was it this time? ‘Find my pet’? ‘Stalk my ex?’ ‘Chase this homeless person off my lawn’? (Months ago, Reem had been on the receiving end of the last one.) In any case, due to the rumors, bounty hunters had been roaming around the region lately; perhaps one would give the job offer a look.

…maybe…?

The first person to read it—a regular who passed by the bulletin board—laughed so hard that the drunkards joined in. The second person, also a regular, asked the boss if the job offer was a marketing ploy. The third was the boss, probably to check if it could be used as one. Despite apparently deeming it useless, he left it there.

Reem, somehow, resisted the urge to read it. Intrigue kept things interesting. As the night aged, and died, she gallantly washed dishes, ferociously mopped, sturdily served alcoholic beverage after alcoholic beverage, and also a second choccy milk.

Speaking of which: the man in black was unfazed. If he noticed when people pointed at him while cackling, he didn’t show it. Could he make it any more obvious that he was a foreigner? Any local would’ve lunged at the dissenters already with a 70% chance of also wielding a blunt weapon. But no, not him. When he finished one book, he merely started another one. Reem pretended to scrub a table while squinting at the title. To Kill a Demon Lord.

…oh, dear, he was one of those.

The job offer was one of those.

How… mundane. So disappointed was Reem that she couldn’t help but ask him, “Let me guess: are you gathering a party to try to kill the demon lord?”

The man in black flipped a page.

“Ugh, knew it.” Reem sighed. She cleaned the table as though it were to blame. Intrigue was what kept things interesting. Hadn’t she just said that? Why ruin it? Why self-sabotage? What could’ve been a dress or a call to adventure was now a rag and yet another naïve adventurer thinking he’d be the one to take down the local demon lord.

The man in black flipped a page.

Reem flipped a page too, mentally. The problem was, her entire book looked, felt, and tasted the same: wake up, lose time, be hungry, work, fail to sleep. Because of this, knowing very well how this exchange would end, she continued, “You’ll fail. I’ve heard the price to duel him is a limb. If you last less than ten seconds, two limbs. You get to choose who loses what in a group, though, so there's that."

Another page.

Due to the drunken ruckus, she had to raise her voice (as though the man in black would listen). “Good luck, though. I dunno. Maybe you’ll win. I dunno. What if I joined your team?”

The man in black scoffed. Reem blinked—he sounded young. “Sure, if you offer your limbs.”

“…uh… I’ll pass.”

“Then stop bothering me.”

A brat and a choosy one at that. Well, at least he hadn’t shown up demanding alcohol like most kids his age would. Why a bar, though? ‘Please stop bothering me’, he’d said. “How many people have you recruited?” Reem asked. “If you haven’t yet, maybe I could ask ar—”

“Go away.”

She tried.

“What would you do if you joined, huh? Clean harder? Piss off.”

And this wasn’t even her worst interaction with a customer today. She cleaned harder, elsewhere. She scrubbed and mopped as though the floor and tables and dishes were the kid’s face. She’d tried. He’d come back crying after losing an arm to the demon lord, and so the cycle would repeat, over and over again, until…

…until…

...she saved enough to go back home? Quit? Died? Reem almost faltered. No, this wasn’t the time for existential crises; those could wait until she got home and failed to sleep. Again and again and again and again and…

Another worknight came to an end. Regulars left. Tourists left. Drunkards were kicked out. The boss asked her to close and to be careful on her way home. The boy in black glanced at the job offer on his way out for a moment too long, and it was only then, for an instant, that he was a person and not an entity. Then he left. Then Reem was alone.

No one but demons and those indifferent to death roamed around so late at night. It was so silent that her breaths were thunder, so dark that the sky swallowed the stars. Naturally, every other tavern in the block was closed, and the one Reem worked at just so happened to be at the edge of the edge of Sun’s Edge.

She shouldn’t have, which was exactly why she did the following: cast a basic will-o-wisp spell to illuminate the bulletin board. Pyramid scheme recruitments… a bounty to beat up someone’s noisy neighbor… an ad for beast-taming techniques…

HELP WANTED: looking for those brave enough to

“…kill the demon lord. Bleh, knew it. What happened to originality?”

“Right?”

“Right! Back in my day, we used to…” she trailed off.

“To?” Prompted the stranger next to her.

The entirety of Reem’s somatic nervous system shut down for a second or two. “T-to…” When had…? How had…? There was someone next to her. “…hi.”

“Hi,” replied the stranger.

“Hello?”

“Hi.”

Was he making fun of her? Reem would’ve wrestled him, but one, she wasn’t a local, and, two, even under her will-o-wisp’s dim light, it was quite apparent that this stranger doubled her in size. At least. “Can I help you?” Reem asked, which was such a stupid thing to ask that she almost forgot to be scared.

The stranger’s pale fingers brushed the job offer. “I’m considering joining this,” he replied. “Aren’t you?”

“…huh? Me?” Reem stared at the fingers—the claws. “Are you…?” ‘A demon?’ Duh. ‘Going to eat me?’

“Demons can’t kill,” was his reply. “Not anymore. Not if we wish to belong.”

“I wasn’t gonna ask that.”

"Truly?"

“Really. Um, truly.”

“I believe you.” He didn’t believe her. Not only that, but he mocked her; all along, the demon had been doing so, and only then did Reem notice. Fear could blind, but so could getting used to something. Reem, the waitress. Reem, the janitor. Reem, the factory worker. Reem, the coward, the clown, the toy. “I must say, for someone who reeks this much of fear, your composure is admirable.”

“Just eat me already,” she said.

“Is that so? No pleading for your life?”

The demon was right about something: they could not kill… if they wanted to ‘belong’ to society. As part of the treaty that had been made almost a century ago, no sentient species, regardless of circumstance, was allowed to take the life of another. The issue with that was that nobody cared.

The claws retreated from the job offer and instead poked at the will-o-wisp, which fizzled off. No one else was around at this time of the night. No one. Still, for almost a year, she had walked back home with no major events, good or bad. “I won’t plead for my life, if that’s what you want,” Reem told him. “Just… hurry up.”

“And if I don’t plan on eating you?”

“Why else would you talk to me?”

Reem’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, not as much as those of a demon, of course, but enough to see him retreat. Just a bit. “Why wouldn't I?" He asked.

"Uh. Um."

"Exquisite response. I can't help but agree."

“Yeah."

"Yeah." The demon added, "I think I'm joining the hunt. Won't you?"

She shrugged.

She waited. Again and again and again and...

...and then the demon was gone.