Epilogue

With the Holy Queen's disappearance and the Holy Princess's absence, the Kingdom of Bright was thrown into a state of chaos. There was an immediate power struggle between several factions that had served under the leaders. Within weeks the struggle had grown into a conflict that threatened to destroy the kingdom.

It wasn't until the Holy Princess and the Hero returned before the fighting was halted. Although it was only temporary. The prospect of peace with Evuluss divided the country into new factions. Those that had served directly under the queen and had been fighting each other fiercely only weeks before joined together to argue against the Princess's plan for peace. Shortly after, the other allied nations joined behind the Holy Princess and squashed the rebellion. They intended to hold a conference where they would discuss the future among themselves before talking to Evuluss. Unfortunately, Pain convinced the Demon Lord to show up as a surprise.

"Wassup!" Pain said as he barged into the room.

The leaders had sought to place the conference in a secret secluded dungeon in the furthest reaches from Evuluss. The meeting was to be held in an open space on the dungeons fifth floor. Between the conference and the dungeon's entrance, there were four floors of vicious monsters that led out into a forest of horrendous enemies that was further surrounded by a terrain thought to be nearly impassable. The allied kingdoms had felt even if the conference's information was leaked, no one would still be able to attend without the teleporting magic they had cultivated.

Yet, the Dark Commander and the Demon Lord just casually strolled in as the conference was about to begin. The only visible damage on either of the two was a slight scrape on Pain's knee.

The Demon Lord looked around at the confused faces of the various leaders.

"Pain, they are giving us strange looks; I told you this wasn't a good idea."

"Nonsense, Charlotte, look, all our friends are already here. There's Girolamo, Carol, and the Exposition wizard!"

"I told you not to call me that!"

The leader of the dwarfs turned to the Kingdom of Bright representatives. He was known as the Stonesmith King that had proudly led the dwarfs for many decades. At the height of the war, he had let his only child embark on a dangerous quest with the hero to defeat the forces of evil. Those very same forces had now barged into a meeting he was already not too pleased with going along with. He drummed his large fingers on the table as he spoke.

"Do ye want to explain something Kingdom of Bright?" he asked in a booming voice. The Hero and Holy Princess looked around the room awkwardly.

"Did he tell you they were planning on coming?" the Holy Princess whispered to the Hero.

"You know he wouldn't tell anyone that might try to stop him," the Hero whispered back.

They continued a quiet back and forth while Charlotte looked around the table the allies had set up for the conference.

"Pain, I told you this was a bad idea. Look at all those stares we are getting, and there is not even a place for us to sit."

"Don't worry! That's why I had the goblins make this," Pain whipped two long cylinders bags off his back and pulled out their contents. "A fold-up chair. Super convenient for these sorts of things."

While the Hero and Holy Princess were whispering to themselves, Pain walked next to them and shoved the two chairs in front of the table. He and the Demon Lord sat in the chairs and looked around the room.

"Don't worry about us being here. You may proceed with the conference." The Demon Lord said while trying to sound as casual as possible.

"Oh, and does someone know healing magic? I slipped and scraped my knee on the way in," Pain added.

It was under these conditions that the talks began. They droned on and on in a protracted and tedious manner. Pain nearly fell asleep in the first few hours. If not for the Demon Lord occasionally jabbing his side with her elbow, he would have been out cold in no time at all.

Then it was finally time for a break. The kingdoms split up to discuss amongst themselves in different areas in the dungeon. The time would be used for kingdoms to discuss how they felt about the conference's direction while away from the whole group. That was how it was supposed to work, at least.

"Where did Pain go?" the Demon Lord suddenly asked while she met with the Kingdom of Bright. Everyone in their group began to look around frantically.

"I thought it was your turn to watch him!" the Hero said to the Demon Lord.

"I thought Carol was doing it!" the Demon Lord said with a worried expression.

"I thought Girolamo was watching him!"

They came to the frightening realization that Pain had wandered off.

Meanwhile, the dwarf representatives were off in some distant chamber discussing their plans.

"We are all in agreement then?" the Stonesmith King asked in a gruff tone.

The other dwarves nodded.

"Hey, the dwarves! Wassup!" They were interrupted by a sudden intruder.

"You!" the Stonesmith King pulled out his sword and pointed it at Pain's neck. "What brings you to our meeting villain?"

"Oh, hey Smith, maybe you can help me. I was trying to find a restroom, but I think I made a wrong turn."

"My apologies. It is down that hall, take a left at the third door, and it will be on your right," the Stonesmith King said while sliding his sword back into its sheath.

"Awesome, thanks!" Pain said as he ran off.

"Was it wise to let him go?" one of the dwarf advisors asked.

"I sensed no evil intent from him, and I can believe he merely got lost in this labyrinth. I know I have many times.

They continued their meeting as before until they were interrupted again.

"Oh, hello again," Pain casually greeted them.

"You dare interrupt us again!" Once again, Pain had a sword pointed at his throat. Pain merely shrugged it off and walked past the Stonesmith King.

"So, I hear you guys have good alcohol."

"Hmph, we have the finest liquor in the whole world," the dwarf king said proudly as he stabbed his sword in the ground and made a triumphant pose.

"Well, if it is that good, I'll have to give it a try."

"You villain, do you think we would simply hand over our alcohol to you?"

"I wasn't planning on getting it for free... so I guess no."

"If you want our alcohol, you must provide something in exchange!"

"Calm down, Smith, we haven't even finished the conference yet."

"I sincerely doubt you know of anything impressive enough for such an exchange!" The Stonesmith King folded his arms and appeared to be looking down at Pain, even though he was shorter. "Also, my name is not Smith!"

A normal person might realize that the Stonesmith King was being stubborn and difficult and give up. Pain, however, took it as a challenge.

"Alright, let's see. In my world, we had massive metal buildings that scraped the sky."

"Ha, that is nothing. Our capital city reaches the very core of this world with how deep it is!"

"That... seems a little unsafe... and hot... anyway, we have weapons that can cause massive explosions."

"Such technology is easy to create but useless when some wizards specialize in explosions."

"We have machines that fly, all the way up to space, past the sky!"

"Why would anyone want to leave the dirt?"

"Alright... Um... what about an elevator? I haven't seen one in this world before!"

"A what?"

"A box with a door that slides up and down. It can be used to get to different floors of a building."

The Stonesmith King began to think to himself. He was not quite sure what the Dark Commander was talking about, but he had spent many hours climbing stairs in his kingdom.

"Tell me more."

It would take a while longer before the Demon Lord was finally able to find Pain. She walked into the dwarves break-out area only to find Pain and the Stonesmith King laughing and sharing stories.

"And then he said, 'that's not an ore mine, that's a stone mine!'" the Stonesmith King said before making a big laugh and smacking his knees.

The other dwarfs laughed along with the king while Pain did his best to go along with the group.

"Stonesmith King! I am sorry about my Dark Commander!" the Demon Lord joined the group and began to pull Pain away.

"Ah, don't worry about it. We had a good talk with him!" the Stonesmith King said while wiping tears from his eyes.

"Pain, we need to get going; the conference will resume soon!"

"Alright, see you later, Smith," Pain said with a small wave.

"That's still not my name, ye fool!" the Stonesmith King yelled back in a friendly tone.

When the talks resumed, the dwarves had wholly changed their position on the peace talks to the other nations' surprise. During the next break, Pain won over the elves. Then he won over the other representatives of nation after nation.

By the end of the conference, many of the diplomats and Pain were good friends. Thus, the 100+ year war was finally agreed to be put to an end. Pain quickly helped establish many new things from his world. He sold the technology for many of the conveniences the goblins had made to engineers worldwide and helped develop several sports leagues within other countries.

To this day, it is said that if you visit the Dark Castle, several things will be remembered. The first is the delicious food that delights the senses. The second is the recorded music that plays throughout the halls and lightly echoes throughout every chamber. The last thing is said to be the Dark Commander, Pain Killer, getting yelled at by the Demon Lord.

*****

Thank you for reading The Demon Lord's Summoning Has Gone Wrong. Originally this was meant to be a silly short story that could allow a break from another project, but it ended up taking my full attention and growing into what it is now. I had a lot of fun writing it, and I hope everyone had as much fun reading it.