A Demon Lord’s Tale: Dungeons, Monster Girls, and Heartwarming Bliss

Side Story: A Good Day for a Walk

That day, Shii was taking a walk alone.

“Fu~Fufu~, Fufufu~”

She hummed in a good mood as she walked through the meadow area.

Illuna and Enne were not with her currently, nor were the Wraith Girls.

Usually, the little girls always played together, but sometimes, they end up playing by themselves.

Illuna may be practicing magic, Enne may be out with Yuki, and so on.

Sometimes they just didn’t get together because they were in the mood to do something else.

As for today, Illuna was reading books, and Enne wanted to learn how to make a good cup of tea from Layla.

The Wraith Girls were out exploring Yuki’s new meadow area, trying to get a grasp of all the athletic zones that Yuki had created.

Shii wondered whether she should go with them, but she was not in the mood today and wanted to relax a little more, so she decided to walk around the meadow area by herself.

Note that the Wraith Girls, unlike the others, were rarely alone.

Shii did not know if it was because Yuki had summoned the Wraith Girls at the same time with DP, but the Wraith Girls always had a strong sense of being one as a group, causing them to rarely act alone.

“Blue, blue sky~, why are you so blue~? But it feels so good under you, I don’t care what you are. –Oh, ants!”

Upon spotting the ants, Shii stopped singing, crouched down, and began chasing them as they moved in formation.

When the environment was generated by the power of the dungeon, it simultaneously generated creatures that could be found there, albeit only small creatures.

There would be fishes in the river and insects in the meadow. However, these small creatures were not Yuki’s dependents, so they did not listen to him.

They simply went on with their lives.

This was proof that a dungeon was not simply a place where a Demon Lord lived, but also a box garden.

What spread out here was the very model of a world.

Shii enjoyed observing the ants, as if time was of no concern to her at all.

“You’re so hard-working, and you have such a strong jaw… I don’t want to be like you. Shii wants to be laid back all the time…”

Shii, who had been chasing the ants with rather earnest thoughts, soon discovered a hole in the corner of the castle’s flower beds where ants repeatedly entered and exited one after another.

“Oh, so this is your home! Hmmm, it’s interesting, isn’t it? I wonder if this is how God feels when he sees living things?”

Shii was muttering something subtle and disturbing, while looking at the ants who were working hard without doing anything herself.

As a side note, the first thing Yuki, the master of this dungeon, imagined when he heard the word “ant” was not the small ant but a huge ant almost as big as a human living in the Demon Forest. It even made his face twitch slightly at the mere hearing of the name.

In fact, he remained somewhat traumatized by ants, since it was the ant army that established his dislike of insects.

“Okay, you guys are very hard-working… I’ll give you candy! Eat it well!”

Shii pulled out one of her favorite candy bars from her pouch, which each of the little girls was allowed to carry and could invoke spatial magic, and placed the candy in front of the nest.

At first, the ants looked like they were wondering what was going on, but as soon as they realized that it was food, they began to swarm around it, following their instincts.

Shii, feeling like she had done something good, finished observing the ants with a smile and returned to her merry stroll.

“Walking is good! It’s healthy and wonderful. But Shii’s legs aren’t really legs, so is it good? …Well, it feels good to move the body, so whatever!”

For Shii, her human form was only temporary.

She was originally a small, round, and weakest race of slime. So strictly speaking, currently, she was just a slime taking the form of a little girl.

But Shii had never been bothered by this difference in race in the first place.

Even when compared to others from her own slime race, she never really saw herself as just a slime. “That’s right! Shii is Shii!” was what she would always think.

To her, it was obvious that her appearance would be different from others, and she did not know why she should be bothered by this fact.

…Well, to begin with, there was almost nothing in this dungeon that could be called “normal” in terms of people or things, so it was only natural that she was not bothered by it.

So Shii continued her stroll, wandering here and there, basking in the pleasant dungeon sunlight.

She followed a flying butterfly, smelled the flowers in the flower beds, played with the soil, poked at an insect she found, and made it curl up.

She enjoyed her time alone, freely and as her heart dictated, and when she came near the building that everyone in the family called a [Hot Spring Inn], she found a familiar figure there.

“Ah, It’s Master~!”

Yuki recognized her voice and turned to her. This was then followed by Shii waving her hand before running up to him.

“Oh, Shii, are you alone today?”

“Yes! I was having a walk! What are you doing?”

“Me? I’m… you know, I was wondering about this ridge here, and I’ve been working on it. What do you think, does it look cooler than before?”

“Hmmm, I don’t know!”

“You don’t know, huh? Then I guess I don’t have a choice.”

“There is no choice!”

Yuki smiled and patted Shii’s head.

Yuki’s hand was warm and big.

Shii’s mouth broke into a smile, and she rubbed her head against Yuki’s waist.

“Nfufu~ I got to meet you while I was on a walk, so today is a good day!”

“Really? I am also happy to meet Shii here.”

“Really? I’m so happy!”

Yuki patted Shii’s head and smiled for a while, and then he sat down on the porch of the Hot Spring Inn.

“Okay, I’ve just finished some work, so if Shii is free, let’s play together. What do you want to do?”

“Yes! Um, um…well, sunbathing!”

“Oh, sunbathing?”

“Yes! The sun feels so good in this place!”

Shii also sat down on the porch.

“Haha, you’re right. Well, in the dungeon, the sunlight is comfortable everywhere.”

“Yes, it is!”

Yuki brought two pillows from the adjoining room and put them down, so the two could lay down.

Shii lay down and snuggled up to Yuki as they basked in the sun, while feeling the sun’s warmth spread through their bodies.

Shii was so happy and warm that she started to doze off.