Flowing knee-length silver hair that was as glossy as high-grade Chinese silk. Skin as white and smooth as the finest porcelain. Her posture was refined and full of dignity but still charming nonetheless. Hastily taken pictures were nowhere close enough to capture this dazzling beauty in its whole, a job that only the masterpiece of a one-in-a-century painter could ever come close to.

 

As she came closer to me, all the finest details that a digital device could not ever hope to capture now laid bare for me to marvel at. The ash-colored irises that were like a pair of grey diamonds, the slight blush that made up her dreamy rosy cheeks, the flock of hair that she slightly lifted over her cute mellow ears that were begging to be nibbled. Just looking at her face made one feel out of breath and drive them insane.

 

This girl … isn’t she the one in the pictures Yuji just showed me, which means she must be …

 

“Sei!”

 

Suddenly she approached me even faster after I turned back to face her.

 

And before I know anything, my vision was blocked by something soft and squishy and warm, a bit like marshmallows but with the scent of fresh peach. They just kept dangling in front of my face, rubbing and squeezing it in the empty space between them, leaving me no room to breathe or to see. 

 

“PRINCESSSSSS!!? INSOLENT HUMAN TRASH, I WILL SLICE YOU UP UNTIL EVEN YOUR CORPSE ARE ...”

 

While I was still suffocating under this soft marshmallow-thing, there was a deafening shout from someone whose voice I did not recognize, followed by the sound of something razor-sharp being drawn, together with a monstrous amount of blood lust, all of them seemed to be directed against … me?

 

“Wait, wait … time out! Time out!”

 

Feeling every single hair on my neck uniformly stood up, my survival instinct kicked in and I pushed myself against those marshmallow-things. 

 

When light returned to my vision, all I see was the girl from before being held in the arms by a purple-haired maid cosplayer. Both of her knees were bent as if she was going to fall down onto the hall’s ground, had it not been for the purple-haired girl behind who caught her in a timely fashion.

 

And that maid-cosplay girl was staring at me as if she was going to skin me alive right now, then afterward she would come to the rest of my family members and all of our nine generations to perform the exact same deed. It also did not help that while her right arm was still holding the silver-haired girl, her left one was tightly gripped on a katana that was almost half my height.

 

I did not do anything bad, right? I am just chilling here with my friend Yuji waiting for the entrance ceremony. That’s all, was what I thought, but the expression that devoured people of the girl looking at me seemed to tell a different story, and it seriously made me break out in a cold sweat.

 

Her sharp face, which was just barely a second ago exploding with anger, now relaxed into a half-curved smile.

 

“Human trash, you should be proud. Your name will be forever remembered by your kinds as the one who started the second war against us.”

 

Excuse me, miss?

 

Barely after she finished speaking, there was a swooshing sound in the atmosphere, and all of my inner animal instincts that were buried deep down screeched in agony, as if they wanted to cry out that I would be dead as a doornail in the very next blink of my eyes.

 

“Stop right there, crim … Nora!”

 

My body has nearly resigned to meet its demise, not even of one of my muscles listened to my desperate call for survival when the threat was too fast and too extraordinary for them to handle. Yet when the blade was to be swung down and tear me in two, the pure color of silver once again filled my vision. A pleasant aroma, like that of plumeria, danced together with small particles of light and entered my senses, probing and filling it to the brim.

 

“Princesss!!? What are you doing!?? Why are you protecting this human trash when he dared to violate you!?”

 

‘She jumped onto me first, so that made me the one being violated here, dear weird maid-cosplaying bloodthirsty purple-haired girl. ’, was what I wanted to say, but in this highly unscientific situation, rational thought from a rational man was all but for naught, except maybe to earn another brutal slash of katana from these monsters in disguise.

 

But seriously though, is she protecting me? She even called my name first, as if she and I were acquainted, while there is no way in hell I would ever befriend a demon. Damn, it’s only the start of a new school year and bad luck is targeting me already.

 

“Just … put your sword down, Nora, I have, uh ... my own reasons for this.”

 

“If that is a direct order from the princess, then I, your maid will comply, but ...”

 

From behind, I can hear the metallic sound of sword being sheathed. Before I could breathe out a sigh of relief, I can feel all of my neck’s hair going on a rampage again. This time, the purple-haired girl walked right next to me and stared at me with eyes like those of a beast stalking its prey. 

 

“... this perverted human trash will be on my blacklist. You must keep your distance from pest like him, princess.”

 

Her words followed by a loud “shink” sound, as the katana was finally put back into its sheath.

 

You are the perverted one, your whole family is perverted. No, your nine generations and the nine generations before them are all perverts.

 

I suppressed the urge to throw back at her a hateful gaze and kept my eyesight affixed to the carpet flooring. Whatever I do, I cannot afford to displease these walking calamities, not yet. 

 

“Now, Nora, my seat is here, so, uhm … do you have a place to go?”

 

It seemed that both of them calmed down, and the silver-haired girl, whose identity I could confirm with little room for doubt to be the rumored Demon Princess, was having a conversation with the violent maid-cosplaying girl.

 

“Actually, I do. My seat is on the first row, next to this school’s head or something. I am extremely sorry for this insulting arrangement and having you seated with these brutes. I was vehemently against it as the Chief of Defense, but the Queen herself officially approved of it in the human-demon meeting, so ...”

 

“It’s fine, I understand. Now just ... go to your seat, Nora.”

 

“Thank you for your concern, Princess. And this human trash there ...”

 

Before turning back and walking away, she did not forget to glance coldly at me one more time.

 

“If I caught you doing something disgraceful to our princess again, this thing,” said her as she lightly tapped on her sword sheath, “will come and find you, okay?”

 

And with that, she did a curtsy and walked away.

 

As I looked at her retreating figure with mixed feelings, there was the sound of light cough next to me, followed by a sweet and nymph-like voice that reverberated through my ears, completely caught me off-guard.

 

“Now, it’s back to just you and me, isn’t that right, Sei?”