Chapter 5 - Episode Five

 

   The castle of the Overlord Edi was a sprawling Japanese affair, built with the rising tiers of a pagoda amid a sea of ephemeral cherry blossoms. It actually consisted of several different buildings, like a series of pagodas locked together by staircases and walkways, dancing a complicated dance around several open spaces limned with cherry trees and filled with open training grounds. A beautiful picture it made, perched on a tablecloth of green grass like some exquisite cake in the peaceful morning air.
   Peaceful, of course, being a relative term.
   “Emperor, we are a full thirteen minutes and fourteen seconds behind schedule, and the time for destruction is going to have to run into your time for pillaging unless we get to it right this instant!”
   “Miaki, shut up right this second or I’ll throw you over the edge of this staircase!”
   “Your Excellency, are you sure you don’t need anything else? Any further healing? Some magical regeneration? Aromatherapy to recharge your spells? Any calluses thickened up? A massage and acupressure? Anything at all?”
   “I suppose we could maybe push back the pillaging by a few minutes, but that means we’ll have to plan for ruinous warfare in the middle of our destruction, and how can you enjoy destruction properly if you’re planning for war in the middle of it?!”
   “Miaki, we’re heading towards Fiona as fast as we can! Stop pestering!”
   “As fast as we can? As fast as we can?! Hell no this isn’t as fast as we can! As fast as we can would have involved jumping off the balcony, as I pointed out when we passed it, which would have saved us at least two minutes and twenty-six seconds—”
   “Except it probably would have killed us!!”
   “That’s Aki’s problem, not mine!”
   “Your death would be your problem, believe it or not!”
   “Oh, wah. You blow things so out of proportion, Shiori.”
   “And you don’t take things seriously enough!!”
   “You do not by chance require any mental healing? Crystal and color therapy? Psychoanalysis? Dream interpretation? Some soothing teas? A modification of the feng shui of the castle?”
   “No, I’m fine, thanks, Aki.”
   “Hey, dood! When do you declare payday?”
   “Our Emperor is thirteen minutes and fifty-nine seconds behind schedule and you’re bothering him about payday?! You stupid Prinnies! We should throw you over the edge of this staircase!”
   “Hey, no! Don’t do that, dood! We’ll explode!”
   “All the better!”
   “Miaki, put that Prinny down!”
   “Help! Save me, doods!”
   “Miaki, you are going against today’s astrological forecast! Look, it says right here that causing harm to your friends will result in bad karma and a repercussion of cosmic proportions!”
   “You can take that astrological forecast and shove it up your—”
   “Dood!”
   “ALL OF YOU STOP IT!!!!!”
   For an Overlord’s realm, this was positively tranquil.
 
*     *     *
 
   Shiori, Miaki, Aki, and the Prinnies, Edi with them almost as though by mistake, burst into the main hall of the central pagoda of the Overlord’s Castle like a torrential gale. And Shiori, who was in the front, stopped dead. Miaki cannoned into her, Aki bumped into Miaki, Edi rammed into Aki, and all the Prinnies pulled up short into a colossal traffic jam.
   The reason for Shiori’s sudden stop stood there in front of them all, tapping one high-heeled foot.
   She was an older woman, tall and rail-thin, dressed in a high-collared black dress with a very short skirt and a dark trenchcoat that would have kissed the ground were it not for her high stiletto heels. Her hair was the color of corn silk and cut boyishly short; behind the square frames of her glasses sat two pitch-black eyes.
   “Setsuna-san—” Shiori began.
   Without batting an eye, the woman sidekicked Shiori with a phenomenal amount of strength. Aki and Miaki dove for cover, and the Prinnies all fell flat on the ground; Edi, the only one left standing, made a valiant attempt to catch Shiori instead of getting out of the way. Unfortunately, Shiori was flying at a quite unhealthy velocity. All Edi managed to do was add himself to the trajectory.
   “That’s Professor Setsuna to you, Shiori,” the woman said calmly as Edi and Shiori both splattered against the opposite wall.
   “Hey!” Miaki yelped. “That was our Emperor you just kicked Shiori into!”
   The woman—Professor Setsuna—shot Miaki one look. Miaki hid behind the nearest Prinny.
   “Emperor-sama,” Setsuna said, entirely as though she had not just been responsible for his splattering against the wall, “I need more materials at once.”
   “What?!” Miaki yelled from behind the Prinny. “No way, Setsuna! He has destruction at—”
   Setsuna kicked the Prinny out of the way and grabbed Miaki by the front of her maid’s uniform. Miaki squeaked.
   “Do I have to put you into detention, Miaki?” Setsuna asked in a voice like a cobra.
   Miaki blanched.
   “Y—Y—Y—You c—c—can’t! I’m n—not o—o—one of your students anymore!”
   “You might have graduated from my school, Miaki, but I’ll remind you that was with a D plus and a special dispensation. I can take that diploma back in a heartbeat. Then you will be one of my students again. For another twelve years.”
   Miaki’s eyes rolled up in her head, and she fainted.
   “I thought not,” Setsuna said, dropping Miaki with a thunk. “Now, then, Emperor-sama. I don’t believe we’ve been formerly introduced.”
   Aki was trying to pull Edi and Shiori off the wall while Setsuna was threatening Miaki. However, as soon as Setsuna dropped Miaki and floated over to the wall like a black thundercloud, Aki left off her ministrations and ran for another corner of the room with a speed that would have made Miaki proud, had she been awake to see it.
   Setsuna peeled Shiori off Edi and dropped her aside. Then she pried Edi off of the wall and placed him in front of her. Edi swayed and almost fell, feeling like he had just been shot out of a cannon or sent down a ninety-degree water slide—Setsuna’s hand grabbing and pumping his was the only thing that kept him upright.
   “I am Professor Setsuna Marie Kakizaki,” Setsuna said. “Magicology teacher and headmistress of the Netherworld Magic Academy in this particular Netherworld.”
   She let go of Edi’s hand. Edi promptly oozed onto the floor like limp spaghetti.
   “Nice to meet you?” he offered from the ground.
   Setsuna got right back to business. “Likewise. Emperor-sama, I have been trying to construct the devices you requested, but without enough materials I simply cannot do anything concrete. I have laid out the blueprints and started the framework, but I require certain materials to start the actual construction and I simply do not have them. You must procure some immediately.”
   “Materials. Right.” Edi’s mind was spinning in lazy, smashed circles. “Materials for what, exactly?”
   Setsuna looked actually maybe possibly slightly just a trifle worried. “Materials for the cannon that you requested yesterday, Emperor-sama. Do you not remember…?”
   “You should not hit the Emperor so hard with his own vassals, Professor Setsuna,” Aki called from her corner of the room.
   Setsuna whirled and pinned Aki with a glare. Aki tried hard to become part of the wall.
   “I’ll remind you that you’re still on your term of healer-training, Aki, and your license privileges can be revoked at any moment.”
   “I most certainly am not!” Aki said indignantly. “I am a certified healer!”
   “Only as long as I say you are.” Setsuna turned back to Edi. “You asked me to create a cannon with very specific specifications yesterday, after becoming Overlord of this Netherworld. Surely you remember now?”
   “Actually…no,” Edi confessed. “I haven’t been able to remember anything about yesterday since I woke up this morning…”
   Aki gasped.
   “It’s okay,” Edi said hastily. “I have a bad memory, it’s nothing that weird—”
   “Your Excellency has amnesia!!” Aki wailed. “Oh, it’s too horrible! That such a horrible condition could strike down my Emperor under my very nose…oh, I have failed in the creed of a Netherworld healer! I am not worthy of my position! Professor Setsuna, you must revoke my license at once!”
   “Oh, shut up, Aki!” Setsuna snapped. “You know perfectly well I’m not going to revoke your license. You’re the only trained healer we have right now.”
   “But I have failed my—!”
   “The only thing you’re failing is that test on composure you took before your final, because you obviously couldn’t have passed it if you’re unhinging this much at the first sign of trouble!” Setsuna shouted. “Now pull yourself together and snap out of it! There are much more important things to do, and chief among them is getting the materials I need to make our Emperor’s cannon!”
   Aki sniffed, and wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her slinky black gown. “I took that test twenty years ago, Professor Setsuna.”
   “Doesn’t mean you can’t still fail it now. Now shut up and get these peabrains ready for action!” Setsuna pulled Edi to his feet. “You must be off to the Item World at once, Your Excellency.”
   Edi brightened instantly. “The Item World?”
 
*     *     *
 
   Isolde, the Red Mage Keeper of the Item World, was playing chess against her pet zombie Mastication (his brain was mostly mush, but that was all right—Isolde didn’t know how to play chess anyways) when the most terrifying denizen of the Netherworld breezed into her little alcove, dragging with her a slightly woozy-looking boy being trailed anxiously by Aki and Shiori.
   There was a troupe of Prinnies dragging Miaki, as well, but Isolde honestly didn’t notice them around the horrible visage of her terrifying ex-teacher, Setsuna Marie Kakizaki.
   “Isolde,” Setsuna commanded, letting go of the boy and settling herself with her weight on one gaunt hip. “We require passage into the Item World immediately.”
   The mage hastily shoved her chess game out of sight. “Oh! Uh…of course, Professor. Right away, Professor. But…um…” She quailed at the mere thought of contradicting Professor Setsuna, but it had to be done. “Professor…”
   “YES?”
   “I…can’t send you without direct permission from the Overlord,” Isolde said in a rush.
   Setsuna sidekicked Isolde into the wall.
   “IDIOT!!” Setsuna shouted as Mastication stared blearily at the spot where Isolde had been a millisecond previous. “This IS the Overlord!!!”
   She held Edi up like an old coat for emphasis.
   “Hi?” Edi said uncertainly.
   Isolde peeled her face off the wall and looked over at Edi. She had to do a double-take. “He’s…the…? Are you sure?”
   Setsuna kicked Isolde right up against the ceiling. “Are you denying our Overlord’s title?!?!”
   “No, of course not, Professor,” Isolde said feebly, clinging to the ceiling for everything she was worth—she was certain she was safer there than on the ground. “It’s just…why is the Overlord dressed in a bathrobe?”
   There was a very nasty pause.
   “I’m sorry,” Edi said humbly. “I should have gotten dressed first, huh…?”
   That was the cue for both Aki and Shiori to explode.
   “No, Your Excellency! It is entirely my fault for not noticing when Miaki fetched me to—”
   “No, it is my fault! I was there since you woke up and I not only forgot to fetch you your clothing, but I neglected to—”
   “I should have—”
   “I didn’t—”
   Setsuna pulled a bomb out of her pocket and threw it at Isolde.
   “You idiot!” Setsuna yelled into the smoke that filled the entire alcove with choking thickness. “How dare you criticize the dress sense of our Overlord! I should revoke your Item Keeper status and send you back to school for a month of detention for this indignity! I thought I taught you better than that, Isolde!! How dare you!”
   Isolde was unconscious on the floor and did not reply.
   “If you wish to wear a bathrobe, you may wear a bathrobe, Emperor-sama,” Setsuna said magnanimously.
   “Well, no, I mean, I don’t want to wear a bathrobe…”
   Setsuna whirled and slammed kicks into both Aki and Shiori. “You stupid bimbos!!! Leaving him in a bathrobe when he expressly does not want to be in one!!”
   Edi was becoming worried about his chances for survival around Setsuna, to say nothing of the chances of his other vassals. “Se—uh, I mean—Professor Setsuna—you don’t have to do that…”
   Setsuna nodded. “You’re correct, and I apologize.”
   “Okay—”
   “It is, of course, your right to punish your own vassals,” Setsuna continued grandly. “Please, carry on.” She looked at him expectantly.
   Edi went slightly pink. “Well…no…I just mean, why don’t they just help me get some different clothes, and nobody has to get punished?”
   “Nobody has to get…?”
   Setsuna threw back her head and laughed heartily. Edi stared at her as she laughed until tears ran down her face from behind her square-shaped spectacles, wondering if maybe her last thin shred of sanity had snapped.
   “Oh, my,” Setsuna gasped finally, wiping her eyes on her black sleeve. “Your sense of humor is refreshing, Your Excellency. You’ll win the Yearly Joke Contest for certain!”
   “I, uh…” Edi stalled, not sure what was going on now.
   “But actually, that joke has made me think of something.” Completely serious once more, Setsuna whirled back on Shiori and Aki, who grabbed onto each other for support. “You made the mistake, you go remedy it. Get the Emperor dressed in clothes. Now.”
   Aki and Shiori nodded fearfully. Setsuna turned her glare onto Miaki’s prone body. All the Prinnies who had been carrying her dropped her and ran.
   “And as for you, Miaki—you help as well. Every mess that goes on here is at least half your fault.”
   “But she’s unconscious,” Edi ventured.
   “That’s what she wants you to think.” Setsuna strode up to Miaki and knelt down in front of her. Edi, sensing that violence might be imminent, made a movement forward to intervene. But he was too late.
   “Miaki,” Setsuna said softly, “get up this instant and help your Emperor, or I’ll put you in…the Chair.”
   Miaki was on her feet and out the door with Edi, Aki, and Shiori all in her arms before Setsuna could finish blinking.
   The Professor sighed contentedly. “Ah…it’s good to be the teacher.”
 
*     *     *
 
   Setsuna had undertaken clerical training before she transmigrated into a Professor and became Headmistress of the Netherworld Magic Academy. One or two—okay, maybe seventeen, but who was counting?—Omega Heals later, Isolde was back on her feet, a little woozy but once more able to perform her job as Item Keeper.
   While she waited for her Overlord to return and take advantage of Isolde’s services, Setsuna utilized Mastication the zombie as a rather comfortable if slightly slimy armchair while she perused the latest issue of Netherworld Weekly, a Netherworld news magazine published by the Pleinair Corporation. Isolde, not wanting to seem like she was slacking off, sat stiffly across from her old teacher and her zombie, wishing most fervently that she wasn’t there.
   Setsuna had just finished reading an article about the shocking drop in standardized test scores across the Netherworlds (average Netherworld-wide Cheating scores had dropped a whole four percent) when the door to Isolde’s little alcove opened, and Miaki, Shiori, and Aki filed in, all looking extremely nervous.
   The Professor folded up her magazine and stowed it away in thin air. “Well? Did you do as I instructed?”
   Edi came in from behind them.
    He was dressed in a flowing white garment falling over puffed white trousers, both cinched around his waist with a belt of golden rings with a buckle shaped like the sun. Sandals with attached ribbons which laced halfway to his knees covered ivory socks and the bottom third of the trousers. Over everything draped a kind of long vest, also pure white, with a border of linked golden crescent moons. Three slim golden chains attached across the front of the vest, holding it partially closed across his white-covered chest, and a large hemispherical sapphire provided the last attachment, nestled just beneath his collarbones. The sides were laced up with cerulean ribbons; the back was resplendent with a massive gold-and-silver-thread insignia of an interwoven rising sun and crescent moon.
   Setsuna studied him briefly, nodding reflectively. “This is to your liking, Emperor-sama?”
   Edi blushed. “Uh…yeah, mostly…I mean, it’s okay, right…?”
   A pair of jet-black eyes narrowed behind their spectacles. “He does not sound pleased…”
   “No, I’m pleased!” Edi intervened hastily, realizing where this was going. “It’s fine! Really.”
   “Well, if you’re sure…”
   Miaki, Shiori, and Aki looked terribly relieved.
   “…then it’s time we got down to business.” Setsuna whirled on Isolde, who cringed. “Isolde, send us to the Item World at once.”
   “Of course,” Isolde agreed, her voice quaking a little. “And…into which item?”
   Setsuna pulled a bomb out of her pocket. Isolde pulled a hardhat out of nowhere and dove underneath the table.
   “Get out from there, you ninny,” Setsuna said impatiently. “I want you to send us into this bomb.”
   Isolde peered out from underneath the table, hardhat pulled low over her ears. “Oh…of course…”
   “May the Powers That Be protect me from imbeciles who can’t reach such simple conclusions,” Setsuna muttered.
   “And who will be entering the…er…item?” Isolde came out from underneath the table, although she seemed reluctant to remove the hardhat.
   “I will, naturally,” Setsuna said. “And the Emperor as well.”
   “Naturally,” Isolde agreed. “And…who else…?”
   “I must,” Aki said at once. “I must be there for my Emperor should he injure himself in any—”
   Setsuna roundhouse-kicked Aki into the wall. “Dolt!! That is for the Emperor to decide!!”
   Aki slid down the wall with the sound of wet zucchini being rubbed down a cheese grater.
   “I want Aki to come,” Edi ventured.
   Setsuna glared at Aki. “Get up, Aki! Your Emperor has demanded your presence!”
   Edi made a mental note that Setsuna’s point of view seemed to change remarkably quickly.
   “And who else, Emperor-sama?” Isolde asked as Shiori helped Aki to her feet again.
   “Well…”
   Miaki looked like there was something she dearly wanted to blurt out, but didn’t dare to with Setsuna around. Edi looked at her, then had a sudden illumination of comprehension. “Miaki and Shiori…”
   “Thank you for considering us, Your Excellency,” Shiori said, holding Aki steady as she cast a healing spell on her face.
   “That is five, Emperor-sama,” Isolde said, making a note on a clipboard that was hanging on the wall. Doing her job seemed to lend her some confidence, even with Setsuna standing there like the Grim Reaper. “I can send a maximum of ten people at one time—are there more vassals you would prefer to have accompany you?”
   Edi was about to ask who else there was available to accompany him when a flipper tugged at the end of his robe. Looking down, he found himself staring into ten pleading penguin eyes.
   “Put us in, dood,” the lead Prinny begged.
   Setsuna went scarlet in the face. “Put you in?! Put you in?! You dare to waste the Emperor’s time with such a request, you…you…”
   Her vocabulary seemed momentarily to have failed her.
   Edi looked at the pleading Prinnies, and could no more have refused them their request than he could have convinced them that he was not their Overlord. “Of course. Isolde, can the Prinnies come with me too?”
   Setsuna’s jaw dropped, but she recovered quickly. “Y…yes. Certainly, the right decision. The Prinnies, Isolde?”
   “As you wish, then, Your Excellency,” Isolde said, marking it on her clipboard. “One Overlord, four vassals, and the Seventh Brigade. Into one (1) Bomb. I can prepare immediate transportation. Oh, and Your Excellency…”
   Isolde nodded to Mastication. The zombie got ponderously to its feet, oozed over to Edi, and dropped something into his hands. Edi stared at it in horror for a moment until he realized that it was not a bit of fallen anatomy, but an oddly-shaped object in a bright pink wrapper.
   “A Mr. Gency’s Exit,” Isolde explained. “A gift from me to you for using my services for the first time. Use it to—”
   “Get out of the Item World!” Edi exclaimed. “Wow! A Mr. Gency’s Exit! So this is it! What does it actually look like?” He began to unwrap it.
   “Don’t do that, Emperor-sama!” Isolde said in alarm. “It activates as soon as it is unwrapped!”
   “Oh.” Edi hastily rewrapped the one corner he had managed to get free. “Duh. Sorry.”
   Setsuna burst into hoots of laughter. Edi stared at her.
   “Oh, my, Emperor,” Setsuna gasped, gathering herself. “An apology. You really are a card! A real riot!”
   “Thanks?” Edi said awkwardly.
   Isolde cleared her throat and took a look at her clipboard. “Ah…are you ready for transportation, Your Excellency?”
   “Yeah, sure,” Edi said, deciding he’d worry about Setsuna’s strange laughing fits later.
   Isolde pulled a long wooden staff topped with a strange design resembling an eye with a gemstone for the pupil out of nowhere, exactly the same way she had pulled out the hardhat previously, and tapped the eye against the wooden floor. “Overlord Edi; Vassal Miaki; Vassal Shiori; Vassal Aki; Vassal Professor Setsuna; Captain Clove; Private Sonata; Private Mackwell; Private Twitch; Private Shirley; transportation, complete.”
   There was a whirring, flashing zwoowaush!—and suddenly, Isolde was gone, and the inside of the palace with her, and Edi’s eyes were bedazzled by raining sunlight.
 
*     *     *
 
   “We needn’t stay long,” Setsuna said briskly, pulling a long list out of a pocket of her coat. “I just need to procure these materials.”
   Edi’s eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets. He was standing on what looked like a small plain, covered in grass and trees. The grass was approximately the same length and shade as Aki’s golden hair, but the trees were bright and green. Their branches were laden with fruit—fruit that was round and black and looked suspiciously like…
   Setsuna plucked a bomb from the branch of the nearest tree and studied it. “Yes…yes, this is a good one. I knew I kept that Legendary Bomb around for more than terrifying my classes with.”
   “You mean we’re inside of that bomb?!?!” Miaki’s voice rose about three octaves.
   “Yes. Now be quiet.” Setsuna stripped a length of bark away from the tree and revealed underneath it, not wood, but metal. “Now, where can I find what I need…”
   Edi didn’t pay any attention to what Setsuna was doing as she went around tearing parts out of trees, off the ground, and from underneath rocks. He was still staring around at the new world they were in.
   The plain was small. Very small. At first, Edi thought that it was on the top of a mountain with very steep sides—but as Setsuna continued to mess around with the land and its various parts, Edi wandered over closer to the edge and took a look over to see that the plain simply…ended. Above the plain, sky. Beneath the plain, sky. Off on all sides of the plain, sky.
   The plain was floating in the sky.
   A wonderful swooping feeling, similar to the feeling one gets on a truly startling rollercoaster, rolled up through Edi’s stomach.
   Knowing that he was on something that broke the laws of physics and didn’t give a damn that it had done so, Edi stared around with an expression usually reserved for survivors of a famine staring at a banquet. All around stretched clear, open, brilliant blue sky, flecked with fluffy clouds. Small silvery creatures swooped about in the sky, and although Edi first thought they were large dragonflies or small birds, he suddenly realized that they were, in actuality, winged silver bombs.
   A bomb landed on the branch of a tree, putting its fuse first on one side and then on the other, just like a curious pigeon. Edi gaped at it, amazed. “Hi?”
   Acquiring a baffled set to its fuse, the bomb spread its wings and flew away again.
   “All right, Emperor-sama,” Setsuna announced, turning with the pockets of her coat bulging with machinery. “I think I’ve collected most of what I need. We can leave at any—”
   She stopped.
   “Do we have to leave just now?” Edi asked, looking over at Setsuna.
   Setsuna did not reply.
   “Professor?”
   “DOOD!!!” one of the Prinnies squeaked.
   Edi turned around.
   More or less out of nowhere, swaying lightly in midair, completely sanguine with the fact that it was hanging with no visible support in an open bomb-filled sky, coasting down to land at the edge of the plain Edi and his vassals stood upon, was a huge, dark, forbidding ship, flying a skull and crossbones.
   “PIRATES!!!!” Miaki screeched.
 
 
   “Pirates?” Edi repeated.
   “Pirates, Emperor-sama!! Item World Pirates!!!” Miaki’s hyperactive energy, suppressed for the last hour by Setsuna’s warning presence, found an outlet and exploded. “They’ll seize our possessions, take our shoes, make us walk the plank! They’ll take the Mr. Gency’s Exit and we’ll never get out of here and we have destruction to do at ten-`o-clock, Emperor!!!”
   The ship came down towards the plain, in some macabre way similar to the way the bomb had coasted in onto the branch.
   “What do we do?” Edi asked, starting to feel slightly unnerved. He had of course run into pirates before in the video game of Disgaea—but he was beginning to realize just how different it was to run into them in real life than it was in a game.
   “We have no choice, Emperor-sama!” Shiori drew her sword in a long, shimmering length of steel and dropped into a battle stance. “We must fight!!”
   “Fight?!” Miaki demanded. “Shiori, are you out of your mind?! Emperor-sama, use the Mr. Gency’s Exit! Quick! Before they get here!”
   “Too late!” Setsuna shouted. “Here they come!”
   The ship had touched down on the edge of the plain, the very tip of the bow touching the land while the rest of the ship still floated over thin air.
   “A weapon, Emperor-sama!” Shiori cried. “You need a weapon!”
   “A weapon?” Edi looked down at himself as though expecting to see a sword materializing. None appeared. “What weapon am I…?”
   “You are proficient in Books, Remotes, Nunchaku, and Katanas, Emperor!” Setsuna rapped out. “Did not one of you think to give him a weapon?!”
   “We weren’t expecting to run into pirates in your Legendary Bomb!!” Miaki screamed.
   Setsuna sidekicked her. “Are you trying to say this is my fault?!”
   “We haven’t time for this!” Shiori bellowed. “Emperor-sama, here! Take this!”
   There were two scabbards hanging from Shiori’s waist. With one quick movement, Shiori tore the second scabbard free and hurled it at Edi. Edi reflexively caught it—and found it to be a long, beautiful, silver-as-the-moon katana, the curve of the ebony-black scabbard broken only by a cerulean ribbon tied about it.
   Edi drew the weapon, marveling at the lightness of the blade. He had taken many martial arts classes and knew how to handle a katana, but there was something different about the way he was holding this one. Something different…
   A gangplank slammed down onto the plain.
   Edi dropped into a fighting stance mirroring Shiori.
   Setsuna whipped a black remote control out of her coat.
   Aki seized a crystalline rod that materialized out of nowhere.
   Miaki groaned and pulled out a staff topped with a figurine of a Prinny.
   And a wave of Knights armed with swords erupted forth on the gangplank.
 
 
   “Orders, Emperor-sama!” Setsuna shouted.
   Edi froze. Suddenly what was different about the way he was holding this katana dawned on him.
   He didn’t know the stance he was in. He didn’t hold his katana this way when he practiced at home. He didn’t have the ability to strike the air in a way that would amplify the cut to slash through everything in front of him.
   He did now.
   He was now proficient with a katana beyond his wildest dreams.
   And he could feel it.
   “Emperor-sama!”
   Edi snapped back to himself.
   “Uh…Setsuna! Do you know attack spells?”
   “Of course!” Setsuna snapped back. “Star, Mega Star, Giga Star, Omega Star…”
   “Okay, Setsuna, you and Miaki get back there behind those trees!” Edi gestured at the trees in question. “Get some cover and chain together Omega Star over as many Knights as possible! Aki, stay with them and Braveheart Shiori and me!”
   “Of course, Emperor-sama!”
   “Two of you Prinnies—um, you two—”
   “Private Twitch, dood!”
   “Private Shirley, dood!”
   “Stay with those three and use Prinny Barrage! Protect them! The rest of you Prinnies and Shiori, come with me!”
   “Where, Emperor-sama?”
   “The front lines!”
   Action followed Edi’s word with precision that would have shamed an army drill sergeant. Miaki, Setsuna, and Aki ran for the trees and began chanting their spells. The Prinnies Twitch and Shirley bobbled over in front of them, jumped high into the air, and pulled swords out of the little pouches buckled around their pear-shaped waists. Slashing the swords rapidly, they sent spirals of sliced air arrowing into the Knights’ midst.
   There was a tremendous explosion. Miaki and Setsuna had gotten off their chained Omega Stars, and pinkish-purple lightning flashed across the Knights with the heavy smell of ozone.
   Aki raised her staff into the air. Flaming light concentrated in on Shiori and Edi, lending strength to their muscles and energizing them in every nerve.
   “What do we do, dood?” Captain Clove asked in a remarkably professional fashion for a peg-legged penguin.
   “Um…”
   Edi looked ahead. The Knights were coughing, trying to recover from the onslaught of Prinny and spellcaster, and seemed temporarily distracted. It was the time to strike. Edi had no idea if the turn-based battle system that governed Disgaea had any hold here, and he didn’t have the leisure to find out.
   “Captain, go around to their right side and use Prinny Bomb! You two—”
   “Private Mackwell, dood!”
   “Private Sonata, dood!”
   “I want you to Prinny Barrage over Shiori and my heads, okay?”
   “Got it, dood!” The Prinnies scurried off.
   “And I, Emperor-sama?” Shiori asked, determination serious in her face. “What would you like me to do?”
   Edi looked at her, and blushed. With her face so serious and her eyes alight with the fires of Aki’s Braveheart spell, Shiori looked—
   “…Emperor!!”
   Edi jolted back to reality again. “Can you do Dimension Slash?”
   “Can I?” Shiori snorted. “Can bombs fly, Emperor?”
   Despite the fact that he was trapped in the Item World of a bomb facing down a horde of magic-using, sword-wielding Knight pirates, Edi couldn’t help but laugh at that.
   “Then go for it!”
   Shiori flashed him a quick smile—then she leapt into the air.
   Explosions went off from the side of the Knights as Captain Clove bombarded them with custom-made Prinny Bombs. Streams of air slashed over Edi’s head as Sonata and Mackwell Prinny Barraged down.
   Then Shiori sliced the air.
   And the dimension split.
 
 
   Green and white stars cleared themselves from Edi’s vision with the approximate speed of a very fast snail. The Overlord shook his head in an attempt to hurry them on their way and took a look at the pirates.
   They were gone. Shiori’s Dimension Slash had done the trick—with the Prinnies to soften them up and Setsuna and Miaki to weed them out, Shiori’s powerful technique had utterly annihilated the last of the Knight pirates.
   At least, it seemed that way.
   Edi had just turned to congratulate Shiori when Aki’s yelp echoed out from the trees. “Emperor-sama!!”
   She was silhouetted against the blue sky on the gangplank of her ship. Her short lilac hair lifted slightly in the breeze—her heavy white-and-lilac uniform strained across her impressive bust and snapped about her shapely legs. Her glare pinned Edi to the ground like a pin impaling an insect into a bug collection—in one hand, she carried a naked sword.
   Not just any sword.
   A katana.
   “You,” the leader of the Knight pirates spat, stepping down the gangplank with slow, deliberate steps. “You destroyed my crew!”
   “Your crew attacked us first!” Miaki shouted from the safety of the trees.
   “You ruined my chances of becoming the strongest pirate in the Item World!”
   “You ruined my schedule for Emperor-sama!”
   “You’ve completely screwed up everything!”
   “Well, you screwed up Emperor-sama’s destruction and pillaging, so I wouldn’t be talking, you—”
   “SHUT UP!!!!”
   Edi thought this was the pirate leader’s scream at first, until he heard the crash and realized that Setsuna had just punched Miaki into a tree.
   “I will never forgive you,” the pirate threatened, stepping off the gangplank onto the grassy plain. “You hold a katana—I challenge you to a Shadow Contest!”
   Shiori gasped. Aki cried out as though wounded. Edi blinked. “A what?”
   “You do not know the rules, though you carry a katana?” the pirate demanded. “We both perform The Shadow at the same time. The one that survives carries the battle. The allies of the one that dies concede defeat to the winner!”
   “What?!” Edi asked, astounded. Nothing like this had ever happened in Disgaea before!
   “You can’t refuse, Emperor-sama,” Setsuna said reluctantly. “As an Overlord, you have an obligation to accept the challenges offered you. You must participate. Fight. Win!”
   “But I—”
   “No!” Aki wailed, seizing two handfuls of her lovely golden hair. “I can’t allow my Overlord to face such a dangerous task! There must be a way to—!”
   “No,” Setsuna said grimly. “He has no choice.”
   “But I—”
   “You must win!” Shiori’s hands clenched into fists. “Please! For all of us, Emperor-sama! You must win!”
   Edi had his mouth open to attempt another feeble protest. But looking at Shiori, he realized that there was no protest he could make.
   He had to do this? Then he would do it.
   Squaring his shoulders, he turned back to face the pirate leader again.
   “All right. Let’s do it.”
 
 
   The wind blew across the grass as though called on a cue from an old samurai movie.
   Setsuna, Aki, Shiori, Miaki (a large bandage applied to her head by Aki,) and the Prinnies all stood anxiously on the sidelines.
   Facing each other across the yellow plain stood the pirate leader and the Overlord.
   The sun reflected off Edi’s katana.
   The wind wound around the pirate’s katana.
   For a moment they stood.
   Then they lunged.
   The sun was stunned lightless by a singing clash of steel.
   Normal sight became visible again. Setsuna looked more anxious than anyone had ever seen her. Aki’s face was hidden in her hands; she could not bear to look. Shiori’s fingers were in her mouth. Miaki was holding her breath.
   The pirate leader stumbled.
   Collapsed.
   And did not rise.
   The bystanders watched with their mouths agape, then swung their gazes to their Overlord, standing on the grass with his katana in his hand, looking upset and anxious, but still alive.
   Still very much alive.
   Aki dropped her hands, saw her Emperor standing upright, and screamed. “YOUR EXCELLENCY!!! YOU WON!!!!”
   As one woman, the four vassals, even Setsuna, ran at Edi and slammed him into a four-way group hug.
   “YOU WON, EMPEROR-SAMA!!! YOU WON!!!!!”
 
*     *     *
 Next Time, on Disgaea: Overlords’ Dance

Etna: Card Master Etna has entered the Netherworld Card Tournament to prove herself the best player!
Edi: Ooh! Ooh! It’s Etna again!
Etna: Challenging the horrible Flonne, Etna finds herself cut down by Flonne’s unrepentant cheating!
Edi: Hey! Flonne would never cheat!
Etna: There’s no choice…Etna jumps into the card battle herself as the ultimate card—Beauty Queen Etna!
Edi: Flonne wouldn’t cheat!
Etna: Can Beauty Queen Etna stand up to the power of Flonne’s illegally boosted Dark Love Angel card?
Edi: I’m telling you, Flonne would never cheat!!
Etna: Next time, on Et-Na-Oh, Episode Six, “Beauty Queen Etna’s Mega Showdown!”
Edi: Using equip cards on a monster isn’t cheating, Etna.
Etna: If she’s not losing, then she’s cheating, okay?! Will you shut up and leave me alone?!
 

 

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