"Desmon-kun, I want to believe you're truly pretending not to understand something this simple," Yukinoshita said with a sigh. "Even an elementary schooler could do this without any trouble."
She didn't raise her voice. She didn't need to. The exhaustion on her face spoke for itself.
"Believe me, I'm giving it everything I've got… but I don't understand a thing," Desmon replied with complete seriousness.
For over twenty minutes, Yukinoshita had been explaining basic, interactive material—the kind used with elementary school children to teach them how to write Japanese. Even so, there had been no visible results.
In the days before, she had used regular textbooks. Then she lowered the level. Again and again.
"Yukinon, I think he really is trying…" Yuigahama said, trying to ease the tension.
"Yuigahama-san, if he were truly trying, he would at least look interested," Yukinoshita replied, rubbing her temple. "But his attitude says otherwise."
Being who she was, Yuigahama looked at Desmon with a hint of pity. He seemed completely lost in his own world.
"Don't worry, Yoshi," Desmon said with a smile, giving her a thumbs-up. "I've been through worse. I think I can handle it."
"Last time, it looked like smoke was coming out of your head…" she added, remembering that incident.
By now, Yuigahama had come to accept almost any nickname Desmon gave her. Compared to some of the names he'd used before, "Yoshi" wasn't bad at all.
"Yuigahama-san, don't distract him," Yukinoshita said calmly. "It's hard enough for him to concentrate for more than five minutes."
As if to prove her point, Desmon was staring at the ceiling.
"For some reason, I feel like I haven't done anything for over four months…" he murmured, his gaze unfocused.
Yukinoshita sighed.
"Desmon-san, we'll take a break. We'll continue afterward."
"Thanks…" he replied before resting his head on the desk.
His brain had reached its limit…
"Look, Desmon-san! Puppy videos!"
"Oh… they remind me of one I used to have."
Desmon and Yuigahama started watching the videos together. Hikigaya, who had been reading quietly, looked up when Yukinoshita spoke.
"Hikigaya-kun, even a bacterium has more presence than you," she said with her usual smile.
"I heard that," he replied.
Nothing out of the ordinary. Just another normal day when the Service Club had no requests.
After a few minutes, the study session resumed.
Desmon had already given up.
Learning Japanese wasn't about getting good grades—it was about making his life easier: understanding signs, texts… and creating advertisements for his work. He had once planned to post them around different cities, but a lot had happened since then.
-I wonder when Kurox will come back…
His reliable Devil Arm, which he used to travel long distances without worrying about fuel costs or parking, was currently unavailable. Even so, Desmon could feel that Kurox was somewhere out there.
As he thought about that, a flashback hit him, as if all the mental strain had forced certain memories to resurface.
"Hey, Yuno… do you guys have a laptop here?"
Yukinoshita raised an eyebrow.
"That's not my name," she said coldly. "And yes, the club has one. It's old, but it works."
Desmon ignored the first part.
"Do you know how to make websites?"
"The only one here who doesn't know how to use a computer is the dead-eyed guy next to you," she replied.
"I'm still here," Hikigaya said.
Hikigaya couldn't go five minutes without being insulted by Yukinoshita—just another day as usual.
After a brief exchange between them, Yuigahama decided not to mention that she wasn't very good with computers herself. Yukinoshita took the laptop out of a cabinet and turned it on.
-What exactly are you trying to achieve with a website?
Yukinoshita's doubt was reasonable, since Desmon didn't seem like the type to be interested in something like that.
''What's the reason you're interested in creating a website?'' she asked, tilting her head curiously.
Yuigahama was curious as well, and Hikigaya only glanced away from his light novel for a moment, out of sheer curiosity—Desmon was, in his own way, strange.
"I just thought I was being really old-fashioned when it comes to technology."
For the young demon hunter, this wasn't the first time he'd resorted to this option. Of course, back then, he hadn't been the one managing the website.
Putting his full brainpower to use, Desmon vaguely recalled the name of the previous website he'd had and told it to Yukinoshita. After a couple of seconds, the page loaded.
'DMC. No job is too small and no mission is impossible: from exterminating a pest to restoring the peace that was stolen from you, settling unfinished business, or bringing back what you thought was lost. If something invades your life, weighs on you, or keeps you up at night, call me… I'll take care of it.'
Obviously, Desmon hadn't called Dante to ask for the business's copyright, but he also couldn't come up with a good name for the site.
Having that message greet you the moment you entered the page made it look like nothing more than some kind of virus or data-stealing scam—because no matter how you looked at it, only an idiot would do something like that.
"Did you make this?" Yukinoshita asked, staring skeptically at the laptop screen.
"My supervisor? Secretary? Observer? Hmm… let's just say an acquaintance did it. I told her what to put, though." Desmon scratched the back of his head with a hint of pride.
"I see… it really does look like something you'd choose…"
A strong slogan was what made a website appealing—or at least that was what Desmon had been told back when he lived in the least glamorous part of the city.
Of course, it wasn't just a website with an overly long, flashy title. As they scrolled further down, what followed caught the attention of the Service Club members.
"I don't even know what to say…"
"That's… weird…"
"Wait, is that tiger real?!"
Those were the three reactions as they gathered behind Yukinoshita to look.
What they saw were various photos uploaded to the website, each with brief descriptions. They were jobs or requests Desmon had handled—though a few random photos were mixed in as well.
In the pictures, Desmon could be seen with his clients or alongside completed jobs, ranging from keeping an elderly woman company so she wouldn't feel lonely, to rescuing a cat stuck in a tree.
The photos were complete nonsense, proving that Desmon accepted just about anything thrown his way. The strangest part was that he wasn't always paid in money.
Who needs cash when you can get homemade cookies from a sweet old lady?
"Exactly how long ago was this?"
The photos had no dates, so Yukinoshita assumed they were from the months before Desmon arrived in Japan.
"A couple of months ago."
There wasn't much difference in Desmon's appearance, aside from the various outfits he wore. Still, a keen observer would notice that the young demon hunter's gaze back then had been duller and colder, despite his childish and foolish behavior.
Curious, the three of them kept scrolling through the website. After all, the further down they went, the stranger the photos became.
One showed Desmon taking a selfie in what looked like a prison yard.
Another had him smiling while standing on the roof of a police car.
There was one where he sat in what seemed like a luxurious office, with several basketballs neatly lined up behind him.
Another showed him inside a police station, eating donuts.
But by far the strangest image was a photo of him wearing an elegant suit, acting as someone's lawyer and defending them in court—despite photography being strictly prohibited in such places.
"Desmon-kun… are you really related to Hiratsuka-sensei?"
No matter how much Yukinoshita thought about it, there was no possible connection between the person in those photos and her teacher.
"Distant relatives, what can I say? My life's pretty hectic, haha," he said with a slight blush, like an innocent maiden.
Yukinoshita narrowed her eyes for a second, then quickly returned her attention to the screen when photos of the tiger Yuigahama had mentioned earlier appeared. A cat was still a cat, even if it was much bigger—especially when that same tiger was shown playing with a giant ball of yarn.
The most reasonable conclusion was that the photo had been edited. After all, there was no way Desmon had a Bengal tiger as a pet… right?
The next few minutes passed like that, until they finally reached the bottom of the page.
"You've really traveled to a lot of places!"
Throughout the entire page, Yuigahama was fascinated by the photos showing Desmon traveling to various parts of the world—or at least, that was how it appeared. In reality, he had been sent to those places for work.
"They were just quick trips. I didn't even get to do any sightseeing," he said, waving his hands dismissively.
"Were you riding in a private jet?" Hikigaya pointed at a photo showing Desmon inside an exclusive-looking jet.
"Let's just say I know someone who knows someone," Desmon replied casually, not bothering to elaborate, since they probably wouldn't believe him anyway.
He wasn't exactly the most reliable person when it came to infiltration jobs—especially when he had to borrow something from the FBI.
"So, Desmon-kun, what exactly is the reason you're showing us this page?" Yukinoshita asked.
She had a rough idea of what Desmon was after, though she could be wrong. When it came to him, there was always the possibility that he would suddenly say he wanted to create a website dedicated to cat pictures. If Desmon asked for that, Yukinoshita wouldn't refuse.
"I wanted to know if you could make a copy of this page."
Currently, several organizations were in charge of managing that site, since Desmon himself had left it in their hands. And despite his incredible memory, he had somehow completely forgotten the username and password needed to access the job requests.
Obviously, he couldn't maintain a normal life by living off cookies or candy people sometimes gave him as payment. After all, when it came to work of any kind, pest extermination was the most commonly requested.
Need to get revenge on a massive criminal organization? Desmon was your guy.
Need to tank the stock of a huge corporation? No problem—Desmon would figure something out.
A job accepted was a job completed, with an astonishing 100% success rate.
No job was too small or too big. Of course, he took his time deciding whether to accept one. He might have been a fool, but he wasn't stupid enough to put an entire country's police force against him… or was he?
"That's right, you did mention a few times that you were looking for work. I see what you meant now…" Yukinoshita said.
She had always brushed off Desmon's words as meaningless rambling, never taking them seriously. But after realizing that he really did live off odd jobs, she had to admit that sometimes the nonsense he spouted wasn't nonsense at all.
"That's correct. I have to survive somehow."
He had never mentioned anything about his parents. Even Hiratsuka-sensei had dodged the question when Yukinoshita asked her. There was no way Desmon's parents would give him so much freedom, given how he was.
From what she could tell, the white-haired boy would probably answer any question asked of him, but she chose not to bring it up. Chances were, Desmon would just ask her the same thing in return.
That was something Yukinoshita couldn't have anticipated. After all, Desmon would probably say something like, "Damn, your mom and sister are hot."
It was a scenario she very much preferred not to imagine…
"I can make a similar page. It'll take me a few minutes," she said as she began moving her fingers across the keyboard.
She wasn't the number one student nor was she considered a genius for no reason.
While Yukinoshita focused on recreating the website, with Yuigahama advising her to add flashy colors and cat images in certain spots—something Yukinoshita actually agreed with—Desmon decided to take a nap, leaving the hard part to the professionals.
Hikigaya, for his part, went back to reading. The atmosphere in the Service Club was calm and relaxing for him. After all, during that incident on the Kyoto trip, it had been Desmon who discouraged Tobe from making his confession, so the club's status quo had remained unchanged.
And so, it was just another ordinary day in the Service Club.
…
"This is strange. It's been three days and I haven't gotten a single request."
Desmon stared at his laptop screen in boredom. His new website was finished and online, yet not a single person had visited it.
"That's normal. Honestly, it was strange your old site had so much reach when, no matter how you look at it, it screamed scam," Yukinoshita said.
She was right. No sane person would visit a site to hire someone when all they knew was that he could solve any problem. From any angle, it looked suspicious.
-Maybe I should've gone around putting up posters in different cities…
Desmon kept hitting the refresh button, hoping that by some miracle the request counter would go up. That was all he had been doing these past few days.
"So, did Desmon-san just get lucky?" Yuigahama asked.
She couldn't help but feel sorry seeing Desmon so dejected.
"Maybe. Or maybe it has something to do with the culture of the country he lived in," Yukinoshita replied.
She had studied abroad, so she understood well how different cultures could shape people's preferences and tastes—even if that meant ending up on some rather questionable websites…
Plausible theories, but the truth was that Desmon's previous site would have met the same fate as the current one if not for a third party who had taken it upon themselves to promote it and get people to visit and trust it.
"He mentioned he had help with his previous site, so that person must have handled the promotion through ads or advertisements on larger websites."
Hikigaya said this without taking his eyes off his novel. He might have seemed indifferent, but he was always listening to what was being said around him.
"I have to admit, sometimes you say things that actually make sense, Hikigaya-kun—though most of the time it's just incoherent nonsense."
"Tch."
It was obvious that receiving even a single compliment from Yukinoshita was already too much to hope for.
"So Desmon-san just needs to promote his website, right?" Yuigahama tilted her head like a curious little puppy.
"That's correct, Yuigahama-san. But even advertising on small websites costs money, and if we're talking about larger, more popular ones, the price would be enormous. And if you want continuous promotion, I highly doubt Desmon-kun could even dream of paying for that."
Those words were a death sentence for Desmon's site. Without advertising, no one would visit it; without visitors, he couldn't find work or earn money. In the end, he needed to invest money into promotion—but money was exactly what he lacked the most right now.
Letting out a long sigh, Desmon set the laptop aside and stared at the ceiling.
-I guess I don't have much choice… I'll have to visit that place. I wonder if they have a branch in Japan?
Resigning himself to the fact that the first thing he would have to do was work for them, Desmon decided to visit on Saturday. There was also the favor he owed for the gift he had received on Sunday—after all, no one is kind enough to give things away for free.
"I'll manage," he muttered to himself, regaining his usual attitude. "Yoshi, wanna watch some funny dog videos?"
"Sure!"
With the two of them returning to their daily routine, and Yukinoshita just about ready to unleash her sharp tongue on Hikigaya, the day went on without any further incidents in the Service Club.