My Wives are Beautiful Demons

Chapter 838: Visit to the Kingdom of Witches

Vergil entered the Kingdom of Witches through the most direct path possible, which, for him, meant crossing a dimensional fold, ignoring three layers of ancient barriers, passing over a labyrinth of defensive runes, and appearing right in the center of Salem as if he had used the front door. In his defense, it was not exactly an invasion if he could get in. At least, that was what he thought during the two seconds of silence that followed his arrival.Then every alarm in the dimension went off at the same time.

Salem’s sky turned red. Invisible bells began echoing over the crooked towers, ancient houses, and stone streets lit by magical lanterns. Runes lit up on the ground, containment circles appeared in the air, barriers rose over rooftops, and an absurd number of witches appeared around him in less time than any demonic army could organize a defensive line. Some floated on brooms, others hovered inside magical circles, others appeared in windows, balconies, posts, rooftops, and even on top of a cat statue that clearly did not appreciate being used as a military platform.

Vergil stood still in the middle of the main square, surrounded by staffs pointed at his head, open grimoires, rotating runes, spheres of fire, ice, poison, light, shadow, distortion, curses, seals, spiritual needles, cursed dolls, and at least one flying kettle that looked much more dangerous than it should have. He looked around with the usual expression of someone who had realized the situation had become inconvenient, but still not enough to be called a problem.

An older witch, wearing a purple hat and round glasses, shouted from the top of a balcony: "Identify yourself or be reduced to a conceptual puddle!"

Vergil slowly raised one hand. "Sorry. I came only—"

He did not finish.

Something hit him from the side.

Not like an attack. Like a hug.

A woman threw herself at him with enough force to make him take half a step back, wrapping her arms around his shoulders as if they were childhood friends reunited after a short trip. Vergil looked down and found white hair, a far too cheerful smile, and a snake comfortably coiled around her neck, staring at him with the same calm of someone who had already decided that the Demon King was safe furniture.

"What’s up, Demon King!" Pandora said, completely happy.

The silence in the square became even worse.

Several witches hesitated.

One of them whispered, "Pandora knows the invader?"

Another answered, "Pandora knows everyone dangerous. That does not help."

Vergil lowered his gaze to Pandora. "You are hugging me."

"I am."

"During a dimensional alarm."

"I am also doing that."

"Do you think that is prudent?"

Pandora thought for half a second. "Not very, but I already started."

The snake around her neck raised its head and lightly touched Vergil’s shoulder with its forked tongue, as if it also wanted to greet him. Vergil looked at the animal, then at Pandora, and decided that the day had already started too wrongly to demand logic.

Before any witch decided to fire something out of nervousness, a portal opened in the middle of the square. Alice came out first, followed by Seris and Morgana. The three evaluated the scene in silence. Vergil was surrounded by armed witches, Pandora stuck to him as if he were a luxury pillow, the snake analyzing his collar, and half of Salem ready to turn the square into overlapping craters.

Morgana sighed. "Always causing trouble, huh..."

"I merely entered," Vergil said.

"That is the problem," Morgana answered. "You ’merely enter’ places that have twelve security protocols and then act as if the alarm were a lack of hospitality."

Alice, for her part, was not looking at the alarms, nor the witches, nor the diplomatic situation. She was looking at Pandora hugging Vergil. Her face was far too calm, and precisely because of that, the expression was concerning. Her eyes lowered to Pandora’s arms around him, then rose to the woman’s smile, and a cold aura began to form around her fingers.

"No one touches Vergil," Alice murmured.

Pandora looked at her without letting go of Vergil. "Ah, hi, Alice."

Alice smiled.

It was not a good smile.

Vergil finally held Pandora by the shoulders and moved her away a little, more to prevent an internal war than out of real discomfort. "Let go before I have to stop a murder."

Pandora obeyed with a small pout, clearly thinking it was unfair. "You are all very possessive."

Alice answered immediately, "Yes."

Morgana looked at Seris. "Are you going to solve this, or do you want to wait until the square explodes?"

Seris already had one hand on her face, sighing like a queen who had just realized her spiritual daughters were about to launch military-grade magic at her future husband because he did not know how to use a dimensional doorbell. She raised her other hand, and her voice expanded across all of Salem, crossing streets, towers, rooftops, basements, libraries, laboratories, and every witch holding a wand with homicidal intent.

"Girls, false alarm!"

All the witches froze.

Seris continued, with the naturalness of someone announcing dinner was ready. "He is my future husband, everything is fine!"

The silence that followed was so absolute that even the magical circles seemed to stop spinning out of embarrassment.

The witches of Salem went pale.

Some lowered their staffs by reflex. Others looked at one another with expressions of pure social collapse. A young witch dropped her grimoire on the ground. Another pointed at Vergil, then at Seris, then at Vergil again, as if trying to find where, exactly, mathematics had been murdered.

"Future husband?" one of them whispered.

"Of the Queen?"

"With the Demon King?"

"Since when is our mother getting married?"

"Wait, is he going to be our father?"

"I do not want to call that man father. He looks like he judges souls with his eyes."

"He probably does."

Vergil looked at Seris.

Seris looked back at him and smiled, completely satisfied with the chaos she had created. "Did you like it?"

Vergil arched his eyebrows. "Are you offering yourself like that?"

"I like being efficient."

"You just traumatized an entire dimension."

"Salem needed excitement."

Morgana murmured, "Salem needed protocol training, not a family crisis."

Alice was still looking at Pandora. "And some people need a sense of personal space."

Pandora raised both hands in surrender. "I hugged him as a friend."

"That sentence does not reassure me," Alice answered.

Seris snapped her fingers, and little by little, the alarms began to shut off. The sky returned to its normal shade, the defensive runes vanished from the ground, the magical circles dissolved, and the witches began to disperse, though many still looked at Vergil as if he were living news. Some whispered so loudly they were not even trying to hide it.

"He is more handsome up close."

"Queen Seris has dangerous taste."

"If he becomes our king consort, do we have to bow?"

"I do not know, but I do not want to test it."

"I wonder if he knows how to make tea."

Vergil heard everything.

Unfortunately.

Seris heard it too, and she seemed to enjoy it far more than she should have. She walked up to him with her hands behind her back and that expression of a witch satisfied with having turned a security incident into national gossip. "It has been half a year since you came here personally," she said. "Did something new happen?"

Vergil looked around. Some witches were still pretending to fix things just to keep watching. Pandora had approached Morgana to tell her something that probably had nothing to do with the crisis. Alice remained far too close to him, as if marking territory through physical presence. Seris smiled as if all of that were perfectly normal.

"Yes," he answered. "Let us go inside. I need to borrow your knowledge."

Seris tilted her head slightly, her smile diminishing a little when she realized his tone had become serious. "That sounds important."

"It is."

"War-level important?"

"Worse."

Morgana closed her eyes for an instant. "I knew it. Whenever he appears without warning, it is worse."

Seris turned toward Salem’s main street and gestured for them to follow. "Then come. If it is something that requires my knowledge, it probably also requires tea, a locked room, and at least three gossiping witches prevented from listening behind the door."

Vergil began walking beside her. "Can you prevent them?"

Seris smiled. "No, but I can pretend."

Alice followed right behind, still occasionally throwing looks at Pandora. Morgana walked with the tired expression of someone who already knew that conversation would end in work. Pandora, for her part, walked cheerfully as if she had been invited on a stroll, with the snake coiled around her neck observing everything with curious eyes.

As they crossed the square, one last witch, very young, raised her hand and asked with the courage of someone who had not yet learned how to survive Salem’s internal politics: "Queen Seris, so does the wedding already have a date?"

Seris stopped.

Vergil stopped too.

Alice went rigid.

Morgana murmured, "Do not ask that."

Seris looked at Vergil with a slow smile.

Vergil pointed to the hall door ahead. "Meeting. Now."

Seris laughed, satisfied, and continued walking.

Behind them, all of Salem returned to whispering.