The Demon Lord's armor clanked with hollow echoes as it towered over the forest clearing. Moonlight glinted off its jagged pauldrons, casting skeletal shadows across Lumina's determined face.
"Stay behind me!" she ordered, not noticing Satoru subtly adjusting her stance with a yawn.
"FOOLISH MORTALS," the armor boomed—its voice suspiciously similar to Satoru's deeper register when he ordered tavern drinks. "YOUR PUNY BLADES CANNOT—"
A bird pooped on the helmet.
The party froze. The armor's empty visor somehow conveyed utter exasperation.
Satoru "tripped" into Sybil, his elbow "accidentally" bumping her spellbook. Her half-formed ice spell mutated into a blizzard that flash-froze the Demon Lord's legs.
"Wow!" Satoru cheered, secretly rewriting physics so the ice wouldn't melt. "What amazing magic!"
Sybil stared at her trembling hands. "I... don't know this spell."
Inside the armor, a scrap of parchment fluttered:
*"Punch left knee for +100 EXP.
S."*
The cult's assassin moved like liquid shadow between the trees. His dagger thirsted for the "Shadow God's" blood.
He never saw the root that "coincidentally" tangled his foot.
Satoru caught the tumbling assassin with one hand. "Whoops! Clumsy me!"
Their faces were inches apart. The assassin's pupils shrank as he finally saw it—the universe swirling in Satoru's bored gaze.
"Tell your master," Satoru whispered, letting just a fraction of infinity bleed into his smile, "that real gods don't leave witnesses."
The assassin wet himself before vanishing into the night.
High Priest Roland's vision had been clear: The Saint wears rags, but his shadow wears a crown.
Now he gaped at the guild's most pathetic adventurer—currently getting chewed out for spilling soup.
"It's him," Roland breathed.
Satoru chose that moment to sneeze into his own hand, then wipe it on Garrik's cloak.
"...Are we sure?" a cleric whispered.
Deep underground, the true Demon King stirred in his millennia-long slumber.
Something was wrong.
His resurrection ritual had been hijacked. His minions were following fake orders.
And worst of all—someone had doodled bunny ears on his ceremonial armor in permanent marker.
A roar shook the abyss:
"WHO DARES MOCK THE DARK LORD MALGOROTH?!"