Chapter 9 - Meeting New Scaly Friends

Alex and Mira dashed through the corridors of the Demon Queen's castle, ascending stairs after stairs to reach the next floor. The castle was eerily quiet, with most of its inhabitants preoccupied with the anticipation of the heroes' invasion. Some had already evacuated to the bunker beneath the castle. The upper levels were devoid of activity, save for a few demon guards patrolling the area.

"Hold on, is that Mira?! Mira! Where are you going?! Is that a human?!" shouted one of the demon guards as Mira and Alex passed through them.

"Sorry! I'll explain later! For now, please move aside!" Mira shouted back over her shoulder to the confused demon guards. She then turned to Alex, still running alongside her. "Sir Alex! I'm sorry to ask this again, but are you sure you want to go to the battlefield?"

"Yes...! I have a plan to help the Demon Queen...! But I need to be there for that plan to work!" Alex replied, though he was struggling to catch his breath from the exertion of running. It had been quite a while since he had engaged in any sort of exercise, so sprinting and climbing stairs were proving to be challenging. He briefly considered asking Mira to drag him like a kite again, but quickly dismissed the thought, remembering the near-death experience he had endured just before.

Seeing Alex's determined expression (while ignoring or even being oblivious to his heavy panting as he tried to match her pace), Mira smiled at him. "I understand, Sir Alex! Then follow me!" she directed, leading him up from floor to floor.

"Where exactly are we going, Mira...?! Shouldn't we leave the castle?!" Alex inquired, still struggling to keep up with Mira's pace. He had thought that Mira was leading him out from the castle, but she had been leading him higher and higher inside the castle instead.

"The distance between the Demon Queen's Castle and Penelope City would take us roughly 2 to 3 hours on foot! If we want to get there fast, there's only one option that could theoretically get us there the fastest!" Mira explained hurriedly, explaining her reasoning.

"Seriously?! Then what is it?"

"You'll see, Sir Alex. Just trust me on this!" She smiled at him, indicating that he should trust her.

Alex did selfishly ask for her help, but he felt a bit doubtful as Mira continued to lead him inside the castle. And yet... considering all the help she had done for him during this whole 'summoned hero / Idol Producer' ordeal, he knew he had to trust her once more.

They continued their ascent to the higher floor of the Demon Queen's Castle. Eventually, they reached what seemed to be the highest floor of the castle. They stopped at a large iron double door, with Alex panted heavily from all the running, while Mira showed no signs of fatigue whatsoever. Without hesitation, Mira burst through the iron doors easily, revealing the chilly, almost sunrise sky of this fantasy world.

Alex followed trough Mira's charge to the large door to the outside, albeit just slowly walking through it... and saw a sight that was beyond his expectation.

He finally had a good look at the outside of the world he had just been summoned into. At first, he had thought that he was going to encounter some barren waste land with no life in sight, or a territory filled with creepy and horrifying sights befitting a demon's domain. Instead, he was greeted by a landscape of lush green forests stretching as far as the eye could see. The Demon Queen's Castle itself was surprisingly... clean and architecturally quite beautiful.

He also heard commotions coming from the ground floor, likely related to the ongoing invasion by the heroes. Additionally, he observed a stream of demons entering the Demon Queen's castle, presumably demon civilians seeking shelter inside.

He was awestruck by the views, comparing the fresh air to memories of the pollution-heavy concrete jungle of his original world. 'So... I'm really in another world, huh...?' he thought to himself, now even more convinced that this was indeed not his world, and he had truly been summoned here, by the demons no less.

"-Alex...? Sir Alex? Sir Alex! Please pay attention!" Mira called out Alex whom was still awestruck from the view of their world.

"Huh...? Oh yeah! Sorry-!" Alex was jolted from his state of awe and turned toward Mira's voice. However, he found himself face-to-face with the intense gaze of a dragon. Alex stared back at the creature for few seconds. Then... he screamed, "AHHHHH!!!" His panic yell startled the dragon, causing it to let out a loud roar in response. Alex fell back onto his rear end, completely taken aback by the sudden encounter with a dragon.

"Sir Alex?! Please don't scare the wyvern! They are quite sensitive creatures, you know!" Mira scolded Alex, seemingly unaware of his fear of encountering a dragon up close.

Alex finally caught sight of the creature that had startled him. It resembled like a dragon alright, with its scaled body, but its large arms were equipped with wing-like webbing and it was about the size of a horse. It was not quite a 'dragon', but rather a 'wyvern', a somewhat closely related creature or its cousin. Maybe even the lesser version of Dragon.

"Well, well, well. Who's this human here, Mira? Did you just catch him?" came a rough yet feminine voice, distinct from Mira's. Alex turned to see Mira standing alongside a few more wyverns, paying them no mind, and another individual, a beautiful woman with reptilian-like features, watching him with amusement.

A strikingly beautiful woman with a stylish side bob of blonde hair framing her face, her light brown skin glowing in the soft morning light on top of the Demon Queen's castle. Clad in light brown leather armor and black pants, her stature exuded confidence. Her allure was enhanced by the mischievous glint in her eyes and the playful curve of her lips.

What truly distinguished her was the reptilian-like feature: a large tail that swayed behind her. As she moved, the tail seemed to possess a life of its own, adding an unexpected allure to her already captivating presence. Upon closer inspection, one could discern the faint pattern of scales adorning her exposed skin, subtly hinting at her demonic (or maybe reptilian) nature, much like Mira and the others.

Alex was somewhat taken aback by the rugged yet beautiful appearance of the new demon he had just encountered. It seemed that nearly every demon he met was strikingly beautiful. 'Is their standard of beauty pretty high here...?' he wondered to himself.

"Ah, yes! I almost forgot to introduce you! Casey, this is Sir Alex, the summoned hero!" Mira presented the still-recovering Alex to the reptilian woman. Alex's expression was blank at first, but he quickly snapped out of his daze.

"Oh, uh, yeah. Name's Alex Lee. Pleased to meet you...?" he said, trailing off with a hint of awkward uncertainty. Should he have introduced himself as the "hero," or perhaps as an 'Idol Producer' instead?

"Kahaha~! So, you're the rumored summoned hero, huh?" she laughed, finding the situation amusing. "You were earlier the talk of the town. I was expecting a more rugged-looking guy, but you seem interesting nonetheless. Kahaha~!" She laughed again at seeing Alex's oddly neat appearance. The Salary Man's appearance, that is.

She also found his intense gaze somewhat... "interesting". But she kept that to herself for now.

"Nice to meet you, Alex. As you might have heard from Mira, I'm Casey." She approached Alex and extended her hand, offering to help him stand. Alex accepted her hand, which felt strangely scaly yet smooth, and rose to his feet with her assistance.

"Thanks, I guess...?" Alex expressed gratitude to Casey for the hand, though as he stood up, he was suddenly approached by the earlier wyvern creature once more, its face staring intently at his own. He was startled again, but Alex wasn't as surprised as before, merely backing off a bit from this particular wyvern's curiosity about him. He didn't sense any hostile aura from it, but he remained wary of such odd creatures.

"Easy there, girl," Casey quickly intervened, calming the now-known female wyvern. Alex was relieved that Casey was there to calm down the wyvern. Though, with that being said, when Casey attended to the wyvern, it looked... pretty cute to him. Like petting a dog... a large scaly "dog", to be precise. But he quickly dismissed the idea of trying to pet the big scaly "dog" as there was something more important at hand.

Alex turned his attention back to Mira, who was also casually petting one of the wyverns. "Eh... Mira...? What's going on here...?" Alex asked Mira for an explanation, noticing that she was unfazed by the presence of the wyverns surrounding them.

"Why, Sir Alex, we are going to ask the wyverns to help us fly to Penelope City!" She explained excitingly.

"... Eh...?"