How to Rent an Apartment After Defeating the Demon King

Aldric spent most of the morning at home. The apartment was tidy, his lunch was ready, and he had checked the following week’s schedule twice, which he considered sufficient to declare the morning properly underway.

He picked up his phone from the living room table.

Maxime had told him about a book on medieval European fortifications. Aldric had listened with polite interest until Maxime mentioned that it contained detailed plans of several French castles.

His interest had immediately become considerably less polite.

In his world, making complete plans of fortifications available to anyone for the price of a book would have constituted a serious security failure. In Paris, they sold them in bookstores.

He had looked for the book in two of them. The first had been out of stock. At the second, a saleswoman had explained that he could order it online and shown him how to find the store’s website on his phone.

A simple procedure, in theory.

Aldric opened his browser and typed “Furet du Nord.” A banner covered half the screen, asking whether he accepted cookies.

This problem, at least, he had encountered before.

The first time Aldric had come across cookies, he had spent several minutes trying to determine what an online store could possibly want with biscuits. Emma had explained that the word referred to small files stored on his phone.

He still didn’t understand why anyone had named them after biscuits.

Neither did Emma.

Since then, he had refused them.

The banner disappeared.

First defense breached.

Aldric entered the title of the book into the search bar. Several results appeared, with the book in second place. He opened its page.

A fortress dominated the cover, surrounded by soldiers.

The walls were depicted accurately enough. The towers had acceptable proportions, and the archers had been given adequate elevation.

The knights, however, were a problem. Nearly half of them stood within range of the defenders without mantlets, without raised shields, and without even making use of the terrain.

“Poor positioning…”

One of them was even attacking the main gate alone while his companions remained several yards behind him. Aldric hoped the book handled strategy better on the inside than its cover did on the outside, but that did not stop him from pressing Add to Cart.

A confirmation appeared.

Item added.

Finally, a step with clearly defined success conditions. He continued toward checkout, where the website suggested creating an account to make tracking his order easier.

Creating an account meant providing several pieces of personal information in exchange for easier access to the service. In his world, an agreement of that nature would have required a seal, two witnesses, and at least one person responsible for explaining the legal consequences. Here, all he had to do was press a blue button.

He accepted, and a new page appeared with several fields to fill in. His first name caused no difficulty, nor did his last name, and his address had become familiar enough that he could now enter it without checking his rental agreement. He then entered his phone number and email address.

So far, everything was proceeding correctly. No incomprehensible terminology, no missing administrative documents, and no one was asking him to come back with a piece of paperwork whose existence he had been unaware of five minutes earlier. After several months in France, a procedure this simple should have reassured him.

It had the opposite effect.

He had learned that when an administrative procedure went too smoothly, it usually meant he had not reached the difficult part yet.