That was just one possibility, but now that I’d had one of my strengths pointed out to me, it was natural to try and make use of it.
I wasn’t under the impression that it would be a total walk in the park, of course. I hadn’t so much as touched on the world of comedy throughout all the three hundred years I’d spent killing slimes, and I knew virtually nothing about this world’s sense of humor. The only people who’d praised me for my comedic sensibilities were my family and maybe a random acquaintance or two (though I could practically hear Beelzebub grumbling, Who are you calling a random acquaintance?! the moment that thought crossed my mind). It wasn’t like I’d ever been praised by a professional comedian, so I had no idea how reliable their opinions were.
That said, my daughters had faith in me, and the rest of my family believed in me, as well. I had to live up to their expectations! If there’s one thing I had in spades, it was motivation, and I let that propel me onward as I watched one performance after another.
“You were certainly paying careful attention to the act, weren’t you, Lady Azusa…?” Laika observed after a performance as the two comedians I’d been watching departed from the stage. I could only travel so far on my own, practically speaking, so I’d had her carry me to my destination.
“Oh, yeah, I was,” I replied. “I’m trying to take this kinda seriously, I guess…”
“You sure didn’t look like you were here for a quick laugh. You were watching the act like a professional scouting out reference material. I could tell just from sitting next to you,” observed Flatorte, who was sitting on the opposite side of me from Laika. She and Laika would be participating in the competition, and I felt bad about taking up their practice time by having Laika fly me around, so I’d invited Flatorte to come along as well.
“Nah, I’m a far cry from the professional level…but I guess I can’t go using the fact that I’m an amateur as an excuse to do shoddy work, can I?” I mused.
In this competition, it wouldn’t make any difference who was an amateur and who was a pro. The only rule that mattered was that whoever had the funniest sketch would come out on top.
“You really have seemed more motivated to me recently, Lady Azusa,” said Laika.
“I can tell, too! You’re fired up for a real battle, Mistress!” Flatorte agreed.
I’m not so sure how I feel about them thinking that I’m super fired up for comedy, of all things, but I guess I’ll try and see it in a positive light…
It always seemed to be easier for people to put their all into their hobbies than their day jobs. In that sense, I figured it wasn’t too weird for me to get worked up over the script.
There was still some time left before the next act was scheduled to begin, in any case, and in the meantime, I had a question that I’d been meaning to ask the two dragons.
“So have you two decided what sort of act you’re putting on?” I asked.
“Naturally! The choice was so obvious, it wasn’t a choice at all!” Flatorte declared with an odd degree of confidence.
“Oh? Are you okay with talking about it?”
“I should keep it secret, but since you’re the one asking, Mistress, I’ll spill the beans. I’ll be playing the lute!”
Oh, right. Flatorte really was great at playing lutes (which were so close to being guitars in this world, they might as well have been the same thing).
“The plan’s for me to play the lute partway through the performance. I’m thinking of going with the title ‘Lute Stand-up #1.’”
A stand-up routine with a number in its name where the performer plays a stringed instrument while they talk? Isn’t that almost identical to an old form of Japanese comedy?!
“You should know, Lady Azusa, that the act Flatorte is describing is specifically our plan for the first round,” Laika said, closing her eyes as she explained herself. “A performance involving an instrument will likely make a strong impression but is unlikely to get much in the way of laughs. The goal is to display her skill with the lute, meaning we’ll be deviating from the contest’s intended subject. If we want our audience to laugh, then in the long term, we’ll have to divert our focus in that direction.”
“Now that’s the sort of analysis I’d expect from someone as levelheaded as you are!”
It did kind of feel like Flatorte’s act would be taking elements of a musical performance and mixing them with elements of a comedy show, rather than going pure comedy. I didn’t think that Laika would know the first thing about comedy, but she was still doing a pretty good job of thinking all this through. She’d always been a clever person, and breaking things down was one of her specialties.
“Laika’s talking a big game, but just so you know, it was I, the great Flatorte, who thought up all our material! She’s a real critic, but when it comes to actually making something herself, she’s hopeless,” Flatorte grumbled.
“And yet you won’t deny that you found my criticism worthwhile, will you? You certainly took it into consideration. I don’t appreciate the implication I haven’t pulled my weight,” Laika jabbed back.
Interesting… I guess Laika’s analysis isn’t enough on its own—you need the sort of drive and initiative that Flatorte has, too.
“Let me explain our material for the second round, Mistress! We have a really good trick planned for that one,” said Flatorte.
“A trick…?” I repeated apprehensively. She’d sounded so proud, it was actually making me a little nervous.
“In the second round, we’re gonna pull the audience into the act. Though really, since we’ll probably only have the judges watching us in those early stages, we’ll be getting them in on the action.”
“Yep, that’s another tricky stunt, all right!”
The concepts for the two acts she’d told me about could hardly have been more different from each other, but they were each remarkably off-the-wall in their own right. In a sense, it was just like Flatorte to come up with plans like those. If I wanted to put it nicely, I’d say it showed how flexible she was.
“That plan, of course, is another that won’t carry us any farther than the first round we use it in. Breaking down the established roles of viewer and performer is amusing, but only by virtue of novelty. Once you’ve done it once, it ceases to have the same effect,” Laika noted, jumping in to explain things in detail once again. “Moreover, when it comes to the simple task of earning prolonged laughter from the audience, it’s not particularly effective. As such, we will be using it exclusively as our tactic to clear the second round.”
“R-right… I’ll have to keep that in mind. Like, seriously, this stuff’s all good to know.”
It turns out that Laika and Flatorte have thought all this through way more deeply than I have!
“Laika’s always bringing up all this conceptual mumbo-jumbo,” Flatorte grumbled. “As if going on and on about all that theory junk could ever make anyone laugh! She’s such a bore.”
“You simply can’t expect to come out on top of this sort of competition by making up acts at random and performing them with no sense of purpose,” Laika countered. “The world of comedy is full of performers who’ve learned and improved through mutual competition. When stepping into such a world, it’s of grave importance to pay the respect that is due to those who came before you.”
I could see both of their points, but there was one thing that Flatorte was definitely wrong about: The little speeches that Laika went off on every once in a while weren’t boring at all. If anything, they were interesting enough to be a show in their own right…
A few people sitting behind us, by the way, had started muttering about how “a group of pros came to watch” and how “those dragons must be performers!”
No, really, we’re just amateurs! Honest!