Chapter 3
Closure for These Feelings!
1
Eating utensils clattered.
As inept as she was the rest of the time, when we were having a meal, Darkness could act downright refined and eat without making a sound. She must have been feeling awfully nervous today or something, because uncharacteristically, the clattering was coming from her knife and fork.
We were all seated around the table.
“Kazuma, pass the soy sauce, please!”
“Yeah, sure…” It was right next to me, so I grabbed it with my free left hand and was just about to pass it to Aqua when…
“Oh…!” (That was Darkness exclaiming.)
…I remembered that my left hand was still attached to Darkness’s right hand. I had accidentally dragged her to one side when I tried to give Aqua the soy sauce.
“S-sorry about that…,” I said.
“N-no, it’s all right…,” Darkness answered meekly.
“Thank you!” Aqua chirped, apparently ignoring both of us. She was in such good spirits that you would never imagine that until a few minutes ago, she had been weeping about almost being boiled alive by some tax collectors. She seemed to have forgotten all about it as she scarfed down her dinner. She was so carefree that I started to feel a little jealous. If I’d been chained to her instead…
“…I-I’m all done…,” Darkness mumbled, blushing faintly and with more than half her meal still on her plate.
“Why are you both so nervous?” Megumin interjected. “Sleeping with each other after such a long acquaintance surely isn’t so intimidating. If you are that worried about being alone together, Aqua or I could join you, and we could have a little sleepover.”
““Y-yes, please…!”” Darkness and I answered in unison, to my surprise.
Darkness’s eyebrows twitched. “…Hey, it’s one thing for a woman like me to ask Megumin to sleep with us. But you’re a guy. Where do you get off saying she should join us? As a woman—even if not much of one—I’m a little uncomfortable with that.”
Ugh, what a headache.
“Listen, you know perfectly well this isn’t going to go anywhere sexy,” I said. “If I’m going to risk inviting all sorts of zany misunderstandings anyway, I might as well have Megumin sleep with us. You’re the resident muscle-brained character anyway. Who knows, maybe you’ll give me a big hug in your sleep and break me in half without even waking up.”
“D-don’t be dumb! In what universe does anyone crush someone in their sleep?!”
It would be better to have Megumin or Aqua there with us than to be up half the night worrying about my demise at the unconscious hands of Darkness. Anyway, we’d all camped out together, slept in the stables, and so on. Frankly, sleeping in the same room should have been no big deal at this point.
“Hoo-hoo. You know, I think this might be the first time we’ve all slept in the same room together since we moved in here!” Aqua said. “So as a special treat, before we go to bed, I’ll tell you one of my scariest scary stories!”
“N-no, you need not do any such thing, Aqua…,” Megumin said.
“Y-yeah, she’s right,” I agreed. “I don’t think we need any spooky stories, what with this being a former haunted house and everything.” I was remembering some business about a haunting back when we had first gotten this place.
But as for Darkness…
“Gosh, who ever heard of an adventurer who was scared of a little story? No wonder so many people have been complaining to our family recently about cowardly adventurers. Show a little backbone.” She sounded really annoyed.
…Geez…
“…Huh, I guess I do remember you saying something like that a while back. Wait, why have people been complaining to your family…? Oh yeah, you’re the acting governor right now, aren’t you?”
“You know as well as I do that once the adventurers around here get a little money, they completely stop taking any hunting quests,” Darkness said. “We finally managed to clean up all the leftover quests, but it’s not that easy to fix a lazy streak. There are even monsters starting to stake out territory right near town. At least that might help light a fire under people…”
“Hang on a minute. Are you saying Axel’s adventurers have all become NEETs? Wait a sec… That whole urgent summons today… The thing about paying all those taxes you’d looked the other way on…”
“You’re finally catching on,” Darkness said with a smirk. “Those adventurers might have kept the town safe in the past, but if all they’re going to do now is sit around, then there’s no need to give them any breaks when it comes to taxes, is there? Yes, part of the tax-collection scheme today was a ploy to get the adventurers up off their behinds. The Guild personnel were more than happy to go along with it. They’ll get more tax money, and adventurers who suddenly find their purses empty will come in to work. They’ll probably even take care of those monsters, the ones that are getting too close to town. But don’t you worry—all that tax money will go right back into benefiting the adventurers…”
“Damn youuuuu!” I jumped to my feet and gave a violent jerk on the handcuffs. Darkness, naturally, was dragged upward. “So what the hell?! You’re telling me I got chased to hell and back just because you wanted to get some rich loafers to do their jobs?!”
While it was true that the police had let me go without pressing charges due to it being my first offense, it turned out that the cause of my newly minted criminal history had been right beside me all along!
“What do you mean, ‘just because’?! Taxes and labor are a citizen’s duty! What’s wrong with telling someone who refuses to work that they need to at least pay their taxes? Our country doesn’t need NEETs! They’re nothing but trouble! They’re worth less than garbage!”
“So one of my party members completely rejects everything I ever was until I came here?!”
Darkness and I were about to come to blows when Megumin said tiredly, “…I don’t think any of us is worried about you two getting into a lewd situation at this point. Just go to bed for tonight. And try not to kill each other…”
2
With dinner out of the way, the next order of business was obviously…
That’s right, for a Japanese person like me, it had to be a bath.
“Oh, screw you! I’ll have you know that Japanese people have to take a bath every day or they die! I’m nothing like you nobles, who hate bathing and try to cover the stink with some perfume! So stay out of my way!”
“Screw me?! Screw you! We nobles know perfectly well that we have to bathe every day! Where are all these nobles who you claim hate baths? I simply thought that with things being the way they are, it would be best to skip the tub and just rinse ourselves off with some warm water, that’s all…!”
That was the gist of our argument.
“After all that running today—all that sweating—I damn well better get a bath! I might not even last the night otherwise. I’m not asking you to get in with me or whatever. You can sit there and wipe yourself off with a towel if you want while I have a nice, relaxing soak.”
“But look, taking a bath means getting naked…! You want me half-naked, cleaning myself off, while you sit in the tub completely nude…?!”
While Darkness and I yammered at each other:
“My turn. I use my magic card of Swamp Magic. Aqua, your monsters can’t move for this turn.”
“…Urgh. I still can’t do anything, then. I pass.”
At the table, Aqua and Megumin were absorbed in some kind of card game. I guess they weren’t even going to bother trying to stop us from fighting anymore.
“Personally, I don’t care if you see me naked once or twice in my life, so it’s fine by me. Some might even call it a privilege, so maybe you should enjoy it,” I said.
“And you’re saying I do care? Nobody’s worried about your modesty. I’m afraid for myself, having to look at your naked body!”
“My turn. I use my magic card of Explosion Magic. The opponent dies.”
“Waaaaahhhh! Megumin, I don’t like the way you’ve been using those magic cards! I’ve lost three times in a row without ever being able to do anything!”
I ignored Aqua and Megumin, leaving them to their weird little game, and instead dragged Darkness—still muttering about this and that—toward the changing room.
I’d heated the water while Aqua and Megumin had been making dinner. I hurried to take off my…
“…Huh, how’s this work? With these cuffs on, I can’t take off my shirt… Maybe I’ll just have to cut myself out. This thing was getting old anyway.” I grabbed my dagger and sliced up the shirt I was wearing…
“I’m not sure how I feel about your complete willingness to get naked with me right next to you.”
I guess Darkness had some kind of objection, but I ignored her as I reduced myself to wearing nothing but one handcuff and a towel. Darkness, for her part, was holding her towel; she’d taken off only her shoes. I guess she planned to wipe down her body while I sat in the tub.
She followed, embarrassed, as I gleefully headed for the bath.
We sat back-to-back to rinse ourselves off before we (or I) got in the tub. Darkness still wouldn’t take off her shirt or skirt; instead, she soaked the towel with warm water, then squeezed it uncomfortably under her shirt.
It didn’t take me long to rinse off, and I headed straight for the tub. That meant, of course, that Darkness had no choice but to sit right near the edge.
“Whew… A good bath can take the edge off on even the toughest day. What a blessing…”
“…The way you don’t hesitate to strip down right beside a noblewoman of a certain age… No, forget it, I’m not going to say anything else about whatever you decide to do.” Darkness dipped her right hand, the one with the cuff around it, in the water, then sat down smack on the wet floor, sliding up against the edge of the tub. There was some quiet splashing from her hand in the tub. “…Hey,” she said with a sigh, “do you think the other adventurers resent me now?”
That came outa nowhere.
“…? No idea. You think they even know it was your idea? Heck, they never had to pay taxes until today, right? So maybe they don’t care that much. Then again, I guess I can be blasé about it, since I managed to escape without paying anything.”
There was another sigh from Darkness, this one more resigned. “…I didn’t want to do it, either, you know. Our nation’s finances are in terrible shape. We’re in such a rough spot that we even had to beg for financial aid from Elroad. Those taxes really will be returned to the adventurers several times over eventually… Honestly, if they’d done their jobs like they were supposed to, I wouldn’t have had to resort to such tactics…”
Gee, that sucked. “You say labor is a citizen’s duty, but if a guy was so loaded that he’d never have to work another day in his life, why would he? Especially when the job is something as dangerous as adventuring. My country griped about labor and taxes, too, but there were lots of people like me: people who belonged to the Advanced Class known as NEET. We should have the right to quit working if we choose to.”
“I’m impressed your country still exists, if that’s their attitude. That stuff… What did you call it? Manga? You said you have some form of amusement by that name in your land, yes? You said something about how if you could draw decent pictures, you would be able to accrue a mountain of wealth creating manga and then live a good life… So suppose we have one of those manga artists. And suppose she makes a ton of money. She decides to live a life of luxury with the cash. Then she announces that she’s not going to finish what she started. She’s not going to draw any more manga. Who needs an ending anyway, right? …Wouldn’t that be a problem?”
…Erm, well… Yeah.
…A big problem.
There were a bunch of series I wanted to see more of (not going to name any names).
“Work entails responsibility,” Darkness went on. “This is a town for beginners. It has all kinds of support systems in place to help new adventurers get on their feet and learn the ropes. The expectation is that those adventurers will then be able to protect the people and the nation if it comes down to it. The more experienced and veteran adventurers recognize their role and obligation as adventurers even if they make a bunch of money, but for some reason, the newbies in this town… I don’t know why, but they’ve started to get some strange ideas lately.”
…?
“Strange ideas?” I asked casually, stretching out in the tub.
“Yeah… There’s this dumb motto that’s been spreading through the ranks of the adventurers lately. It claims that ‘the hardest worker is the biggest loser’ or something.”
“……”
I had a vague idea of who had started that motto.
“…Hey, why so quiet all of a sudden? Looks like you have some idea how it started. Hmm? Are you still upset? Hey, if you have something to say, then just say it.”
“It… It’s nothing, trust me…”
Nothing except what I’d been saying to the other adventurers for ages now.
3
When we emerged from the bath, we discovered a weepy Aqua clinging to Megumin.
“One more round! Please, just one final round to settle things!”
“I’m afraid not. The result is always the same. You simply can’t beat me, Aqua. As we agreed, you must do any one thing I say, understand?”
Megumin was virtually undefeated when it came to brainy stuff like board games and card games. It was probably due to that famous Crimson Magic Clan intelligence, but I wished she would use it for something constructive.
“Okay,” I said. “I know it’s early, but I think we should hit the sack. Early to bed, early to rise. Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and able to find that stupid key. I’m hoping we can get our hands on it before I have to use the bathroom in the morning.”
“Y-yeah, you’re right,” Darkness said, still clearly embarrassed. We’d each done our business earlier, and while Darkness was doing hers, she’d insisted I sing in an unusually loud voice in order to cover the sound. I seemed to remember having to do the same thing for Megumin back when this house had still been haunted.
I objected that if she was so desperate, Darkness should be the one to sing, but no, I ended up giving an a cappella concert. Feeling aggravated, I randomly stopped singing once or twice just to make life hard on her, and as payback, while I was taking my turn, she grabbed my shoulders from behind and shook me. That naturally led to another shoving match, but I’d had my fill of this idiotic situation. It was time to get some sleep and hopefully find that key before I had to use the bathroom again tomorrow.
“All right, we’re off to bed. Megumin, Aqua, you’re really not joining us?”
“The two of you can sleep together tonight. Based on what we’ve seen so far, I highly doubt there will be any ‘mistakes.’ In fact, I wish you would get along well enough that one could worry a little more about such lapses. You both need to be a bit more adult.” Megumin was clearly fed up with our constant fighting. Though because my mind was always in the gutter, I couldn’t help but hear the word adult and imagine something totally different.
Megumin seemed awfully indifferent about this for someone who was supposedly more than friends and less than lovers with me.
…A glance at Darkness made me think I wasn’t the only one with my brain in a dirty place. Her intense blush suggested she was imagining something disgusting, so I gave a yank of the handcuffs to snap her out of it and headed for my room.
For the record, the handcuffs made it impossible for me to put on a shirt. So I was still naked from the waist up. But it was nice and warm in my room, and with the covers pulled up to my chin, I wasn’t worried about catching a cold.
We would be sleeping in my bed, in my room. The cuffs were attached to my left wrist and Darkness’s right, so I would sleep on the right side of the bed.
I dove under the covers as soon as I could. “…Now, just because we’re in bed together and my sexy, sexy bod is within arm’s reach, don’t think that means you can get up to anything while I’m sleeping.”
“As if! Sexual harassment is your game; I think I’m the one who should be worried here.”
So she wanted to be difficult? Fine. I pointedly rolled over, turning my back to her. “Good night!”
“H-hey! What, you’re really going to sleep? And nothing else…?”
In response, I pulled the covers over my head.
4
I didn’t know how long I had been asleep when I discovered I had rolled over so I was facing Darkness. When I opened my eyes, there she was, inches away from me, her own eyes closed. I was practically cheek to cheek with her. I mean, she was very, very close.
Hang on…
“Just what are you trying to do?” I asked calmly.
“?!” That made her jump; then she lay perfectly still, eyes closed. “………Zzzz…zzzz…”
“Hey, don’t pretend to be asleep; I know you were just—”
That was when I felt something strange on the back of my neck. I touched it with my free hand, and…
It was oddly damp.
This could mean only one thing…!
“You…! You kissed me, didn’t you?! You kissed my neck while I was sleeping, and then you got your hands all over me, didn’t you?!”
“I d-d-d-d-did not! I didn’t get that far! No, wait, that’s not what I meant! I swear this isn’t what it looks like!” And then Darkness was blushing again, tears brimming in her eyes as she shot upright.
“What isn’t what it looks like?” I said, still touching the damp spot on my neck. “My neck is wet, here! I know you can’t hold back your own lust, but to go after me while I’m sleeping! To violate my pure, virginal body…!”
Darkness raised her pointer finger in front of her mouth desperately. “N-not so loud! It’s not—! I swear, I didn’t do anything! It’s just, when I woke up, I realized I had shoved my face into your neck! I’d just drooled on it a bit…! I knew I should wipe it off, but when I saw the way you looked so defenseless, sleeping there handcuffed to me, I felt like I’d done the worst thing in the world… I felt so guilty…! And it only got worse and worse…!”
So she had been playing with me. I sat up, feeling around my body. “…Huh. My belt is still buckled and everything… I guess you really didn’t do anything to me…”
“Wh-why do you sound slightly disappointed…?” I didn’t know what had been getting “worse and worse” for Darkness, but she was blushing faintly and her breath was ragged.
“I always knew you were a horndog with a hot bod, but I never imagined you would actually attack me in my sleep. I’ll bet when you snuck me those drugs, you meant to go all the way back then. One of these days, I’m going to have to start calling you Perviness.”
“P-please don’t…! Ngh… Hrgh! H-having you shouting at me and calling me a perv when we’re like this…it’s making my heart race… Maybe I really am a lost cause…”
“Oh, believe me, I knew you were a lost cause from the day I met you.” I straightened the covers and tried to go back to sleep.
Darkness, still embarrassed, lay down next to me. “…You know, now that you mention it, when we first met, I never imagined we would be close enough to snipe at each other like this. I felt like I could hardly talk back then. Like I wasn’t so good at getting my feelings across… Like there was more distance between us…”
The room was dark and quiet. I listened to Darkness talk. Finally, I said, “Hmm, being a noblewoman, you really shouldn’t be able to get all buddy-buddy with a guy you just met… I do remember you being more reserved back then. You never lectured me, and you sure never argued with me. Back then, I thought you were sexy and a little weird but also a bit mature…” I lay on my back as I talked, and Darkness gave a quiet chuckle.
“Back then, I thought you could stand to be a little more honest, but I took you to be a hard worker, someone loyal and true and kind. Someone who wouldn’t dirty his hands with evil deeds.”
Suddenly, she rolled over so she was facing me.
“And now you think I’m a disloyal backstabber, unkind and eager to stain my hands with evil? Gee, thanks.”
“That’s not what I said, was it?” Darkness chuckled again. “Hey, Kazuma…” She sounded like she was about to ask me about the weather or something.
“Hmm?” I casually turned my head so I was looking at her.
“…Do you like Megumin?”
5
It was cloudy outside. There was a full moon tonight, but only the faintest light seeped in through the window now. Just enough to give me the barest idea of Darkness’s expression.
But then…
“S-sorry, I guess that was a weird question.” She was getting embarrassed again; I could see her smooth, pale skin flushing red.
The question had come up so suddenly that I didn’t quite know how to respond… “Uh, I mean, I sure don’t hate her. So yeah, I guess you could say I like her. ’Course, I like Aqua, too. And, uh, you, naturally.”
Darkness went quiet at that. “…I know what you’re trying to say. You don’t mean as a woman. You mean as an adventuring companion, right?” Lying there in the darkness, she sounded almost…lonely.
…Huh? What was going on here? This was one hell of a mood. Oh shit, it was that mood.
Even I, a virgin who had never so much as been on a proper date with a girl, could feel it. I got the distinct sense I shouldn’t let this conversation continue. That it would definitely, for sure go somewhere bad.
How did this keep happening? How did I, a virgin who had never even seen a boob, keep ending up in these situations? Like the one with Megumin the other day. How did I, a person who had never even been kissed, keep ending up with all these adult problems?
As I groped for a response, Darkness gave a gentle tug on the handcuffs. Just the slightest pull. That, of course, dragged my cuffed left hand closer to her.
“Tell me… What about Megumin? Do you…like her as a woman?” She took my left hand in both of hers. Her hands were warm.
Nearly petrified with fear, I thought about what I should say. My current status with Megumin was more than friends and less than lovers. We’d agreed not to tell Aqua or Darkness, but maybe Darkness had figured it out anyway.
Megumin and I, we…
“I… I don’t know. To be perfectly honest, I don’t know, myself. But I don’t hate her. I guess I probably do like her as a woman. For some reason, I feel calm when I’m with her. It feels weirdly…natural.”
I just said what came to mind. I was confident that it was how I honestly felt in that moment. I didn’t normally think too hard about it, but with all the times I had teased her—all the things we had been through together—I felt Megumin’s presence growing bigger and bigger in my heart. And lying there across from Darkness in the dim moonlight, I simply told her how I felt.
I wonder why. I didn’t try to throw her off the trail or hide my thoughts or anything, and I couldn’t put a finger on the reason. I just told her, plain and simple.
“I see…,” she whispered, and then she pressed my hand gently back into my chest. As abruptly as she had turned to face me, she turned away again.
………
After that, Darkness was quiet, with no indication that she might say anything else. But when I was about to break the silence…
“I like things the way they are,” Darkness whispered.
“The way they are”? What was that supposed to mean? Before I could ask, Darkness went on, with her back still to me: “…I like things the way they are. Aqua does something dumb and then cries about it, and you act all huffy, but you clean up after her all the same. Megumin unleashes her magic and destroys something, and you go to apologize with her. Or I say something stupid, and you get angry…” I could hardly tell what she was talking about. “Or you’ll go to the lake for a picnic together, like I guess you guys did today with Megumin. You and I will argue about the silliest things. Aqua will suddenly beg to go on a trip somewhere, and you’ll roll your eyes but still make plans…” Her voice had started to shake. “And then you say it would be nice to get a little vacation, but then wherever we go, somehow, we still end up in trouble…”
I reached out and touched Darkness’s shoulder. “H-hey. I don’t know what’s wrong, but get ahold of yourself.” I gave her shoulder a tug, trying to make her face me.
“But I know… I know if you commit to one person, everything will change. We won’t be able to stay the way we are… Are you sure we can’t stay this way? Just like this, forever…? With us thinking up every money-making scheme in the book to pay off our debts… Unexpectedly encountering absurdly strong enemies but still getting away with our lives… Can’t we remain as we’ve always been?” She refused to look at me while she spoke. And then… “Do you really want a lover? And…does it have to be Megumin?” She still wouldn’t turn toward me.
“U-um, well… Do I want a lover…?” I wasn’t sure how to continue.
“If all you want to do is make love to a woman, surely I can satisfy you. I can fulfill your desires, whatever they may be. I’ll endure anything… I’ll do anything…”
What was this idiot talking about?
“You’re making fun of me. No wonder I’m so riled up. That’s not what I want. What I want is… Well…” But I still didn’t know what to say.
What did I want?
That’s when I noticed Darkness’s shoulders trembling.
“…You’ve been acting weirder than usual all day today. Seriously, something’s wrong with you. Look, let’s get some sleep. And then tomorrow…”
But that was as far as I got before Darkness suddenly turned toward me. I caught my breath when I saw her face. She was crying. Big, wet tears were streaming down her cheeks. She firmly gripped the hand I had on her shoulder.
“Why can’t it be me…? Tell me, am I really not good enough for you…?!” she sobbed, her tears flowing ceaselessly.
6
I lay there with my hand on Darkness’s shoulder as she wept. I would’ve given anything in exchange for an adequate response.
I had no idea how much time had passed.
Finally, Darkness gently removed my hand from her shoulder. “…I guess I’m not showing you my best side,” she said, still red-faced and sniffling.
Having a girl cry in front of me was way too high a hurdle. Sure, I was always making Aqua cry, but this was different. In this moment, I knew I had to say something sensitive, but the words wouldn’t come. In fact, I had only a faint idea of why Darkness had started bawling in the first place. Maybe this was why I was still a virgin. Darkness looked at me with red-rimmed eyes. She seemed to be waiting for me to say something. But I wasn’t sure what I should say.
In the end, I couldn’t find any words and just lay there in uncomfortable silence. Darkness looked down and started mumbling. “…The truth is, under any other circumstances, I would already belong to that governor. But you saved me from that fate. You saved me and won me my freedom. Now what I want most is to cherish this life… This happiness that you gave me. If it meant all of us could stay together just the way we are, then I would…”
………
“You’d throw yourself at me? What are you, stupid? That’s right—I remember you doing the same thing when it came to that governor, being all eager to sacrifice yourself. You’ve got me all wrong, Darkness. I’m not saying I want a lover because I want to do…you know…that sort of thing, and I’m not saying I wanna do it with just anybody. It’s… I… Well, Megumin told me a while back how she feels about me. And ever since then, I… I sort of started to notice her more. And it was like…‘Oh yeah, I guess I care about her, too.’ At least, that’s what I’ve started thinking…”
Even I didn’t really know what I was trying to say, but Darkness kept her eyes downcast and listened intently.
“I do, too,” she said finally, not looking up. “…I love you, too.”
My heart skipped a beat… On the other hand, I had sort of already known. Now all I could do was swallow spit, unsure what to do.
“…It wasn’t really clear to me at first. I just dimly felt like you were sort of my type. You… On the outside, you were a lazy perv who tried to coast through life by doing as little work as possible. You wanted to spend all day drinking, and you wound up deep in debt… Heh-heh.”
This girl’s “type” sounded like bad news. I knew one thing for sure: She was definitely not giving me a compliment.
“You better not forget, you were part of the reason we wound up in debt, too,” I said.
Darkness chuckled again at that. “So, what? You want me to pay back my debt right now, with my body?”
“Sorry! Sorry, I won’t say it again,” I blurted, and Darkness’s shoulders shook again, this time as if she was amused. She continued, still unable to meet my eyes. “…But in spite of all that, you went on to defeat one powerful opponent after another, and I felt so relieved. There was the guy with the enchanted sword, who was a lot stronger and more experienced than you. Generals of the Demon King with vastly higher levels. If I mentioned every single one, we would be here all night. But in any event, you always surprised me in the best way… When you threw money in the face of that governor, I thought my heart would burst.”
…………
Okay, that was definitely a compliment.
“…You started out useless, but you changed over time. It didn’t matter who you were facing or how strong they were. You belong to the weakest class, and you don’t even have any special equipment. You have a bow any amateur could find in a shop and a sword with a funny name…and with no more than that, you’ve managed to solve every problem and beat every challenge that came your way. You even managed to pay off that massive debt…”
As I listened to Darkness, I started to feel like I was actually pretty awesome.
“All of a sudden, you weren’t quite my type anymore. Although to be fair, recently you’ve gone back to drinking all day and not doing any work… But you aren’t the worthless man I dreamed of.”
What was she getting at?
“I love you. I was drawn to you at first because you were the exact kind of worthless guy I was into. But somewhere along the line…you became my type. Whatever kind of person you become in the future, I’ll still have feelings for you.”
Damn, this sounded tough. I was happy, sure. Really happy.
“I love you… And you love Megumin, or so you say. But that doesn’t stop me from caring about you… I have love for Megumin, too. And Aqua. I meant to keep all this stuff inside forever, if that was what it took to keep us all together. But…” She finally looked up, looked me right in the eye. “That stuff Megumin’s mom said the other day. She said Megumin said she wanted to be more than friends.” Darkness’s eyes were still moist and red. The tears had left streaks down her face. “I guess I wasn’t as strong as I thought… I guess I couldn’t endure as much as I thought I could. I do like Megumin; I really do. But the thought of losing you to her… It’s so painful and so scary.” She seemed like a little girl, terrified of losing something that mattered to her.
“…Kazuma, are you…? Are you sure…it can’t be me…?”
She sounded afraid of the answer.
Ugh, this was hard. I was happy; I really was. I was thrilled to hear Darkness’s confession. And yet…as happy as I was, my heart felt like it was going to break.
“Darkness… Listen, I…” My chest hurt. It was agonizing. “Darkness, I definitely don’t hate you, either. Hell, I’ve never in my life had a beautiful older woman fall in love with me.”
The pain…
It hurt to speak. Dammit, why couldn’t this world be more like a dating sim? Feeling like I might burst into tears from the sheer agony, I stared at Darkness, who had been crying, from about as close as it was possible to get.
“…Look, back in my home country, I never even had a single love interest. I always assumed I’d live out my whole life without going on a date… I gave up hope of even having a real conversation with a girl… And now here you are, telling me how you feel about me. Of course that makes me happy.” Darkness was watching me closely, trying to figure out what I was getting at. She looked like her heart was in just as much pain as mine. If only this could be like a novel, or a game, or one of those harem manga. “But…I’m really sorry. There’s already someone I’m interested in, so I can’t say ‘Yeah, I like you, too’ when someone else confesses to me. I don’t have enough experience to know how to play it two ways at once, and I’d like to think I’m a slightly better person than that anyway. I can’t return your feelings.”
It would have been nice if this alternate world happened to embrace polygamy. It would have been nice if everyone could have been happy without me having to actually choose anyone.
Nice. Sure. But that wasn’t how it worked. Darkness closed her eyes softly and turned away from me again.
We lay there for I don’t know how long, neither of us saying anything. At last Darkness whispered, “…Thank you for being honest. I’m sorry I made things hard for you.” As she spoke, she sat up, a smile spreading across her face. It was her usual confident grin. A calm smile backed by real strength. She brushed her hair away from her face, still smiling, then stood up, crossing her arms as if everything was great now. And then, with tremendous confidence and affection, she smiled at me again. Finally, she pointedly turned so her back was to me.
“…All right, then, Kazuma. I’ll see you tomorrow… I can’t help it; I really do like you. You could have diverted that conversation in any number of ways, but you gave me closure instead…”
As she spoke, Darkness headed for the door of the—
Hey!
“Just a—!”
There was a jangle of the chain. Darkness, completely caught up in the passion of the moment, had been trying to make her exit with a dramatic speech, but she’d completely forgotten we were still attached at the wrist.
“Hrf?!”
The chain yanked violently on her right hand. It dragged me up out of bed and spun her half around so she slammed face-first into the side of the bed.
………
I couldn’t tell if she was hurt. She wasn’t moving. “…H-hey, are you okay…?”
She didn’t look up at me. She just sat there on the carpet. Then she buried her face in her knees. Her shoulders were shaking gently again. Then I saw the tops of her ears getting red…
“…………………………………………Pffft!”
“Hrk?!”
I couldn’t stop myself from laughing. Maybe I really was hopeless.
7
“I’m gonna kill you! And then I’ll die myself!”
“And come morning, Aqua will happily resurrect us both. I know, I know! I’m sorry I laughed! But what was I supposed to do? This is your fault, too, you know! After all that tension… How could I not laugh?!”
It was the middle of the night, and we were having what you might call a chain death match.
“I was being so serious! When a woman works up the nerve to confess her feelings to you, it doesn’t matter what happens after; you should expect to die if you laugh at her! …Oh yeah… That’s just the kind of guy I’m dealing with…! Hey, at least let me get in one punch!”
No fair!
“But you just…! You looked so serious, and when you tried to leave…! Pffft… Bwa-ha-ha…!” Just the memory of the moment was enough to make me laugh again.
Darkness yelled, “You’re dead!” as she made a grab for me.
“H-hey, I’m sorry, okay? I get it! My bad! I shouldn’t have laughed! One hit! I’ll let you land one punch, and then you’ll forgive me, okay?”
Darkness lowered the fist she had raised at me. “…Okay, fine. Stand right there and close your eyes.” She was breathing hard and glaring at me. I was scared. Very scared, to be honest! Dammit, could I even take one punch from a powerhouse like Darkness?! I could, right? I hoped…
“Here goes. Ready?”
I stood on the carpet, eyes closed, as Darkness took up a fighting stance. I steeled myself. “Y-yeah, come at me!” I said, my eyes still squeezed shut…when something brushed my face. I flinched—just about jumped, actually—but it was only Darkness’s hand, touching my cheek.
No sooner had I registered what it was than I felt something soft pressing against my lips.
“…?!”
I’d never been kissed before, but even I knew what was happening. I opened my eyes to see Darkness, red up to her ears and still looking angry but caressing my cheek with her left hand. She pulled away from me, and the tip of her tongue peeked out, just barely brushing past my lips.
“Wh-why, you…!” I said, feeling like I should object somehow but not actually sure what to say. Before I could find the words, Darkness tugged on the chain between us, pulling my left hand toward her. She took my wrist, leaning close to my ear. “…I really meant to let it go, but I gave up on giving up on it. I’m older than you and Megumin, and I’m noble, to boot. Starting tomorrow, I’ll keep my distance from you, and I won’t try anything. But I want one last chance…”
With that goose-bump-inducing whisper, and still holding my wrist, she pushed me onto the bed!
“Hey, wh-what do you think you’re doing, Darkness?! Hold on! I don’t like where this is going! I don’t like where this is headed one bit!” As soon as I hit the sheets, she was on me, and I was desperately trying to decide what to do.
Darkness, her face red and her breath coming hard, said, “You’re always calling me perv this and ero that, like Perviness and Lewdness and whatever else…! All right, I’m a pervert! I admit it! And I’m going to keep you up all night! I’ll have my way with you till the crack of dawn!”
“Okay, I get it—just calm down. At this rate, we’re both gonna have our first times, and I think that’s really a pretty serious—Look, calm…down?!”
I tried to sit up, but Darkness grabbed my left hand with her right and leaned into me, forcing me back onto the pillow. That, of course, left me horizontal. Still pushing my left hand into the pillow, she mounted me, straddling my hips.
This was bad. Really, really bad. I knew what kinds of things happened in this position.
“Seriously, Darkness, dial it back! Stop! This is the endgame we’re talking about—!”
I was trying to talk her down, but Darkness leaned in so her face was next to mine, panting heavily and brushing my cheek with her left hand. “I seem to remember you shoving me into bed once in my own home… Well, today the roles are reversed…!”
This was getting way out of hand. How, you ask? Well, the rest of me might have been lying down, but one part of me was standing tall and proud.
“…? Oh…”
I guess it was inevitable that she’d notice it, considering she was straddling me. Darkness made a little embarrassed sound. She didn’t act like she was going to get off me, though.
No! Don’t get swept away! Don’t let this porn-game nonsense get to you! Keep your cool, Kazuma Satou! Are you really going to betray Megumin?!
That was just yesterday! It was only just yesterday that Megumin and I had decided to be more than friends and less than lovers! If I gave in to my urges now, of all times, I would be betraying everything Megumin felt for me…! Yes, even though I could always say I had no hope of resisting Darkness’s sheer physical force, even then…!
Darkness looked a little embarrassed, but she caressed my cheek again, drawing her face closer to mine.
“S-stoppp! Don’t do this, Darkness! Damn, I’m stuck…! Someone from the weakest class like me doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of beating you in a contest of strength…!”
While I shouted at Darkness, I took my free right hand and…!
…My free right hand?
“Hey, Darkness, you forgot about my right hand! It’s just hanging out here! You’re supposed to use your left hand to grab my right so I can’t resist! Otherwise, you’d better watch out for all the dangerous skills I have, like Drain Touch!”
“Huh? Oh…!” Darkness, startled, pressed down on my right hand like I’d instructed.
Damn. That meant both my hands were trapped now.
Shit, here I finally had Megumin, but now I was completely at Darkness’s mercy…! I squirmed desperately beneath her.
“…Hey, Darkness, why’d you stop?”
“Huh…? O-oh, I just… It took both my hands to hold you down, and now I’m not sure what to do next…”
She had me pinned and that was what she was worried about?
“Dumbass, what do you think you have a mouth for?! I’m already half-naked; don’t you realize you can take that mouth and do whatever you want to me?!”
“Oh! Y-yeah, right…” Darkness didn’t sound very confident as she leaned toward my neck, her tongue darting out from between her lips…!
…And then, maybe getting a late case of cold feet, she hesitated at the last second, her tongue almost—but not quite—brushing my skin.
I couldn’t help groaning piteously. “Ugh, that’s my Perviness! What a tease! But I won’t break! …Seriously, though, hurry up and do it already!”
“Oh, s-sure! All right, here I g-go…!” Darkness’s tongue reached out farther…!
“H-hang on! I’m really straining, like, down below! Before you do anything, please just loosen my belt a bit! I mean, you can even accompany it with a classic line like ‘Your mouth says no, but your body says yes…!’”
“S-sure, okay…! Your mouth says no, but your body says yes…!” Darkness let go of my hands so she could get at my belt…!
“Dumbass, who lets go of both hands?! You need to hold one of them down so I can’t resist!”
“Oh! R-right, sorry!” she said, apologizing reflexively.
“Okay, listen. I hate to say it, but you need to get off me for a second. You want to come at me from the side, like I’ve been asleep… Right, like that, and then you want your right forearm to hold my left wrist, and then you reach out with the same arm and hold on to my right wrist… Yeah, there you go. See how that leaves your left hand free? Good, now you can prevent me from being able to get up by shoving that huge rack of yours against my midriff or my chest…!”
“Oh, y-you mean like this…? I see. Now I can use my left hand to get your belt…!”
And so, with my help, Darkness managed to get a handle on powerless, unable-to-resist me and reach for my belt…!
“Eeeyow-ow-ow-ow! Why would you make it tighter?! You’re supposed to loosen it! Take the belt off! But take your time with it and say…y’know, ‘Heh-heh… Looks like you’re having a tough time…!’ or whatever!”
“R-right! S-sorry I’m so bad at this…! Heh… Heh-heh… Looks like you’re having a tough time…! I see you’ve stopped saying ‘no’…!”
“Great work! Nice ad-libbing!”
Darkness reached down for my belt as I watched, helpless, and…
“Huh? Wh-wha—?”
“Hey, let’s go! Pick up the pace! Double time! And while you’re down there, don’t forget that after my belt comes off, your mouth’ll have full access to every part of me down there, so think long and hard about what you’d like to do next…!”
At that moment, the door came flying open. Standing in the doorway were a displeased Megumin and a very tired Aqua.
I didn’t miss a beat. And so I shouted:
“Heeelllllp! She totally jumped me!”
“Wha—?!”
8
Aqua had a key in her hand. One that undid the handcuffs with a clatter. She had found the key using the powers she was always bragging about, the ones she claimed let her see in any level of darkness. And as for Megumin, who had slapped Aqua awake…
Apparently, she had cashed in her one demand of Aqua—which she’d won in their earlier card game—to force her to look for the key Darkness had lost. And why had she done that?
“Ugh, it’s the middle of the night, and you two are disturbing the peace…! I told you to be friends! Not to spend the entire night shouting at each other!”
It was lecture time. Darkness was seated formally on the carpet in my room. “…I-I’m sorry about that…” She bowed her head before Megumin, who stood assertively above her, arms crossed.
“I’m so sleepy,” Aqua chimed in. “I worked really hard finding that key, and I wanna go to bed.” Megumin duly thanked Aqua for her help, and she tottered off to bed. As for me, now free of the cuffs, I was sitting on the edge of my bed, kicking my legs and listening to Megumin’s diatribe.
I took my turn having a shot at Darkness, whose head was still bowed. “Man, you really are a sicko. It’s bad enough the way you crept up on me, full of lust, while I was slumbering peacefully. But then, as hard as I tried to resist, you went and…!”
“What?! Wh-why, you son of a—!” Darkness glared at me from the floor.
…As did Megumin.
“………”
Confronted with an expression that said she knew everything, I slid off the bed and assumed a formal seated position beside Darkness. “I, uh…somehow feel like this is where I belong.”
“You assume correctly,” Megumin said, and Darkness shot me a take that smirk. Bitch…
Megumin looked at us both and sighed. “I swear. You only had to spend one night together. I thought it might make you a little more open with each other, but instead… Darkness, were you able to tell him what you wanted to tell him?”
““…?!”” Both of us stared openly at Megumin. Just how much had she figured out? Man, Crimson Magic brains were nothing to sneeze at. Seriously, why didn’t she normally act this smart?
“Er, um… Megumin, I’m sorry…” Darkness sniffed.
“What are you apologizing for?” Megumin said. “It’s not my place to say anything about this issue. You should be more honest with yourself. It’s not as if Kazuma and I are proper lovers yet, and I know Kazuma’s restless nature too well to feel completely certain of whom he will choose. Were you able to communicate your own feelings to him, Darkness?” She sounded like a fully grown adult. And then she smiled sweetly at Darkness.
Darkness, still sniffling, balled up her fists and braced them against her knees before she nodded vigorously. Megumin’s expression got even happier. To me, she somehow seemed like a mother, gently looking on as her kid tried to make their own way in the world. I wondered why my chest hurt a little when I saw Megumin that way. Was this…you know? Like, I wanted her to be a little more jealous or something? Or maybe her remark about not knowing who I would choose just straight-up hurt.
Honestly, even I knew I could be a real pain in the neck.
Then Megumin smiled at me, too, as if she already understood the whole emotional mess in my heart. “How resourceful you are. Taking care not to burn any bridges. You know, if you could apply that same wit to awesomely destroying a monster every once in a while… Well, I’d like to see that.”
Darkness continued to nod. Geez, and here she’d told me that she wanted a worthless guy who never worked. But she still wanted him to pay his taxes? What?
“Looks like I’m beat…,” I said, smiling at the two of them. They both smiled back. Finally…
“By the way, purely out of curiosity, I take it nothing actually did happen?” Megumin asked, sounding just a tad uneasy.
…Hey, was that a touch of jealousy I heard?
“No, nothing,” Darkness said promptly. “He resisted too hard and wouldn’t let me get away with anything.” She shot me a teasing look. Why did I have the feeling I was being punked?
Megumin, relieved, gave Darkness something of a triumphant grin. So I let it out real casual-like.
“…Oh yeah, come to think of it, that ambush Darkness sprang on me when I had my eyes closed earlier was my first…hmm, whaddaya call it again?”
““…?!””
Megumin looked stricken, and Darkness stared at the ground.
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