Chapter 3
May We Get Some R&R in This Pitiful Village!
1
“We’ll get back to our patrol, then,” Bukkororii said, edging away from us. He and the other three clustered together, and after he intoned a brief bit of magic—
“See you later!”
—all four of them vanished from sight.
Awesome! Now those are some real wizards. They must have teleported straight back to the battlefield…!
“They are so cool,” I said admiringly, still not taking my eyes off the place where they had disappeared. “They’re like an elite combat brigade or something.”
“You think so? I’m sure they’re very happy to hear that,” Megumin said, still leaning on my shoulder.
“What do you mean, they are very happy? They’ve already teleported away, right?”
But Yunyun answered, “They disappeared using magic that bends light. Teleport takes a lot of MP. If they used it after every battle, they wouldn’t have enough magic to last a whole day. I’m pretty sure they just disappeared like that because they wanted to make a dramatic exi— Eyow!”
Suddenly a pebble came flying from where the other wizards had been standing, bopping Yunyun on the head. Sort of a warning to keep her mouth shut.
…So they were there.
“Incidentally, light-bending magic creates a field a few yards in diameter around a specific person or object, making it invisible to everyone outside of it. But if you get close enough, you can still see it,” Megumin said blandly.
This prompted Aqua to take a few quiet steps forward.
“…!”
There was a tiny gasp of distress and the noise of something scuttling backward. Aqua froze in her tracks, staring intently but not moving…
“…………”
“…………”
…until she suddenly jumped forward.
““““?!””””
At the same moment, I could hear several people scrambling away.
Oh, quit it already…
I turned away from Aqua, who was merrily chasing the invisible thing around, and the rest of us headed into the village. For starters, we would go to Yunyun’s house and see if we could figure out what was going on.
Aqua finally caught up with us, having apparently tired of the chase.
“Hey, those people are something, huh?” she said. “Even I couldn’t catch them!”
So they’d gotten away from Aqua, who did have strong stats in everything except Intelligence and Luck. Exactly how they had managed to escape was somewhat ambiguous, but they must have been a true special-strike team. Elites among the Crimson Magic villagers, no doubt.
“They probably doped themselves up with physical buffs so they could run away. I can’t imagine the NEET brigade has all that much stamina, lolling about like they do every day.” …And thus Megumin stuck a pin in my admiring fantasies.
“…What do you mean, the NEET brigade? Aren’t they a special guerrilla strike force, doing battle with the Demon King’s army?” I asked. “They even said they were going back on patrol.”
“Those people never managed to get jobs, so they have plenty of time on their hands. If they went to some other town to become adventurers, they would probably find everybody wanted to party up with them, but they just want to stay in the village, never cutting the apron strings. They decided to call themselves a strike force and wander the village because they didn’t want everyone to notice that they were just sitting around all day.”
Megumin gave me an answer, but I thought I would have been happier not knowing it.
And anyway, so what? Apparently, even the NEETs around here could kick some serious butt.
“Everyone in the Crimson Magic Clan learns advanced magic when they grow up,” Yunyun said, reading my mind. “Every single person in the village belongs to the Arch-wizard class. After learning advanced magic, they pick up as many different spells as their skill points allow. At least, that’s what they normally do…”
Megumin avoided looking at Yunyun under the guise of taking in the nostalgic sights of her hometown. Crimson Magic Village was about the size of a small farming settlement. None of the various clan members I saw looked the least bit concerned about anything; in fact, some of them were yawning openly. Maybe the spring weather was getting to them.
Really, this didn’t look like a place at war with the Demon King at all…
Darkness spoke up. “…Mm. This is quite a griffin statue. Did a famous sculptor carve it?” She was patting a stone sculpture near the entrance to the village. I could see what she meant: The griffin was so realistic, it looked like it might swoop down and grab one of us in its talons at any moment…
“That is a griffin that wandered into the village and was turned to stone by petrification magic,” Megumin said. “It looks rather cool, so we decided to leave it there as a tourist attraction. These days, people mostly use it as a landmark when they’re trying to meet up.”
Wh-what a ridiculous tourist attraction.
After Megumin’s explanation, Aqua was patting the statue with great interest, muttering something to herself.
“Hey, you,” I said. “What’s that spell you’re using?”
“Just some magic to reverse status effects. I want to see a real live griffin!”
The four of us dragged Aqua away and headed for Yunyun’s place to find out just what was going on.
2
Her home was a big house in the middle of the village. We were at a table with sofas on either side, where a middle-aged man sat furrowing his brow. This was the sitting room of the chief of the Crimson Magic Clan, and that was the chief himself in front of us—that is to say, Yunyun’s father.
“Aww, that? That was just a letter to let my daughter know what was going on. I got a bit carried away was all. My Crimson Magic Clan blood just won’t let me write a normal letter…”
“Sir, you’re not making any sense,” I said pointedly. Beside me, Yunyun’s mouth was hanging open.
“…What? D-Dad? Not that I’m not happy you’re safe and all, but could you go over that again? Your letter began, ‘ By the time this letter reaches you, I will be dead ’…”
“Why, that’s the way members of the Crimson Magic Clan have always opened their letters. Didn’t they teach you in school? …Ah, you and Megumin both had such good grades; you graduated early, didn’t you?”
“…And the part about not being able to destroy the Demon King’s base?”
“Oh yes, they put up a pretty impressive encampment. No one can agree on whether to tear it down or leave it there as a new tourist attraction.”
“Hey, Yunyun. Mind if I sock your dad one?”
“Be my guest.”
“Yunyun?!”
Darkness gave Yunyun’s appalled father a quizzical look. “…Hmm? Just a moment. You said the Demon King’s army really did establish a base, right? So were you telling the truth about one of his generals being here, too?”
“Oh yes, one who’s strong against magic, just like I wrote in my letter. She’ll be around soon. Wanna have a look?”
Just as the chief was offering us his easygoing invitation…
“Alert! The Demon King’s forces are approaching. Alert! The Demon King’s forces are approaching! All who are able, please assemble near the griffin statue. The enemy appears to number roughly a thousand.”
““A th—?!””
Darkness and I both reacted with shock, but the three Crimson Magic Clanners looked as if this was nothing special. Maybe they hadn’t heard the part about there being a thousand enemies out there. This whole village was home to at most three hundred, by my reckoning. More than triple that number of the Demon King’s soldiers was on their way, and these guys were acting like it was no big deal.
Aqua, demonstrating an unusual maturity as she sipped the tea that had been brought out, said suddenly, “A thousand of the Demon King’s minions, huh? Looks like it might finally be time to show the true power of a goddess.” This village seemed to be having a really weird effect on her.
I’m begging you, please, please don’t do anything else stupid…
Darkness sat frozen. Megumin said calmly to her, “There is no need to panic. This is Crimson Magic Village, and everyone here is a powerful wizard. Would you like to see?”
3
…It was really pretty amazing.
“Yargh! Yaaaaarrrgh!”
“Lady Sylvia! Milady! You must escape! Even if none of us makes it, you alone must…”
“Curses! Curse it all! We can’t even get close enough to counterattack!”
“I told you we shouldn’t attack Crimson Magic Village! I told you I didn’t want to go!”
Before we even reached the village gate, the Demon King’s forces were already routing. Barely fifty Crimson mages stood against more than a thousand foes.
And as for those fifty wizards…
“ Lightning Strike !”
“ Energy Ignition !”
“ Freeze Gust !!”
“ Cursed Lightning !!!”
“Geez… I’ve got to admit, I’m actually impressed.”
They were unleashing a merciless barrage of magic against the vanguard of the Demon King’s army.
This hardly qualified as a battle. It was a complete and utter trouncing. I expected lightning to fall on the enemy troops, but then a dozen of the demons were simply incinerated, totally out of the blue. White mist surrounded another group. I thought they would be turned to ice, but forks of black lightning pierced them, leaving holes in their chests.
…Then the sea of enemy troops parted, and from the center emerged a beautiful woman in a long dress.
“Troops! I will be your wall, so stay behind me! It’ll take time before they can use their advanced magic again—that’s our chance!”
Who knew the Demon King had such a hot general? She looked like nothing more than a slim human woman; her dress had a delightfully low neckline. A blue earring sparkled in her right ear, strikingly clean and pure in contrast to her flashy dress.
A group of men and women came forward to confront the general. I recognized one of the men. It was Bukkororii, who had teleported us earlier. His red eyes flashed, and he thrust out his hands. From long acquaintance with Megumin, I knew that when a Crimson Magic Clan member’s eyes got redder, it meant they were getting really worked up…
“ Tornado !!”
And it meant they were getting ready to pour a whole bunch of MP into one giant spell.
Bukkororii’s incantation summoned a massive whirlwind right in the middle of the Demon King’s soldiers, flinging a bunch of them helplessly into the air. The fall would probably be fatal.
The gorgeous girl next to Bukkororii held out her left hand, her eyes flashing as well. She had a weapon in her right hand, unusual for a member of the Crimson Magic Clan. I looked closer and found that it was a wooden sword carved in the shape of a dragon. Maybe it was a magical weapon or something? That might explain why a member of the Crimson Magic Clan had it.
The girl extended her left hand and gave a swipe of the sword in her right.
“ Inferno !”
A conflagration broke out, smack in the middle of the still-raging whirlwind.
4
After watching the battle, we headed back to Megumin’s house. Yunyun went her own way, saying she was going to find Arue, the one who’d sent us that letter, and give her a piece of her mind.
“Phew!” I said, reflecting back on the magic display those wizards had put on. “That was something! So that’s what it’s like to see real Crimson Magic Clan members in action.”
“To refer to them as real suggests there are fake Crimson Magic Clan members. I should like to know exactly who you believe to be a fake!” With Megumin leaning on my shoulder and looking like she might bite me, we arrived at a snug one-story house. Not to be rude, but I couldn’t help thinking it seemed a little poorer than the average place. Megumin, looking tired—maybe because of lack of MP—went up and knocked on the front door.
A moment later, feet thumped toward us from inside. The door opened slowly…
Out peeked a girl, about primary school age, who resembled Megumin.
“Ooh, is that your little sister, Megumin? She’s pretty cute,” Darkness said, breaking into a smile.
“Megumin, she’s like a tiny version of you! C’mere, mini-Megumin. Want some candy?” Aqua was suddenly holding some candy. I had no idea where she’d gotten it. But before the girl could react—
“Komekko, I’m home. Have you been a good girl?” Megumin spoke to the child in a gentle voice, still leaning on my shoulder.
Komekko…
Be it Komekko or Bukkororii, I had pretty much ceased to be surprised by Crimson Magic names. Maybe there was something wrong with me.
Komekko looked at Megumin and froze. She must have been overcome by the joy of seeing her sister again. Her eyes went wide, and she sucked in a deep breath. Then she shouted, “Daaaaad! Sis is back, and she brought a guy !”
All right, kid, time for you and me to have a talk!
5
“Look closely, now. See the upside-down cup on this table? I’m going to make it move all on its own!”
“Wow! Amazing! How do you do it? Hey, Blue-Haired Girl, how do you do it? Tell me!”
“It’s magnetism!” Darkness said. “There’s got to be a magnet under the table. That’s how you’re doing it, right, Aqua? Isn’t it?”
We were in the living room at Megumin’s house. Aqua was doing party tricks with a cup, and Komekko and Darkness were eating it up. I figured Darkness was probably right about the magnet. The cup Aqua was using was made of metal, after all. It would be easy enough to slip a magnet underneath the table…
As I listened to them try to figure out the secret to her trick, I glanced over thoughtlessly.
Aqua was sitting there in the middle of the living room, her hands folded neatly on her knees. She was staring intently at the mug on the table, but that was all—and it was moving.
……?!
I could barely believe my own eyes. I focused more and more on what was happening over there, when…
“Er…! Ahem!” The person in front of me cleared his throat pointedly.
Whoops, right!
I had gotten so caught up in what was going on that I had almost forgotten Megumin’s father was sitting across from me on the carpet, fixing me with a baleful stare. At first glance, he looked almost normal, just a man with black hair. But his eyes were sharp, and he radiated a quiet, intimidating pressure. Until this moment, I had known nothing of him but his name: Megumin’s father, Hyoizaburou.
“…I understand that you have been looking out for my daughter. For that, at least, I thank you.” He gave a small nod.
Next to him sat an attractive woman, who somehow looked a bit like Megumin, with rich black hair and the first hints of wrinkles around her mouth and eyes. “Yes, thank you very much… Our daughter often mentions you in her letters, young Kazuma… I almost feel like we know you…” Megumin’s mother, Yuiyui, bowed deeply.
I shot a withering look in the direction of the person who more than anyone else should have been here helping me clear this up. A bedroll had been laid out in the corner, and Megumin—having spent all her MP on the explosion earlier—was curled up on it, fast asleep.
Hyoizaburou took a long, meaningful look at Megumin, then turned to me, nonplussed.
“…And what exactly is the relationship between you and our daughter?”
It was the third time he had asked me that.
“…Sir, as I keep telling you, we’re just friends.”
At that, Hyoizaburou went over to the tea table where Aqua was doing her trick, with an expression of disgust.
“Grrraaaaaaahhhh!”
“Ohhhhhh! Stop, dear! Please! Please stop flipping over tables! You break them, and we don’t have the money to replace them, especially this month!”
There really were a lot of very strange people in the Crimson Magic Clan.
Hyoizaburou sat sipping the tea his wife had made.
“You must excuse me. I lost control of myself because you keep mocking me with your insistence that you and my daughter are just friends.”
I bit back the words I’d been about to say— S-seriously, we’re just friends —and pulled something out of my item pouch, hoping to change the subject. It was a collection of the buns we had bought in Arcanletia on our recent hot-springs trip. Since we’d left Axel right after getting back, they were still in my bag.
“Uh, here…Just something small…” I held out the box of buns, and Hyoizaburou and his wife both grabbed it at the same time.
“…My dear wife. Young Kazuma was thoughtful enough to bring me a gift, so will you please take your hands off it?”
“Heavens, my love. A moment ago, you could barely even look at him, but he gives you a little something and suddenly you can remember his name. Stop now, you’re embarrassing yourself. These will be our dinner tonight. I won’t let you just eat them with your wine, understand?” Was she joking? If so, it wasn’t very funny.
I fought down the urge to point out that meat buns weren’t very good for dinner or drinks, when Komekko exclaimed happily, “Food?! Is that actual hard food?! Not, like, that nasty gruel we always eat? Actual stomach-filling food ?!”
…I reached into my bag and pulled out all the preserved rations I had with me, spreading them out on the floor.
“Just something…really small…”
“Welcome to our home, dear Kazuma! Wife, bring a cup of our finest tea!”
“We only have one kind of tea, dear. But I’ll bring it right out. You boys wait there.”
I sat sipping the tea Yuiyui had brought. Komekko had a bun in each hand and was stuffing her face like a squirrel. As she gobbled them down, she watched me intently from her spot beside me. For a moment, she studied the food in her hands, then swallowed heavily.
“…Here. They’re delicious.” She held out a bun that was still whole. She never took her eyes off it, though, clearly famished.
“Komekko, sweetie, stop! Come over here; come back to us girls!”
“She’s right, Komekko! That’s a bad man who does nothing but play nasty pranks on your sister. Come over here before he turns on you!”
Komekko, however, ignored Aqua and Darkness, instead looking at me with a puzzled tilt of her head. I would have to give them what-for later. Komekko was an angel.
“Thank you, Komekko, but you eat it. I’m already full,” I said.
“Oh, really?” was all she said before settling next to me again and wordlessly tearing back into the food. I could feel the corners of my lips pull up at the sight of her smile.
Hyoizaburou was eyeing me dangerously. “…I don’t care how much food you bring me. You can’t have Komekko.”
“I’m not trying to take Komekko, sir! You don’t have to listen to those two!”
Aqua snuck up to where Komekko was wolfing down meat buns beside me, then grabbed her in a hug and snatched her away as if to protect her from me.
…I’ll get them for this, that’s for damn sure.
Komekko continued eating, totally oblivious to being spirited away.
Yuiyui smiled and watched me sip tea, and at last said delicately, “Now, Kazuma, I hear you have quite a lot of debt. You seem like a very nice man, and I’m not opposed to you…but don’t you think it might be better not to be with our daughter until after you’ve repaid everything…?”
I did the biggest spit take of my life.
“What do you mean, be with ?! I keep telling you, we’re just friends !” I said, choking.
Megumin’s mother gave me a questioning look. “From my daughter’s letters, I got the impression the two of you were quite intimate. Is that not the case…?”
“Okay, just a minute. Can I ask what exactly she wrote to you?”
As I tried to calm down, Hyoizaburou and his wife exchanged a glance. Then Yuiyui began, “Well, she wrote…”
Psst.
The next two pages reflect the original
Japanese orientation, so read backward!
“…and how her life is basically a constant stream of sexual harassment.”
I had heard enough. I got on my knees and bowed deeply to her parents.
Hyoizaburou picked up the thread. “But she says that even so, you’re an important friend whom she could never leave. Even if you are riddled with debt, an unrepentant pervert, have no real combat ability to speak of, abuse your friends every time you open your mouth, and don’t know common sense from a hole in the ground, she says that if she ever took her eyes off you for one minute, you’d die. I assume that if she was willing to say all that, there must be something there…”
He sounded sincere. And while I wasn’t exactly thrilled with everything I’d just heard, it did warm my heart a little to know that she considered me an important friend. We’d been through so much together—the bond between us was strong enough that we could forgive each other’s faults. I didn’t even mind knowing that she had been saying these things behind my back. My trust in her was still…
“After all,” Yuiyui went on, “to hear her tell it, she provides all the firepower in your party—why, if she wasn’t there, your group would fall apart! She’s told us all about how she took out the Demon King’s general Vanir and how she attacked the castle of another general every day to draw him out, then played a crucial role in his defeat.”
…I guess those things aren’t technically untrue.
She’d helped us get rid of Hans recently, too. I wasn’t sure I’d say that we would fall apart without her, but…
“That’s right! And she dealt the finishing blow to Mobile Fortress Destroyer! Ahhh, my little girl makes me so proud!” Hyoizaburou said, continuing where his wife left off. He did seem genuinely happy… And I mean, he wasn’t wrong . But still…
Without thinking about it, I glanced over at the sleeping Megumin. She had been breathing deeply, but now she had her back to me…
Don’t tell me she’s awake.
I studied her suspiciously.
“She wrote so many other things about her party and her friends, too,” Yuiyui said. “But if you don’t mind my asking, what about all that debt? I can’t help but worry about my daughter’s party. I’d love to help in any way I can, but our family doesn’t have much money…” She gave me an apologetic look.
“Oh, please,” I said easily, “don’t worry about it. I took care of that debt a long time ago. And I’m expecting a windfall about the time we get back from this trip. So really, we’re fine—you don’t have to worry.”
Hyoizaburou pricked up his ears at this. “…Oh-ho. If I may ask, just how much of a windfall…?”
I didn’t think too hard about the question—maybe because I was a little anxious being at Megumin’s actual house—but replied, “About three hundred million eris, I guess.”
““Three hundred million?!””
…Huh? Should I maybe have kept that to myself?
Hyoizaburou slid a little closer to me. Then he clapped his hands, a perfectly brilliant smile on his face. “Oh yes, Kazuma. Please stay here tonight! You all are friends of my daughter’s, after all—how can I not extend my hospitality? Stay as long as you like—forever, in fact! As adventurers, you must not have a home of your own, right?”
“Oh yes!” Yuiyui said. “Komekko, let’s you and Daddy and me camp out here in the living room tonight! You two girls can sleep in our room. Our house isn’t very large, though. We just have this room and our room and the room that used to be Megumin’s bedroom… It might be a little small for all of you to live in. Say, dear, weren’t we just thinking about remodeling…?”
I wanted to break in before they could get any further ahead of themselves and said a bit hesitantly, “N-no, it’s all right. We have, uh, our mansion back in Axel and all…”
““Mansion?!””
Did it again.
Megumin’s parents were looking at me with shining eyes. I averted my gaze, hoping to find help from Aqua and Darkness…
“And now, for my next trick! I will do something amazing with this little box!”
“Oh! She’s going to open it, and something’s going to fly out from inside! I’m sure that’s it, positive!”
“Wow! Amazing!”
Suffice to say, they weren’t going to be any help.
6
It was late in the evening, but Megumin still hadn’t woken up. It was understandable. In some ways she was the most adult member of our party, but she was still just fourteen. We had gone to Arcanletia, gotten back, and immediately left again, plus she had used up her MP on that explosion. As she slept…
“Meat, Mom! Real meat!”
“I’ll take that! Dear, you have the bok choy—it’s supposed to keep a woman looking young. And I want my wife to be beautiful her whole life through!”
“Oh, but my love, your hair’s been thinning lately. You should have the seaweed salad with that meat!”
None of them seemed the least bit concerned about the return of a family member they hadn’t seen in ages. They were completely focused on the food I had gone to get for them.
The main dish was hot pot. Aqua was drinking the wine we bought to accompany the meal, while Darkness seemed a bit anxious, as though this was her first time eating at a table with a whole family. I kept peeking around to make sure I was minding the local manners, but I was doing my part to demolish the food supply.
Finally Komekko sat back, her stomach full and her eyes shining. “Hey, Dad! Mom! Blue-Haired Girl is awesome! She pulled this huge Neroid out of a tiny little box!”
That got my attention. Darkness noticed me leaning in. “It was really something, Kazuma. It shouldn’t have been physically possible! She pulled this huuuge Neroid out of that box, and it went leaping through the window. I keep wondering how she did it…”
At that, I turned to Aqua, who was happily drinking her wine. “…Hey. I’ve been wanting to ask you. Could you show me one of your party tricks? I mean, really show me?”
“Uh-uh. These aren’t tricks, they’re art, and you can’t rush art. It has to emerge spontaneously, at a moment of intense emotion! If you really want to see what I can do, throw me a party that will put me in an artistic mood.” As she spoke, she popped some peas—a snack to go with her alcohol—out of their pod with one hand, nimbly launching them toward my mouth. “Way to suck… I popped those peas right on target; the least you could do is catch them in your mouth… Eek, s-stop! You don’t even drink that much wine; don’t take all my peas!”
All in all, it was a pretty pleasant dinner. For the first time in a long while, I thought back to dinners with my family in Japan. The anxiousness of roughing it started to vanish, and I just relaxed and enjoyed the food.
It happened when I had just gotten out of the bath and was going back to the living room.
“Don’t be stupid! Don’t you love your own daughter?! What you’re trying to do is like throwing a delicious-looking little lamb into a cage with a wild beast that hasn’t eaten in a week!”
I had been the last one in the bath, and now I heard Darkness hollering something in the living room. I peeked in, wondering what all the fuss was about. There was Hyoizaburou, sawing logs. I was sure he’d been awake when I went to take my bath. He was pretty quick falling asleep. I didn’t see Aqua anywhere. She must have already gone to her room.
“Now, now, they were already living in the same house together. Were there never any…mistakes? Then there’s no problem! Our daughter is already of marriageable age, and Kazuma is a discerning man. If something happened between them, surely it would be because they both wanted it? And as parents, how could we object?”
Apparently, Darkness was pushing back against my sleeping in the same room with Megumin. Personally, I didn’t care where I slept. Megumin’s mom had a sly smile on her face.
“…If you don’t mind my asking, Miss Darkness, why are you so against this arrangement? Is it not to your liking for Kazuma and my daughter to sleep together?”
Even I wasn’t thrilled with the way she’d put that…
“What?! It almost sounds as though you think I’m jealous or something! That makes me extremely uncomfortable, and I really wish you would stop…”
…Huh?
“O-oh, I’m sorry. My mistake. But it would be such trouble to move my daughter to another room. Someone has to sleep in the same room as Kazuma.”
“Then have Mr. Hyoizaburou sleep with him!”
“I’m sorry?”
Darkness was offering a sound argument, but Yuiyui seemed a little startled.
Hang on. I’m sure Darkness is right, but I get the feeling I’m missing something here…
“Well, we couldn’t— I mean, knowing Kazuma from our daughter’s letters, we couldn’t let him sleep with Komekko—she isn’t the right age yet. But I wouldn’t be exactly comfortable letting him sleep with the master of the house, either…”
Hey, just what kind of person did this lady think I was? Tomorrow I was going to make them show me all the letters Megumin had sent them.
Darkness was getting more and more agitated. “Then…! Then have me sleep with him! At least if that animal tries to do something to me, I can resist with all my might, and somehow…! No! My resistance might be futile in the face of his inhuman lust, and he might do something awful to me. I-I’m sure his appetite has been building and building this entire trip. And he stayed up all night! They say men are especially ravenous after staying up all night…! He holds me down despite my desperate attempts to resist, blocking my mouth because what if Komekko wakes up and everyone will hear and shut up already —”
“ Sleep !” Yuiyui intoned, and Darkness slumped down right where she was, ending the stream of idiotic inanities from her mouth. Good on Yuiyui.
…I looked at Hyoizaburou, who had somehow managed to remain fast asleep throughout this entire exchange. Maybe Yuiyui had…
That was when Yuiyui noticed me watching from the doorway. “Oh, Kazuma,” she said, wrapping one arm around Komekko, who looked terribly sleepy. “Done with your bath? Miss Darkness fell asleep rather suddenly. Could you help me carry her to her room?”
The smile never left her face.
7
“Thank you for your help. Miss Darkness must have been exhausted from your trip. I’m sure she won’t wake up till morning. And my husband and Komekko and I are all very sound sleepers. It’s very hard to wake us up, even if there were to be any loud noises or voices or… Well, you must be tired, Kazuma. Rest well!” She kept shoving me insistently toward the room where Megumin was asleep.
“Uh, s-sure… Thanks, I guess I’ll try to get some sleep… Hey, just so you know, Megumin and I have known each other long enough that there won’t be any…mistakes or anything. Our pervy Crusader is just the worrying type. You don’t have to listen to her, okay?”
“Oh, I understand, I know exactly what you’re saying. And of course, on the off chance that anything did happen, I’m sure you would take responsibility…!”
You know, I don’t think she understood very much at all.
She gave me one last, forceful push into Megumin’s room. “Sweet dreams…!” I heard her say behind me.
I turned to the dark room, a little annoyed. There was Megumin. I had no idea when they had brought her in here. While she was asleep, I could see how beautiful Megumin really was. A few rays of moonlight filtered in through the window and played gently across her face. Looking at her rich, soft black hair, I felt a tugging on my heart that I had never…
…What was I doing, getting infatuated? I saw Megumin every day. It was probably trauma from that thing with the orcs that suddenly left me all googly-eyed over her. When we got back to Axel, I would have to go to the succubi for some psychological care.
I was pretty tired, and thinking about dropping off to sleep.
…And then I heard a voice from just outside our room:
“ Lock !”
Megumin’s mom must have magically locked the door. I knew it was mostly my fault for stupidly running my mouth about all the money I was coming into, but I had to wonder whether Mom quite had all her marbles. No matter how much their daughter had written, did they really trust a guy they knew only by letter? Maybe they had a lot of confidence in what she’d told them.
…Whatever. Time for bed.
It was only when I took another look around that I realized.
The futon Megumin was sleeping on was the only one in the room.
8
Bathed in the moonlight that drifted gently through the window, I froze. The sight of Megumin, snoozing soundly, filled my vision. It was just the two of us here now. Aqua had already drifted off to the sleep of the drunk, while Yuiyui had ensured the two most likely interlopers, Hyoizaburou and Darkness, wouldn’t be conscious for a while… And then she’d locked the door so no one could get in or out of our room.
Talk about the perfect setup.
There was only one bed in the room. And although it was spring now, it still got cold at this time of night. Even indoors, I would probably catch a cold if I slept without some kind of cover over me. And what if it turned into pneumonia or something? I had heard the healing magic around here didn’t work on actual diseases. Death by illness was considered part of your natural life, and you couldn’t even be brought back with Resurrection. In other words, it was way worse to die of disease than to get killed in battle.
Anyway, what was I worried about? It wasn’t technically a problem for me to get under the covers with Megumin…
“…………”
I stood thinking for a long time. If I so much as laid a finger on the peacefully sleeping Arch-wizard, I would never again be able to deny it when Darkness or Aqua called me a monster or inhuman or all those other hurtful things. I was a gentleman! Not some animal. But I did have her parents’ permission. That meant I still had the upper hand, even if Megumin sued me or something. Or did I? I had no idea how this world’s legal system worked. Damn! I should’ve studied the law more closely. Then I might…
No, that wasn’t the issue.
It wasn’t a question of lawsuits or something. I’d been looking at this all the wrong way. Argh! This whole situation had even me confused.
Okay, calm down, Kazuma! Calm down and think!
It was really a bit of a chilly night for thinking, though. It was hard to think when you were too cold. First I needed to get under the covers and collect myself.
I wriggled into the bed, careful not to wake Megumin. I felt the heat of her body beside me, heard her deep breathing. Now I could finally think…
……………
No, I couldn’t! What a cunning trap. I had ended up in bed next to Megumin without even realizing what I was doing. I was about to try to get up again when I realized. Suppose I scrambled out of the bed. I guess Megumin would open her eyes at exactly that moment. And then—well, you’ve seen enough anime and manga to know what would happen next.
Yup. No matter what I said, I would be sure to get it. And I could swear up and down that I hadn’t touched her or that this was all her parents’ doing, but it wouldn’t matter.
Oh, man. This sucked. I was basically being framed as a perv.
Well, I wasn’t going to make the mistake of all my forebears. If I could see how not doing anything was going to get me into all kinds of undeserved trouble…!
Then I can at least revisualize this and make sure it isn’t a false accusation.
I could hear Megumin’s deep, even breathing.
Oh man. My heart’s really pounding.
It crossed my mind that I was about to do something totally unthinkable.
But hang on. I wasn’t some sexless saint. I was just an average guy, and I wanted to get it on as much as the next virile young man. Put a healthy guy like me into bed with a beautiful, helpless, sleeping woman, and there was bound to be a, you know, “mistake.”
It was Megumin’s parents who had engineered the situation. It was all right—I could beat the rap. In this situation, I could walk free even if Sena herself took me to court…!
So I steeled my resolve and was just about to make my move when…
…Megumin opened her eyes, blinking sleepily. She saw me lying there, trying to make sense of the situation.
“Good morning,” I said. “Did you sleep well?”
“Oh… Good morning, Kazuma… How long was I out…?”
It was late at night now—maybe not quite midnight but definitely a solid eight hours since Megumin had asked us to let her sleep for a while and then collapsed into bed. She gave a murmur of acknowledgment when I told her this…and then she suddenly seemed to register where we were.
“…And why are you sleeping in the same bed as me, Kazuma?” she asked, staring at the ceiling.
I, too, kept my eyes fixed above me as I replied, “…Don’t make me say it. It’s embarrassing.”
“What?!” She suddenly sat up.
“Hey, don’t steal the blankets; it’s cold. Anyway, chill out.”
“You expect me to be calm?! I wake up in my own room, in my own house, to find you in bed with me?! I couldn’t be calm if—!”
As she spoke, Megumin jumped out of the bed and patted herself down. She was probably checking to see if I’d done anything to her.
As a relieved look came over her face, I said, “Geez, do you really think I’m so disgusting that I would do something to you while you were asleep? What is this vibe I keep getting off you people? We’ve lived together for more than a year, and has anything happened? Darkness, too—she was super against us sleeping in the same room like this.” I straightened up the sheets Megumin had thrown aside when she jumped out of bed, letting only my head peek out from under the covers as I spoke. I was cold.
Megumin seemed a little lost for words at all this. “Er… W-well… You’re right. I’m sorry… It’s just that waking up to this was a little confusing… Y-you’re right. You do jokingly sexually harass me, but you’re not the kind of person who would actually do something untoward in a situation like this.” The ghost of a relieved smile passed over her face.
Still not letting anything more than my head out from under the covers, I said, “Damn straight. And don’t you forget it. The only reason I’m even in this room is because your mom trapped me here, okay? Shoved me right inside and locked the door with magic. Getting in bed with you was my only choice.”
Megumin sighed at this. “That mother of mine…,” she muttered, her shoulders slumping, as if everything I’d said made perfect sense to her. I rolled back the sheets and patted the bed next to me.
“So that’s that. Get in bed—it’s cold. Don’t worry, I won’t do anything.”
This drew a momentary frown from Megumin. She looked at the ground and said quietly, “…You really won’t do anything? Even though you’ve finally got me alone?”
Talk about suggestive. Wait—whoa. D-does she want me to do something? I mean, between this and the way she held my hand back at our campsite—I really am finally getting popular with the girls!
I immediately contradicted everything I had just said as forcefully as I could.
“Idiot, we’re finally alone—how could I not do something? I’ve even got your parents’ blessing!”
For some reason, this caused Megumin to run for the window.
“That’s what I thought! I’m staying at Yunyun’s house tonight!”
“Dammit! You set me up!”
Megumin jumped out the window of her room and disappeared into the dark.
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