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Chapter 2 

May There Be Eternal Slumber for the Lord of the Lake! 

 

“O Kazuma! Death should not have taken thee!” 

I found myself in an all-too-familiar white room. As I opened my eyes, I saw that the upbeat voice belonged to Eris. She could be surprisingly saucy. And actually, she seemed to know a lot about Japan. 

“…You’re in high spirits, Lady Eris.” 

“Sorry. It’s just that everybody says that, and I wanted to try it once.” She gave me a mischievous wink. To see a real goddess, with her unearthly beauty, do something so cute was practically enough to make me hyperventilate. 

Next, however, she scratched her cheek and looked a bit distressed. “Still, Kazuma, getting sent here doesn’t even seem to faze you anymore. Let’s see… Your friends are all okay. They’ve escaped the hydra and gotten somewhere safe. As far as your corpse, Darkness deliberately got herself eaten by the hydra and somehow managed to retrieve it.” 

Now, this was a goddess who knew what she was doing. She had calmed all my fears before I even had a chance to voice them. 

“Deliberately got herself eaten? God, she doesn’t know when to quit, does she?” 

After the monster had woken up, we’d somehow collected Aqua, and then Megumin had let loose with her Explosion. 

Which was great, as far as it went. 

“I don’t think that’s very fair, do you?” I found myself complaining to Eris. “Growing back its lost heads? I mean, really?” 

That’s right: Megumin’s blast blew off several of the hydra’s heads, but it magically regenerated them and then went on as if nothing had happened. 

There was another question, too… 

“What kind of shape is my body in after being eaten by a hydra? I’m pretty sure I can’t be resurrected if the injuries are too extensive…” 

And that would be the end of me. 

“Let’s…see… Yes! It’s all right! You can be resurrected! Only about thirty percent of your body is missing. That should be workable!” 

Maybe I would have been happier not knowing. 

“…G-great…!” I wilted a little. 

Eris looked at me pleadingly. “When you get back, don’t be too hard on Darkness, okay? I know she was the one who pushed you to fight this monster, but…she had her reasons—I promise. So… She’s absolutely racked with guilt over your death; she’s really in shock. Not as much as you, having just died and all, but still…” 

She looked very worried as she tried to console me. 

……… 

She really is a sweetheart… 

I tried to think. Did I have anyone like this in my life? Wiz? Yunyun? 

No, they were both very nice, but Lady Eris gave me this overwhelming sense of security, like an embrace. 

“Don’t worry—I won’t shout at her,” I said. “Say, Lady Eris, you told me once that you occasionally come down to the mortal plane to have a little fun. Do you ever happen to come by Axel? I’m always a little sorry that the only time we get to see each other is when I’ve just died…” 

Eris held back a giggle. “We’ve met each other repeatedly in the mortal realm. I think it’s about time you put two and two together. Honestly, I’m a little disappointed that you haven’t yet.” She sounded so teasing. 

 

*  *  * 

…Wha…? 

“Wait, what did you just say? That I have met you? You mean, like, in Axel? Wha…? What?” 

Even with this little hint, I couldn’t quite seem to grasp it. I had already met her? Repeatedly? 

When? Where? Who had I seen who might fit the bill? 

Watching me fret, Eris couldn’t hold back a little laughter. 

“Okay, let me give you a clue. Down there, I don’t look the way I do now. I’m a little more lively, and I don’t even speak exactly the same way.” 

A different appearance, livelier, and a different way of speaking…? 

“And I may be a goddess, but don’t use Aqua as a point of reference—not all goddesses end up as Arch-priests…” 

I hardly let her finish before I exclaimed, “Oh, I’ve got it! You’re Maris, aren’t you? The one who broke Keith’s nose when he was all, ‘I guess it’s true that the size of an Eris priest’s chest is inversely proportional to her faith!’” 

Eris started laughing again. “No, I’m afraid not.” 

Huh? 

No, wait, it has to be—! 

“Seris! The one who teamed up with Darkness to give Dust a beating after he was like, ‘I heard the goddess Eris pads her bra—I bet an Eris priest with big boobs would be in for some divine intervention! Are those even real? If you two aren’t using padding, you’d better prove it to me right now—off with those shirts!’” 

“Wrong again.” Eris was still smiling, but I thought I could sense a hint of anger, too. 

But if she wasn’t Maris and she wasn’t Seris, then who…? 

Just as I was starting to sweat, Aqua, with her impeccable ability to spoil a moment, started shouting: 

“Kazuma! Kazumaaaa! The resurrection’s all set! Hurry up and get back here! Darkness is really depressed, and she smells funny! Come on—hurry up!” 

It bugged me a little that Darkness was feeling down, but I had more important things to attend to right now. 

Having said that, I was also totally out of ideas. “Lady Eris, I give! I give up; I’m sorry! Please tell me the answer; I’m begging you! Otherwise, what if I accidentally do something rude to you without knowing it and end up incurring your wrath?” 

Eris looked like she couldn’t quite decide what to do. “Something rude? Wrath? I think it’s a little late to be worrying about that, after what you did to me the first time we met…” 

“Huh?” 

“Nothing, nothing. My true manifestation is a secret.” She pointed meaningfully at herself. “And while we’re at it, don’t believe everything my senior goddess says to you, okay? I’m not w-wearing any pads, at least not right now!” She patted her chest for emphasis, blushing just a little. 

Then the white door I knew so well appeared in front of me. I started to panic slightly. She still hadn’t told me who she was on the mortal plane! 

Completely ignoring my plight, the door began to open, a bright light shining from within… 

“H-hey! Lady Eris, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to make you mad! I didn’t mean for you to sulk! I honestly don’t care about the size of your chest, I swear!” 

“Farewell, Mr. Kazuma Satou! I certainly hope the next time you see me here, you’ll have figured out who I am. Bye-bye, now! Have a safe trip!” 

Eris’s cheeks were still red, and she refused to tell me the answer to the bitter end. But the crimson color in her skin made me notice something: a white line on her right cheek. 

“Huh? Lady Eris, there’s something on your ch—” 

I didn’t get to finish my sentence before she shoved me through the cold, unfeeling gate. 

“Welgome bag, Gazuma!” 

I opened my eyes to see Aqua holding her nose. 

The reek that suddenly assaulted me caused me to jump to my feet. “Holy—! It stinks in here!” 

There was a sour, fishy smell, and it was coming from… 

“Me?! Is my body making that stench?!” 

I guess when you spend enough time in the stomach of a hydra, you start to smell like it. 

Then something else dawned on me: No one would meet my gaze. And that, in turn, led me to another revelation. I was stark naked. 

“My clothes dissolved, huh…?” 

“Yes, they did. Would you cover yourself already? Anyway, Kazuma, there’s so little of you left that we should call you Kid-zuma for a while. Your armor is done for. That sword of yours, the one with the weird name—it’s still here, but the scabbard is gone.” 

“I shall not stand idly by while you belittle the name I bestowed upon that sword!” 

Megumin was all over Aqua. I ignored them, taking up the bare katana that was left. 

“And what are you so upset about?” I asked. 

Darkness was over in the corner with her knees up to her chest, looking downcast; she smelled as bad as I did and was no more popular because of it. She shuddered when I spoke and looked at me apologetically. 

“Aren’t you angry with me for forcing us into that fight?” 

“Why the heck would I be angry with you? Yeah, you were the one who was all excited to go for it, but it’s not like we aren’t used to fighting the Demon King’s generals and big game…or me dying.” 

“That’s true, I guess…” This seemed to throw the normally straightforward Darkness off her rhythm. 

“That wasn’t like you,” I said. “I heard from Lady Eris how you got yourself eaten by the hydra just to help me. Heck, I can see you’ve got blood specks here and there. Are you okay? You don’t look too dissolved.” 

Darkness glanced at me. “This blood splattered on me after I rescued you. I had to cut my way out of the hydra. Much longer in there, and I would have suffocated and perished as well. But I’m okay now. I’m not injured.” 

She still looked pretty bleak. 

“I appreciate your going in to get my body,” I said. “Thanks. Hey, come on, let’s hurry home and take a bath. Sound good?” I smiled as if to say, No worries, right? 

“Hey, Kazuma, I’m glad you’re trying to cheer up Darkness, but I don’t think you should be offering her a bath in that state.” 

Oh, that’s right. Naked. Oops. 

“I finally understand why the royal knights haven’t offed that hydra yet. It’s not that they won’t; it’s that they can’t.” 

We were on the road back to Axel, reflecting on the battle with the monster. We practically had to drag Darkness, who still seemed depressed about something. 

“Apparently, a Kowloon Hydra uses all that magic to regenerate lost heads,” Megumin said. “To defeat it, one would need to hit it with such immense firepower that it would be unable to regenerate, or otherwise to wound it over and over, forcing it to use up all its magic regenerating, and then finally deal it a mortal blow when it was out of MP. Neither seems very practical…” 

She was right about that. And hydras weren’t stupid. You could keep on hurting it, but that was why it fled to the bottom of the lake to regenerate its MP. As for firepower, what could we use that would be more powerful than one of Megumin’s explosions? 

I looked back at Darkness, who was trudging along at the tail of our formation. “Megumin’s right,” I said. “This one’s too much for us. Let’s just let the knights deal with the hydra. They can work down its magic until it goes to sleep. You okay with that, Darkness?” 

After a long pause, “Yeah” was the only answer we got. 

Had she really been that interested in taking out a big bounty? 

Then Aqua spoke up, looking inordinately pleased with herself for some reason. “Well, it’s not all bad news. Thanks to me, that hydra won’t be coming out of that lake anytime soon! It’ll consider the water I purified to be an infringement on its territory, and it’ll be busy polluting the lake again. That should buy enough time for the knights to arrive and take care of things.” 

“Hold on a second,” I said. “What’s this? Did you actually do something worthwhile? Something almost…clever?” 

The two of us were ecstatic, but Megumin, riding on Aqua’s back, offered, “When Aqua is this confident, there’s usually a catch.” 

Why did she have to go and jinx us? 

I was normally the one to give Megumin a piggyback ride after she had used up her MP, but today she asked Aqua to do it, claiming I smelled funny. 

“No, no, I don’t think there’ll be any trouble this time,” I said. “Heck, even if there is, it won’t be our fault. We were the ones who bought some time for the knights to get there!” 

“That’s right!” Aqua added. “Do you have some problem with the way I work? I can’t believe you, Megumin! You’d better be nice, or I’ll make you ride with Kazuma or Darkness.” 

“Please, anything but that! I apologize!” 

We got back to town without any special trouble. 

“Megumin and I will go report to the Guild. You two stink bombs should go home and take a bath. The way you look right now, Kazuma, you’d probably just get arrested anyway.” 

At the moment, I was covered in nothing but a cape I had borrowed from Megumin, and between that and the smell, I was eager not to attract too much attention. 

“Let’s go, Megumin! Be sure to exaggerate what we did as much as possible. We can’t get a reward for killing the monster, but maybe we can score some cash!” 

“Just leave it to me! I shall spare them no detail of the impressiveness of my Explosion!” 

Somewhat against my better judgment, I let the two of them go, and Darkness and I headed back to the house. 

Once we were home, I let the still-gloomy Darkness take the first bath, then I went in and soaked until the smell was finally gone. 

“It’s kind of scary what a person can get used to,” I muttered to myself as I sank into the tub. “I just died, but it doesn’t especially bother me.” I looked down at my body, about a third of which had been destroyed. Aqua had joked about calling me Kid-zuma, but I had been healed back to my, uh, original size, right? 

There in the bath, I did a thorough inspection of the parts of me that had gone missing. 

I heard Darkness’s worried voice from the changing room. “Kazuma, you’re taking even longer than usual in there today. Do you hurt? Or are you still trying to recover your physical strength after coming back to life?” 

“I-I’m just fine! No problem! That smell was awful, right? I’m just making sure it’s all washed off.” 

Darkness was kind enough to be concerned about me despite her own depression. I could hardly tell her that I was making sure I hadn’t “shrunk” after having my body restored. 

In spite of my assurances, Darkness didn’t go anywhere. She was just standing there. Was there something she wanted to say? 

After a moment, she managed to come out with, “Hey, Kazuma. I’m… I’m sorry I forced us into that hunt. Everything’s gone so well for us in the past, I guess I just got overconfident. I really wanted to take down that hydra.” 

“Well, I think we’ve seen the last of it anyway,” I said. “All’s well that ends well. What’s taking Aqua and Megumin so long? I bet they stopped at the Guild for a nice meal. Let’s hurry over and catch up with them there.” 

“Y-yeah… Sounds good…” Darkness still didn’t seem very happy. 

…Was there some kind of connection between that hydra and her? Or did it have something to do with that butler from the other day? 

“I left you a change of clothes in here, okay? I’ll be waiting in the living room.” 

She was about to leave the changing room. 

“Is there some reason you feel like you have to defeat that hydra?” I asked. 

“?! W-well, I…!” 

Bingo. 

She didn’t say anything else, though, and for a second I wondered what to do. I wouldn’t normally be too keen on going a second round with an opponent who had just killed me. But it seemed like the despondent Darkness couldn’t bring herself to ask to go back and fight the hydra again. 

“…Things didn’t work out today,” I said after a second, “but the next time we fight that hydra, we’ll make sure we have a plan. All right?” 

“Wha—?!” 

I couldn’t help but tease her a little. “What, all that talk about keeping the citizens safe and stuff, and you were just gonna give up on that monster?” 

“I was not, you idiot! Who do you think I am?! Protecting the populace is the very mission of the Dustiness family! The next time we meet that hydra, it’s done for!” 

Ah, the familiar bluster. I felt like I had gotten a little bit of the old Darkness back. 

Having both taken our baths and gotten rid of the delightful smell, we arrived at the Adventurers Guild. I assumed Aqua and Megumin were already finished making the report. I opened the door, and… 

“Why?! Why must you always do these outrageous things to us?!” 

“It’s true! Aqua, you remember the other day when you turned the fishmonger’s tank to pure water and killed all the fish he got from the ocean?” 

“B-but I thought I was doing them a favor! That fish tank was so small. I thought the least I could do was give them some nice clean water.” 

“What do we do?! We can’t deal with a Kowloon Hydra on our own!” 

“M-Mommy! I wanna go home!” 

“Pass around those wanted posters! More posters! One for every adventurer in town!” 

The Guild was in an absolute uproar. Adventurers and staff were shouting, and right there in the middle of it all, Aqua was standing and weeping. 

“Oh! Kazuma, Darkness, thank goodness you’re here!” Megumin said when she spotted us. “You have to do something about this!” She worked her way through the commotion to reach us. 

“And what is ‘this’?” I asked. “What’s got everyone so upset? It looks like they’re all angry at Aqua, but I thought we did pretty well this time.” 

“W-we did! And the hydra would have woken up eventually with or without us, so there’s no reason everyone should be this upset…” Megumin, never keen on confrontation, shrank into herself. Darkness grabbed a passing guild girl. 

“Hey, what’s going on here? I know we failed to defeat the monster, but there’s no call to make this much fuss about it. We didn’t manage to kill the thing, but at least we bought some time until the royal knights arrive.” 

“Th-that’s just it. Your timing couldn’t be worse. It seems there was some kind of problem in the capital, and the knights don’t have time to trouble themselves with the likes of us…” 

Some kind of problem?! 

“Spill it! What’s going on?! Is the capital in trouble?! Is my adorable little sister in danger?!” 

“L-little sister? No, it sounds like the trouble occurred a short while ago and is mostly over now. It seems nothing serious came of it. Right now, the knights are on a manhunt for this person who turned the capital upside down…” 

I felt my heart start beating again. I had been on the verge of running off to the capital myself. 

“Apparently, a group calling itself the Silver-Haired Thief Brigade actually managed to infiltrate the royal castle…” 

Darkness and I both just about choked. The employee didn’t seem to notice us, though. She held out a sheet of paper. “Just two people managed to overcome the royal knights and a group of highly capable adventurers to boldly rob the castle of several important treasures.” 

I took the paper and looked at it. It was a wanted poster. Across the top it read, SILVER-HAIRED THIEF B RIGADE. It depicted a villainous-looking guy in a mask, along with a silver-haired boy. The reward was two hundred million eris. 

Man oh man. They were offering almost as much for me as for a general of the Demon King… 

“Two hundred million… Two hundred million…” 

“D-Darkness? Don’t look at me like that.” 

Darkness normally showed no particular interest in money, but she was holding a wanted poster and giving me the crazy eye. 

The Guild employee gave us a somewhat puzzled look but said, “The upshot is that we don’t know when or if a unit of knights will actually come here.” 

Crap! That makes pretty much everything our fault. 

The employee, totally oblivious to my mounting anxiety, continued, “But there is some hope. A few of the knights went all the way to Crimson Magic Village to see a famous fortune-teller who would tell them where the criminal was. Apparently, the fiend is right here in Axel! And the knights are on his trail like a pack of hounds!” 

I broke out in a sweat. 

“So we need your help, Mr. Kazuma Satou. You and your party have such good luck with big bounties like this one—if you can catch the thief, I’m sure the knights will be able to spare some men to help us!” 

“Uhhh… I’m sure you’re…right,” I said. I was trying to act calm, but Darkness jabbed me with her elbow. 

“It’s only a matter of time until they catch the thief,” she said. “After all, our own town is home to a fortune-teller even more powerful than the one in Crimson Magic Village!” 

I knew who she meant. Someone wearing a mask very much like the one shown on this wanted poster. 

This was bad. That demon loved his money, and for a bounty like mine, I was sure he would turn in his own business partner without so much as a second thought. 

Suddenly, Darkness was frowning and trembling. The Guild employee clenched her fist as if to emphasize how high her expectations were. 

“I just know you’ll do everything you can to help us, Mr. Satou!” 

She smiled widely. 

I, of course, decided to go full shut-in. 

“One day in the woods, there a mighty dragon stood…” 

Aqua sat with her feet up on the sofa, looking out the window at the pouring rain as she hummed a song. As ever, she was holding her egg, projecting a beam of warm light onto it from her palm. She claimed that singing to the egg was a way of helping the animal inside learn before he was born. 

Megumin jumped up and said, loudly enough to drown out Aqua’s singing, “Kazuma, revenge! We must take revenge on that hydra!” 

I was sitting cross-legged on the floor, brushing Chomusuke. 

It had been three days since we’d fled the Adventurers Guild. Now that I knew people were on the hunt for me personally, I stuck close to Aqua to avoid Vanir’s future vision and never left the house. 

The miserly demon seemed to have trouble seeing people who were around Aqua; it was my good luck that Aqua, still obsessed with hatching her egg, never left the house, either. 

Megumin, apparently impatient with the shut-in lifestyle, urged us on a daily basis to seek revenge. 

“I heard you before,” I said, “but how exactly are we supposed to defeat that monster? I’ve been thinking about it, but I haven’t been able to come up with a good plan.” 

Megumin clutched her staff and clenched her teeth. “Firepower is the answer! We need to hit it with even more! If one Explosion isn’t enough, we must drop them on the foe until it is wiped out of existence! If you could use Drain Touch to transfer Aqua’s MP to me like you did during the battle with Mobile Fortress Destroyer, I believe it would be possible!” 

Megumin’s impassioned argument caused Aqua to leave off singing. “No way. Why should I have to be subject to some corrupt Lich skill like Drain Touch? I’m tired of having to put up with that. Kazuma can try to threaten me and Darkness can try to bribe me and you can go as crazy as you like, Megumin, but I say no way. My holy MP isn’t something I dole out to just anyone!” 

I gently ran the brush along Chomusuke’s tail. “And what have you been doing with your oh-so-important MP lately? You don’t have to look after that egg every waking minute. Just leave it in front of the fire. If you leave it too long, you can just have it for lunch.” 

“You’re gonna get a taste of my holy fist the next time you mention snacking on this egg. I’ll have you know that I’m pouring MP into this dragon egg. Dragons can practically be described as balls of magic, so the more MP they have, the stronger they are. And this dragon is going to stand above all his kinfolk! As his mother, I want to do everything I can for him.” 

…She was bent on insisting she had a dragon egg. Fine. Forget about her. 

“Anyway, Megumin, why do you want revenge so badly? I know Darkness has some weird fixation on this hydra, but what have you got against it?” 

“Well, you know, this and that. For starters, it did kill you. Should I not want to avenge you with my own hands?” 

“O-oh. Gosh. Well, that’s…” 

I had to admit, hearing that had a certain appeal. 

“Recently, Darkness and I have been going to the hydra’s lake every day, using Darkness’s Decoy skill to draw it out, and then hitting it with Explosion before fleeing home. But despite our persistent harassment, we can’t figure out any other good way of dealing with it.” 

“I thought I hadn’t heard the daily boom outside recently. So that’s what you’ve been up to! Right now the monster doesn’t seem too interested in attacking the town or anything, so don’t antagonize it. And you, Darkness! You’ve been encouraging her? I thought it was your job to stop her from doing stuff like that!” 

“Er, hmm,” Darkness muttered from where she was seated on the carpet, polishing her armor. She couldn’t bring herself to look at me. “But I so desperately want to defeat that hydra. And this is a way of whittling down its MP…” 

It was obvious by now that she really did want to bring down the hydra herself. Not that I had any way of knowing why… 

“Whatever. We can’t do anything until this rain lets up anyway. We’re talking about a water monster; trying to fight it in a downpour would only give it the advantage. When the rain stops, then we’ll see what we can do.” 

Honestly, what I really wanted was to wait until the whole bounty-poster thing blew over. 

“But it’s the rainy season,” Megumin said. “According to the weather fortune-teller, the rain won’t stop for a while.” 

“When the rain lets up, we’ll see what we can do.” 

“Why, you! What you’re really saying is that you can’t be bothered!” 

“Hey, what’re you doing? Stop it! Don’t take it out on Chomusuke!” 

Megumin had grabbed the brush and was trying to keep me from grooming Chomusuke’s tail. 

Out of all of us, only Darkness looked really serious as she sat there relentlessly polishing her armor. 

Several days passed, but the rain didn’t stop. Aqua and I stayed shut up in the house, while Darkness and Megumin kept going out to face the hydra. 

Today was no different… 

“We’re home! I am sorry, but please prepare a bath. You know how Darkness is!” 

In they came, Darkness carrying Megumin on her back and smelling sour. 

“Did you get eaten again? I thought you were just going to smack it with an Explosion and run away. This is dangerous. You guys have to stop.” 

Darkness sloughed the immobile Megumin off onto the carpet, then started to remove her own armor, breathing heavily. She had just polished the stuff the other day, and now it was covered in scratches and spatters of hydra blood. 

“That accursed beast!” she said. “Maybe it’s not just chance that it’s survived so many days of Explosions. Before I could use my Decoy skill, it ambushed us. Megumin didn’t have time to chant her magic. That was a real tight spot… But we got out of it somehow, then I had Megumin hit it with Explosion, and while it was busy regenerating its heads, we got away. I guess beating this thing really isn’t as simple as it seems.” 

She sighed, even as Aqua wandered up and cast Heal on her. When Darkness finally had her armor off, she thanked Aqua and then headed for the bath. 

“…Hey, Kazuma,” Aqua said, “can you really not think of any ideas of how to score a quick victory over that hydra? You’re so weak, but your redeeming features are your wide range of not very valuable skills and the way you can think of a dirty trick to get out of any situation.” 

“Oh, hey, something just came to me. First we tie you up in chains, and then we throw you into the lake. When the hydra swallows you, we get a whole bunch of adventurers to pull on the chains and fish it up. Then we make sure it can’t get back in the water and beat the stuffing out of it. What do you think?” 

““……”” 

Aqua launched herself at me, but I grabbed her egg and held it hostage until she calmed down. 

“Personally,” Megumin said, “I don’t have any problem with it, given that I can make use of my Explosion. But don’t you think Darkness has been acting a bit strange lately?” 

She looked in the direction of the bath, where Darkness had retreated. 

“…Phew. …? Uh, Kazuma, what are you doing to my armor?” 

When Darkness came back from her bath, she found me crouched next to her armor. Megumin was sitting beside me, watching me work. 

“I’m fixing it. It was all beat up when you came home today. You know how rainy it’s been recently. I’ve been looking for stuff I can do here at home.” I worked out the dents in the armor with a mallet, using my Smith skill for the first time in a while. 

Darkness almost seemed to turn shy. “You know, I remember you fixing my armor on the road when we went to the hot springs together, too.” She paused. “I’d like it if we could all go back there again.” 

“Not me,” I said. “I can’t stand that town. Those people are nuttier than Megumin.” 

“Hey! I shall have you tell me what kind of nuts we are talking about!” 

I shoved her away—I was trying to work, here—as Darkness looked on in amusement. 

“Yeah, but…even so, I wouldn’t mind,” she murmured. Her words seemed to carry a deeper meaning. 

Some time later… 

“Kazuma, she’s not here! When I went to wake her up, her room was empty!” 

“Ohhh, that Crusader! I explicitly told her not to go to that lake anymore. Why must she be such a terrible listener?!” 

Darkness, who had told Megumin it was too dangerous to bring along any companions, had started going to the hydra’s lair on her own each day. She ignored our attempts to stop her and would come home ragged every time. We started taking turns guarding her, but… 

“How could you be asleep, you idioooot?!” 

“Waaaaah! I’m tired, too, you know! I take care of Emperor Zel all day! Being a parent is hard work! You could stand to have a little sympathy!” 

“Parent, my ass! Gimme that egg! I’m starting to think it looks mighty tasty!” 

“Stop! I’ve been heating that egg for so long that if you broke it open now, something terrible might happen! If you saw what was inside, it would break your heart!” 

Aqua clutched the egg to her stomach and hunched over so she looked like a turtle. I was practically spitting as I bellowed, “Who cares about a stupid egg right now anyway?! Darkness is more important! What the hell does she think she’s doing?! Is it some stupid thing about a Crusader’s duty or her mission as a noble to protect this town or whatever?” 

“We can worry about Darkness’s motivation later,” Megumin said. “That hydra is learning. Darkness gets hurt worse and worse every day—we can’t let this go on forever!” Never a fan of unexpected situations, she was clutching her staff. 

I estimated that Darkness had snuck out of the house around dawn. 

“Hey, Kazuma, is there really nothing we can do about that hydra? I’m going to drop off my egg at Wiz’s shop, then Megumin and I are going to chase down Darkness and give her a piece of our minds. Do you want to come along? Although I’ll understand if you’re too scared to face an enemy who’s already killed you once.” 

She was still crouched over her egg. It was an unusual thing to hear from Aqua, who typically wasn’t much into conflict and battles. 

If even she was up to doing this, then I could hardly stay at home by myself… 

Ahh, dammit! 

“There’s somewhere I need to go. You two, just bring Darkness home somehow. If you run into the hydra, don’t fight it. Just run back here.” 

The two girls nodded. 

Left alone in the house, I grabbed some eris bills from my room and put them nonchalantly into my wallet. 

“That stupid idiot. I guess I’ve got no choice!” 

To help my stubborn noblewoman, I would do what I had to do. 

The next morning. 

I got up early and headed for the lake. 

On their way to the lake the day before, Aqua and Megumin had run into a battered and dirty Darkness heading in the opposite direction. Darkness told me later, with an embarrassed smile, that Aqua had healed her wounds and then lectured her all the way home. 

It looked like our Crusader genuinely had no intention of leaving the hydra alone. 

I looked at the lake that spread out before me, waiting for Darkness. I was sure she would come, and I presumed Aqua and Megumin would be with her. 

Finally, around noon, Darkness showed up with our other companions in tow. She stopped short, and her mouth hung open when she saw us. 

That’s right, us: Standing behind me was every adventurer I could find in Axel Town. 

As Darkness stood immobile, the gathered adventurers began to call out to her: 

“Hey! You’re late, Lalatina!” 

“I knew you’d come, sweet Lalatina!” 

“Lalatina!” 

“Lalatina!!” 

“…” 

“Stop it, Lalatina! They only called you by your name—you need to stop silently strangling me! St-stop! Quit it already!” 

The teasing of the adventurers had caused Lalatina to grab me, weeping. 

“What’s the big idea, Kazuma? If this is some new form of harassment, two can play that game!” 

“No! Why would I get all these people together for something as dumb as that? I just told everyone that you’d been fighting the Kowloon Hydra all by yourself day after day and begged them for help!” 

“—?!” 

Darkness let go of my shirt and looked around at everyone gathered there. 

“Look! Lalatina’s turning red!” 

“Be nice! I know what she looks like, but our dear Lalatina is still a delicate young woman. We need sweet Lalatina’s strength to defeat the hydra. What’ll we do if you make her run home crying?” 

“And Kazuma’s been good about keeping us all in wine. Yesterday he treated us to some of the most expensive stuff available! Nothing wrong with doing him a good turn. Whatever Lalatina wants, Lalatina gets!” 

“You hear that, Darkness?” I interjected. “Look at all the people who came out to help when they heard about the stupid things you were doing every day, stupid. It’s one thing to have muscles for brains, but you’ve got to stop worrying people like this.” 

Darkness, blushing furiously, replied in a small voice, “Th-thanks…” 

“I’m sorry? What’s that?” 

I was hoping to force her to repeat it much more loudly, but she only glared at me with teary eyes and looked around again, still embarrassed, at everyone there. Each time someone met her eyes, they looked away bashfully again or gave a friendly smile. After a minute, Darkness herself started to smile, too. 

“Everyone, thank y—” 

“Waaaaah! Kazuma! Kazuma!! I’m not sure, but I think the hydra is waking up faster than usual!” 

The interruption came from Aqua, who had gone into the lake at some point. 

At the same time, Megumin, preparing her magic on the shore, said, “That’s why I told you it would be better not to get in the lake until Kazuma’s signal!” 

“But! But!! I wanna get home so I can see Zel hatch…!” 

Aqua’s timing couldn’t have been worse for Darkness, who had finally mustered the courage to thank everyone. Now the Crusader stood blushing and quivering. 

There was a massive splash as the Kowloon Hydra launched itself out of the water after Aqua. 

“Each and every one of you is completely, utterly useless!” 

Battle, start! 

Things began a little more suddenly than I would’ve liked, but basically the battle went like this: 

“Thieves, you have your steel wires? Archers, get your hook-tipped arrows ready and wait for my signal!” 

“Waaaaaah, do it! Do it fast!” 

Step one: Aqua lures the hydra to the water’s edge. 

“Tanks, hold position—it’s your job to make sure the back row stays safe!” 

Step two: Men and women in armor ward off the hydra’s attacks. 

“Wizards, get those spells ready to use at any time! I’m looking for the most powerful stuff you’ve got! Put everything into it; we’re not going to get a second try!” 

“Just leave it to me! This time my Explosion shall definitively decimate that deplorable dastard!” 

Step three: We get our biggest, baddest magic ready to strike the finishing blow. 

And then… 

“Darkness, you get right in front of that thing and use your Decoy skill! This is all down to your toughness! Don’t let it make mincemeat of you this time!” 

“Who do you think I am?! Everything else aside, defense is the one thing no one can best me at!” 

Step four: Darkness gets the hydra’s attention and fights it head-on! 

“Hey, Kazuma! What about me? What should I be doing?” 

“If you’ve already buffed everybody, then there’s nothing for you to do until people start getting hurt! Just pick somewhere out of the way and cheer us on!” 

“Aww, no fair! I want something to do, too!” 

And then, when Darkness had the hydra pinned down… 

“Darkness! You’re up!” 

“Damn right I am! Hey! I’m the one you want! Decoy!” 

Darkness activated her skill from her place on the lakeshore. While the hydra was distracted, I used my Ambush skill to make myself as inconspicuous as possible as I crept toward the monster. 

Those eight heads could have sent any of the rest of us straight to Eris, as I already knew from experience. Darkness, however, just set her jaw and endured the full force of the monster’s attack. 

““““Bind!”””” 

The hydra came up on land to pursue Darkness, and the moment its eight heads were all in roughly the same place, the thieves used their wires to tie the creature’s various necks together. At the same moment, the archers let loose with their hooked arrows. The arrows would have bounced off the creature’s hard scales, but they lodged themselves nicely among the wires. 

Once the adventurers were confident the hooks were set, they began a great tug-of-war on the attached ropes. This brought the hydra even farther away from the lake and prevented it from running away. 

As all this was happening, I was getting close with Ambush until I jumped on the hydra’s back, feeling its scales under my hands. 

“If you have to be out of MP before we can kill you, then let me help you get rid of all that magic!” 

The instant I started using Drain Touch to absorb its MP, the hydra started thrashing wildly. I guess Aqua did say something about dragons being basically living lumps of magical power—this critter was awfully sensitive to having its magic absorbed. 

“Yippee ki-yay! It’s working! It’s— Whoaaaaa!” 

When I started draining its magic, the hydra began fighting furiously to free its necks, but restrained by Bind, it couldn’t reach me on its back. 

One of the adventurers watching the scene cried out, “Kazuma, get out of there! What are you, nuts?! What do you think you’re doing up there?” 

“It’s okay! I’m using one of my secret skills to help weaken this big lug! Wizards, when all its MP is gone, let loose with your—” 

That was as far as I got before the hydra twisted its whole body and tried to slam its back into the ground. 

Crud! 

“Eeeyiiikes! I’m gonna get smooshed!” 

“Idiot! What do you think you’re doing?!” As I was thrown from the hydra’s back, Darkness immediately covered me with her body. Notwithstanding the fact that I had been nearly crushed, having Darkness that close to me got me in a bit of a tizzy. As the hydra came rolling over, Darkness put herself in a push-up position to prevent me from being squished. 

“That’s my Miss Dustiness! Endurance and upper body strength till the cows come home!” 

“Shut your mouth and move your butt! I can’t…go on like this…” 

Darkness may or may not have been fine if the hydra continued to roll over on us, but for me, it definitely wouldn’t have been pretty. 

With Darkness red-faced above me, I reached out toward the hydra. “Keep going, Darkness!” I said. “You have to hold out a little longer; don’t give up! Just stay right where you are!” 

“I-is this—? Is this the fabled edging play?! I’m sorry, I can’t—it’s too much…!” 

Darkness had been here every day, whittling away the hydra’s MP. I wasn’t about to let all her effort go to waste by letting this thing get away now! 

I simultaneously threw myself into two separate activities: using Drain Touch and scolding Darkness. 

“You finally decide to start being some help and you’re already finished?! I thought you were planning to defend your title in the Endurance Championship! And you can’t even put up with this? Finish what you started! Are you really gonna give up so easily with all these adventurers watching?!” 

“—?! Being physically crushed by a hydra and emotionally crushed by this man’s words at the same time! What have I done to deserve such a reward?! Why today of all days?!” 

Darkness’s whole body was shaking, her face red and her eyes brimming with tears. Every muscle was dripping with sweat, but somehow she managed to hold out. 

I continued to drain the monster with all my might. The hydra flung its captive heads around, slamming them into Darkness. 

“Pull! Puuull!” The beefy adventurers who had been guarding our back row were now pulling mightily on the ropes attached to the arrows attached to the wires attached to the hydra. Apparently, they intended to rescue Darkness from her trial of endurance. 

Darkness gave me a contented smile and whispered, “I… I can’t hold on anymore… But d-don’t…worry, Kazuma… At least we’ll die together…” 

“Oh, I’m worried! Don’t you quit! I’m the only one who would die anyway! You’re the one with all the buffs and everything! You think just being squashed flat by a hydra would kill you?!” 

My equipment at that moment was minimal, partly because most of my gear had been dissolved in the hydra’s stomach the other day. At this rate, with my laughably weak defenses, I was as good as dead. 

And I was not keen on dying twice in such a short time. 

“If—if I give up, you’ll die… Ahh! What is this? You’re ordering me to endure, almost as if you were my master, and yet at the same time, I hold your life in my hands! Oh, the paradox! Which of us is the master now?! I’ve never tasted such a sensation before, Kazuma…!” 

Great. What had happened to the thoughtful, serious Darkness I’d seen recently? The cool one? 

It was at that moment of utmost crisis that we heard it: 

“Look! The hydra’s weak now! And it can’t even move! I lay claim to the great bounty, the Kowloon Hydra! The money goes to whoever kills it—all the money! I’m not sharing with anyone!” 

“Hold on, how can you say that in a situation like this?! And it can move—it’s just that its heads are bound. So watch out! Oh! Dust! Duuust!” 

I recognized those voices. At the same moment, the weight on top of us lightened considerably. Some strong, brave person must have pulled the hydra off us at last. 

Darkness and I managed to crawl out from under the rampaging monster and scuttle back to where Megumin was waiting. 

“Light of Saber!!” 

I knew that spell from all the times I had heard it invoked at Crimson Magic Village. I looked in the direction of the voice to discover that Yunyun of the Crimson Magic Clan had inserted herself into the battle at some point and launched her spell at the hydra’s heads. It looked like someone had been eaten and she was rescuing them. 

Actually, why hadn’t I noticed her there sooner? Was she just that easy to miss? Come to think of it, I remembered somebody hesitantly calling out to me on the way here, but I had been so busy thinking about Darkness… 

Then one of the adventurers shouted, “Check it out! The head she cut off isn’t regenerating!” 

I looked for myself, and sure enough, the hydra was down to seven heads. It looked like the monster was trying to flee back into the lake, but several heavily armored adventurers tugged on the ropes and made sure it stayed where it was. 

“Okay, wizards, you’re up!” 

I shouted to our magic users, who had been waiting eagerly to unleash all of their most powerful spells. 

“Open fire!” 

At my order, a storm of magic slammed into the hydra. Fireballs and lightning bolts went flying, including the full wrath of two Crimson Magic Clan mages. 

“Light of Saber!!!” A blindingly bright blade of light sliced at the hydra’s necks as Yunyun gave Megumin a triumphant look. 

A corner of Megumin’s mouth twitched upward; her red eyes flashed, and she brandished her staff. 

“Explosion magic incoming!” shouted someone, no doubt from Axel Town and of long acquaintance with Megumin’s magic. “Everyone near the water’s edge, evacuate!” 

“Cover your ears!” someone else yelled. 

“Now! Now I shall take revenge for Kazuma! May this be a flower I offer at his grave, a fragrant blossom whose aroma he can smell up in heaven…!” 

Hey. Revenge is all well and good, but I’m standing right here. 

“Explosion!!!!” 

The light from Megumin’s staff lanced toward the hydra, which had already been the subject of so much magical abuse. The bounty head that had made this area a wasteland for so long gave one last, great scream before it went to its eternal rest. 

“You must recognize my victory! I eliminated six hydra heads, whereas you were responsible for only two, Yunyun! Anyone can see which of these numbers is greater!” 

“Wh-why should you win, Megumin? You just stood around until the hydra was nearly unconscious! I was out there helping to rescue someone who got eaten; I must get points for that!” 

“Yes, perhaps one point, for rescuing a punk who thought he was going to claim the entire reward for himself and instead only got swallowed. But if you truly consider yourself a member of the Crimson Magic Clan, then surely you understand the importance of waiting for the right moment to grab your glory!” 

With the hydra in the books, we and the other adventurers were going back to Axel in high spirits. Megumin and Yunyun (the former having strong-armed the latter into giving her a piggyback ride) had been going at it like this all the way home. 

Despite how powerful our opponent had been, we had finished the job with just a single casualty, and that person had already been resurrected by Aqua. 

Keith and Rin, whose party I had once joined, were chatting with me. 

“Man, oh man,” Keith was saying. “I guess we really can do great things when we need to! Er, although maybe it wouldn’t have been possible without you and your party, Kazuma.” 

“That’s for sure,” Rin said. “I know we agreed to split the bounty, but you guys should definitely get more. Maybe you can take the share of the idiot who said that the one who kills the hydra gets all the money.” 

The truth was, though, that it had taken all of us to bring down this monster. And so… 

“All right, then!” I said. “I know we’re all tired from that hydra. Let’s take it easy today and get our reward tomorrow!” 

““““Yeah! Whoo-hoo!”””” 

“You’ve gotta be kiiiidding!” 

I thought I heard a disappointed moan mixed in with the cheering. I glanced over happily at Darkness, who was walking beside me. The nervousness and unhappiness she had shown lately were gone, as if she had been freed of whatever had been possessing her. 

“So how do you feel now that the hydra’s gone? Think you can start getting some sleep again?” 

“I do. You’ve helped me figure out a few different things,” she said. “Things I now feel silly for having worried so much about. But it’s not the death of the hydra that’s made me feel better.” She smiled for the first time in days. “I remembered how much I like the people in this town. That’s helped me get over my hesitation. I’m not afraid anymore, and I won’t have any regrets.” 

“Every once in a while, you manage to keep a straight face saying something that would embarrass anyone else.” 

Darkness pinched my side gently in response to my teasing. Then she said: 

“I can’t tell you how happy I am.” 

Again, someone else might feel silly making a declaration like that. 

“Hey, venerate me more! Praise me! Say, ‘Thank you so much for so generously bringing me back to life, Lady Aqua!’” 

“Yo, Kazuma! It’s great to be back from the dead and all, but this priest of yours is really getting on my nerves!” 



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