It was the day after meeting Wiz.
Long story short on why she was the one going around purifying the spirits was that the Priests that should've been doing it we lazy. They weren't gonna go around purifying these spirits when they could be doing for another spirit that'll actually get 'em paid.
Aqua, as a Priest, wasn't too happy to hear that about her Job class, but I handled her easy enough. We also worked out a system in where Aqua would go around and do the purifying periodically, something else she wasn't happy about, something about her beauty sleep I think, but she agreed.
Unfortunately, because there was no Zombie maker to defeat, we failed the quest by default, and weren't rewarded.
"Have you heard? Rumour says that a boss of the demon king army had taken over an old castle which is situated in the hills a short walk from town,"
In the corner of the bar operated by the guild.
I was listening to a man sitting at my table and drinking during the day.
I am not drinking beer though, but Neroid swish.
What is Neroid?
What is swish?
I have no clue, but it was an okay non-alcoholic drink. I wasn't a fan of alcohol of any kind. I didn't like giving myself a physical and intellectual handicap.
I finished the 'Neroid' and place the cup on the table
"Sounds bad. Not my problem though," I said.
"Right you are," He agreed.
There were many people in the Adventurers' Guild today, chatting about various topics and providing me with useful information.
For example, spotting dangerous monsters at some place so do not take quests from that area.
"Anyway, it's better not to approach the abandoned castle to the north of town. This is not the capital of the kingdom, so who knows what the Demon Army general is doing here. But since it is a general, it is probably a Lord Ogre, vampire, arch demon or dragon. No matter which one of them it is, it's gotta be a monster that could instantly kill us. The best way is to not take any quest near that abandoned castle,"
"Right, thanks for the tip," I answered.
Better to take the effort to be polite so I could possibly receive more info in the future.
"What? Why are you all looking at me like that?"
Aqua, Darkness and Megumin took small mouthfuls of the vegetable sticks in the cup in the centre of the table as they stared at me.
"Nothing–? I wasn't worried about Kazuma joining another party or anything,"
Aqua said as she looked at me with uncertain eyes.
I sighed, "I was only gathering intel, nothin' more and nothin' less"
"Er… Right, I knew that," Aqua lied.
She is a terrible liar.
I took a seat at the table beside Aqua and reached for a vegetable stick.
Huh? It dodged.
The fuck is up with this world.
"'Steal'… So I've been thinking about what skills I should get, as I'm the most flexible of us," I took a bite from the carrot stick and continued, "What skills do all of you already have?"
"My skills are centred on 'Physical Defence', 'Magical Resistance' and 'Abnormal Status Resistance'. I have a skill called 'Bait', used to taunt the enemy,"
"Don't you plan to learn something like '2-handed sword' to increase your abysmal accuracy?"
"I don't plan to. It might sound like I am boasting, but my stamina and strength are great. If my attacks land easily, I could easily defeat monsters without taking damage. And it's not-"
"Yeah, yeah. I know where this is going, so you can shut-up now," I cut her off, not interested in hearing her masochistic reasoning.
I looked towards Aqua.
"Aside from party tricks, what have you got?"
She looked a little affronted, but answered regardless.
"I have just about every healing spell. Including 'Resurrection'!" She exclaimed with pride.
I let out a low whistle and beckoned for her to continue, which she did, after a moment of preening.
"I can purify any water based liquid into 100% pure water, I can summon water, cast some minor buffs and use 'Turn Undead',"
I nodded, "Good. Those are good skills. We'll want you to get some higher tier buffs, and maybe some debuffs to use too, but otherwise, you've got a good skillset,"
She preened more, seemingly very pleased with my praise.
"From now on, I want you to try to focus on just your buffs, and healing when we need it," She nodded, and opened her mouth to speak, looking slightly confused, though I cut her off, "Don't worry, I'll tell you if we need some of your other skills, alright?"
She nodded again, "Got it!"
Finally, I looked at Megumin.
"Apart from 'Detonate'," She began, "All of my skills are about improving 'Explosion'. I do have 'Fast Chanting', which would help 'Detonate' too though,"
"Okay. Please remember to stick to 'Detonate'. We can't have you cast 'Explosion' from the outset of a fight, and then be stuck, and possibly in danger. I can't let you get hurt Megumin; you have the super important role of being our Trump Card if things really go to shit. You understand?"
She seemed very happy with my words, her face even flaring up when I said 'I can't let you get hurt,' and she quickly nodded, agreeing to my request.
A few more days passed.
Days I spent rigorously training my magical capability.
I learnt about what could be accomplished with the spells I have, how they worked with the mana I put into them, and how much mana I could use before I pulled a 'Megumin'.
Here's a way to look at it. How much effort I put into pushing my mana is equal to how much mana I consume for the spells. However, comparing mana consumption to the resulting output follows something of a curve.
If I consider the base output as the mid-point, an exponentially higher amount of mana is required, the higher the output I want to produce is. Inversely, an exponentially smaller amount of mana is required to make the output smaller. This means making the spell stronger uses way to much mana, while making it weaker requires way to much focus and control to maintain it.
My limit, it would seem, for magical consumption is quite high. I hadn't noticed it in my first tests, but I came quite close to expending all of my mana, I just didn't notice the new sensation that came with my mana capacity running low.
The first day of training, I overdid myself quickly. It took me a minute of using my life force as fuel that I noticed the effects. I felt weak. Heavy. Like the world was working particularly hard today to drag me face first into a kiss. The absolute killer of a headache was just a bonus.
And what a bonus it was.
After a couple of hours whining to myself about how everything sucked, and becoming familiar with the sensations of being absent of mana, it seemed to have recharged, so I returned to practice.
The morning second day I spent seeing how having a low quantity of remaining mana affected spells. Good news; it didn't. I was essentially free to use my spells at full strength, so long as I remained careful of not running out. From late morning to evening, I went about running myself dry, letting myself fully recharge, then running myself dry again, on repeat, getting myself accustomed to the feeling of how much mana left equated to what output I could use for how long. The third day, I purchased a watch and timed how long it took to recharge from empty, which turned out to be roughly 2 hours and 6 minutes.
The results would be more accurate, but it's hard to tell when I'm 'fully' recharged, as my recharge rate isn't continuous. It takes a moment to start up after usage, and begins to slow as I approach full capacity.
Yeah. Pretty awkward there.
The fourth day I dedicated to experimentation. I managed to replicate a basic 'Light' and 'Electricity' spells, but like 'Freeze', they weren't as potent as my base four spells. Likely because I didn't have the skill associated to producing them.
I had hoped that with my slight ability to modify my spells, that I'd be able to produce flammable materials with 'Create Earth', but to no avail. Though it did give me an exceptional idea.
Alchemy.
Not, like, potion making, but specifically, 'Transmutation'.
A spell that can change one element to another. Lead to gold, copper to steel. Change something cheap to something valuable. Or maybe something else. Something less inherently expensive, like, perhaps, Uranium.
I could possibly produce nuclear weapons.
I seriously needed to get 'Transmutation'. This just got moved straight to Priority One.
Priority Zero was, of course, my personal safety.
But back to the present, it was the morning of the fifth day after meeting Wiz.
I sat at the table at the Guild with Megumin and Aqua, eating breakfast. Aqua was up at the counter collecting her reward from the cabbage hunting quest.
On her request, we decided to receive our own individual rewards from the quest, likely as her harvest was only second to mine.
"Kazuma, look. I earned a lot, so I tried enhancing the armour I sent in for repair… How is it?"
Inside the incredibly crowded adventurers guild filled with people collecting their bounties, Darkness showed me the armour she got back from the repair shop happily.
Well, if I want to put it simply…
"This armour look like something an upstart son of nobility would wear,"
"…Kazuma is merciless no matter the time and place. Even I would want to hear an honest compliment some time,"
Darkness said with a dejected expression.
How the fuck am I supposed to know?
Anyway…
"There is someone even more problematic than you, so I don't have the time. Could you please take care of that pervert who's acting worse than you do?"
"I can't- can't take it! The magic powers from this staff made from manatite, the colour and glister…"
Megumin was hugging her newly upgraded staff and grinding her face against it like the contact was bringing her physical pleasure.
Manatite is a rare metal said to have special magical properties. Adding it in when making a staff or other magical device would increase the power of spells cast with it.
Since strengthening her staff with her earnings, Megumin had been acting this way.
I heard the power of the explosion spell would increase by dozen or so percent.
Why are you increasing the power of the explosion magic that was already blatantly over powered? Isn't it already excessive enough?
If I were a betting man, and I am, I'd say that you're compensating for something; little Megumin.
Instead of voicing my thoughts, and receiving the assault like retaliation that would be sure to come should I do so, I instead opted to ignore her.
I am already satisfied after collecting my rewards.
Darkness who attracted the monsters who came because of the cabbage.
Megumin who destroyed those monsters with a single spell.
And Aqua who chased the cabbage on her own without caring about, nor assisting any of us.
"What did you say–? Wait, what is this?"
Aqua's voice reverberated through the guild.
As expected, Aqua was arguing with the person manning the counter.
She grabbed the collar of the poor counter lady serving her and protested.
"Why is there only 50,000 Eris? You know how many cabbage I caught, right? It's way more than 20!"
Woah, she can count to 20? An astounding accomplishment from the resident moron.
"Um, this is hard to say…"
"What!"
"… What Aqua-san turned in was mostly lettuce…"
"… Why was lettuce mixed in there?!"
"Even if you ask, I don't know!"
From their conversation, there seemed to be a problem with the bounty.
Aqua probably realized there was no use in arguing with the woman, and returned to the table.
Aqua put her hands behind her back and approached me with a smile.
"Ka-zu-ma-san… How much did you get from this quest?"
"Two mil'," I answered, mouth full of food.
"T-two million?!" Aqua stuttered in return.
Aqua, Darkness and Megumin were stunned beyond words.
The cabbages I caught were mostly high grade cabbage that yield plenty of experience points.
This. This right here? This is just one of the reasons why the luck stat is the single most valuable stat that exists.
"Kazuma-sama–! How should I put this… I always thought that you were the best guy I ever met!" Aqua praised
"I'm not giving you money," I responded with finality.
"B-but Kazuma-san, I thought I would earn a lot from the quest, so I spent all the money on me in the past few days! I estimated I would make heaps of money, so I owe nearly a hundred thousand Eris in this bar! I can't pay it off with the bounty!" She cried.
"Then work hard to make the money to repay your debts and learn from your mistakes. They aren't mine to cover," I said firmly, but kindly.
'Kazuma…" She whined, tears in her eyes, "You promised to help me,"
Oh? Trying to guilt me into helping? That was a mistake.
I darkened my expression rapidly, throwing in a bit of betrayal to strengthen the blow.
I quickly grabbed a platinum coin from my wallet, tossed it at her aggressively, forcibly pulled the coin pouch she had received from the guild away from her and stood.
She flinched hard and I lent down, "Don't you ever abuse my promise again," I delivered harshly.
She paled and her eyes widened. She realised her mistake, face showing her shock, regret, guilt, and fear.
I kept up the angry expression as I gave her a final, sideways glance, before turning on my heel and walking out of the guild.
Upon making it out the doors, my face returned to its default neutral position, leaving none the wiser to the breach of trust I had apparent experienced.
I think I'll take the day off. Let her stew in her accomplishments for the day while I enjoy myself.
Oh, maybe I can visit Shiro again. It's a Saturday, so she's probably not working. That'll be fun.
Mind made up, I headed south to the bar where I first met Shiro that never bothered learning the name of.
I had a fun day.
Shiro had been at the restaurant portion of the bar when I arrived, and was very pleased to see me again.
We talked a good bit, and I got some insight into why she was so easy the first night.
Short of it is; strict, over-protective parents, a week of built-up arousal and a low alcohol tolerance.
Long of it isn't too different. She hated how cooped up she was by her parents' rules and restrictions and left the household as soon as she turned 15 (the legal adult age here). A friend got her some work and she shared accommodation with a couple other young women.
That was all well and good for a couple of years.
Then she got a new, better paying job. Of course, this job was also much harder working, and left her exhausted by the end of the day. After finishing her meal, she would simply collapse in bed and fall asleep. This left her no free time to 'enjoy' herself, and lead to a whole lot easier job for me when I arrived at the end of her first week. Plus, I was apparently nearly perfectly her 'type'.
Guess you could say I really lucked out.
That wasn't all I learned of course. I also learnt a lot of menial things. Likes, dislikes, sexual habits, that kinda thing, which I had catalogued in my mind to help me with interactions in the future.
Did you know she really likes dogs, even if they don't really like her? Seems that her biological heritage didn't carry the rivalry that dogs and foxes had as not-so-friendly fellow hunters.
Her vulpine ears are also more capable than my own. She can pick up quieter sounds more easily, and if they're completely reflective of real foxes, they'll be able to pick up lower frequency sounds that I can't. She would be useful for dungeon exploring. Much more capable at picking up strange rock movement or hearing enemies who are sneaking or are simply further away.
A neat fact I learnt is that most demi-human races are incapable of producing half-blood children, the only exception being the elves, which yes, are considered demi-humans. For them, the race of the child follows the race of the mother over 90% of the time.
The day wasn't all fun and games however.
I had just arrived in front of Wiz's shop.
When we parted ways I had asked for (see 'demanded') her address.
It was small and simple, not unlike the majority of the buildings around it, differing only with the small sign out in front of it, claiming that the building was a magical item store.
I pushed open the single wooden door and a small bell above me jingled, signalling my entrance.
"Coming!" A voice from the back called, "One moment please!"
"Hello again Wiz," I said as she came around the corner into my line of sight.
"Oh," She said, surprised, "Hello again Kazuma-san. Are you here for something specific, or would you just like to browse?"
"I'd like to ask you something, actually," I said. At her inquisitive look, I continued, "You're a lich, so you've been around for some time, so I wanted to ask; what do you know about Alchemy?"
"You've come to the right person," She began proudly, "Because I know quite a lot about potion making,"
Huh, seemed this world followed the Elder Scrolls when it came to potion craft, using 'Alchemy' and 'Alchemist' rather than 'Etymology' and 'Apothecary'.
"Not that kind of Alchemy,"
She looked a little panicked and said, "I er- d-don't know what you're talking about,"
I rolled my eyes, "Does 'Transmutation' ring any bells? How about 'Chrysopoeia'?"
"H-how do you know those words?"
"My, my… Wiz, were you withholding information from me?" I asked, tone darkening, as I lit a small flame on my palm.
Her eyes snapped to the fire, widening rapidly. Seems that my chantless casting was even more impressive than I thought.
"H-how are you-"
"What do you know Wiz?"
"I-I only know of it. Alchemy hasn't been practiced in centuries, how can you possibly know the spell names?! And how are you casting without chants?! Nobody in the last three centuries has been able to do that!"
"First question; you don't have to worry about, and the second; through skill, knowledge and determination. Now tell me more about Alchemy,"
I left the store somewhat unsatisfied, but not unhappy with what I had learned.
No-one had learnt Alchemy in centuries, but that didn't mean there was no-one alive who knew about it. The person who did, just happened to be another of the Demon Kings generals. She didn't know which one, only that one did, unfortunately, so I would have to figure out who, and force them to use the skill before killing them, which makes my job harder, but not impossible.
Alchemy had died out because it was a very dangerous magic for whoever was casting. Basic spells would consume all of the casters mana, and carve right through their life-force as well if preparation wasn't done correctly.
My guess is that it was due to a few things. The first being the lack of knowledge of the Laws of Conservation of Mass and Energy. What you were attempting to make had to be of identical mass or you'd have leftovers, or much worse, not enough.
'Not enough' is much worse because your body would use your mana to create the missing mass. As the people of Earth know due to Einstein's famous equation of general relativity; E=mc2, or Energy is equal to Mass times the Speed of Light squared. With this you can easily figure out how much energy would be needed to produce just a gram of extra material. Speed of Light is constant, and normally rounded up to about 300 million metres per second. So 300 mil times 300 mil times 0.001 (1 gram) equals 9 times 10 to the 13 joules, or 90,000,000,000,000 joules.
There are roughly 30,000,000 seconds in a year, so with 1 gram of matter converted directly to energy, you could power a 10-watt globe for about 300,000 years.
Another note; a 1 megaton Nuclear weapon outputs about 4.8 times 10 to the 15 joules, so 50 grams of matter into energy is roughly as powerful as the Tsar Bomba, the most powerful nuclear weapon ever used.
50 grams is 4 tablespoons worth of sugar.
That is enough to recreate the Tsar Bomba.
Imagine trying to recreate that with your life-force.
I think you understand the danger there.
So Alchemy had died out, but I think I could make it work, with my understanding of modern day science and chemistry
Chantless casting, on the other hand, wasn't dangerous; it was just incredibly difficult, apparently. The last person to be capable of chantless casting lived about 350 years ago, and was the single most accomplished mage in recorded history. After learning everything the was to learn, he went about learning something that couldn't be purchased.
I think the problem is that the adventurers of this stick exclusively to the skills they get from their card, rather than trying to develop them themselves. Rather than self-teaching and experimenting, they stick exclusively to what is in their 'textbook'.
It was evening, and darkening quickly.
If I wanted dinner, I'd have to get some soon.
I made my way back to the Guild.
I'd left Aqua alone for long enough I think.
I opened the door at walked to where I could see the three girls.
Aqua was picking at her food, barely eating, before she spotted me. She jumped to her feet, startling Darkness and Megumin, and ran towards me, tears already forming.
"Kashuma!" she wailed, "I'm shorry, I'm sho shorry Kashuma-ha-ha,"
I opened my arms and she leapt into them and began weeping.
"I'll pay you back… I promise," she said after a moment, sniffling, "I-I won't take a-advantage of you a-again either, I swear. I won't forget what y-you've done for me,"
"It's okay Aqua, it's okay,"
"Even though I'm so useless and I'm not thankful… Please don't leave me Kazuma-san…"
I tightened my hold on her, which she reciprocated, "I won't leave you Aqua, and I won't break my promise… I'm sorry too; I over-reacted," I said.
She shook her head, barely lifting her face from my shoulder, and said "No. It's my fault. I was greedy and out of line. It was my fault, not yours,"
I sighed, "What am I gonna do with you?" I said light-heartedly.
Looks like Aqua's conditioning was going excellently.
I slowly pulled out of the hug and walked with her to our table. I smiled apologetically at Darkness and Megumin as we sat, smiles they returned with sympathy.
I ordered dinner for myself with Aqua attached to my side.
Once my food arrived, our table had returned to our usual interactions. Apart from being asked what I did, where I answered very simply, everything was easy.
Once our respective meals were finished, I brought up the topic of quests, so we went to the quest board to see what was available.
"… Weird? Why are there so few requests?"
The board was usually full of request, but there were only a few today.
"Kazuma!" Aqua said, back to her usual self "Pick this one, this one! A giant bear showed up in the mountains, its name is Black Fang…"
"No! Hey, what is this? Why are there only high difficulty quests left!?"
As we were filled with doubt, a staff member, Luna again, came to us.
"I'm sorry… A general of the demon army seemed to have moved into a small castle near town… It might had been the influence of the demon army, but the weak monsters in the region are all laying low, resulting in a drastic drop in quests. A band of knights dispatched from the capital will be here next month to take out the boss. But until then, there will only high difficulty quests left…"
When she heard the staff member say that, the penniless Aqua screamed.
"Why—?"
Hmm, wonder how she'll repay me.
"Really… Why did he picked this moment to move here! I don't know what this boss is, but it better watch out if it is an undead!"
Aqua complained in tears as she started browsing through the employment magazine.
The other adventurers were feeling the same and seemed down. There were more people getting drunk in broad daylight.
I don't know why the boss chose to move here.
'Cos, y'know, I'm not psychic.
There were many parties stronger than we were, but their powers were still limited. This is the first town novice Adventurers visits, a place for the beginners to learn the basics.
In game terms, a Demon King General should be a near end-game boss.
We had a hard time fighting toads; there was no way we could take on the boss, regardless of a numbers advantage. He could just drop a low level AOE (Area Of Effect attack) and wipe us all out instantly.
We'd need another advantage if I wanted to kill him.
It seems that for the moment; I'll have to wait.
"That means until the powerful adventurers and knights from the capital come here next month, we can't work as usual," I said.
"Yeah. During this period of time when we can't do quests, I would need you to accompany me like this…"
I came with Megumin to the outskirt of town.
There are no dangerous monsters around town right now. Since the general arrived, they've all gone into hiding.
I came along with Megumin who couldn't use explosion spell because we couldn't take on quests for a walk.
This girl had something she needed to do every day, which was casting her explosion magic.
Apparently.
I didn't believe her in the slightest when she told me that she needed to cast it once per day or 'she would die'. I decided to play along however. I might be able to learn some stuff from watching her magic usage repeatedly. I could also train my magic while I walked, working on maintaining control while doing other things.
"Here should be far enough," I said, impatient, "Go ahead and cast your spell and let's go back,"
A short distance from town, I rushed Megumin to cast her spell.
But Megumin shook her head and said:
"No, the guards will lecture me again if we do this too close to town,"
"You said 'again' just now didn't you?" I asked with a laugh, "How many times?"
Megumin glared at me with a pout.
"…? What is that, an abandoned castle?"
On the hills in a distance ahead.
A deserted ancient castle was erected there.
It looked just like a haunted house.
Ah. This is probably where the demon army general is staying.
"Let's pick that place! No one would complain even if I destroy a ruin like that,"
Wow, she's stupid.
But let's see what happens.
"One moment please," I requested, pulling out my Adventurers' Card, opening the 'Hide' skill and dumping six of my points into it to make myself substantially harder to find.
Megumin prepared the spell happily after I finished.
A breeze blew through the hills that made me felt refreshed.
The chanting of the explosion spell that didn't fit in with this comfortable atmosphere was carried off by the wind.
"'Explosion'!"
And so, Megumin and I started our new daily routine.
The penniless Aqua was working hard every day.
Darkness said she would return home to train.
The idle Megumin went to the abandoned castle to cast her explosion spell daily without fail.
It might be a cold evening with icy rain.
Or a lazy afternoon after lunch.
Or a refreshing morning when she went for a stroll.
No matter the time, Megumin would cast her spell at that castle every single day, to no response from the general.
Either he wasn't there, or much less likely, he didn't give a shit.
And I watched Megumin's spell every day, I came to understand the quality of the explosion she created with each spell cast.
"'Explosion'–!"
"Oh, that seemed pretty good. The impact of the explosion could be felt through my bones, followed by the air tremor that followed immediately after. It is strange that the abandoned castle remained intact but… Good explosion!"
"Great explosion!" Megumin responded with enthusiasm, "Kazuma understands the way of the explosion more now. Your comment today hit the mark and was poetry like… Kazuma when will you to seriously consider learning explosion magic?"
"I am, and have, but from the composition of our current party, there is no need for 2 wizards. But when our party balances out more, and I have left over skill points, I'll learn explosion magic,"
Megumin discussed such things with a smile.
Just like this, we talked about how many points we could give the sound of the explosion: Like even though it wasn't too loud, but the pitch was great, and chatted about the way of the explosion.
"Well," I said, picking Megumin up from the floor and placing her on my back, "Let's head back to town, shall we?"
After we continued our explosive stroll for a week, in the morning.
"Emergency broadcast! Emergency broadcast! Attention all adventurers, please prepare your combat equipment and report to the main gate of the city ready for combat!"
The familiar emergency broadcast could be heard throughout the town.
After hearing the broadcast, we put on our gears and rushed on scene.
Many adventurers were gathered at the main gate. When we reached the scene, we saw an intimidating monster standing before us, and we could only stare at it blankly.
It was a Dullahan.
A monster that brought despair and premonition of death to men.
After turning into an undead, its physical strength only increased from what it had in life, and it possessed unique powers.
The knight in black armour standing at the front gate held its head on the left side of its body. Before the eyes of the gathered adventurers, it presented its head that was covered fully in its helmet before everyone.
The head said in a distorted voice.
"I am a general of the Demon King army, and had moved into a castle nearby recently,"
Ah, so he was in there.
"Every day every day every day! The crazy idiot who comes to my castle to cast explosion magic, where are you—!"
This boss of the demon king army was seriously angry.
I had to try very hard to not laugh.
I think we can still dodge conflict with relative ease. Considering he began with conversation rather than combat, it shouldn't be too hard to appease him.
The yell of the Dullahan seemed to be suppressing its anger until it couldn't hold back anymore, making the adventurers around me chatter.
Or rather, everyone present doesn't seem to get what was happening.
Anyway, the reason for the emergency summon was probably the Dullahan before us who was going mad from fury.
"… Explosion spell?"
The gaze of the people around us naturally fell onto Megumin besides me.
Megumin, who had quickly become centre of attention, turned her head sharply at a girl wizard standing beside her.
I followed her gaze, and looked at that girl. Everyone else around did the same and stared at the girl.
"Huh? M-me? Why are you all looking at me? I can't use explosion magic!"
The girl wizard who was being framed denied in a hurry.
Finally, Megumin sighed and walked forward with an annoyed face.
The adventurers in front of her parted, opening a path to the Dullahan.
Megumin stood about 10 meters from the Dullahan and faced him.
With myself in the lead, Darkness and Aqua also followed behind Megumin.
Aqua, who always seemed to attack aggressively whenever she saw an undead, probably thought the sight of an angry Dullahan was the sight of one close to attacking, and she watched him intently.
"So it's you…! You're the moron who cast explosions on my castle every day? If you knew I was the general of the demon army and wanted to challenge me to a fight, then enter the castle! If not, then just hide in town and tremble! Why are you bothering me with such convoluted means? I knew there were only low-level adventurers in town! I wanted to leave such minor characters alone, but you can't catch a clue and come boom boom booming with your spells every day! Is there something wrong with your head?"
Hey, someone else was catching on. Neat.
Megumin was intimidated and was a bit scared, but she still flicked the cape she wore.
"I am Megumin. As an arch wizard, I have mastered explosion spells…!"
"… What kind of name is Megumin? Are you mocking me?"
"No! That's not it!"
Even though she was retorted by the Dullahan when she introduced herself, Megumin composed herself and continued, "I hail from the Crimson Demon clan, the elite wizard of this town. I cast Explosion magic continuously in order to lure you, the general of the Demon army out! As I planned, you came to town alone after being tricked, your end is near!"
Seeing Megumin pointing her staff at the Dullahan excitedly, I was standing behind her and whispered to Darkness and Aqua.
God Megumin, could you trigger any more flags?
"Hmmph, forget it. I didn't come here to mess with peasants like you all. I am here to investigate something. I will be staying in that castle for the time being, so don't cast explosion spell anymore. Understand?"
"That is like asking me to die. Those of the Crimson magic clan need to cast explosion spell once every day, or we would die,"
"Hey, hey! I never heard of this before! Stop bullshitting me!"
Fucking hell, she really doesn't know how to keep her mouth shut.
The Dullahan placed his head on his right hand and shrugged.
"You don't plan to give up explosion magic no matter what? Even though I had taken the side of darkness, I was a knight before and have no interest in slaughtering the weak. But if you continue to bother me with such things around the castle, I have my way of handling things too," he said darkly.
Megumin took a few steps back.
"I shall predict your death! You will die one week from now!"
As the Dullahan cast its spell, Darkness grabbed Megumin's collar and hid Megumin behind her.
"Huh? D-Darkness!"
As Megumin screamed, Darkness's body glowed with a faint dark light.
Oh. She got hit. Guess she'll die in a week. That'll be pretty funny to watch, considering her masochism.
"Darkness are you alright? Does it hurt anywhere?"
Megumin asked quickly as Darkness stretched her hands a few times to confirm it.
"Yeah, I didn't feel anything," she responded, sounding unimpressed.
"That curse won't harm you now," the Dullahan began, "My plans were a bit foiled, but since the camaraderie among adventurers is so deep it might just hurt more.
Listen carefully, girl of the Crimson demons. If this goes on, that crusader will die in one week. That's right; this is all your fault! In the following week, you will see the pain of your companion and regret your actions!" he paused to laugh to himself, "You should have listened to me obediently!"
As Megumin's face was turning pale because of the Dullahan's words,
Darkness shouted as she trembled, "That means you had cast a death curse on me, and I have to do as you say in order for you to release the curse! That's what you meant right?"
"Huh?"
God fucking dammit.
"Ugh…! Just a mere curse. Don't think you can make me submit! I won't yield! But, what should I do Kazuma?" Darkness said, excitement building, "Look at that Dullahan; look at his evil lusty eyes under his helmet! No matter how I see it, he wants to bring me back to his castle and do as he pleases if I want him to release the curse. A pervert that wants me to do hardcore pervert play!"
The Dullahan, whose confusion and disgust only built the more she spoke could only make a confused "Huh?" once again.
Yikes.
"Even if you can do what you want with my body, you would never have my heart!" Darkness declared, "I am going to become a female knight imprisoned in a castle and let the henchman of the demon king do unreasonable things with me! Ah, what should I do? What should I do Kazuma? This situation is more thrilling than I expected! I don't want to go, but I have no choice! I will resist to the very last moment, so don't stop me! Well then, I will be back in a jiffy!"
I grabbed her by the collar and pulled her back.
"Leave the poor guy alone, would you?" I said, before turning to the general, "Sorry 'bout them. I do my best to stop the explosions for you,"
He looked a little taken aback, but responded with gratitude, "Thank you. If you want me to release the curse on that Crusader, then come to my castle! If you can make it to my room at the top of the castle, I will release her curse! But," he paused, "my minions are everywhere in the castles and it's full of undead knights. Can you rookie adventurers make your way to me?" He laughed before turning his horse and riding away.
Once he was out of sight, I turned to Megumin.
Her face had gone green and she trembled.
"Sacred Break Spell!"
"With me around, breaking the curse of the Dullahan is easy! What do you think? I look like a priest sometimes right?" Aqua said with pride.
"Nicely done Aqua," I said, to which she smiled brightly.
That's anti-climactic.