CHAPTER 3 - PART 3 & 4

Part 3

"Kazuma, let's hurry and find a quest! One with lots of weak monsters! I want to test the power of my new staff!"

Megumin said suddenly.

Yeah.

"You are right, when we were hunting the zombie maker, I didn't have time to test out my new skills. Let's find a safe and simple quest."

"No, let's find a quest that can earn lots of money! I cleared my tabs, so I don't even have money for food today!"

"No, let's find one with strong enemies! One with monsters that have strong attacks and are tough as nails…!"

Hey, there should be a limit on how disunited a party could be.

"Anyway, let's decide after looking at the bulletin board."

Everyone followed my suggestion and moved to the bulletin board.

And…

"… Weird? Why are there so few requests?"

That's right, the board was usually full of request.

But there were only a few today.

Also…

"Kazuma! Pick this one, this one! A giant bear showed up in the mountains, its name is black fang…"

"Rejected! Hey, what is this? Why are there only high difficulty quests left!?"

That's right, all the quests left on the board were beyond our capabilities.

As we were filled with doubt, a staff member came to us.

"I am sorry… A boss 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 had all laid low, resulting in a drastic drop in quests. A band of knights dispatched from the capital would be here next month to take out the boss. But before that, there are only high difficulty quests left…"

When she heard the staff member say that, the penniless Aqua screamed.

"Why—?"

…Even I was feeling sympathetic towards Aqua.

"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 browsed through the employment magazine.

The other adventurers were feeling the same and seemed really down. There were more people getting drunk in broad daylight.

I don't know why the boss chose to move here.

Frankly speaking, the adventurers in this town were about our level.

There were many parties stronger than us, 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 boss should be characters that appears towards the end.

We had a hard time fighting toads, there was no way we could take on the boss no matter how many of us there were.

Part 4

"That means before the powerful adventurers and knights from the capital come here next month, we can't work as usual."

"That's how it is… 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.

After the demon army boss came, the weak monsters hid themselves in fear.

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.

Would I need to accompany this fellow out here every day for the whole month?

I thought about ignoring Megumin and asked her to go alone, but she countered that no one would be carrying her on the way back.

"Here should be far enough right, hurry up, 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 'too' just now right? Because it was too loud?"

Megumin nodded to acknowledge me.

Can't be helped, I felt a bit uneasy without my weapon, but there's no monsters around anyway.

And so I decided to hike a bit further.

Now that I thought about it, I didn't have much chances to walk around outside leisurely like this.

My trips outside were usually because of hunting monsters or quests.

Not a casual stroll like this…

"…? 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…

"It feels creepy… As if there are ghost residing in there…"

I mumbled to myself…

"Let's pick that place! No one would complain even if I destroy a ruin like that."

Megumin prepared the spell happily after she 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…!

… 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…

And I watched Megumin's spell every day, and was even able to judge whether the condition of the explosion spell was good or bad.

"'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 city remained intact but… What an explosion!"

"Great explosion! Kuku, Kazuma understands the way of the explosion more now. Your comment today hit the mark and was poetry like… how about it? I am not talking about this casually, Kazuma do you want to seriously consider learning explosion magic?"

"Yeah– the way of the explosion is interesting… But from the composition of our current party, there is no need for 2 wizards. But when I retire from adventuring and have left over skill points, it would be interesting to use them to learn explosion magic."

Megumin discussed such things with a smile.

Just like this, we talked about how much 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.