Chapter 3: A Benveolent Overlord of Death

Kazuma and his new party were sitting on a wooden 4 chairs dining table in Adventurer's Guild Hall after cabbage harvesting. Eating… cabbages.

Yes, only cabbage related food was on the menu, the reason being the harvesting emergency quest that took place a while ago.

Not just in guildhall but in whole town, cabbage dishes, everywhere.

Kazuma took a bite of stir-fried cabbage salad, and much to his surprise, it tasted really good somehow, despite being just "cabbage".

Kazuma had earned a lot of money from the so-called cabbage hunting quest.

"Darkness, you are amazing! You were like a wall of iron in front of the horde of cabbages! They couldn't break through you no matter what!"

Started Megumin by complimenting Darkness's defense. Darkness's defense actually was quite admirable even to Kazuma, who's not easily impressed. She is a tank and a swordswoman.

"No, I didn't do much, I'm just a solidly built woman. By the way, Megumin's magic is very powerful! You took down a very big horde of cabbages and monsters that were chasing the cabbages; you shocked all the adventurers present!"

"Hmph, no one can stand against the power of explosion magic!"

"Also, thank you for rescuing me from those cabbages, Kazuma. You were very cool cutting those cabbages down with your sword, you are very skilled!"

"Indeed, you are a beast and all, but your swordsmanship is no joke."

Spoke Megumin with her arms crossed.

"Kazuma, with my command as goddess, I shall give you the title: 'Cabbage Slayer'!"

Declared Aqua after finishing her fried cabbage meal. Kazuma clenched his fist and said:

"Don't you dare call me that."

"Now, then. Let me properly introduce myself last time because of me officially joining this party. I am Darkness, my calling is "Crusader". I can use a 2 handed weapon - a greatsword. I am most useful at being a tank for the party, please take care of me!"

Darkness declared proudly with her hand on her chest, then sat back on her seat.

"Welcome to the team, Darkness."

Said Megumin.

"Kuku, our team's turning out great! I am an arch-priest, Megumin's an powerful arch-wizard, Darkness is an great crusader and Kazuma is an skilled champion! Four member with top-tier class is very rare! You should be grateful to us all Kazuma."

Aqua said with a smile on her face.

"Grateful? A arch-wizard who doesn't want to cast spells other than explosion."

Kazuma starts stating things coldly. Megumin awkwardly averts her eyes and face to other direction.

"A crusader who's overwhelmed by masochism and would rather jump into monsters than actually fight with her sword."

Darkness face turns bright red and she starts panting.

"Look, she's seriously turned on from that. And you, the person with extraordinary intelligence. You are so arrogant, talking about grateful when you do nothing but waste money on booze. Get your crap together, if we went to fight some decently powerful monster like this, even with our top-tier class - we'll be squashed like insects."

Kazuma finished his cold and harsh monologue with literal deadpan expression, making it seem even colder - Ice King. Harsh, blunt, rude, cocky, and arrogant is Kazuma, a beast.

Aqua had her eyes filled with tears wanting to flood the town. Darkness was still panting, and Megumin pretended nothing at all happened.

"You are truly a monster. If you don't keep your mouth in control, you could make any girl or even demon king cry, Kazuma."

Stated Megumin.

"If you feel stressed, please, v-verbally abuse me!"

Said Darkness with hand on her chest and bright red face.

Kazuma exhaled clearing his stress and stood up from his seat.

"Hopeless."

He said while patting Darkness's shoulder. He went to his inn to work out for a while and then sleep.

Exercises like pushups, etc actually increase strength stat, very little by little, and he has to maintain his body too anyways.

Next day.

Kazuma's level increased to 11 because of defeating so many cabbages. Skill points increased from 33 back to 36.

Quarter of total cabbages yielded quite a lot of experience points, and so he leveled up. They also sold for more than average cabbage.

It may have been a hilarious and disappointing event, but it was profitable.

Eating cabbages or any other food gives experience points, as Luna had stated back when he became an adventurer. And, eating cabbages jammed with experience points gave even more experience points, common sense.

If you are wondering why cabbages sell for 10,000 eris per head? It's because fresh cabbages granted experience points for eating them. Buying load ton of them and gobbling them up could get you a higher level, no risk at all, considering you are rich enough for that.

Kazuma was thinking of learning magic spells now. Yes, he didn't know any yet. If you think Wind Slash is a magic spell, bam, it's not. It's a swordsman skill, it's very common and not very powerful.

Although he did many quests himself and cleared many dungeons until now, he never encountered a monster or lich that used magic spells against him. It's probably due to him doing easy quests and not always going to the heart of the dungeon he explored. He's knows he's powerful with relic and all, but he'd rather not push his luck too far and die miserably, he's always slightly cautious.

Kazuma was gonna to ask the Megumin later to show him basic and intermediate magic.

Right now, he was walking towards a well-known blacksmith in the town to get his armor upgraded with the money he earned from harvest season.

He was in front of the blacksmith's door. He could hear sounds of hammering on metal from outside.

He pushed up the fairly big double door and was greeted shortly after.

"Welcome!"

A tan well-built man with a goatee and weird small size haircut. He was wearing white tank top and black pants.

"Iis my armor ready?"

Kazuma replied coldly with deadpan expression, as he always does, to everyone.

The shop was filled with all kinds of weapons and armors. It had a full forge behind the shop, in the open.

"Satou Kazuma, right?"

"Yes."

"Yes, yes! It's ready!"

After saying that, the shopkeeper brought Kazuma a new light, yet very defensive armor on a armor stand.

It was actually Kazuma's old armor, but smelted again and upgraded to better material.

Kazuma started wearing the armor over his white t-shirt and trousers, as he always does. Kazuma looked himself in the mirror that was in the armor shop.

First, over his normal clothes, he wore grey and golden carved chest piece, and knee pieces. They were made from very expensive material that has physical and magical resistance. He also wore a brown leather belt that is connected to his black sheath on his waist.

Second, over his armor and sheath, he wore a knee-length black and purple open jacket/cloak with straight collars. The jacket is very thin and light weighted. It was made from a special fabric that has high magic resistance.

Third, he wore his shoulder armor and gauntlets that didn't cover his hands, instead they covered his wrists to forearms above his jacket/cloak. They were grey and golden too, and made from the same armor material. He is also wearing black gloves. [1]

"How much is it, again?"

Kazuma asked.

"850,000 eris."

"Hmph, good job, you have my praise. It's a great armor, I assume you also used material with high magic resistance and physical resistance on armor, and high magic resistance fabric on cloak."

"Yes, I did, sir."

"Alright."

Kazuma paid him and went back to Guildhall.

Cloak costed 150,000 and other armor 100,000 making it 700,000 for each armor piece and 150,000 for cloak.

Inside guildhall. It was livelier than usual, the reason being adventurers collecting their bounty. Kazuma went to sit on a chair. Some adventurers took a glance at him in curiosity because of his new armor.

"... Huh, I almost didn't recognize you!"

Said Darkness.

"Whoa! Kazuma you look even more cool!"

Said Megumin with sparkling eyes.

"Megumin, teach me magic spells."

"What are you kicking me out of party?!"

Megumin became uneasy.

"No, I want to learn intermediate magic to protect myself. I am going to use magic as a ranged option."

"As long as you don't kick me out!"

After that, they went to the outskirts so that Megumin can freely use magic towards the sky.

They were standing on a hill near a lake.

Megumin pointed her staff towards the sky.

"Alright! I will show you offensive and defensive intermediate spell I know. I specifically mastered Wind and Fire magic, so don't expect other element magic spells from me."

"Why did you only master fire and wind?"

"Kuku, great offensive spell 'explosion' requires mastery for fire and wind!"

Kazuma let out a sigh.

"Alright, show me what you have."

"Fireball!"

A giant ball of fire formed itself from thin air in front of Megumin's staff and shot to the sky. It slowly started disappearing after travelling quite far.

Kazuma took a look at learnable skills. Basic and Intermediate Magic was added instead of Fireball. He immediately understood that he had to learn intermediate magic first to learn actual spells used inside that category.

He swiped his finger on name 'Intermediate Magic' and tapped 'Learn' on his card. He couldn't decide whether to learn basic magic or not, but he still learned it as it was quite cheap and gave 5 basic spells for 5 skill points.

"Done?"

Asked Megumin.

"Yes."

"Alright, next up, blade of wind!"

A slash-wave like distortion was created in the air and that distortion traveled at great speed until they were unable to see it.

"Blade of Wind, a spell that violently slashes the target hit. You can create as many blades as you want considering you have enough mana to do so."

Megumin explained like some master.

"Wind Curtain!"

A short powerful gust of wind blew in front of Megumin's staff. The wind seemed to be visible, like, it was a very transparent white glass.

"Now, this isn't a offensive spell but a defensive one. Wind Curtain, it a spell that can divert small and less powerful projectiles like arrows or fireball. It won't protect against powerful ones like advanced magic or a power shot from archer. Also, you can put more mana into a intermediate spell to make it more powerful, and it will break through Wind Curtain. Advanced form of "Wind Curtain" which is "Wind Shield" remains for longer and is more powerful."

Megumin explained.

Kazuma learned all 3 intermediate spell he saw just now. He also noticed 2 new spells that weren't shown to him.

"What is 'Wind Manipulation' and 'Fire Manipulation' spell?"

"Oh, they are starter intermediate spell, they aren't offensive or defensive just able to control very small amount of that specific element."

Megumin once again explained like a teacher.

Kazuma still learned those spells and wanted to try them out.

Blade of Wind and Wind Curtain cost him 3 skill point each and Fireball was 3 skill point too but was reduced to 2 because of his unique champion skill - Element Affinity.

Elemental Affinity is a Champion learnable skill that allows the user to choose a specific element. If they learn spell of that element the skill point amount is reduced. Kazuma chose Fire element and so fireball cost him less points.

I will reveal another champion skill - Class Affinity. It's the same thing as Elemental Affinity but this time chosen class skills cost him less points. The class he chose was swordsman. Advanced one-handed originally costed him 10 skill points but choosing the affinity reduced it to 5.

Now, back to spells. 3 and 3 for wind spells and 2 for fireball spell making total 8. He also learned Basic and Intermediate magic for 15 skill points making it total 23. Last 2 skills were Wind and Fire Manipulation which costed 2 for Wind and 1 for Fire making it total 26 skill points.

His current skill points were 36 and now he's left with 10 skill points.

"Fireball."

Kazuma casted fireball but much to his disappointment it was smaller than what Megumin casted.

"Why is my fireball smaller?"

Kazuma asked.

"Hmph, you can't compare to magic power of Crimson Demons and my staff also boosts my magic power."

Megumin explained haughtily.

"Wind Manipulation."

Wind Manipulation allowed Kazuma to summon small and less powerful gust of wind at will. He could pour more mana into it and summon more powerful and a little bigger gust but it had limits that's why it was starter intermediate spell.

Fire Manipulation was different from wind. It allowed you to summon fire at will but also produce heat in your body part or radiate heat through your body and again it had limits otherwise it would be very powerful and melt the user itself with high temperature.

Kazuma was quite satisfied with what he learned. He was confident in his magic power and mana pool. Even if they were intermediate, they can become powerful by using more mana. And stones called manatite exist.

Manatite is a powerful purple bright stone filled with mana. Amount of mana it has depends on the quality of the mana. The price of manatite also depends on the quality. High-quality manatite cost a lot eris.

Also, basic spells were tinder, wind breath, create earth, create water and freeze. With those Kazuma could summon tiny amount of those elements.

"Now, I won't be able to cast explosion today!"

Megumin pouted.

"You don't need to. Wait, can you show me a advanced spell?"

Kazuma asked, and for some reasons Megumin started sweating like crazy.

"Hm? What's wrong?"

Kazuma held his chin in his right hand and looked at Megumin closely with cold eyes.

"I-I… d-d-don't know any advanced spell other than explosion…"

Megumin smiled awkwardly and looked away from Kazuma.

Kazuma took a deep breath in and out.

"Once you get enough skill points for a advanced magic spell - learn it."

"Y-you won't kick me out of the party?"

Megumin's eyes widened.

"No."

Megumin's face brightened at Kazuma's reply.

"Thank you so much!"

"Let's go back."

Kazuma's whole party is sitting in guildhall.

"Let's take a quest. Oh, how about raising Aqua's levels? Clerics don't get to fight on front lines so they have to grind levels by purifying undeads. Healing magic is like offensive magic for undeads - it makes their body break down."

Darkness said with armed crossed.

Aqua's face lightened up.

Kazuma assumed a thinking pose. He immediately thought of one of the aspect of leveling up, rise in stats. If they raised Aqua's level, that means her intelligence will level up too, making her less dumb.

Kazuma looked towards Darkness.

"Why does a Masochist like you wanna do quest that doesn't satisfy your fetish?"

Darkness immediately got bright red.

"Huh? I am thinking about my companions, that's all!"

Darkness immediately averted eyes in awkwardness after saying that.

"You don't have you armor right now anyways. Let's get a undead purifying quest or something."

Said Kazuma leaving his thinking pose, he moved towards the quest board and others followed him.

"Look dungeon exploring quest, it should have undead."

Said Megumin pointing at the quest.

"We should accept quest that are specifically about clearing undead."

"Then how about this…"

It was evening. The sky was orange and cloudier than usual.

They were walking on a hill towards the cemetery for the poor people.

The quest they accepted was to defeat the zombie maker in the cemetery.

Zombie Maker is a evil spirit that raises zombies from the dead and rotten corpses buried in cemeteries.

Kazuma's party set up a tent outside cemetery and are wait for nightfall, in other words, the zombie maker itself.

They cooked meat in the tent while they waited.

Kazuma poured coffee in a mug that was filled with water created from spell "Create Water".

After pouring coffee he used wind manipulation to create a very small whirl of wind inside the mug to mix water and coffee together.

"Wow! Kazuma I never thought of using a starter intermediate spell like that! You are using it better than a mage!"

Said Megumin excitedly.

"Shouldn't you be saying that you never used any spell other than explosions?"

Insulted Kazuma instead of accepting the praise.

He heated the coffee with "Fire Manipulation" by warming the mug with high temperature.

After a while, they finished eating and drinking their food and took a small nap.

It was mid night.

They started walking inside cemetery.

Kazuma is leading the others while using enemy detection he learned from Chris to detect any undead or zombies.

Suddenly Kazuma stopped and following their instincts, others stopped their movements too.

"What's wrong?"

Asked Megumin.

"They are a lot of enemies ahead, didn't you say that zombie maker only animates 2 or 3 zombies?"

Said Kazuma.

After a few moments, they see a bright light ahead of where they were standing.

Kazuma looked closely to find blue light in the shape of a magic circle.

"Huh, I think that is not a zombie maker…"

Said Megumin.

Kazuma moved forward with Murasame unsheathed.

He saw a black-robed figure, and around the figure were spirits flying up.

"Ah!"

Suddenly, Aqua yelled and ran towards the robed figure.

"Wait, you!"

Aqua said while pointing her finger at the robed figure.

"What are you doing here, you lich!"

Aqua started stomping the magic circle.

The so-called lich was trying to stop Aqua with tears in her eyes.

"Stop, stop, please. Stop destroying my magic circle!"

Said the crying person whose voice sounded like a girl, and in fact she was a woman.

"Shut up, lich! You are thinking of using this magic circle for evil means, I know!"

The undeads or spirits Kazuma had detected before didn't come in to help the lich.

The lich was more like a poor girl being picked by some random bullies.

"Stop… It's a magic circle that sends wandering spirits to after-life!"

Now the lich seemed more like an arch-priest than Aqua.

Lich was doing such benevolent acts that Kazuma couldn't resist the urge to facepalm and think again: what' . .world.

"Why are you doing things that's arch-priests do, you are too cocky for an lich! Let me show you the power of a real arch-priest, I will purify this whole cemetery."

Said Aqua arrogantly.

"Eh, w-wait! Stop!"

Said the crying, pitiful lich.

"Turn Undead!"

Aqua spread her arms wide open and chanted.

The whole cemetery was engulfed in white light.

The spirits, undeads and zombies vanished in instant.

The lich too…

"Eh, uh, I-I am disappearing, please s-stop!"

Said the lich crying.

Seeing this scene in action would make Aqua a antagonist of this whole story.

"Puhehe, isn't that what should happen to a lich?"

Kazuma walked towards Aqua and smacked behind of her head.

She crouched and starting rubbing her head in pain.

"Why did you hit ME?"

Hitting her broke her concentration, and so the magic surrounding the cemetery stopped.

The legs of the lich had become transparent.

Kazuma looked closely.

"Hm.."

Kazuma assumed a thinking pose, and the lich tilted her head in confusion.

"Aren't you Kiz?"

Said Kazuma confidently.

"No! I am Wiz."

"Yes, the owner of that defected magic item shop, right?"

Kazuma had once visited a magic item shop to just check it out, but most of the magic item there had flaws.

The owner of that shop was Wiz.

"That's mean…"

Wiz said.

Wiz was a beautiful, well-endowed woman with pale face as a characteristic of lich. She is robed in purple and black clothes.

"Anyways, t-thank you for saving me."

Wiz thanked Kazuma.

"Why are you purifying wandering spirits?"

Asked Kazuma.

"What are you thinking Kazuma? Get away from that lich, let me purify her!"

Shouted Aqua.

"Y-you see, I am a lich, an overlord of undead. I can hear voices of spirits wandering in the world. People buried in this public cemetery were poor and didn't have a proper burial, so they didn't ascend to afterlife. That's why I'd periodically send them to afterlife."

Such benevolent act for a lich who defied laws of nature, an overlord of death. A boss-type undead.

Kazuma sighed after realizing a LICH is doing the job of ARCH-PRIEST.

"What about the priests of this town, don't they do something?"

Asked Kazuma curiously.

"Since, the priests of this town are m-materialistic, no, uh. I mean… rites for those without money would be pushed down their waiting list… something like that…"

Said Wiz hesitantly.

"You can speak freely, this monster here won't do anything."

Said Kazuma.

"Who are you calling a monster?"

Shouted Aqua.

"You mean the priests of this town are people who worship money, and the public cemetery for poor people is ignored, right?"

Said Megumin.

"Yes, that's how it is…"

"Are you the one who is animating zombies?"

Asked Kazuma.

"I didn't animate any zombies, the corpses that are intact automatically rise due to my magic. Uhm, I won't have any reason to come here if wandering spirits ascend to heaven. So.. How should we resolve this?"

It was almost dawn.

Kazuma and his party were going towards the town.

The quest is failed since there was no zombie maker.

They also let the lich called Wiz go.

"I can't take this!"

Aqua shouted.

"'The lich performing good deeds, I can't help but want to kill her!" is what you are thinking, stupid girl! Why can't you shut up for once, you are seriously pissing me off!"

Kazuma shouted.

What's wrong with Aqua's thought process is like the mystery of this world.

She isn't a goddess, but a girl with 1 IQ given the title of goddess.

She just thinks of what goddess should do and act according to that.

Despite the lich performing benevolent deeds, Aqua can't help but feel jittery to kill her.

Kazuma suggested that Aqua would purify the cemetery periodically, but… no.

She was whining about her sleep time being reduce.

So Kazuma had smacked her and forced her to do it.

It's her job as a self-proclaimed goddess.

Wiz had never once attacked a human, in fact she was human herself before turning to lich, of course.

Wiz had a small magic item shop and lived normally inside the town.

Because of her human appearance, she doesn't have much problems blending in real humans.

Forget the fantasies of lich being in the heart of dungeons as final boss, this "New World" is a joke of fantasy and adventure.

"We are lucky she's a good person. A lich is very powerful, even with Aqua, we'd probably lose."

Megumin spoke nonchalantly.

"How far their offense and defense go?"

Kazuma asked curiously.

"Hm, Lich have high magic defense, so magic doesn't work good against them, you need a enchanted weapon. They can trigger all sorts of curses and abnormal status just by touching their opponent, and can also drain life, mana or stamina; truly a legendary, immortal and powerful undead. What was surprising is that Aqua's magic is very effective against them."

Explained Megumin.

Kazuma thought of learning skills or magic from her.

A powerful undead should have powerful skills or magic.

But first, he has to raise his levels more.

"Kazuma, tell me the address of that lich. I will erect a holy barrier around her house!"

Kazuma smacked Aqua.

"Forget her already, dammit!"

Adventuring with Aqua is starting to piss Kazuma off.

After Word:

[1] r/Konosuba/comments/jjtpk7/demonic_kazuma/ replace this image's cloak with seiya's jacket, credit goes to the creator.

Ain't got much to say…

Real action will come… soon… maybe next chapter.

Kinda starting to lose motivation, ain't getting much reviews and seems like people are literally giving up on first chapter itself. When I checked the views of chapter 2 specifically, they weren't much comparing to how much chapter 1 has.

I am not receiving reviews and so it's hard to tell if people dislike or like it my work…

Haaaah, idk :)