Chapter 4: Explosion
After their discussion, Megumin, Kazuma, and his parents all headed to the adoption office. Stepping inside, Tsuyoshi speaks with the receptionist.
"We're here today to adopt this girl, but she doesn't have any identifying documents. Do you know which part of the office handles undocumented children?"
"Ah yes, of course. It's the desk over there."
The receptionist pointed at one of the desks, and Kumiko and Megumin began to walk over.
"Say, where's she from? This isn't for the paperwork, don't worry. I'm just curious, I haven't seen anyone quite like her."
Kazuma thought about how to respond. He decided to tell the truth, mostly.
"She's from a small town in central Europe, I can't remember which country, called Belzerg."
"Well that explains her more traditional clothing."
Megumin had insisted on wearing her mage outfit, despite our warnings that something like this would happen. Tsuyoshi butted in.
"Well thank you so much for keeping us company, but we should really join the others."
After heading over to the desk she had pointed at, Kazuma and Tsuyoshi helped with the paperwork. There was less paperwork than they had expected, and so they managed to leave early with adoption and birth certificate papers in hand. Kazuma looked at the birth certificate, seeing that Megumin was indeed legally 16 years old, if he'd done the math right. After eating a late breakfast at a cafe, they returned to the house.
"Son, I've taken a few hours off work for Megumin's paperwork, but I have to get the office soon. Your mother needs to go as well. I'm giving you one of my credit cards. I know that Megumin has lots of things to take care on her second day in this world, so don't hesitate to get what she needs, all right? Take care."
Kazuma's parents soon left to catch their trains, and Yamato was already at school. Megumin had been watching his exchange with Tsuyoshi.
"Your dad really trusts you, Kazuma. It's so strange to see, compared to how everyone treated you back in Axel."
"I think it's because of you, to be honest."
"What do you mean?"
"He takes me having a girlfriend as a sign that I've grown up, I guess."
"Hmmm… Do you have any plans for today, my grown-up boyfriend?"
Kazuma rolled his eyes at that last part. He did actually have something he wanted to do today. When Eris sent them to Japan, she specifically mentioned Megumin continuing her quest to master explosion magic. And Kazuma certainly didn't want to defy Eris. So he wanted to find a safe way for Megumin to practice her explosion magic. If he didn't she might cause some serious damage.
"Megumin, do you remember how Eris-sama said that you would continue on the path of explosions, even in this world?"
"I do, Kazuma. It's one of my most fond memories, even if it only happened yesterday."
"Well I think I have a plan for how we can do it safely…"
The two were standing on the docks by the small fishing boat they had rented. Kazuma had installed a ship tracking app on his phone, and the plan was to let loose an explosion out on the water far away from anything they could put in danger. Since Megumin can only cast Explosion if she can see the target, they had brought a ladder to extend her horizon. The 148 centimeter Megumin standing atop a 4 meter ladder would be able to cast Explosion over 8 kilometers away, which was more than enough to put them out of harm's way. He had even gotten her a compass so she could cast in the correct direction.
They both got in the boat. Kazuma had received a quick lesson in how to operate the engine and steer the vessel from the rental company: it didn't seem too hard. They headed out on the boat towards a clear patch of ocean about 10 kilometers in radius. As they approached their target location, they talked.
"You know, Kazuma, I'm quite impressed with how much math you did to get this all to work. It really appeals to my Crimson Demon values."
"Flattered to hear it. Back in school, before I became a NEET, math was always my favorite. Say, how did they teach math back in the Crimson Demon Academy?"
"It's quite a boring answer, but exactly the same way you learned math. Our clan was started by some Japanese guy, after all."
"Despite coming from separate worlds, our math is the same. Poetic, right? Oh, here we are!"
Kazuma took out the ladder and placed it on the deck. Megumin climbed up the ladder onto the very top. They were both wearing life vests, though Megumin's looked pretty funny on top of her mage outfit.
"Okay, Megumin. Face 230 degrees and cast Explosion as far away as you can."
Megumin turned to face the right direction, looking at her compass. They were about 2 kilometers into the clear area, so the blast should occur directly at the center. Kazuma got up onto the ladder, to catch Megumin once she'd used up all her mana.
"Whenever you're ready!"
I am Megumin!
The foremost mage of the Crimson Demons
Forever exiled to the far off land of Japan
Let my enemies die, a mushroom cloud rise
The splitting of the atom could not possibly beat
EXPLOSION!
Off in the distance, exactly where they expected it, they saw the expanding fireball that was Megumin's Explosion. Kazuma brought the limp Megumin down the ladder and pulled out a protractor and a calculator, waiting for the fireball to reach its peak size.
"The angle from the center to the edge of the fireball is about 4 degrees. Multiplying the tangent of 4 degrees by 8 kilometers… gives a radius of over 500 meters. Megumin, that can't be right… I must have used the wrong equation!"
"No, that's the right equation all right..."
Megumin's mana depletion meant that she didn't understand the gravity of what she had just said.
"Megumin! Get down! Cover your ears!"
Kazuma then quickly followed his own instructions. Mere seconds after his warning the shockwave finally hit them. The heat was incredible but it didn't burn them. It was possibly the loudest thing either of them had ever heard.
"Aghh!"
They both cried out: their ears were in incredible pain. Eventually the pain dulled some: the sound must have subsided. But Kazuma couldn't hear Megumin's voice; he couldn't even hear his own voice. So his attempts to shield their hearing had been for nothing. Shit. Without Aqua here, what could they do? Kazuma looked at his adventurer's card and saw that he could learn Heal. He'd asked Aqua to teach him at some point, but he hadn't had enough skill points at the time. He did now. After learning the skill, he frantically grabbed Megumin's ears, chanting Heal. He then healed himself.
"Kazuma? I didn't know you knew healing magic."
"Megumin! Oh, thank Eris!"
Kazuma was relieved, but Megumin didn't look too shaken by what had just happened. It was probably due to her mana depletion. They both turned to look at the epicenter of the blast. A massive mushroom cloud loomed over the waves, still glowing.
"Kazuma, I think this is the best Explosion I've ever cast!"
Kazuma quickly converted the fireball radius into an approximate yield in kilotons of TNT. The results scared him.
"Megumin, listen to me. For some reason, your explosions are far more destructive on Earth. The explosion you just made was about 7 times as large as the one that destroyed Hiroshima. An entire city! That isn't what Eris-sama meant when she said to be careful!"
Kazuma checked the ship tracker. Everything seemed normal.
"It doesn't look like anyone was seriously hurt… except for some hearing loss. And I know that you had no clue how much stronger your explosion would be. This isn't your fault."
Kazuma used Drain Touch to restore a bit of Megumin's mana. Feeling less exhausted, Megumin stopped to think about the massive explosion they were witnessing.
"Maybe it was the last line of my incantation that boosted the power so much. It's not unheard of for small changes to the incantation to have a large impact on the spell performance."
Kazuma tried to remember. What was the last line again? Oh right.
The splitting of the atom could not possibly beat EXPLOSION!
She must have asked one of his parents what nuclear weapons were at some point. What a weird question to ask your boyfriend's family. Perhaps insulting nuclear weapons in her incantation had made her spell act more like a nuclear weapon? It was a terrifying possibility, considering that a blast like that could obliterate a city. But more importantly, they had to get out of here.
"Megumin, we're heading back right now. I wouldn't be surprised if the authorities are looking for us."
Just as he said that, despite his incredibly high luck stat, which now that he thought about it may be meaningless on Earth, he could hear the buzzing of helicopter blades above him. A loud voice came from a speaker attached to one of the helicopters.
"Young man and wizard holding a staff. Put your hands up! You are being detained."
Kazuma and Megumin gave each other a glance and complied. They were soon being handcuffed and loaded into a helicopter. It was straight out of an action movie. Kazuma compared how awesome being arrested in a helicopter sounds, with how mediocre the real thing was. Before they knew it, they were both placed in a jail cell and their handcuffs were released. The door was locked.
"Well, you see Megumin, this is the situation I was trying to avoid. Guess my luck isn't as good as in your world."
Megumin was busy staring at the mushroom cloud from the cell window, which was still visible despite the distance. Scary.
"Well at least we didn't die like last time!"
"That's a very low bar, Megumin. Not dying from casting your own spell is like a minimum requirement."
"You're never going to let me hear the end of that incident, will you?"
"You mean the incident that took away my precious mansion? How could I possibly let you live that down?"
As Kazuma and Megumin continued to argue about "the incident," the cell door suddenly opened. A guard walked in.
"You're being released on special request by the United States military."
"What?"
"What's the United States, Kazuma?"
The guard was confused by Megumin's question, but he explained.
"They've asked the Japanese government to release you from jail and drop all charges, of which there were many. Their only condition is that you meet with an officer. We've already given them your address, Satou Kazuma."
"Well, those conditions sound pretty favorable. Let's go, Megumin."
As they left the jail and took the train home, Kazuma gave Megumin a brief history of the United States.
"In 1776, a group of colonies in a place called America decided to declare independence from their mother country, Britain. Britain at the time was kind of like Belzerg, except it also had a parliament like Elroad. And like Belzerg, Britain had the world's strongest military."
"I think I understand what Britain was like. So why did the colonists rebel?"
"They thought that the British parliament didn't have the right to tax them. Anyway, they won the war and formed a country called the United States, which is a democracy where the people decide who runs the country."
"Wait a minute… they started a war… over taxes?"
"Well not exactly, but the taxes sparked the conflict."
"And they won?! A band of rebels defeated the world's strongest military because they didn't like paying taxes?!"
"More or less. They also had help from a country called France."
"Still an impressive victory. So are the United States and Britain sworn enemies now?"
"Not at all. They're incredibly close allies."
"What a crazy world you live in!"
"Says the girl from the fantasy world…"
Megumin gave him a strange look, but he continued.
"In the 20th century the United States became incredibly powerful and played an important part on the winning side of both World Wars."
"I think I can figure out what a world war is. It's just a war between many major powers, right?"
"Exactly. Near the end of World War 2, the United States developed nuclear weapons to bring an end to the war. Oh right, and Japan was on the bad side of this war. Anyway, Japan refused to surrender and so the United States destroyed the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki using nuclear weapons. That ended the war."
"So that's what you were talking about when you mentioned Hiroshima..."
"Ever since World War 2 ended in 1945, all the major world powers have had nuclear weapons. They're so utterly devastating that a direct conflict between two nuclear countries would be suicide for both. That's one of the reasons there was never a World War 3."
"So nuclear weapons are so powerful that they can stop wars from even starting? I sure wish my explosion magic could've done that in Belzerg."
"If explosion magic had been that powerful in your world the Crimson Demon Clan probably would have taken over the world. Please don't tell me you think that's a good thing…"
Megumin looked like she wanted to confirm that yes, world domination sounded pretty cool, but she let Kazuma continue.
"Throughout the rest of the 20th century, the two biggest powers, the United States and the Soviet Union were enemies in a bitter rivalry. This was the Cold War."
"What's the Soviet Union?"
"The Soviet Union was founded in 1917 in a similar way to the United States, in a revolution. But the Soviets were communist while the Americans were capitalist, which made them bitter rivals."
"So what's the difference between the two systems?"
Oh boy, Kazuma thought. How could he possibly explain modern-day economics to a girl from a medieval-style fantasy world?
"Under capitalism, businesses are usually privately owned and people can freely exchange goods. Under communism, businesses are owned by the government, and people can purchase goods from state-run businesses. Capitalism is very efficient, in that it produces a lot of wealth, but it can also leave some people very poor. Communism gives people equal shares of the country's wealth, but the lack of free exchange means there's less wealth in total."
"A debate between total efficiency and total equality… So what happened during the Cold War?"
"Both the United States and the Soviet Union stockpiled nuclear weapons, in case the other side decided to strike. The large amount of nuclear weapons was obviously terrifying, and the threat of nuclear armageddon was very real. But nuclear war never broke out and the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991."
"Are there any other major communist powers left?"
"Not really. Every single major power has private businesses and free exchange."
"Hmmm… so I understand the basic history of the United States, its emergence as a world power in the 20th century, and its rivalry with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Is there anything else I should know?"
"After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States became the world's most powerful country by a very wide margin, which is why people call it a superpower. Currently no other country is even close to overtaking it, but China, a large country close to Japan, is certainly trying. In 2001, a group of religious extremists called Al Qaeda destroyed two skyscrapers in the American city of New York, in an event now known as 9/11. In response the United States invaded two countries, Iraq and Afghanistan. In the case of Iraq, however, some people thought that they had nuclear weapons, which was seen as motivation to invade. Countries in this region, the Middle East, allegedly having nuclear weapons is unfortunately pretty common. The invasion of Afghanistan had more to do with Al Qaeda."
"So the United States is the world's most powerful country by far, and it has invaded other countries for either having nuclear weapons or harboring extremists?"
"Pretty much. Seems like you have a pretty decent understanding of the world events of the last century already."
"So, Kazuma… If I had to guess, I'd say that the US military wants to meet me because they want to keep anything even resembling a nuclear weapon under wraps? And me being a walking talking nuke poses a huge threat?"
"That's a really good guess. Hopefully they don't want anything unreasonable."
"We can only hope."
They get off their last train and walk towards the house. They see a tall man in a military uniform waiting for them. He must be the officer.
"Do you have time to talk?"