The departure of Megumin and Komekko, along with Aqua as their 'escort to fun' left Darkness and Kazuma with one very clear goal.
'Find the proof we need.' The statement was very clear in Kazuma's mind. Darkness, for once, seemed focused.
She huddled behind him, they were alone and it was needless, but, 'At least she's clear on our goal and she isn't bothering me about something pervy. I swear by the great sage of my favorite animes, I'll chuck her out the damn window if she does.'
Darkness watched while Kazuma's fingers jimmied with the lock that kept Megumin's door shut, it was fascinating in a way, 'He's always been good with his hands.' She thought, recalling the way he once so skillfully repaired her armor during their trip to the home of the Axis church. 'Could that be his aim, to use those deft hands? We're breaking into Megumin's room! Why… I am a crusader! Such an act… he could blackmail me! He could press me to any lewd thing and I would 'have' to obey to protect my reputation as a holy warrior!' Her face began to turn red as she watched him force the little thin piece of metal in between the door and the bolt and heard it click as it was forced back into the hole which housed it.
'What degradations will I be subjected to if I follow him within? Where did he even get these skills? Does he plan on breaking into 'my' room to take advantage of his status as master of the house?! Is that his plan?!' Darkness asked herself, breathing harder and harder behind him.
Kazuma felt her hot breath on the back of his neck, and closed his eyes when he turned the knob. 'I guess even a pervert is going to be uncomfortable doing something like this, at least she's not horny for once.' Kazuma thought privately as the door creaked when it swung out.
"C'mon," he said in a needless whisper and entered the room with one slow and hesitant step.
Uncertainty vanished when he stepped within, though his guilt didn't. "Alright, we need to search the room, Crimson Demons are supposed to be pretty smart so let's be thorough. Don't take too long though, that excuse buys us a few hours, nothing more."
"Right!" Darkness said, her eyes lingering on the bed when she stepped in front of him, she waited for his hand to go to the back of her neck, to force her toward it… but instead she heard him take a step away from her, over to one side of the room.
"What are we looking for, Kazuma?" Darkness asked, concealing her disappointment by looking away from him.
He scratched his head, "I honestly don't know, that's part of the problem. But 'something' to suggest Komekko really is behind these incidents."
"I see." Darkness said, and approaching the wardrobe shared by the sisters, she flung it open and began to sort through it. The rustling sound of fabric capes and skirts, along with the screech of metal hangers scraping over the pole set Kazuma's skin to tingling.
While she searched, Kazuma stood in place and did what he did best. He thought.
"Where would I put… whatever it is?" He asked himself in a thoughtful mutter.
"Where?"
"Where?"
"Where?" He asked himself repeatedly.
Darkness stood on a chair and looked on top of the wardrobe, hopping up a few times to see, and sliding her hand along the top. She was rewarded with nothing but a dusty hand that she wiped off one over the other, scattering the gray particulates into the air where they slowly sank to the ground.
Kazuma watched them fall, caught by the light of a nearby window, they glimmered a little, hanging in the air before slowly drifting down to the carpet.
A thought came to mind. 'Komekko is very short.' He thought, and crouched down so that he was about eye level for her. "Darkness, crouch down."
She set the chair back into place and mimicked him with her knees open. "Like this?" She asked him.
"Yes." He said with conviction, "Komekko is short, if she kept anything, it would have to be where 'she' can reach it. So, only check at heights she can climb or reach."
"Brilliant!" Darkness said with a hushed reverence for his cunning, and they waddled around the room, opening drawers, sliding hands behind dressers for several minutes.
Then another thought came to mind.
"Darkness, the bed." Kazuma said.
She turned bright red. "Kazuma! We can't! We live together! We're a team… we mustn't!" Darkness said, her mouth opening and closing, her body trembling with nervous energy, "I am a holy crusader and I must remain p-p-p-p-p-pure!"
"Still! If you force me, my aim is so bad I am sure I can't stop you… Ohhhh… to be defiled on the very bed of my dear friend under the guise of finding proof of a culprit!" She hugged her body and her trembling became something very different from nervous.
"Not that, you perv!" Kazuma shouted and pointed to the dark space below. "Just… lift the bed up a few inches! Use those rock hard muscles for something helpful!"
Darkness' face became serious, she let out a wordless, "Hmpf" and turned up her nose, but she did as he told her to do and approached the bed. She stood by the heavy wooden frame, grabbed it underneath, and lifted it easily a foot higher off the floor.
Kazuma went down to his belly and inched himself under, there, near the center beneath the bed, he found a notebook.
He snatched it between his fingers and drew himself out from underneath the frame.
"Alright, set her down there." Kazuma said absentmindedly while he read the cover.
"Got it." He said and looked at the title, 'Battle Against the Boob Lady'.
He flipped through the pages and found a kind of combination pseudo journal ranting about her affection for the boy who fed her, her love for her sister, and her fondness for Blue Bimbo. What stood out was her hatred for the one trying to get rid of her, the one that 'hid all the food in the world', and plans for her destruction.
"Well, this is it." Kazuma said and held it up, "I'm sure Megumin will be furious about my breaking in, but…" He pinched the bridge of his nose, "Hopefully she'll understand that this was an urgent matter." He held the notebook over to Darkness, who began to flip through it.
"Why would she say these things about me… What have I done to her? I'm only worried about her? I'm trying to do the right thing…" Darkness said, neither asking nor asserting, nor really paying any mind to anything else.
"We'll ask her that when they get back. For now… do you want a beer?" Kazuma asked, and in a rare sullen moment, Darkness nodded her head.
"I think I do. But first, I owe you an apology Kazuma, I really thought it was you, I should have known that you are not that kind of a man. Not when it counts, anyway." She said, then gave him a tiny smile, "The rest of the time though…"
"I told you, the 'steal' skill gets random items, I can't control it and have no idea why it always steals women's panties." Kazuma said, crossing his arms in a defensive posture and giving her a tight lipped expression.
"Regardless… I want a beer." She said, and followed him out, closing the door behind her when they left the room.
Minutes later, Darkness sat at the table with a sullen and downcast expression on her face, the bittersweet bite of the beer lacked its usual savor for the troubled crusader, and that had not changed by the third one. "I just don't think this will work, Komekko needs normalcy and stability, we can't give her that."
"True, but it beats where she was, and Megumin is family. How stable is it if we shuffle her off somewhere else right after she got used to this place?" Kazuma asked and threw back the mug to drink a beer of his own.
They'd gone round and round enough times with no clear answers, the 'Battle Against the Boob Lady' notebook sitting between them on the table clearly spoke on its own for Komekko's thoughts on the matter.
They fell to an unhappy silence that endured until they heard the sound of a trio of girls coming in their direction.
"That was just the best, I'll have to get Kazuma to give me an allowance or something so I can do this all the time! After all an amazing goddess like me should be spoiled rotten by the whole world all the time! And I do practically carry the team most of the time!" Her high pitched voice was filled with its usual overconfidence.
"Don't push it, useless goddess, or I'll make you pay all your own debts from now on!" Kazuma shouted from where they sat in the kitchen, and from the other side of the door came a shriek of alarm that could have only one source. He set the notebook at his side on the bench a moment later.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry I'm sorry, okay, okay?!" Aqua squealed while she ran into the kitchen with Megumin and Komekko following behind her. They were holding skewers of roasted meat that put out a savory and delicious smell which seemed to immediately fill even their large kitchen area.
Kazuma put that aside and tapped his head, Aqua winked and rushed back out the way she'd come. "I'll be right back, I need something!" She said and sprinted away.
"Megumin, Komekko, sit down, I need to talk to you both." Kazuma said with steady and barely blinking eyes.
Sensing the change in his serious demeanor by the way he straightened up, Megumin and Komekko clasped hands and sat down on the long bench at the table with slowness and unease.
"You're so serious, is something wrong?" Megumin asked, her red eyes shining with anxiety.
"Yes." Kazuma said and looked down at the wide eyed Komekko.
"For… a while now, strange things have been happening. Darkness got tacks in her bra, someone put glue on her panties that got them stuck to her skin, all of her panties went missing… to name just a few things. Somehow 'I' kept getting the blame."
"That's because you're a pervert." Megumin asserted without malice, but more matter of factly, her hand sliding up and down her staff while she spoke to him.
"But I wasn't, I didn't do any of those things." Kazuma said with firm resolve just as Aqua returned wearing the double ended plaid cap of her own, then delicately placing a matching one over Kazuma's head.
"But somebody did! Darkness wouldn't do it to herself after all!" Megumin asserted, unaware that Komekko had begun to look away from Kazuma and down at the table.
"Yes, somebody did. That somebody was Komekko." Kazuma stated, and Megumin shot to her feet.
"You can't prove that! I can't believe you, Kazuma! Putting the blame on an innocent child!" She shouted at him and leveled her staff toward where he sat calm and collected, turning his brown eyes toward her.
"The last pair to go missing. Darkness, tell her." Kazuma explained and waited while Darkness explained the trap.
"Still! That doesn't prove anything! He could be framing her, stealing only one so my sister would take the blame!" Megumin said with less conviction than before.
Kazuma grew into the role, grabbing the brim at the front of his cap, he yanked it down a little. "Aqua?" He said with a smooth, deep voice.
Aqua mimicked the gesture and explained how she was tasked with taking them out on the town, and Komekko began to shift uncomfortably. She dropped her skewer when the shaking in her hands grew too great, and it fell with a clatter to the floor.
She leaned down and snatched it up with gusto, shoving the meat into her mouth uncaring that it fell where they all walked.
"And that leads us to this moment… Darkness and I snuck into your room, Megumin, and we searched it." Kazuma confessed, Megumin's face began to turn as red as her eyes, her mouth opened to shout, but she stopped when Kazuma turned away from her.
He picked up the journal and laid it down on the table, he slid it over toward Megumin, who picked it up to look it over.
The title was in Komekko's hand, she flipped it open and began to read.
"Komekko… would you care to explain this?" Kazuma asked of her, and the little crimson demon burst out into tears.
She thrust her little arm out and pointed her finger at Darkness.
"Boob Lady hates me! She wants me gone! She's trying to get rid of me!" Her tiny little legs kicked as she howled, "And she's mean! She's why we went hungry cause she hid all the food in the world down in the basement! I sawed it! I saw! I saw her down there take some, she must have put it down there! How come she got it all an we got nothin! An she wants to take Mr. Kazuman away! I just wanted him to stay an her to go away! I want to stay with sister! I don't wanna leeeeeave! She's gonna make me leeeave! I don't wanna be hungry! I don't wanna be cold!" Komekko howled and screamed like a tiny banshee as the little pieces fell into place.
"I gave Mr. Kazuman the panties cause everybody said he liked em so much! An I thought if I made things bad for Boob Lady then she'd go away instead!" Komekko flung herself toward a stunned Megumin and caught her sister around the waist.
"Don't let her send me away! Pleeeease!" She yowled up while shimmering tears ran away from her eyes to fall in endless drops down to the stone floor to stain it in dark little pools.
Megumin dropped her staff and picked up her little sister, she hugged the girl to her chest and stroked Komekko's back from the back of her head to the base of her spine. "There there, there there… nobody is sending you away…"
"R-R-R-Really?" Komekko replied, heavy, nasty sniffles looping one after another for the better part of a minute as the little girl calmed down from her tantrum.
"This explains a great deal, there are some big misunderstandings here." Kazuma said and took a deep breath. "First, Komekko… Darkness isn't hiding all the food in the world, not even close. Darkness doesn't even do the shopping. Us buying food here isn't why you went hungry back home."
"Then how come…" Komekko began, but Kazuma interjected.
"Do you trust me?" He asked, and the little girl nodded with wide, tearful red eyes.
"Then believe me. We're not keeping any food from you, we buy everything here, neither Darkness nor anyone nor Megumin has been to your village to take food away." Kazuma replied, and Komekko turned her face up to her sister.
"Z'at true?" She asked.
"Yes, yes that's true… Kazuma is telling the truth, I promise." Megumin replied and rubbed her red sleeve over Komekko's teary eyes several times in rapid succession.
"Then there's this… Darkness isn't trying to get rid of you, she's just worried about you."
"And… I don't want to admit it, but she's right." Megumin muttered. "We need to provide some stable care for you… and if this shows anything, it's that I can't do that." Megumin put her forehead to that of her little sister. "I'd do my best… but I'd fail you. That this could happen, tells me all I need to know."
Komekko began to shake her head in rapid, desperate denial.
"It's true, I only want what's best for you, Komekko, though maybe I didn't say it the right way, you're a good child… but you are a child and we leave often, I want you to have a good life, not just go from one bad home to one that is just as bad in a different way." Darkness said with profound sympathy.
Komekko looked around at them all, "I don't wanna go…" She whimpered.
"They don't exactly have daycares in this world." Aqua said, "But hey Kazuma is about to be super rich."
"Right… Megumin… this does make Darkness' point, but what if we hired somebody to stay here full time for her, someone to look after her…" Kazuma continued, "I'll pay for everything. You can just… I don't know, pay me back later or something," he waved it off with a flippant snap of his wrist, "It'll be fine."
Megumin's eyes were shimmering, "I'll… pay you back, somehow, some way… I promise… but who would we even hire?"
"Mask man!" Komekko exclaimed. "He said he needs a new home after someone 'stunk up his old one with pathetic novice priest magic!'"
Aqua paled.
"No! Not him! Not him! Anyone but him!" Aqua exclaimed, which in Kazuma's mind, was the strongest endorsement anyone could have offered.
"Alright… so… Komekko, you're not going anywhere… but no more pranks on Darkness, and no more stealing panties and bringing them to me in the middle of the night, promise?" He asked.
"Pwomise!" Komekko exclaimed and fell into Megumin's embrace to squeeze tighter and tighter while Kazuma stood up.
"Now excuse me, I've got to go see a Demon about renting a room here." Kazuma said and headed to the door.
Aqua followed, her little fists pounding on his back, "You can't! I won't let you! He's a filthy, filthy demon made of dirt!"
The noise of the angry goddess faded when the door shut and Darkness put a hand on Komekko's little dark haired head, "It was fun while it lasted." She said, and walked out herself, leaving the sisters alone and a confused look on Komekko's face.
When they were alone, Komekko leaned in toward Megumin's ear and said, "Careful, or I'll make him mine instead, heh, heh, heh…"
The laughter went on while Megumin blushed a deep crimson, shocked not only by her sister's words but by the thought that sprung up on its own, 'Did I just gain a rival?!'