Chapter One: Deja Vu All Over Again

Next to zero responsibilities. All the video games and anime and manga he ever desired. The most delicious food he could imagine. Endless time with which he could enjoy his life without fear of an untimely death.

And Kazuma Satou was utterly tired of it all.

He hadn't bothered watching or playing anything new for weeks, everything tasted the same, and the lack of anything resembling progress in his life meant he'd taken to sleeping extra hours just to make the days pass faster. A state he'd surprised himself by reaching, but one he'd reached nonetheless.

Ironically, his lone responsibility remained the only thing he looked forward to these days. As was his duty in this realm, he often got called in to speak with someone recently deceased, usually to present them with the same decision Aqua had given him: moving on to Heaven, reincarnating on Earth, or being brought to Belzerg to become an adventurer. Oftentimes, though, he struck up a conversation with them before he gave them that choice. He could lie and say it was meant to steady their nerves before they made a decision affecting the rest of their new lives, but in reality, he used it to keep his sanity intact. He deeply cared for Aqua, Megumin, and Darkness, but without being able to speak with someone less… extreme on occasion, he might have snapped long before now.

Even that wasn't cutting it these days anymore, though; opportunities to meet other souls had grown sparse as of late. Maybe the others had picked up shifts without telling him, but now it happened maybe twice a week at best, and sometimes not at all. He'd probably have to talk with the others about that sooner rather than later, because like it or not, it occupied more and more of his thoughts by the day.

The sound of footsteps behind him diverted his attention. Once he turned around, he saw Megumin holding a pair of controllers in her hands. "Hey there, Kazuma. Want to play some video games?"

Kazuma shook his head. "Sorry, Megumin, but I think I need a break from games for a while."

Megumin's face dropped. "Kazuma? Tired of video games? Did you hit your head or something?"

She then rushed to him and grabbed his head as he yelped in surprise, proceeding to jerk him around for a few seconds while she examined his skull, probably looking for signs of brain damage or something equally ridiculous. When she found nothing unusual, she gave Kazuma another look for the ages.

"Nothing is wrong with me, Megumin," Kazuma said before Megumin could try inspecting anything else. "Maybe I can play later."

Megumin wandered off after hearing that, probably to start up a video game anyway. After he'd introduced Megumin and Darkness to video games, both of them played to various degrees, but for a while, Megumin's gaming habits surpassed even his. She'd cooled down over time simply because she'd started running out of interesting games to play, but she still had a controller or keyboard in front of her for several hours on any given day.

She might be fine with keeping things that way, but after all this time, Kazuma had finally grown exhausted of his life of decadence and ease.

He needed change.

Despite his numerous complaints about the world (and his companions), forging a new path in another dimension or even returning to Belzerg seemed more and more appealing every day. When was the last time he'd done something he found exhilarating, or even remotely exciting? Years ago if he felt generous with the definition, before he even arrived here if he didn't. While going adventuring again promised both highs and lows, he'd take that over the straight line dominating these last few years.

Kazuma rose from his seat. Might as well bring up the issue now: what was going to stop him?

He'd just have to hope the others were in the same mood, because as much as he wanted to get out into the world again, he refused to do it alone.

It didn't take long for Kazuma to gather the other three. While he almost needed to drag Megumin away from her game, the other two came without incident, although both of them looked concerned. He rarely bothered them unless something urgent was going down; the last time he'd done so, the Demon King's successor had arisen in Belzerg and caused another war, which didn't exactly happen every day.

Aqua and Darkness both paid close attention to him, although for what reasons, Kazuma had yet to figure out. Meanwhile, Megumin's body remained in constant motion, looking like the slightest provocation would send her back to the game room.

Kazuma sighed. "I'm not going to waste any more of your time than I need to. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I want to become an adventurer again."

Aqua let out a whoop. "About fucking time!"

Kazuma recoiled like Aqua had slapped him. "Wait, what?"

"I might not be much of an adventurer myself, but those two are," Aqua said. "They've wanted to pop that question for literal years. They kept asking me for advice and I had nothing to say because I've never really wanted anything in my life and it just kept happening over and over again and it was so tiring…"

Aqua stopped there, clearly having run out of breath. Kazuma assumed everything she needed to say had been said anyway, so he continued the conversation. "Wait, how long have you guys been planning this for?"

"Years now," Darkness said. "All three of us probably would have gone on an adventure without you by now, but we were worried about how it would affect your mental state if we left you alone for that long."

Aqua nodded. "You'd lose your mind. Don't even try to pretend otherwise."

Kazuma restrained himself from saying anything snarky. Unlike much of what Aqua said, that had some basis in reality: he'd heard tales from Eris about the many years where only she and Aqua inhabited this realm, and even he couldn't help but be surprised about some of the shenanigans they engaged in just to keep themselves occupied, such as a years-long prank war, a contest to see who could have hot fudge with every meal for the longest, and even experimenting with various illegal substances just to see what they were like. (Fortunately for them, goddesses lacked the ability to get addicted to cocaine.)

Megumin nodded. "I can't wait to get started! This is going to be great, the guild's back together again and I'll be able to blow things up! Come on, let's get going!"

Kazuma wasn't quite ready yet, still wanting to ask a few questions before they got going. "If none of us are going to be here anymore, who's going to take our jobs?"

"I already spoke with Eris, she says she has that covered if we want to leave for a while," Aqua said. "I'm guessing you won't want to be gone for very long, though."

Truer words had never been spoken. Kazuma had learned from Aqua's mistakes: even if he wanted to do this he also needed an escape hatch in case something cataclysmic happened. He'd prefer to see this new adventure to its end no matter where it took him, but he made no promises on that front.

Darkness asked the question Kazuma had asked himself every day for who knew how long at this point. "What are we going to do now?

Unlike most of the days in recent memory, Kazuma actually had an answer this time. "I say we all grab whatever we think we're going to need before we get going. And Aqua, don't forget your purse this time. Having some cash to start with would be useful and I'd prefer if you didn't mooch off of me."

"I won't," Aqua called over her shoulder as she split off from the group. She definitely would if Kazuma didn't prod her again, but the thought was what counted.

Because she was the only one with any experience doing this kind of thing, Aqua volunteered to set everything up. Dimension-hopping (and bringing others with her) was well within her capabilities, as evidenced by her first adventure with Kazuma, but she didn't know if any of the others could do it yet and wanted to make sure this was done right. If the four of them got dumped in the middle of some backward wasteland, she'd lose her fudge.

Kazuma was the only one who'd beaten her to their previous meeting spot. "Aqua, do you have your purse?"

One trip to her bedroom later and she could confidently answer yes.

Megumin and Darkness arrived not long afterward, meaning the time had come to get started.

"Creating an appropriate portal is easy peasy," Aqua said. "Is there anything you'd like me to focus on when picking where we're going to end up?"

Megumin and Darkness both brought up their requests first, and theirs were pretty simple to satisfy: Megumin wanted the opportunity and ability to blow stuff up with something similar to Explosion, while Darkness wanted the opportunity and ability to risk her life (and dignity) for her friends. As for her, she just wanted a place where she could learn some neat party tricks to impress those around her.

Then came Kazuma's turn. His desires proved a bit harder to satisfy.

"I want to keep my memories of this place when we leave, and I want you three to do so as well."

That was easy enough.

"I'd like a place where I can use magic, preferably in a manner that's easy to learn."

Not too difficult.

"Somewhere we don't have to worry about the baseline necessities would be nice."

Certainly feasible.

"Here's the biggest one of all: I don't want to be the main character. Someone else needs to already have that designation, which can't be shifted just because we arrived. External forces at play, I suppose."

That one proved the hardest to satisfy, especially with Kazuma's other requests. With Kazuma's stupidly high luck, in just about every universe she considered he'd stumble his way into main-character status in no time, whether he meant to or not. Even with the many, many universes Aqua knew of being factored into that equation, it still took her quite some time to find one that fit the bill.

"I've found a universe that satisfies all your requirements," Aqua said. "Now, all I need to do is get the portal ready…"

That required less effort than all the fancy effects it caused implied. As a goddess, she merely needed to provide the specifications for the portal, and in many cases everything got handled for her. She wisely refrained from telling that to the others; at the very least Kazuma would jump at the opportunity to say she was so thick-headed that magic itself kept her training wheels on.

"Everything will activate as soon as all of us step inside the magic circle," Aqua said. "Last chance for any of you to back out."

Darkness stepped into the circle first, refined as always. Then Megumin. Kazuma squeezed between them a few seconds later.

Aqua paused for a second. She'd gone through enough on her first adventure, did she really need a second one under her belt? Despite that, though, this one would have people who at least marginally cared for her on it, and the odds of her being so obscenely overpowered that any conflict became a joke was high. Thus, she joined her friends and allies in the circle, everything she'd set up starting to go off in some simulacrum of a countdown sequence.

"Here we go! Everyone try not to puke!"

Kazuma started to say something in response, but it got drowned out by a high-pitched ringing noise exploding through the room as the portal to their new home activated, sucking the four of them right towards it while engulfing them in a blast of brilliant light. Aqua had time for nothing more but one last look at the life she left behind as the vortex greedily sucked her in, flinging her headlong into their next adventure.

Fortunately, Aqua's portals didn't cause much vertigo: emptying his stomach would make a horrible first impression on the locals. That didn't make his landing much easier, though: he would have fallen over upon impact if Darkness hadn't shot out a hand to steady him. The same fate had befallen Aqua and Megumin: Darkness' other hand held Megumin upright while Aqua was pulling herself off the floor and cursing. Too bad Darkness didn't have a third arm.

As before, it took a few seconds for his vision to clear upon arrival. Unlike the last time, though, the sight didn't take his breath away. The four of them appeared to have landed in a train station of some kind, although Kazuma didn't know of a train station that didn't have any windows. He could only see a single train upon a single track from here: a scarlet behemoth that resembled an old-fashioned steam engine, bearing English letters on the side he wasn't going to try and read yet. He picked up quite a few conversations happening around him, also in English, but while Kazuma understood enough of the language to pick up some cues he couldn't dive any deeper. Hopefully, Aqua kept her ability to force-feed languages to everyone, because otherwise, he'd have a hard time communicating with anyone who didn't speak Japanese.

With the crowd starting to thin out, Kazuma decided to kick things off. "I'm guessing we're supposed to board."

Aqua shook her head. "None of us have tickets, we'll just get chucked off!"

"Getting thrown off a train is only about a two on the humiliation scale, and I haven't seen anyone else with a ticket," Kazuma said. "We'll blend right in. Come on, let's go!"

The three girls all darted for the train after hearing that, while Kazuma hung back for a few seconds longer to try and figure out the logistics of his new home. Right before he set foot inside the nearest train car, he looked more closely at the writing on the side. Right before he stepped foot inside, one of the last to do so, he finally understood that the train he was boarding was called the Hogwarts Express.

That set Kazuma's brain in motion. "Hogwarts Express? I think I remember that name from somewhere, but exactly what's not coming to mind. Maybe it's from one of the games I've forgotten about or something…"

Then, as the train blew its whistle and began to move, everything fell into place.

"Oh, no…"

Thanks for checking this out! Hopefully you enjoyed the first chapter. I apologize if it's a little dry.

This story is rated M for language, sexual situations (no lemons, though), Darkness, Professor Umbridge, and Darkness with Professor Umbridge. (If you know, you know, and if you don't, you'll find out soon enough.) There will also be some violence, but I don't think it'll get too graphic.

There may be some romance in this story, but those pairings are undecided at the moment. However, there will be no harems, because I don't particularly care for those. All romantic relationships will strictly involve two people, although whether they stay canon compliant is something I'm going to figure out later.

Thanks again for reading, and I hope to see you next chapter!