"So this is the mansion."

I commented, standing next to the large building which was quite large compared to the mansions back in Japan.

It used to belong to a noble family for a long time before it was abandoned due to some unknown reason.

What were we doing in such a place?

Well… apparently it got infested by some mean evil spirits.

So we were called to deal with the problem, with the reward being the mansion itself.

How did that happen…

It was Wiz who actually passed the mission to us.

Nervously saying how it wasn't a lich's job to deal with evil spirits.

I also remembered Aqua talking to Wiz after the Destroyer was beaten.

And I don't know what they talked about, but when Wiz came towards me, she was paler than her usual self.

When I asked Wiz if she was being harassed by Aqua again, she rapidly shook her head saying she was fine and Aqua only tried to purify her once a month nowadays.

Whatever the reason may be, this quest gave me an opportunity to finally move out of the stables.

We still had about 41 million eris worth of debt left, so we still needed a place to stay for at least the rest of the winter season.

"Not bad! This place is great! This is where someone like me should be staying!" Aqua shouted while hugging a small bag.

Megumin carried a bag that was twice her size. She seemed to be sporting a small blush of excitement, and I found the sight of her rosy cheeks quite cute-

Wait.

Hold up.

She is 14.

I might be 16, but she is still just 14.

And I'm standing in front of a haunted mansion.

Definitely not the time.

"But can we really exorcise the evil spirits? I heard you need a full team of priests to do that kind of job, and new spirits would keep coming back no matter how much you clear them," Darkness said, as she was the only one who wasn't taken aback by the size of the reward.

I wonder why.

"Priests of your Eris Church might need help dealing with some spirits, but I am Aqua, goddess of water. I will take them all out alone, just you watch," Aqua said, who looked to be excited by the thought of purifying the spirits.

"But it feels like this place has not been occupied for a very long time, didn't the disturbance of the spirits only happen recently? Could it be, this mansion already had issues before the spirit problem hit the entire town…?" Megumin said uneasily.

Yeah, I kinda forgot about Megumin's reason for not following us in the dungeon.

She is afraid of the dark, so of course the haunted mansion would spook the girl out.

"Yes, but even if this mansion had problems, we'll be fine. We have Aqua with us, right? No worries, she's an expert in fighting the undead, and you've got me here as well if you get scared," I said, trying to be reassuring and at the same time deploying my cool face.

And from the look of cringe that came across my companions, it wasn't working.

Still, even though I think that Aqua is useless on most days, I think I can rely on her when dealing with the paranormal.

"Leave it to me! … Fufu, I can see it, I can see it! With my spiritual eyes, I see the noble, who was fooling around with a maid, and the child that the maid bore, who was kept here as the illegitimate child of the noble clan! The noble died from illness, and the maid went missing. The young girl left here contracted the same disease as her father, and died without ever seeing the faces of her parents! Her name was Anna Filante Asteroid. The things she liked were dolls and the stories of adventurers! But please don't worry, this spirit won't pull pranks on us. She will not harm us! Ara, she might be a child, but she liked mature things like drinking fine wine. So, prepare some wine as an offering!" Aqua said like a psychic who drank more alcohol than they could handle.

She lost me at Anna Filante Asteroid.

Really? Asteroid?

Who the fuck names their family Asteroid?

After Aqua's rambling, we entered the mansion and took off our equipment.

We had settled the distribution of rooms beforehand, so everybody started putting their luggage in their rooms.

Seeing as Megumin and I both had our rooms on the second floor, I helped her move her huge bag into her room.

I held onto the faint hope that the evil spirits would be exercised because of the fact that Aqua resided here.

With that thought in mind, I went to sleep in our new abode.

I woke up in the middle of the night, wondering how long I had slept.

The mansion was silent, so it should've been late at night.

I was confused for the reason I woke, only to realize that I had to relieve myself.

I was about to get up from the bed, when the sound of an empty bottle hitting the ground rang through the room.

Hearing the sound, I shifted my gaze to where the sound came from.

In the corner of the room stood a tiny doll of a girl in a dress, who looked way too similar to the one in the Annabelle series.

I am dead.

Cold sweat broke out across my face as I covered myself in my blankets and faced away from my visitor.

What was going on, why did it appear here?

I didn't have any recollection of it being in this room earlier. Did Megumin place it here to scare me?

Yeah, that should be it. That had to be it.

That damn cute loli!

No explosions for a month for her.

I closed my eyes and willed that the doll was just part of a prank and hoped it would just disappear.

Clop.

The sound of something made of wood hitting the floor rang throughout the room.

"It's just a prank, just a prank," I muttered under my breath.

Clop.

Oh, it wasn't the sound of something hitting the floor, the damn doll was walking.

Yeah, I should've known Megumin wouldn't do me like that.

Clop.

Not just Megumin, all my party members were nice, I should treat them better from now on.

Clop.

Specifically Aqua, she was a goddess after all. Evil spirits? Those things would be killed instantly if they met Aqua. Our Aqua was a goddess that could easily purify a lich!

Clop.

Clop.

Clop.

I'll apologize to Aqua for cutting her hair too, I was too disrespectful to a goddess. Yeah, I would reflect on it, I would reflect on it.

I lay there for a few seconds in silence as the sound from before had stopped.

Did Aqua-sama hear my prayers?

When the silence remained after a long minute, I relaxed slightly, exhaling the breath that I didn't even know I was holding in.

After 5 minutes or so, I remembered the reason I woke up in the first place.

As the doll seemed to have left me alone, I opened my eyes to go to the toilet…

Only for my eyes to meet with painted blue ones.

Shit!

"AHHHH!" I shouted while I jumped away from my bed and saw that the doll had brought its friends too.

Now there are 10 of them.

Seeing the dolls advance on me, I summoned my axe and cleaved one of them in half.

The twin pieces of the doll hit the floor as its comrades watched it.

Yeah, see? That will happen to you if you mess with me.

I was broken out of my triumphant thoughts when I felt something grab my legs.

I looked down and saw that the doll I had sawed in half was crawling with one of its hands while it grabbed me with the other.

Fuck.

I ran out of the room as the dolls gave chase.

Aqua might be the only one who can deal with this, so I started shouting, "Aqua! Aqua-sama!" as I ran barefooted in the corridor toward Aqua's room.

I was so scared that I didn't even knock and charged straight into Aqua's room.

They can yell 'pervert' at me all they wanted once this was over, but first someone stop these dolls.

I closed the door in a panic and locked it.

A second later, I heard the sound of the dolls crashing into the door.

I sighed in relief and turned around and met with deep crimson eyes which shone in the night.

Any other day I might've found them beautiful, but now…

"Ahhh!"

"Wahhh!"

I couldn't help but scream, and the demon before me was also shrieking for some reason.

She sounded familiar, and upon closer inspection, I realized it was Megumin in her pajamas.

Cute came the thought to my mind, even in the whirlwind of emotions that raged through me.

"Don- Don't scare me, Kazuma! And what're you doing so late at night in Aqua's room?"

"Hey, that's my line! And why are you in Aqua's room? And where did Aqua go?"

"Ugh… there was a doll moving around my room… and… well… I wanted to ask Aqua to protect me… I wanted to ask her to take me to the ladies…"

"You too then."

Hearing what I said, Megumin seemed to realize I was in the same boat as her.

"You were chased around by dolls too? I think Aqua and Darkness went out to exorcize the spirits," Megumin said, now calming down.

As I racked my brain over what to do, Megumin seemed to realize something and said, "Kazuma, the noise outside the door seems to have stopped. Maybe the dolls aren't there anymore?"

Ah, now that she mentioned it, yeah, the sound had stopped.

But that doesn't mean I'm going out there.

Oh no no no, I am not falling for the same trick again.

Aqua could purify a lich easily, so she wouldn't be taken down by a doll.

If that was the case, then we could just camp in this room until Aqua and Darkness exorcized all the spirits in the mansion.

But first I had to do something.

Hey Megumin, please face the door and cover your ears. Excuse me, but I'm going to relieve myself at the balcony…"

I walked toward the balcony…

And Megumin grabbed the belt of my trousers from behind, and yanked me back.

"Hey, what are you doing? Release me, or my trousers and the carpet in this room will be ruined!"

"I won't let you go! How could I let you relieve yourself! Aren't we comrades?! Whether it's the toilet or anywhere, we go together…!" Megumin said with a serene smile…

Why do you have to act like that at a time like this?

"Stop that! Why are you picking this moment to talk about being comrades? Look, there's an empty wine bottle there, just use that!"

I felt something wrong when Megumin didn't shout at me for even suggesting that, so I looked at her.

I found her staring intensely at the balcony window.

… I looked over there with a foreboding feeling.

Was this unexpected, or was this just as expected?

Many dolls were pressing against the window and looking our way.

"AHHHH!"

Megumin and I screamed at the same time and charged out of the room.

"Sniff… Kazuma, are you there? Don't leave me, okay?"

"I'm here, of course I'm here. I won't leave you even if the dolls come out, so hurry up."

She's been talking for a while, maybe because she was worried about me leaving her behind.

"... Um, Kazuma… it's a bit embarrassing to go to the ladies room like this… could you loudly sing a song or something?"

Excuse me?

We're being hunted by haunted dolls and she wants me to sing her a song?

Sigh, the things I do for her.

Speaking of songs, I only knew anime songs, so I just started to hum the music to Renai Circulation, as it was still stuck in my head.

Yes I am a weeb.

At least no one here knows where this is from…

"Umm… I didn't expect you watched TikTok videos Kazuma, but what should I expect from someone like you?" Aqua said as she came across the scene of a grown ass man humming cute anime songs.

But more importantly, did she just say TikTok?

"So you dealt with all the spirits?" I asked Aqua and Darkness who had shown up outside the bathroom.

"Yes, no more problems. There were a lot of spirits here, but they were no match for my godly powers," Aqua boasted as she struck a pose.

"Ok good, so as much as I would like to celebrate that, I feel like sleeping, so good night," I said to them and went to move to my room.

I was just outside my room when Megumin tugged at my sleeve.

"I know you might feel scared, so… so you can sleep in my room with me," Megumin said while looking away, but keeping her grip on my sleeve.

I don't think I have ever said yes to something that fast before.

'I had something completely different in mind when I came here', I thought as I layed in the futon in the corner of the room while Megumin slept on the bed.

Don't get me wrong, I just thought we would be in the same bed.

Nothing naughty.

Nah-ah.

I lay there in my futon trying to sleep, but I didn't find any.

I don't know when, but…

Somewhere along the way in the past 3 months…

In our time spent together, I developed something that I feared more than anything.

I only realized it during the small touches between me and her.

It raised questions in my mind that I had no answers to.

And also gave me answers that although felt like a gentle breeze, also brought with it the chaos of possibilities.

I finally went to sleep that night with a girl with deep crimson eyes on my mind.