A Goddess's Champion
A Konosuba Story by Andrew Joshua Talon
DISCLAIMER: This is a non-profit fan-based work of prose. Konosuba is the property of Natsume Akatsuki, Yen Press, and Drive. Please support the official release.
I woke up to Aqua on top of me. I groaned, as I saw the sun rising outside the window.
"Uh... Aqua... W-We gotta get to work," I said.
"Mmm... But we have the room until noon~," Aqua crooned. She did something that made my eyes cross.
"Ah... B-But... We gotta... Have to...!"
"What's more important? Work? Or..."
She leaned in and whispered hotly in my ear.
"Accepting the love of your goddess~?"
... Yeah, this was a no brainer.
It was easy to spot the Boss as we got to the construction site. He was glaring at us as we ran up, a tall, heavily muscled bald man with a rough, bushy beard and mustache. I tried to pull my hand out of Aqua's grasp as we approached, but she tightened her grip.
"You two are really late," he stated, "It's the middle of the afternoon!"
"Ah, w-we are really sorry, Boss," I said, bowing very low with my back ramrod straight. "Really sorry. Uh... I mean, Aqua's injury, and all..."
I peeked up under my bangs. The Boss's scowl remained hard, as though etched in stone.
"Please kid, I was young once too," he scoffed. I blushed, as did Aqua. God she looked so pretty that way-
STOP IT!
The Boss heaved a sigh, and shook his head. He smiled nostalgically.
"You two remind me of my wife and I, when we were first starting out as adventurers," he said wistfully, "I was an Adventurer once too, you know!"
"Really?" I asked. The Boss nodded.
"Yup. Which is why I'm firing you both."
Our faces fell. My stomach felt like a hole had opened up in it.
"I come to work to escape my wife! I don't need to be reminded of her all the damn time!"
Shit... Shit... I mean...
Did I regret losing my virginity and having hot sex with a goddess who loved me all night, most of the morning, and through lunch?
... Fuck no!
But this was, at the very least, a considerable inconvenience.
"I don't want to go back to the stables," Aqua whimpered.
The Boss groaned loudly.
"Look you two lovebirds! This ain't a charity! I gotta make money! Got mouths to feed and bills to pay!" He rubbed the back of his head, grinding his teeth. "But... I can give you your last paycheck, and one last little job, all right?"
He turned, rummaged around in the pile of supplies, and yanked out a very large cloth sack. He set it down in front of us.
"Here. I want you to haul this old junk away."
"What kind of old junk?" I asked, untying the bag and opening it. My eyes widened. I reached in, and pulled out a short, curved sword. "Huh?"
"Level 2 Cutlass," the Boss said, "Not much, but it's got more heft than a standard short sword or dagger. You should be able to handle it. There's a few daggers, potions, some more low level armor and equipment... Maybe a few eris coins-Take that as a tip."
We both stared at the Boss. His face went red behind his white bushy beard.
"I told you, I used to be an Adventurer myself! Adventurer class! I did it until I could make enough money to start my construction business!" He barked. "You're trying to become a real Adventurer, right? All those advanced classes looked down on us for being the ultimate Jacks of All Trades! Well, I'm not letting some newbie adventurer and his bimbo girlfriend make us look bad! That equipment's just taking up space in my attic, so you're taking care of it and I'm paying you a fair wage! That way, you don't complain to your friends that I'm a shitty boss and no one wants to work for me, got it?!"
"I uh..." I slowly nodded, bewildered. "Y-Yeah... Thanks."
I tried to pick up the bag... And grunted. It was a lot heavier than the construction supplies I'd been hauling around for the last few months, and while I'd seen some stat increases from that exercise, it still wouldn't budge.
"I can get it," Aqua said cheerfully, "I've got Strength-!"
"Bah! What kind of an Adventurer didn't grab Strength when he could!" The Boss scoffed. "A lot of us have been using it all this time!"
"W-Wait, you have?" I asked. "How could I learn it, then?"
The Boss rolled his eyes.
"You're lucky I don't want you disgracing my class, kid," he grumbled. "Give me your adventurer's card."
I handed it over. The Boss took it, and pointed out some glowing words on the paper.
"See? Whenever a skill is demonstrated in front of you, you can spend skill points to learn it," he said. "Go ahead, Tap STRENGTH."
I did so... And my body was flooded with energy. I gasped-I felt stronger, more limber. I reached down and picked up the bag of equipment. It was still heavy, but I could lift it. Even carry it for a time.
"There, that's better," the Boss said, "It's a passive, automatically activated skill. Uses a little mana at the start of every day. Right now, probably a sixth of your total pool. But you can regenerate that quickly."
"Wait, that's how you learn skills?" Aqua asked in amazement. The Boss shook his head.
"Where are you two even from?"
"Uh, far away," I said quickly, scowling at Aqua to keep quiet. She pouted back, but nodded. "Ah, still... That's great to know, Boss."
He scowled at us harder, his eyes locked on the cutlass.
"You know how to use that?"
"I-I mean, I started with One-Handed Sword-"
"Ugggh," the Boss groaned. He grabbed a short wooden planks, and gestured for me to drop the bag and follow him. I did so, walking over to the grassy field near the construction site. He turned to face me, holding the plank like a sword.
"Right... You've got just enough skill points for two last skills," he said. "First? Sword Dance."
His body glowed yellow for a brief moment, and then he moved with grace, speed, and agility, thrusting his wooden stick and parrying invisible blows. Aqua and I watched in awe at the demonstration of skill, before he stopped.
"Basic enhancement skill. Makes you look like you're not a total embarrassment to swordsmen everywhere," he stated. "And, one that's perfect for your class-Critical Hit!"
His sword glowed red. Before I could even react... The Boss had thrust the wooden pole right into my crotch. My eyes crossed in agony as I fell, clutching my crotch. I threw up, and tears fell from my eyes.
"KAZUMA!" Aqua cried, falling to her knees at my side.
"Combined with Sword Dance, Strength, and your insanely high Luck Stat," the Boss said, though I barely comprehended through the pain, "That'll at least let you start slaying some low level monsters. If your bimbo girlfriend buffs you enough, you two can start clearing some mobs. Make some actual coin."
"It's okay, it's okay!" Aqua cried. She held her hand over my crotch. "Heal!"
In an instant, all my pain vanished. I took some deep breaths, and smiled up at Aqua through my tears.
"Thanks Aqua-EEP!"
"Oh good, it's all in working order," Aqua sighed happily.
"N-Not in public!" I hissed.
"But we did it in that back alley before we got here-"
"Aquaaaa!"
I got back to my feet, and took some more deep breaths. Aqua again reached for me... And I took her hand in mind. Best not to give her more ideas. I looked to the Boss, and smiled warmly.
"I... Thank you," I said, "F-For everything."
The Boss grunted.
"Bah! I didn't do anything," he said, "Just didn't want you two to ruin my business by claiming I'm an unfair bastard. And I wanted to get rid of some worthless clutter. And make sure you two didn't get yourselves killed. My wife and I went through a lot together. Had a lot of close shaves. If we didn't get some help, we wouldn't be here."
He glared.
"That kind of guilt would ruin a meal! So don't fuck it up! And don't show your faces to me again until you've made something of yourselves! ... Not that I care if you do!"
"... Can you be my dad?" I murmured.
I mean, considering my dad back on Earth... The Boss was an improvement in every single way.
Said Boss flushed deeply.
"D-Don't say stupid shit like that! ... Incidentally, here is my address if you want to stop by for dinner some time and your last paychecks," he said, holding out a sheet of paper and some eris coins. "Bring a gift! That's just manners! Bah! I've wasted enough time. I've got work to do!"
He stalked off, his face still burning bright red.
"What a strange... Nice man," Aqua commented.
I grinned at her. Geez, Aqua should have crushed her foot sooner!
"Still! We're in business! Let's grab a quest-!"
"Tomorrow," Aqua stated flatly. "It's too late to go out and night quests would suck."
"Aw," I muttered. "But I want to try out my new skills..."
"And I want to have more hot sex with my champion," Aqua stated.
"... You win."
Aqua beamed.
"I knew I would! The great Goddess Aqua always wins!"
I sighed, and rubbed her head affectionately.
"You sure do."
"You don't have to sound so sarcastic about it!"
Okay. The quest we got was very simple, but also paid pretty well. We were in the early summer season, and the heat had dried up a lot of local streams and marshes. So a local monster that made these places their habitat were now intruding onto human farms.
They were giant frogs. Monstrous things, over three meters tall. Cows, pigs, goats, even people were all going missing-Eaten by these things.
Their meat was also sought after because it was tender and delicious, and a lot of their organs and bones were used in various potions. Kill five of them, get 300,000 eris and plenty of XP. Though you got diminishing returns on that the more frogs you killed.
Seemed simple enough. And after another night of banging my goddess girlfriend into a happy pile of mush (And I had never thought I would say anything remotely like that), we headed out to start our first quest.
It was a relatively quick walk, only about thirty minutes, before we got to the small farming village nearby. The locals pointed us in the direction of the latest attacks, and we trooped out onto the green fields for a random encounter.
It didn't take long before we spotted one of them. It was huge, blue colored, with red highlights. It was just finishing tossing back a goat into its huge gullet. Seeing the goat still struggling made me a little queasy... But Aqua's hand on my shoulder helped me focus.
"Right," I said, pulling out my cutlass, "Buff me."
"You got it, Kazuma," Aqua chirped, "Mana Regen. Strength Boost. Agility Boost. Dexterity Boost. Health Boost. Health Regen. Stamina Boost..."
When it comes to gaming "styles", mine often fell into two categories, depending on the game. For simple RPGs without much substance or difficulty, just fighting and bashing and maybe some keyblades, I played it fast and loose and just shrugged when I lost. Those are more action games with a veneer of RPG stamped onto them. This doesn't make them bad games, just not very serious ones.
For the really hardcore games like Dark Souls or MMORPGs, I was much more serious. I would do every side quest. I would read every bit of lore. I would comb the forums for ideas and tactics. I would stock up on every single item I could get, I would experiment with my party set up, ability set up, everything, until I found one that worked.
A contradiction? Not really. A pro athlete isn't going to expend as much mental energy on a simple game for fun as they would for the finals.
Of course, there was a bit of a contradiction here already: This was a starter quest, something early in every game. You have the worst gear and maybe some items and you just bash some monsters real good to start building up.
Of course, this was easily explained by two things:
One... This was real. I'd died and ended up in this world, and I had no intention of dying again.
And two? Even in the easy, don't-think-much RPGs, I would still take advantage of every buff, every item, and every advantage I could to win. Sure, losing isn't quite as annoying in a game like that... But I don't like to lose, period.
So of course I looked through Aqua's adventurer card, and I had her cast every buff she knew on me. And it was a lot.
"... Haste And Limit Boost," Aqua finished, as the magic flowed over me. "How do you feel?"
I took a deep breath. Holy shit... How did you even begin to describe it? I was full of energy, all coursing through my veins like lightning. My mind was sharp, sharper than it's ever been in my life. I could make our Aqua's heartbeat, the crunching of goat bones, the exact angle of the sun... I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to throw her down and resume our activities last night. I wanted to run for miles.
"Amazing," I said honestly.
Aqua beamed at me. She kissed my cheek.
"Go get 'em."
I charged the first giant frog. It turned, and, just like in the description on the job poster, began to tense its muscles to unleash its tongue.
"Sword Dance," I murmured, the passive skill boosting my Agility and Evasion. I darted out of the way of the tongue strike-I wouldn't say it was moving in slow motion, but it seemed slow and clumsy. My eyes locked onto the giant frog's jugular veins, their weakspot. I held up my cutlass.
"Critical Hit!"
I thrust right through the thing's skin, puncturing its slimy skin and severing all the arteries. It choked, gagged, maybe even whimpered... And then collapsed, dead.
I took a few deep breaths. Holy shit... I... I...!
"YOU DID IT!" Aqua cheered, jumping up and down behind me. I turned and grinned back up at her.
"YEAH! ONE DOWN!"
Aqua pointed behind me.
"MORE INCOMING!"
I looked. My eyes widened.
What the hell?!
Maybe fifteen of them were hopping our way. They weren't in a big mob, mind you, say three vague groups. But they were all moving in the same direction.
"What spooked them?" I muttered. I shook my head. "Doesn't matter. I'll-!"
One broke ahead of the pack, hopping for me. I readied my sword.
"I'll-!"
"I'LL GET THIS ONE!"
Aqua blazed right past me, having applied Haste and no doubt many other buffs. My jaw dropped.
"Aqua, wait-!"
"RELAX!" Aqua called back with a cocky grin, "I'M A GODDESS! I CAN HANDLE A LITTLE UGLY TOAD!"
"FROG!" I shouted back. I began running after her. "AND DON"T GET COCKY!"
"DON'T UNDERESTIMATE ME!" Aqua shouted. She pulled back her fist, and lunged for the quickly advancing frog. "HERE IT GOES! GODDESS...!"
Blue energy flared around her fist... And again, I thought back to the poster. I had read every line on it several times, because again... Hardcore Gamer Mode.
It had made two things very clear: These giant frogs were immune to blunt blows... And water.
"AQUA WAIT-!"
"BLOOOOOW!"
Her fist stuck the giant frog, blasting a huge amount of water everywhere. The frog's body wiggled, jiggled... And then settled down. It eyed Aqua hungrily. She laughed nervously.
"Ahaha... I-I always thought frogs were cute-"
It opened its maw wide, and chomped down on her, just as the rest of its fellows caught up. My grip tightened on my cutlass.
Intellectually, of course, I knew that Aqua was basically a demigoddess. Her stats were insanely high, aside from Luck and Int. She was very, very strong.
She was also essentially the embodiment of the element of water. These things were not a real threat to her. Not even.
I knew all that intellectually. If this was a game I would have calmly taken down the frog trying to eat her, grabbed her, and retreated to somewhere we could whittle away at the groups for the EXP.
I knew all of that.
"AQUA!"
... That's not remotely what I did. Not with rage screaming through my entire being.
"CRITICAL HIT!"
The frog trying to swallow Aqua suddenly lost the top of its head. It all went flying from my sword blow. Another frog tried to grab me, but I evaded with Sword Dance and slashed its stomach open. One managed to shoot its tongue at me, and it latched on. It yanked me back... And I drove the cutlass right through its brain.
Another frog approached-I slashed its front limbs off and thrust the blade through its brain, killing it instantly. Still another-Thrust right into its heart, and I ignored the gore and viscera that covered me. Another. Another. Another. Another. ANOTHER...
I didn't really have any conscious thoughts... I just acted.
A few began to flee. I chased after them. One I just stabbed through the brain from behind. I raced after the next one, and slashed its back legs apart. It skidded in front of me, still trying to drag itself away. I got on top of it and took out its brain, yanking back the absolutely gore covered blade.
A monstrous screech fell upon me. I looked up-Some kind of gigantic snake thing had slithered out of the woods, black armor, long tongue and fangs.
Oh... That's what was chasing them, I thought vaguely. It hissed, and lunged for me with its fangs outstretched. Sword Dance let me evade as it slammed its head and fangs into the giant frog carcass. Critical Hit did the rest.
I jammed my cutlass through its right eye, and it howled. I yanked it out and Danced around the wounded snake monster, another Critical Hit letting me take out its other eye. The cutlass snapped as the blinded monster pulled its fangs out, shrieking.
Its head fell towards the ground, its mouth wide open. I charged right for it, the snapped cutlass out. Even with it like this, I could take out its brain, I could kill it-!
Everything... Stopped. My strength vanished. The world turned grey. I felt like I weighed fifty tons. I saw the ground rushing up to meet me. I heard my heartbeat stop. I heard Aqua scream my name.
Goddamnit... It was supposed to be... A starter quest...
Notes:
I've got nothing.