Iris' turn
After one look at Kazuma's face as my footman bowed him into the cathedral's private dining room, I knew there was going to be trouble. If the barely concealed 'chewing nettles' set to his jaw didn't give it away, the stiff way he stalked into the room and bowed would've told anyone with eyes.
With that in mind, I turned to the attendant stationed beside the table. "We shall serve ourselves tonight, I believe. You are dismissed, Edmund. And you as well, Burke." I continued to the footman. As soon as the door closed behind him, Kazuma's patience snapped, his tone fairly groaning under the weight of the sarcasm. "Is there some reason of which I am unaware that I have incurred your displeasure, your majesty?"
"I see that Sir Kyouya wasted no time," I guessed. "And no, you've done nothing to offend me. That I am aware of," I added after a moment.
Dropping the courtier pretense, he dragged out the other chair and dropped into it. "Then why did you saddle me with that pompous, two faced jackass?" He halted for a moment in indecision, then shook his head. "No, actually I'm going to stand by that. If anything I'm being nice to him! I thought this mission was important, not an excuse to get that putz out of town for a while!"
"You haven't said anything I haven't thought of him," I assured my dinner companion, relaxing against the back of my chair and trying to strangle the twinge of guilt at his accusation. "And no, removing Hans is of the utmost importance. The fact of the matter is that for all his many faults he is the advanced class Swordmaster, holds a sacred weapon, and is a capable fighter." I said instead. All true, but getting him out of my hair temporarily was definitely a nice side benefit. "We are not precisely spoiled for choice of people with those qualifications. More to your point, we need a victory, and soon. I would be leading the task myself if not for…other considerations. Which I cannot and shall not be discussing." Best not to go into the gory details, there was no reason to engender bad blood between him and Claire. My grandfather's comment about policy making being like sausage making was all too apt at times.
Kazuma settled a little at that, though clearly still displeased. Well, that made two of us. "And does he really…are both of his two old party mates with him?"
I frowned in disgust. "Yes, through something of a loophole. Eris disdains marriage between more than two partners, or the taking of lovers after marriage. However if one remains unmarried it is technically…well there is a bit of a gray area." I gave him my best basilisk royal stare. Claire told me it was quite good now. "I for one do not hold with such things."
Evidently Kazuma agreed, since he hurriedly changed the subject. "Of course not! Never crossed my mind! I just can't believe the high society types don't complain."
Letting it pass, I shrugged. "They do, to some degree. But again, he is a capable fighter and that counts for much. Is it not the same in your world?"
"Pretty much. 'If you're poor, you're crazy. If you're rich, you're just 'eccentric,'" he chuckled. With that we started dinner properly.
Tonight's offering was traditional Belzerg fare, the cathedral kitchens not having access to the new recipes. Even if they had, their menu tended to favor simple fare as a sign of devotion and frugality. With the new offerings having been introduced at my table, it would be some time before they were considered anything except experimental haute cuisine or noble fashion. That said, the care and skill with which the grilled pork cutlets, bean and vegetable stew, and sourdough bread were prepared far exceeded what the typical home cook could achieve.
"So, the other thing I meant to bring up," Kazuma began while cutting a slice of pork. "Thanks for covering for me with the lye. I think it'll give me the edge against Hans that I need."
I gave a small shake of my head as I did the same. "Not at all. Though now that you have it, I would appreciate an explanation on what you intend to do with it."
"Sure! So to start with, there's a thing called an acid-base reaction…"
Kazuma's turn
My merry band set off the next morning, with me driving the same rental wagon I had gone ahead and bought rattling down the cobblestones. Not just to avoid the trouble of reloading the cargo, thank you. A beater like this one was perfect for blending into the thousand others in the city on our way to the gates.
I was flanked by two archwizards of the Crimson Demon Clan, an archpriestess of the Eris church, and a swordmaster from Tokyo. Somewhere there's a joke that starts with all of us walking into a bar, but for the life of me I didn't think our situation was funny.
Once we left the city, Sylphina and Komekko spread out to either side of me a little on their mounts. Dressed as common adventurers, we just looked like a merchant who hired a few guards for his cargo on his way to who knows where. Kyouya stayed right where he was, plodding along on his charger beside the driver's seat of my wagon.
He also seemed to think he'd found a protege.
"Look, man. I don't care. I'm not hooked up with any of these three. End of story." I hissed, glancing at the two girls on horseback. Megumin was as unable to ride a horse as I was, so she'd hitched a ride in the back and been napping since before we left the city.
"Connerie, as our French friends say," Kyouya smirked. "I've seen how you eye them. Anytime I so much as mention one you glance her way. And don't think I didn't notice you flipping that tarp corner over to shade Megumin back there. Good move, BTW. Always a smart idea to put in a little caring touch here and there, not too much though. You want it to be a special surprise, not something they start expecting."
Thank all the gods, he'd been keeping his voice down as he talked, and talked. I didn't want to think about how they'd react to him basically feeding me lines to put together Baby's First Harem.
"So like I was saying, the most important thing to remember about women is that it's all mental. The key to winning her is getting inside her head. Figure out what she wants, and how you can associate yourself with those things, and you're halfway to payday. Now, when I first met Clemea she was gung ho for being a warrior. So, I approached her with that in mind, and made sure…" he stopped talking as Sylphina sidled her chestnut gelding over, switching topics at the blink of an eye.
"The one handed weapon skill is a fine starting point, Sir Kazuma. However, that is all it is. Your build could surely benefit from the dexterity boost provided by a rapier skill, since to my knowledge your strength and durability stats are somewhat…subpar? It would be best to play to your strengths rather than try to compensate for a weakness…"
"I'll look into that, thanks," taking full advantage of the break in his monologue my frantic signaling with my eyes to our archpriest finally got me. "Lady Sylphina, do you have any ideas on what I should pick up?"
Giving me a look that said she knew full well that I was using her as a human shield, she replied "Most of the low level priest skills are valuable, if only because priests willing to become adventurers are so rare. And I certainly wouldn't mind having a backup healer in the party."
Kyouya gave me a roguish wink from out of Sylphina's line of sight and flicked his reins. "I shall ride ahead for a bit. Do come find me if you have need of further consultation, I am always delighted to share what poor wisdom I may have acquired in my travels."
Once the ass of the horse and the horse's ass riding it passed on ahead, I exhaled a heavy sigh. "Thanks, I didn't think he'd ever shut up."
Sylphina rolled her eyes. "The three of us are hardly bug repellant, Sir Kazuma. Tell him to relocate elsewhere, or scout ahead if his conversation displeases you."
"INDEED! We are bug SMASHERS! Merely say the word and he shall be ERASED from the MORTAL PLANE!" I nearly jumped out of my skin at the hissed interruption. Craning my neck to look behind the wagon seat, I found Megumin glaring at Kyouya's back while kneeling on the tarp she'd supposedly been napping on. Her ears twitching and glowing eyes narrowed in irritation as she tracked him.
"What, you're saying the way to your heart isn't by Explosion? Say it ain't so!" I snarked back, getting my heartrate back under control. Hurriedly, I thought back and tried to remember if I'd said anything incriminating.
Megumin cleared her throat and looked away guiltily. "A partner who treasures its beauty as much as I…would be a worthy match…"
I snorted and turned back to Sylphina. "You really think I haven't tried? He just tells me I'm deluding myself, and then goes on, and on." Some fellow NEETs came uncomfortably to mind, who just would not shut up about how based Rias or Akeno were or whatever seasonal trash they were obsessed with this month and would forget about in a year.
Not me, of course. I only had quality taste. Like Date a Live, or Rosario + Vampire.
My Kyouya repelling strategy of keeping one or another of the girls around did work though, he rode point for most of the trip out to the otherwise unassuming little town that was playing host to a Demon General.
Megumin knew the inn where they were supposed to meet, and it was on the edge of town at least. But there was still an awful lot of property and people in the 'splash zone' given what I'd seen her Explosion do during that…test. That I tried not to think about too much. Fighting him out of town was going to be pretty much required. The tricky part in all this was going to be pulling Hans into an area that nobody would mind becoming a toxic waste dump, or a crater.
Which led to problem number one.
"Of course the ladies can't be seen acting as common bandits. Neither can I!" Kyouya replied to my proposed plan of just ambushing our target on the road outside town.
"You came out here in disguise," I snapped back. "Just keep wearing it and who's going to know?!"
"Anyone whom I-we tell of this deed! Disguise is a legitimate ruse of war, so long as one announces their true allegiance before the attack. And Lady Sylphina and I are too high profile, and Archwizards Megumin and Komekko are too distinctive, for him to be ignorant of us. Not to mention he has spent extended periods in combat with all of us. The moment he hears our names, or even sees one of our faces, we must assume he will withdraw and the plan is foiled!"
"Not all of us," Megumin muttered grimly, but he ignored her.
Tamping down on my simmering temper, I tried to be civil to the twit. "I don't mean to be rude," I countered, more than slightly bending the truth. "But, I'm told, he pulled out of the capital because the mission failed, not because he was losing. What are the odds he'll back away on seeing some of the same people he was able to handle just recently?"
I admit I didn't try very hard.
This time Sylphina interjected. "I for one have no issue with deception if it serves Lady Eris' purposes, however Sir Kyouya does make a valid point. Hans is powerful, but he has remained alive as long as he has because he is also cautious. He will avoid any fight he has no need to win simply on general principles. We must present him with a situation that does not trigger his suspicion. Even an above average seeming adventuring party such as ours appears to be might cause him to avoid us."
Unfortunately, that made a lot more sense than the Knightly Rules of Engagement that Kyouya was trying to enforce. Damnation.
"Making me the only one who wouldn't seem like a threat to him," I completed her thought.
In her defense, she did at least look embarrassed about it.
Iris was not going to be happy about paying for me flattening a few hectares of expensive tomatoes in the fields beside the road a kilometer or so outside town, but I suspected she'd get over it. If this worked.
Megumin, Sylphina, and Komekko were well back from the road, taking cover at the bottom of an irrigation ditch on the far side of the field and doing their best to radiate as little magic as possible. They would need to sprint to get in position to cast, but they claimed they could do it. Kyouya was closer and doing the same in spite of his complaints, since frontline types were harder to spot, and no real threat to Hans anyway.
As for me, I was with the cart pretending to fix a broken wheel by the highway, the horse hobbled and grazing further off. No need to let the poor guy get caught up in this.
Truth be told, and I'll deny it to my last breath if you repeat it, I'd never been so scared in my life. The Moguunin had jumped us before I'd had a chance to be properly terrified, and for Seresdina I'd had the most dangerous person on earth sign off on my plan and only a stone's throw (for her) away at the time if everything went to hell.
Now it was all on me, and if Komekko and Megumin were each nearly as dangerous as Iris in their own ways, they weren't the ones calling the shots.
I'd been glancing up every minute or two as I pretended to work, and around noon I saw a lone figure leading a pack mule that matched Hans' usual form's description. Wiping my forehead and smearing axle grease all over it in the process, I waved at him as he came closer. The signal for the girls to start running after Kyouya relayed it.
"Hey there! You got a minute, stranger? I need three hands for this job it seems like, and I've only the two. I'll make it worth your while!" I shouted at him, trying to pass off my hands shaking as tiredness.
For a second I thought he'd bite, then his eyes narrowed. "What the hell are you hauling?! It smells disgusting!"
"Lye soap," I replied casually, shifting away from the wagon as I popped my back. "Best cleaner you could ask for. Want a jar? After a day on the road it'd come in handy."
He recoiled like I'd suggested he eat a kitten. Which he probably had, now that I thought about it. "Not a chance! You and that whole cargo of poison can go straight to…!" As he spoke he gave a jerk to his mule's lead rope, and started to leave, but then twenty tons of stone arrived.
Hans was not one of the senior Generals for nothing, as soon as he sensed magic moving he dropped his decoy human form and was into his Jello mountain one in seconds. For once, this was the wrong move.
I dove aside and took off running as Komekko's golem seized the wagon by its traces and swung it like a bat, launching eleven hundred kilos of lye paste in a shower of glass jars at a target too big to miss.
When I told this story to a fellow Japanese, who apparently remembered more chemistry than I did, this was the point where he started screaming.
Funny story. The whole baking soda and vinegar volcano thing that I expected to happen? A big, fizzy mess that crippled Hans long enough for an Explosion to finish off? That only happens if you mix the two in open air. Seal them up under pressure, like say launching the open jars meters inside a slime monster so that tons of him are sitting on top? The gas byproduct has nowhere to go, and the pressure builds. Second problem, lye and sulfuric acid are way, way more reactive than vinegar and baking soda, and on top of that they generate heat when react, not pull it in. So the gas gets made a lot faster, and on top of that all that heat is going straight into boiling the liquid around the jars.
He described it as being more like a steam explosion under those conditions, and that's pretty much what I saw.
Like an idiot, I was looking back over my shoulder while sprinting towards the others when I saw the bubbles hit critical mass after about a second and erupt in a shower of Hans chunks for dozens of meters in all directions.
Much further than I'd had time to run.
I had a fleeting impression of that bastard Kyouya swerving away to dive in front of the girls with his shield up, and then a chunk the size of my chest knocked me cold before it had a chance to dissolve me.
Then I woke up.
Between one blink and the next I was in a blank, gray void, a checkerboard pattern on the floor and blankness above, the only other occupants the ornate chair I found myself in and...
"Kazuma Sato, welcome." In the room was an ornate desk and a chair holding the one who announced my arrival. If there was ever a goddess, she had to be it.
Her beauty was beyond the idols shown on television; she had a glamor that surpassed humans, with long, silky smooth blue hair and seemed to be about my age.
She wasn't too busty nor too lacking, a classic example of medium is premium, and had a light-purple hagoromo draped over her shoulders.
"I am the goddess Aqua. Your time in this world is at an end…"
