For once, thinking that something was going to go easily, didn't completely botch the event. Between Kazuma throwing knives, shielding, and occasionally slashing a crowcat, they succeeded at killing a whole twenty of them, enough for the two of them. Enough that they were no enjoying a meal of roast beef and broiled veggies at the diner Aqua had wanted.
The down side, was that Kazuma was more distracted with his Adventurer's Card than with girlfriend. A girlfriend who was growing increasingly frustrated at being ignored.
The reason Kazuma was so distracted was because he was technically level fifty now. While by far the highest level in the town, he had a non-combat class at base. That's why the new skill, "Money Cannon." A skill that even Luna had never heard of. From what they could surmise, he was possibly unique in that he was a merchant that actually specialized in trying to fight and be an adventurer. Most just tried to make as much money as they could.
Money Cannon was an… interesting, ability, to say the least. It's description was that it allowed him to manifest a Cannon that literally used Eris as ammunition. Not as bullets though, seemingly. Instead, it converted the amount of Eris offered up into energy blasts that could be used a handful of ways. When he'd summoned it to see what it looked like, he could have sworn it was a direct rip off of a Kamen Rider weapon. The big issue? He didn't have much liquidity. So, now he was obsessively thinking of ways to fix that problem instead of paying attention to Aqua.
At least, until he received a sharp kick to the shin from said Goddess.
"Gah, what the fuck Aqua?!" he let out, rubbing his leg under the table, careful to not bump the table too hard.
"You were ignoring me! We're supposed to be on a date you dummy!" she whined, crossing her arms while glaring at him angrily.
For once, Kazuma can't really excuse himself. He had focused on something he thought was cool instead of a date he'd promised her earlier. "Sorry Aqua. I was just a bit focused on the new level. You're right."
Aqua lit up at that, leaning in with a hand to her ear. "Could you repeat that?"
Kazuma lightly tapped her head, smiling indulgently. "Now, now, none of that. You got your praise for now. Let's eat and got back to the house. I wanna make sure it's still standing with those three left to their own devices."
Making a 'tcht' at being denied her 'well earned' praise, Aqua went back to enjoying her food. With her attention span, she soon forgot, going on about some of the adventurers that she'd had to heal the other day.
-Ko-No-Su-Ba!-
Aqua and Kazuma arrived back at the mansion, the ditzy blue-nette going on about a how fewer missions had been coming into the guild. A fact that Kazuma was even more aware of than even her. After all, a demon lord's general moving into the nearby country side would do that. The fact that they'd been content to remain silent made it not too concerning.
"Darkness, Megumin, we're hooome" Kazuma says, throwing his voice so that the girls should be able to hear him.
"We brought some dinner!" The old lady who ran the shop was willing to part with a pot of food for their friends, trusting Aqua to drop it back off the next day.
"Me and Yunyun are in the living room!" came an almost giggling response from Megumin before she started laughing.
The duo came into the living room, watching as a smiling Yunyun and Megumin played with Chomusuke.
"So, everything is alright now?" Kazuma asked, glad to see Yunyun and Megumin smiling instead of whatever it was they had been doing.
"Mhm! We agreed that if we're not competing, we can't be rivals. And if we're not rivals or enemies, nothing is stopping us from just being friends" Megumin explained, acting as if it was some grand revelation and not just the common sense it was.
"Great, glad to hear it. Think you'd be up for grabbing a mission tomorrow? I'm about to go ask Darkness now and you can come along too if you'd like, Yunyun" Kazuma offered, not wanting to leave their guest alone.
"Oh! You don't need to do that, I'm really not that-"
"Bull shit! You are an Archmage of the Crimson Demons! You know advanced and intermediate magic and would be of great assistance to our friend in any task we set out on!" Megumin shouted, trying to protect her friend, even from herself.
"…what she said," Kazuma agreed.
"Oh! Yunyun agreed to go with me for Explosions! We're going to go out to this cool dilapidated castle she found and teleport us back," Megumin told them, nearly vibrating in excitement at finally being able to use her 'full might' again.
Kazuma flinched at that, worried that she might get them further in trouble. "Just try to make sure you don't damage the town at atll, alright?"
"Yeah, yeah" she waved him off, returning her attention to their play.
-Ko-Nu-Su-Ba!-
The newly grown party of five had accepted a mission to take care of a Tyrant Lizard that had wandered too close to town. He wasn't sure, but it sounded a lot like a T-Rex based on what he could read up on it. It also had no business being anywhere around here, usually farther south in a much oppressively hot climate. He wasn't sure if it would be alright, but Feldart had assured him that it would be fine with their current party. There was just one small issue.
None of them knew how to track.
"Stupid overgrown lizard! Why can't it have the common decency to be easy to find? It's supposed to be like, six meters tall! How hard can it be to find?" Aqua whined, her feet sore after their sixth hour of walking.
Kazuma let out a grunt of agreement, wiping the sweat from his brow as they baked in the late spring/early summer heat. "I mean, it's an apex predator. Odds are it is pretty good at ambushes and the like, right?" He offered lamely as an explanation, hefting his Money Cannon in his arms. He'd summoned it as soon as they'd reached the suspected area, excited to try it out. That had been over four hours of sweating ago and the thing was heavy in his arms now.
The canon was, in his opinion, completely out of place in this world. Gun metal grey body, obsidian black leather grip and modern trigger with a reservoir on top of it to deposit coins. It literally allowed him to convert Eris (and theoretically other coins) into kinetic blasts. The smallest setting, a modest ten Eris, was little more than a strong punch. When he tried a hundred, it had destroyed the target, punching a hole through it. Thankfully, with his little pocket dimension, he could easily deposit the coins by just holding his palm on the top of it and withdrawing however many he wanted to use.
Megumin was, surprisingly, the next to speak up, "Doesn't that mean it could easily be tracking us?"
Before that thought could truly take root inside their minds, a loud, bone chilling roar stopped them all dead in their tracks. A cacophony of panicked croaking accompanied the sound of birds taking flight in terror at the presence of danger.
Following the sound, soon enough replaced by loud biting and chewing, the five burst out from the treeline, coming into a familiar field. The damned lizard had led them all the way back to the field near Axle where the giant toads generally stayed. Calling it a lizard wasn't truly doing it justice though. A giant toad is already large enough to eat an adventurer whole, towering over twenty feet tall at its highest point. The lizard was large enough that the bulbous body of the toad fit under a single gnarly, clawed foot. Mottled, dark greens, browns and black blended together across its form, making a perfect natural camouflage in the dark jungles it usually called home. It leaned back down, taking a bite out of the toad, showing sword sharp teeth easily as large as any one of them.
Kazuma threw out an arm, stopping Aqua, Yunyun, and Megumin behind him and allowing Darkness to get in front of them. "I had no idea this thing was so huge. Megumin, think your Explosion magic would kill it?"
"Obviously! I can destroy literal buildings and that is but a stupid animal!" She half shouted, half whispered, terrified despite her bravado.
Aqua clutched at Kazuma's shoulder, shaking in fear. "I don't know if I'd be able to heal any of you if it took a bite out of you."
"Well, then we'll just play it safe. It's already eating. Megumin, just charge up an Explosion as fast as you can and kill it. I'm not joking, no messing around today" he reiterated, not wanting to play around with her need to chant.
"But it won't be even a fraction as powerful if I don't give a good chant!" The diminutive mage griped, stomping her foot, her voice raising a hair louder.
"Shh! Are you trying to make it notice us?!" Kazuma asked, accidentally raising his own voice enough that the beast stopped, now listening to see if it had in fact heard something. The subtle action unnoticed by the party.
"Who do I look like, Darkness? She's the one that would want to get into a melee with it!" Megumin shot back, failing to lower her voice enough this time. The tyrant locked its eyes on them, slowly starting to stalk towards them as they bickered.
"Um, Megumin-" Yunyun tried to butt in, pulling on Megumin's sleeve, being the only one to notice the lizard slowly plodding toward them.
"Not now Megumin, this filthy Merchant has besmirched my intelligence and it must be addressed!" Megumin declared, no longer even trying to keep her voice down.
"I'm the filthy one? Says the pauper Archmage who had to beg for help and food when she first showed up at the guild!" Kazuma borderline shouted, angrily poking the short girl's forehead. "Or do I need to remind you of the debt you stuck me in within days of showing up and asking me for help?"
"Uh, Kazuma?" Aqua asked, trying to catch his attention as she now saw the accelerating Tyrant starting to trot at them even as Darkness took a stance between the party and the monster.
"I said I was sorry!" Megumin shouted back, blushing lightly at the reminder of her blunder.
"GUYS!" Shouted Darkness, catching both of their attentions.
"WHAT?!" They asked in stereo, turning towards the Crusader, only to see the beast now barreling down at them. "FUCK!"
Megumin panicked, starting to fumble with her staff, drawing in mana as the Tyrant was less than fifty feet and closing fast. "You can't Explode it! If you do that, it's going to hit us too!" Yunyun pointed out, shaking the smaller Crimson Demon
"I'll use a variant then!" Megumin defended, having not cared originally about such small details.
Kazuma gathered himself, having fully dropped his canon in his terror at their encroaching death. Hastily dropping to a knee, he took aim. His hands shook so much he wasn't sure of his aim but felt the need to try at least. Less than thirty feet now until it was on them. Darkness had even started to charge at it, hoping to buy them room. She was tough, but he really didn't want to test if her body could handle the crushing force of those teeth. Taking a deep breath, he waited until it started to slow down to engage Darkness, knowing that he'd more likely miss if it was moving than if he waited a moment. He didn't even think of how much money to dump into his shot, instead throwing everything at it in a blind panic. He was only going to get one shot, so why not make it count? What he didn't consider was that he had over 100,000 Eris in his pocket bank right now (he had convinced Wiz to bundle up a lot of her useless objects in a single package for him to sell it all for her to have room for good stock). That wasn't even including the guild funds that Luna trusted him with now. He, with Luna, were effectively living banks for mission pay and there were millions stored that he and Luna could access to pay out. Literally thousands of times more than what he'd put into a shot large enough to destroy a wooden target. So, as he squeezed the trigger, the world turned white.
Aqua and Yunyun had covered their faces with their arms, the light having blinded them. Megumin had been blinded too, but she had been too busy trying to prepare a spell to protect herself. Darkness was frozen in shock as she tried to process what had just happened. All she knew for sure was that her armor was gone. Even her black under suit was completely scorched off of her body that she was just starting to realize was in immense pain, as if she'd been dropped in boiling water. Looking up slightly at her molten hot sword, she saw that the blade just ended at some point, as if a god had just snipped it off with a pair of scissors. That's when she saw the Tyrant Lizard. Well, what was left of it; it's two feet from the ankle down. Nothing else remained as she collapsed forward, unable to move as she fell unconscious.
Aqua, upon realizing Kazuma had a clear view of Darkness in all her naked glory, her hands rapidly covered his eyes, a spike of jealousy stabbing through her heart. "Darkness, what the hell?" She asked, only to become worried as the Crusader collapsed forward. Her previous concerns evaporated as she rushed to Darkness's side, beginning to heal her as fast as she could. After a few moments, she let out a sigh, glad to see their friend would be alright. Giving the others a thumbs up, she tried to smile, far too nervous to do much.
Kazuma was still silent though, looking forward past where the Tyrant had been. It hadn't stopped, instead going through not just the trees on the far side of the field, but he could see a clear hole through a piece of mountain on the distant horizon. If he'd aimed that with Axel behind the Lizard, he might have destroyed the entire town!
"I…I don't think I am ever using this thing, ever again" he swore, his body shaking now at the sheer destructive power he had in his hands.
And he didn't even realize he'd effectively just robbed the guild of its mission payments.
