Just as the Giant Toad's full attention was captured by Kazuma, and it was even starting to turn its body to lash this noisy piece of food with its tongue.
Kōichi moved.
There was no spell chant, and no head-on clash.
Using the explosive power he had built up over those days of hauling bricks on the construction site, Kōichi slipped silently around to the Giant Toad's rear like a black bolt of lightning.
Gripping the rough secondhand wooden staff tightly in both hands, he aimed the tip at the Giant Toad's round, defenseless, and apparently softest spot.
Its butt. More specifically, its cloaca.
"If you're an amphibian, then taste the malice of mankind!"
A sharp glint flashed through Kōichi's eyes. He planted his stance, gathered all his strength, and thrust with everything he had.
"Take this. Axel Construction Site Style Secret Technique. Thousand Years of Death!!!"
Thrust.
There was no flashy magic effect, but that strike, filled with all the fury of a brick hauler and the magic of a Wizard, even if it was only simple reinforcement magic hardening the stick, drove straight and deep into the Giant Toad's weak point.
"Gwaaaaaaaaahhhh!!!"
The Giant Toad, which until now had only made simple croaking noises, let out a scream so miserable it shook the heavens, a cry so full of agony it seemed to transcend species.
Its gigantic body stiffened all at once, and its eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets.
The sheer pain triggered an involuntary vomiting reflex.
Blergh. Urrgh.
Along with a huge mass of disgusting slimy fluid, a blue figure was violently ejected from the Giant Toad's mouth like a cannonball, rolling across the grass several times before finally coming to a stop.
It was Aqua.
The Goddess was now covered from head to toe in semi-transparent slime. Her once-flowing divine robe was plastered tightly to her body, her hair was a complete mess, and a strong fishy stench clung to her.
"Waaahhh! It stinks! It's disgusting! I'm filthy now! Waaaahhh..."
Aqua lay sprawled on the ground, gagging and sobbing, with none of her former arrogance left.
As for the Giant Toad that had just suffered a devastating rear assault, it now looked as though it were clutching its backside, if it had hands, tears welling in its eyes. After one terrified glance at the wooden staff in Kōichi's hand, it bounded off into the distance in an extremely twisted, awkward posture.
"Huff... huff..."
Kazuma dropped onto the ground on his butt and gasped for breath. Looking at the fleeing Giant Toad, then at the wooden staff in Kōichi's hand, still dripping with some indescribable substance, he raised a thumb.
"Nicely done, Kōichi. The method was unbelievably filthy, a complete disgrace to adventurers... but I have to admit, it worked ridiculously well."
Kōichi flicked the filth off the wooden staff and answered with a grave expression, "In this cruel world, victory is justice. That's what the foreman taught me."
"Don't make the foreman sound like some kind of pervert!"
The process had been horrifying, but no matter how you looked at it, Kōichi and the others had successfully driven back their first monster and rescued the Goddess.
A happy ending. A happy ending.
Except for Aqua, who was still rolling around on the ground and wailing.
Looking at the Goddess in front of them, still writhing on the ground, covered in unknown slime and reeking of fishy stench, Kōichi and Kazuma fell into a long silence.
"Hey, Kōichi." Kazuma's eyes were dead, like a man who had just learned he had won the lottery only to realize he had thrown the ticket into the washing machine. "Were we maybe a little too naive before?"
"Yeah." Kōichi replied expressionlessly, while the dirty stuff kept dripping from the wooden staff in his hand. "We thought bringing along a max-level account would let us steamroll through the beginner zone, and that even if all we did was cheer from the sidelines, we could still coast for free experience."
"And what happened?" Kazuma pointed at Aqua, his finger trembling. "That is our so-called max-level account. Other than having pretty stats, her actual combat ability is basically negative! No, negative infinity! Not only can she not carry us, she's basically a taunt totem that actively pulls aggro and then instantly gets herself killed!"
"Waaah... that's so mean... not only are you not comforting me, now you're calling me a totem..." Aqua sniffled miserably while wiping the slime off her face, only succeeding in smearing it around even more. "But those were frogs! They're monsters that hard-counter Goddesses! What was I supposed to do?!"
"Shut up! If you don't want to be left here as fertilizer, stay quiet!" Kōichi and Kazuma shouted back in unison.
Reality was cruel.
The two of them, who had originally planned to ride on someone else's coattails, had finally accepted the truth. In this party, if they did not get stronger themselves, the only ending waiting for them was becoming frog droppings.
"No. I can't keep saving my skill points anymore." Kazuma decisively opened his adventurer card, his fingers moving rapidly across it. "I was originally going to save them and see if I could learn some cool finishing move, but now it's obvious that survival comes first."
"What are you planning to learn?" Kōichi leaned over for a look.
"Enemy Detection," Kazuma said through gritted teeth. "I'm sick of getting jumped out of nowhere. And... Beginner Magic. It may not hit very hard, but if I can at least light fires, make water, and stir up wind, that's still better than running around waving a fruit knife!"
A faint glow flashed, and Kazuma seemed to acquire a new power.
He closed his eyes to feel it out, then suddenly snapped them open and looked toward the depths of the plain. "Over there! About five hundred meters away, three red signals! And they're still coming this way!"
"It works that fast?" Kōichi's heart tightened.
Now that they had support and scouting, what the party lacked most was damage.
The kind of damage that could kill in one hit, or at least blast those slippery monsters to pieces.
Kōichi took a deep breath and opened his own card.
Looking at the Learnable Skills section lighting up, his finger hovered over several offensive spell options.
"If that one, meaning Aqua, can't be relied on, then I'll just have to be the main damage dealer."
Without the slightest hesitation, Kōichi tapped the skill panel three times in a row.
"Kids choose. Adults take everything. Fire, lightning, and ice. The classic three primary colors of RPGs!"
As a large chunk of skill points vanished, fifteen in total, a strange flood of knowledge poured into Kōichi's mind.
The way magical power flowed, which had once felt obscure and impossible to grasp, suddenly became crystal clear.
Kōichi could feel fire elements dancing in the air, water elements condensing, and lightning elements crackling.
"So this is... magic?"
He gripped the wooden staff in his hand tightly. It was still filthy, but in his eyes it had already become a divine instrument capable of commanding the elements.
"They're here!" Kazuma suddenly shouted, his voice trembling slightly. "Two at three o'clock! One at nine o'clock! They're trying to flank us!"
Sure enough, the grass rustled, and three Giant Toads leaped out from different directions.
They had clearly been drawn by their companion's scream a moment ago, or maybe by the fresh Goddess scent coming off Aqua.
"Ribbit!"
The three toads croaked deafeningly in unison, their huge bulging eyes fixed on the trio, especially on Aqua, who was still crouched there trembling.
"Waaahhh! They're back! They're back again!" Aqua screamed and tried to run, only to slip because she stepped on her own slime and crash face-first into the ground again.
"Forget that idiot!" Kōichi shouted, thrusting his staff toward the toad on the left, the one bouncing around most aggressively. "Try this! Beginner Magic. Fire!"
Whoosh!
A fireball the size of a fist shot from the tip of the staff. It did not look that impressive, but the instant it touched the toad's damp skin, the reaction was violent.
Sizzle!
"Gwaaahhh!"
The toad hit by the fireball let out a miserable shriek.
The flames did not inflict a fatal wound, but the intense heat instantly evaporated the mucus on its skin. That sudden dryness and burning pain drove it into agony, and it rolled wildly on the ground trying to put the fire out.
"It worked!" Kazuma shouted excitedly. "Hit it again! Take it down while it's hurt!"
"We're not done yet!" Kōichi's mouth twisted into a fierce grin as magic surged again, this time aimed at the toad on the right, which was just about to launch its tongue. "If you're an amphibian, then enjoy the hell of extreme cold! Beginner Magic. Freeze!"
Crack!
A blast of freezing air enveloped the toad in an instant. The tongue it was about to fire froze solid in midair like a popsicle.
The toad stayed there with its mouth hanging open, frozen stiff like a statue, with only its eyes still darting around in terror.
"That's amazing!" Kazuma stared in awe. "So this is the power of a Wizard? I want to learn that too!"
"One left!"
By then, the biggest toad in the middle had already charged right up to them.
It seemed enraged by what had happened to the others. Instead of using its tongue, it leaped high into the air, clearly intending to crush all three of them into meat paste with its massive body.
"Look out!" Aqua shouted instinctively, despite still being terrified.
Kōichi did not dodge. He stared up at the giant shadow overhead, took a deep breath, and gathered all his magic into the tip of his staff.
"No leverage in midair... this is where you die!"
Crackle crackle crackle!
Blinding arcs of electricity danced at the tip of the staff.
"Beginner Magic. Lightning!!!"
Boom!
A thick bolt of electricity shot upward and struck the toad in midair with perfect accuracy.
As a water-based creature, a frog had almost no resistance to lightning.
The current tore through its whole body in an instant, and for a moment its skeleton could even be seen flashing inside the blue light.
"Rib... bit..."
Black smoke rose from the toad's body as it crashed to the ground like a charred slab of meat, twitched twice, and stopped moving.
The air filled with a smell that was... surprisingly close to roasted frog legs.
The whole field went silent.
Kazuma stood there with his mouth hanging open, not even noticing that his short sword had slipped from his hand.
Aqua had stopped crying too. She stared blankly at the figure standing in the middle of the battlefield, holding nothing more than a beat-up wooden staff, yet somehow looking cool as hell.
"All done."
Kōichi flicked his hair back with a flourish, though there was still a little dust in it, and blew across the tip of his staff as if clearing nonexistent gun smoke. "That's how a Wizard fights. Elegant and deadly."
"That was amazing, Kōichi!" Kazuma lunged forward and wrapped himself around Kōichi's leg. "Boss! I'm following you from now on! Please, you have to teach me the spell that cooks frogs! It looked delicious!"
"Hmph. I'll admit that was pretty good." Aqua got back to her feet too. She still looked like a drenched stray cat, but there was a hint of admiration in her voice, even if only a tiny hint. "But I helped too, you know! If I hadn't drawn their attention, you would not have had a chance to cast anything!"
"Yeah, yeah. Thanks for your noble sacrifice, Goddess-sama."
Kōichi replied absentmindedly, but inwardly he was thinking something else.
At last, he had firmly established himself as the absolute core of this party.