On the rocky hills beneath the setting sun, a "magnificent" march was unfolding, the kind that would make any respectable historian burn their records on the spot.
Kōichi pumped his legs as hard as he could while waving his staff behind him and shouting, "Lightning Strike! Water Magic! Fireball! I don't care what spell it is, just hit already!"
A few weak bolts of light and sparks twisted through the air. Some smashed into rocks, some nearly shaved off half of Dust's ear, but not one of them hit the Lizard Princess, who was wriggling her plump body around with a crystal crown on her head.
"Hey! Kōichi! Did you learn your aim from Darkness?! Are you attacking, or are you putting on a fireworks show to cheer us up?!" Dust howled as he ran for his life. Behind him, Aqua's cries were even more miserable. "Waaahhh! Kōichi, you almost burned my hair! This is a Goddess's beautiful hair! Could you even pay me back if you ruined it?! Help! The lizard at the front already licked my heel! It's slimy! It's disgusting!"
And so, an utterly ridiculous scene appeared on the wasteland.
At the very front was the temporary commander, Kōichi, waving his staff while fleeing in disgrace. Right behind him was Dust, the blond thug dragging a broken rope, his whole face screaming that he wanted to go home. Behind him came Aqua, the useless Goddess, crying miserably while giving off a seductive golden glow. Behind Aqua were more than three hundred rutting lizards with bloodshot eyes, hissing wildly. And at the very back of the entire line, a Crusader in heavy armor was sprinting while letting out a chilling laugh.
"Ha... ha... wait for me! You shameless reptiles, don't just stare at the Goddess! Look at me! I'm the kingdom's toughest tank with the highest defense! Come ram me, ravage me, trample me into the mud! Ah... just imagining it is making my legs go weak...!"
"...These people are beyond saving. They're really beyond saving." Up in the tree, Kazuma Satou was already wondering how he was supposed to explain to Sena-san that the mission had not even started and his teammates had all gone insane.
Just as Kōichi felt like his lungs were about to burst, and Aqua was about to be swallowed completely by the lizard horde, a flash of inspiration struck him. He roared toward the back with all his might.
"Aqua! You idiot! Stop crying and throw that damn taunt spell on the horny masochist behind you! Hurry!"
"Huh...? Throw it on Darkness?" Aqua froze for a moment. Under the extreme threat to her life, her brain, which had spent years in a stagnant state, miraculously worked for half a second. "Right! That pervert Darkness loves this kind of thing! Since she wants to get rammed so badly, she can have all she wants! Reflect Taunt! Go, Darkness! Become Axel's most dazzling bait!"
Aqua spun around, pressed her hands together, and fired a golden beam ten times stronger than before, striking Darkness dead-on as she stood with her arms spread wide to welcome her happiness.
In that instant, Darkness seemed to become a human-shaped sun, radiating an allure so intense that every male creature within ten miles would go mad for it.
The lizard horde that had been hot on Aqua's heels slammed on the brakes. The ones at the very front even rolled several times across the ground from the momentum.
As if pulled by an irresistible magnetic force, they turned their heads in perfect unison and looked at the Crusader, whose face was flushed as she panted nonstop.
"Hissssssss!!!"
The lizard horde let out a roar of excitement unlike anything before, abandoned Aqua completely, and turned like a flood bursting through a dam, surging madly toward Darkness.
"They're coming... they're finally coming! Ooohhh! This is... the ultimate trial I've dreamed of!"
Darkness laughed wildly, tossed aside the longsword in her hand, spread her arms, and faced the earth-shaking impact head-on.
"RUMBLE—!"
The next second, Darkness vanished completely into the green wave of flesh.
Kōichi collapsed onto the ground, gasping for breath. He stared at the mountain-like pile of lizards, and at Darkness, barely visible within it as she kept letting out cries of pleasure, then wiped away his sweat.
"...Phew. Finally... the aggro is stable. Kazuma! What are you doing?! Shoot down that Lizard Princess while you have the chance!"
The decisive shot that should have settled everything instead turned into a complete disaster, thanks to the pitiful biological knowledge of a certain shut-in who claimed to have the strongest luck.
"Hit! Watch this arrow pierce its heart... huh? Wait, why did that rhino-looking lizard fall over? And why is the crown on its head even bigger than the one Kōichi mentioned earlier?"
Kazuma Satou stood on a tree branch, still holding his bow drawn, cold sweat pouring down his temples.
"Kazuma, you idiot! That was the Lizard King! You shot their king dead! Now these male lizards aren't just in heat, they've gone berserk with widowed rage!"
Kōichi looked around at the lizards whose eyes were changing from blood-red to purplish-black, and the vibration of the ground felt like it was about to rattle his teeth loose.
What had been a somewhat orderly charge turned into a mindless, frenzied stampede. Hundreds of lizards started scattering like headless flies, and they were about to break through the defensive line and rush toward the distant farmland.
"Waaahhh! Help! They've gone crazy! Now they look at everyone like we murdered their husband!"
Aqua rolled around on the ground clutching her head, while Dust had already started trying to bury himself in a pile of broken rocks.
At that critical moment, with everyone trembling in fear, a shout filled with a certain sacred, perverted sense of purpose suddenly rang out from the mountain-like mass of green flesh.
"Ha... ha... yes, that's it! This despair! This thrill of being on the verge of total destruction...!"
Darkness suddenly thrust one hand out from beneath the crushing weight of dozens of lizards. Her heavy armor was covered in scratches, her helmet was gone, and her long golden hair had fallen loose in a mess.
With shocking brute strength, she had locked onto a small, ornate lizard that was trying to escape. That was the real Lizard Princess.
"Kōichi! Kazuma! I've caught it!" Darkness let out a martyr-like cry, the blush on her face spreading all the way down to her neck. "I've always wanted to experience it... the feeling of Explosion Magic, known as the strongest attack magic, raging across my body, ravaging me, reducing all will to nothingness! Hurry! While all the lizards are gathered around me... Megumin! Don't worry about me! My body... is pretty tough, you know!"
Kōichi and Kazuma Satou exchanged a look.
In each other's eyes, they saw the same understanding. It was scummy, but undeniably effective.
"Since she's begging us that badly..." Kōichi wiped the dirt from his face, revealed an extremely sadistic grin, and nodded to Kazuma in the tree.
"As her companions, it's our solemn duty to fulfill the one wish she's had her entire life."
Kazuma Satou gave a serious thumbs-up, then quickly slid down from the tree and hid behind the huge rock behind Kōichi.
"Megumin! Fire!"
Kōichi swung his hand down and gave the final order.
"Understood... Since this is our companion's wish, I can only answer with art of the highest caliber!" Megumin raised her staff high. The red glow in her pupils almost became solid, the surrounding air began to tremble and wail, and crimson lightning gathered wildly at the tip of her staff.
"Blacker than black and darker than dark, may my crimson radiance be entrusted to this darkness! The time of awakening has arrived. Let the fallen doctrine of the absurd church appear as an invisible distortion!"
As Megumin's passionate chuunibyou chant rang out, it felt as if all the air had been drained from the hills, and a suffocating pressure of magical power covered the entire area.
"Wait! I'm inside the blast radius too! Help!"
Dust let out his final scream.