There’s a group in this world known as the Demon King’s army. They’re way more powerful than humanity, and they’ve been the common enemy of all living beings in this world for a very long time. They’re fearsome foes: Even with immense power granted by the gods, humanity has proven unable to fight back. And we were standing before that terrible force’s home base, which was surrounded by a nigh-impenetrable barrier…
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“Explosion! Explooooosion!”
“Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! That’s it, Megumin, keep ’em coming! You are the world’s strongest wizard!”
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At that moment, though, one wild wizard was putting the nigh in nigh-impenetrable.
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“Check it out, Darkness! Is this great or what? The Demon King’s army has caused me an awful lot of grief, and I’m finally getting my revenge! Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Demon King—pfft, whatever! How do you like them apples?”
“Oh… Ohhh… One manatite worth enough to buy an entire house, two manatite worth enough to buy an entire house…” Darkness seemed to get paler every time Megumin unleashed her spell.
“Explosion! Explosion!” Megumin’s ecstatic voice echoed around the field, while her outrageously powerful explosions continued to batter the Demon King’s castle.
“Look!” I cried. “The Demon King’s handpicked troops are running away crying like babies! The strongest enemies we could possibly face are like pathetic kobolds before us!”
“Ahhhhh… Ohhhh…”
Not long before, Megumin, her eyes brimming with tears at the mana-crystal blessing before her, had unleashed her explosive attack. And now, as the third wave of blasts impacted the barrier, the Demon King’s troops started rushing out of the castle, practically frothing at the mouth. Dark Knights in pitch-black armor appeared with all haste, along with a wizard-looking guy in a robe the color of night and some sort of winged-gargoyle thing.
I could tell at a glance that each of them would have been powerful enough to give us a serious headache all by themselves. Normally, we would have run away from them as fast as we could—and now they were running toward us, racing past the barrier and heading in our direction explosion.
The gargoyle tried to lead an air assault of winged monsters, but Megumin just pointed one of her spells toward the sky, and then it was raining gargoyle dust.
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“Exploooosion! Exploooosion!”
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Megumin had skipped actually doing the incantation for her spell today, like she had during her showdown with Wolbach, one of the generals of the Demon King. An incantation normally serves to stabilize a magic spell’s power and make it easier to control. An incantation would both increase the power of the explosion and keep the magic from blowing up on us. But Megumin had arrived at utter mastery of explosion magic and no longer needed incantations to do whatever she wanted with the spell.
It only made sense. After all, this Arch-wizard had devoted herself heart and soul to Explosion…
“Explosion! Explosion! Explooosioooonnn!”
It was the only spell she had ever cast in her entire life.
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Her magic could take out gods and demons, so the elite troops who came out of the Demon King’s castle didn’t even leave bodies behind. Darkness was pale and shaking as she watched Megumin’s display. “Th-this is hell… It’s hell on earth…! I know it’s only because there’s so much manatite around, but if the king or the nobility saw this, they would label Megumin the most dangerous person alive…! The state would have to get involved…!”
“Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha! God, does this feel good! I don’t feel the least bit depressed now! Keep at it, Megumin! Blow through that barrier and then drop a few more explosions on that castle! Aqua and the others only just went in. And you know the Demon King’s room has to be on the top floor. When the barrier comes down, just raise your trajectory and wipe out the top part of the castle!”
“Nooo, stop! Knowing Aqua’s luck, she’ll be right in the middle of your explosion! And look at Megumin’s eyes—they’re a purer red than I’ve ever seen!”
Not only were Megumin’s eyes shining red, there were little crackles of blue-white electricity all around her. Was that from casting such a powerful spell so many times in a row?
The barrier around the castle was beginning to buckle under the relentless assault of powerful magic; even the untrained eye could see it. Little cracks were appearing in the semitransparent surface, and it looked like it might give way at any moment.
“Exploooosion! Exploooosion!” Megumin kept unleashing her brutal spell, and monsters kept popping out of the castle like balls from a gachapon machine. I don’t think they were exactly eager to die an instantaneous, ignoble death, but they knew that if they didn’t do something, that barrier was coming down.
While Megumin was briefly distracted by the oncoming troops, some wizardy-looking guys behind the barrier were waving their hands frantically. I assumed they were trying to repair the barrier, but I could see—with my Second Sight skill—that they looked desperate, like they might just burst into tears.
Meanwhile, the Dark Knights who seemed like the elite of the elite found their numbers severely depleted, leaving only some anguished-looking Japanese-style oni demons to come rushing out at us. They were all blown away.
Finally, the area around the castle was pockmarked with scores of giant craters. And the Demon King’s troops stopped rushing madly out at us. Maybe there weren’t any left…