The journey back to Axel was a silent one, punctuated only by the wet, squelching sound of Deadpool's boots and the hiccuping sobs of a goddess. Kazuma had managed to achieve a state of zen-like dissociation, simply putting one foot in front of the other and pretending the two biohazards trailing him were part of a very vivid, very unpleasant dream.
Deadpool, for his part, had entered a new stage of grief. The frantic panic had subsided, replaced by a cold, simmering rage directed at the universe itself. He had stopped trying to scrub the toad guts off with handfuls of grass and was now walking with a stiff, unnatural gait, as if trying to avoid letting his own suit touch his own body.
"This is a violation of my person," he muttered to a passing butterfly. "My suit has a delicate ecosystem of old taco crumbs, gunpowder residue, and faded dreams. This… this amphibious effluvium has disrupted the entire balance. It's an ecological disaster on a microscopic level."
"My divine vestments are ruined!" Aqua wailed, holding up the hem of her now slime-caked raiment. "They were woven from the dawn's first light and rinsed in the laughter of cherubs! Now they smell like… like regret and bad life choices!"
"Welcome to the club, sister," Deadpool grumbled. "We've got jackets. They're also covered in slime."
When they finally squelched their way back into the Adventurer's Guild, the entire hall fell silent. The rowdy cacophony of boasts and drunken laughter died in an instant, replaced by a hundred pairs of eyes staring in horrified fascination. The trio looked less like triumphant adventurers and more like the sole survivors of a calamitous plumbing accident at an aquarium.
Luna, the guild receptionist, stared at them, her practiced smile frozen on her face. Her left eye twitched. "May I… help you?"
Kazuma slapped the slime-splattered quest parchment onto her counter. "Quest complete. Five Giant Toads. Exterminated."
Luna peered at the parchment, then at the three of them, then back at the parchment. She looked like she wanted to handle it with tongs. "I see. Congratulations. That will be five thousand Eris." She counted out the coins with extreme care, pushing the pile toward them with the end of a long ruler, refusing to let her skin make contact with the counter where they had been.
"Excellent!" Deadpool declared, his mood instantly brightening. He scooped up a handful of the coins. "Capital! Funds for a much-needed sanitation project!" He immediately marched over to the Guild's perpetually-confused blacksmith. "You! Smith-man! I have a commission! I need a new pair of briefs. I'm thinking adamantium-weave, something sturdy, breathable, but also impervious to gastric juices of both the terrestrial and extra-terrestrial variety. Can you make that happen?"
The blacksmith just stared, his hammer hanging limply in his hand.
Kazuma grabbed Deadpool by the collar and dragged him away. "We are not spending our first paycheck on weaponized underwear! We are going to the bathhouse. Now. Before we single-handedly cause a plague."
The public bathhouse in Axel was a simple, steamy affair, but to Kazuma, it was heaven. It was a chance to wash away not just the filth of the battle, but the filth of his new life. For Deadpool, it was a brand-new social experiment.
In the men's changing room, he looked around with the focused curiosity of a nature documentarian. "Fascinating. The local male displays a wide range of plumage. From the mighty, barrel-chested warrior to the scrawny, stick-bug-like mage. Note the ritualistic folding of clothes. A clear sign of social hierarchy." He paused, his eyes landing on a pair of neatly folded socks sitting atop a pile of clothes. They were a lovely shade of burgundy.
"They're unguarded!" screamed the yellow text box. "The perfect crime!"
"Hold," cautioned the white box. "We are in a neutral zone. A place of peace and cleansing. To defile this sanctity with petty theft would be a breach of the unspoken 'Bathhouse Code'. It would make us savages."
Deadpool sighed, a dramatic display of restraint. "You are right. We are adventurers, not common sock-thieves. We must have standards."
Inside the bath itself, all standards were abandoned. Deadpool treated the large, communal pool like his personal water park. He tried to start a whirlpool by running in circles, creating a vortex that splashed water into the faces of grumpy, bathing warriors. He used his towel as a makeshift bullfighting cape against a heavyset man who was just trying to scrub his back. He provided loud, unsolicited commentary on everyone's posture.
"You, sir!" he shouted at a grizzled veteran. "Your lower back curvature is atrocious! You need to work on your core! Have you considered pilates? It would do wonders for your sword-swinging form!"
It was amidst this chaos that he overheard it. A snippet of conversation from two adventurers lounging by the side of the pool.
"... and then he pulls out this stupid hamper," one of them said. "Told me it was a 'magic item'. A bottomless laundry hamper."
"Oh yeah? What's it do?" the other asked.
"It's worthless! You reach in, and you always pull out one, single, clean sock. Always just one. Never a pair. He was trying to sell it for a thousand Eris. What a rip-off."
Deadpool froze mid-splash. His head slowly turned toward the men, his white-lensed eyes wide. A bottomless source of single, clean socks? It wasn't just a magic item. It was a holy relic. It was a solution to the eternal problem of the dryer-eaten sock. It was the answer to a prayer he hadn't even known he'd made. He had to find that man. This was now his primary objective in life.
Later, as the three of them emerged from the bathhouse, clean, finally, but with Kazuma banned for life due to his association with Deadpool, they felt a fleeting sense of normalcy. That is, until Deadpool spotted a flyer tacked to a nearby message board.
It was written in a flamboyant, spidery script, filled with unnecessarily dramatic language.
"Hark, ye who seek ultimate power! I, a master of the arcane arts and wielder of the most powerful magic known to man, seek a party worthy of my greatness! Those with weak constitutions need not apply! Seek me at the town square at dusk, and prepare to witness true power made manifest! My path is one of… EXPLOSION!"
Kazuma read it and groaned. "Nope. Absolutely not. That has 'chuunibyou problem child' written all over it. We're not answering that. Let's go get something to eat."
Aqua scoffed. "'Master of the arcane arts'? Please. No mortal can compare to the divine magic of a goddess."
But Deadpool was transfixed. The word 'Explosion' seemed to be glowing with a golden aura only he could see. He clutched his chest dramatically.
"Explosion," he whispered, his voice filled with a reverence he usually reserved for a perfectly fried tortilla or a well-turned ankle. "It's not just magic. It's a statement. It's percussive. It's visceral. It's the Michael Bay philosophy of problem-solving. It's… beautiful."
Against Kazuma's loud and strenuous protests, he dragged the party to the town square as dusk began to fall. And there, striking a pose atop a water fountain, was a small figure in a huge witch's hat, wearing a dramatic eyepatch and a cape that fluttered in the evening breeze.
"I am Megumin!" the girl declared, her voice filled with theatrical gravitas. "An Arch-Wizard and the foremost practitioner of the ultimate offensive magic: Explosion! So, you are the ones who have answered my call? Do you have what it takes to walk the path of crimson destruction with me?"
Kazuma just stared, his face a perfect mask of despair. Aqua looked her up and down with competitive disdain.
Deadpool, however, slowly sank to one knee, his hands clasped before him as if he were looking upon the face of god.
"Teach me your ways, O tiny sorceress of kaboom," he pleaded, his voice trembling with emotion. "Our party is in desperate need of a Minister of Percussive Art and Aggressive Pyrotechnics. Please, grace us with your presence."
Megumin faltered in her pose, clearly not expecting this reaction. "Uh… yes! Of course! You have proven your worthiness by recognizing my genius!"
Kazuma looked at his party. A goddess who was functionally useless. An unkillable mercenary with a sock fetish and a death wish. And now, a one-shot pyromaniac with delusions of grandeur.
He didn't just have a party. He had a collection of ticking time bombs, and he was holding the box.