A muffled boom erupted from underground, and the shockwave sent Megumin flying into the air. Weightless and bewildered, she pried open her crimson eyes — only to find herself hovering three or four meters off the ground, and falling fast.
"AAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!"
The terrified shriek pierced Jhin's ears. He had just barely dodged the chunks of rock blasted every which way by the exploding Lightning Rabbit warren, and when he spun around to look at the hilltop where Megumin had been napping, he found her flailing wildly in midair. He threw himself into a Time Stop and sprinted over to catch her.
"AAAAAAH!"
"Hey, Megumin, cut it out."
"AAAH!!"
"Stop screaming!"
"AAH!!"
When she still didn't register that she was safe, Jhin raised his voice: "If you don't stop, I'm jamming the True Crimson Flame Staff right into your cheru-hole!"
The sound of his voice finally got through to her. Megumin opened her tightly shut eyes and looked at him with genuine confusion. "What's a cheru-hole?"
"I genuinely have no idea why I said that." Jhin had absolutely zero recollection of those words ever existing.
Could "cheru-hole" actually be some term from this world?
"I don't believe you. It's obviously something filthy — that's why you won't say it out loud."
"Believe whatever you want. The Lightning Rabbit commission is done. Let's move on."
Jhin set Megumin down from his arms, but she immediately bolted back up the hill to get a good look at the warren. Her eyes went wide. "Whoa, you blew a massive hole in the ground! What on earth did you do down there?"
"You already know that Lightning Rabbits explode when hit with fire-element attacks, so I figured I'd seal them inside their own burrow and use that against them — take out the whole nest in one shot." Jhin walked up beside her and stared down at the scorched crater gouged more than ten meters into the earth, giving a helpless shrug. "Turns out there were a lot more rabbits in there than the ones we saw outside. So... yeah. That happened."
"It kind of looks like what Explosion Magic leaves behind." For some reason, Megumin's eyes were practically glowing as she said it.
"You're not thinking about keeping a Lightning Rabbit as a guild pet, are you?" Jhin genuinely feared she might decide Lightning Rabbits were some kind of Explosion Magic subspecies and move heaven and earth to adopt one.
Megumin shook her head and reached up to dab at the corner of her mouth — which was, in fact, completely dry. The gleam in those crimson eyes only intensified. "I was just wondering... if I used Explosion Magic to take out a Lightning Rabbit, would the shape of the blast look even better?"
"That's very you." Jhin had a feeling Megumin and a certain someone who once declared that "explosions are art" would get along terrifyingly well.
"So which commission are we doing next?" Megumin crowded up beside him to peer at the three remaining slips in his hand. "How about the Sharp-Fanged Blue Wolf pack?"
"Works for me. Hop on."
Jhin bent his knees and leaned forward. Megumin vaulted onto his back with practiced ease, swinging her legs cheerfully and thrusting her right arm forward like a cavalry commander. "Charge, Jhin!"
"I am not your horse." The ten fingers curled around Megumin's thighs gave a firm, deliberate squeeze by way of warning.
"You — you just groped me!"
"I'm giving you a piggyback ride. How am I supposed to hold on without holding your legs?"
"You definitely squeezed on purpose just now."
"That was a warning. Don't treat me like a horse."
"Liar. You were obviously just using it as an excuse to feel me up." Megumin had been about to accuse him of being a pervert, but then something occurred to her, and a knowing smile spread across her face. "Aha — I get it now. You can't help yourself, can you? Because you're carrying a beautiful girl like me and it's giving you all sorts of indecent ideas."
"I'll admit you're pretty. But not pretty enough to make me do something that gross."
Megumin was completely thrown off by his blunt honesty. This wasn't how it was supposed to go — weren't guys supposed to deny everything furiously in this kind of situation?
"W-well, even if you're trying to butter me up right now, it won't work! When we meet up with Pecorine and the others later, I'm telling them everything."
"When have I ever needed to butter you up? I've got better things to do with my time." Jhin clicked his tongue dismissively — which, from Megumin's perspective, read as naked provocation.
He's saying I'm pretty and then acting like it doesn't count. The nerve.
That was Megumin's interpretation, anyway, and it set her off immediately. She grabbed his cheeks in both hands and yanked in opposite directions. "You just called me stupid!"
"I said nothing of the sort. Stop being ridiculous — and if you keep this up, I will drop you."
"Drop me then! I'm not scared of you!" Megumin locked her legs around his waist and kept pulling at his cheeks, marveling at how stubbornly elastic they were.
His cheek flesh puffed and dimpled in her grip. Jhin gave up and released his hold on her legs, then twisted his head around to silence her with a stern look. But the moment he turned, Megumin lost her grip — and as she scrambled to catch herself, three of her fingers plunged straight into his open mouth.
They stared at each other, frozen.
Megumin had no idea what to do. Her fingertips were resting against Jhin's tongue. On pure reflex, she pinched it between her index finger and thumb and gave it two slow, experimental squeezes.
"???"
Jhin's mind was drowning in question marks.
Okay, fair enough, her hand is inside my mouth and she's not pulling it out — that's already a lot. But she's also pinching my tongue. My wife Hitori Gotoh has never done anything like this to me. How do you even have the nerve?
Having completed her tongue investigation, Megumin's brain finally clawed its way back online. She yanked her fingers out as if she'd touched a live wire. She was just about to mumble an apology — when she noticed the glistening smear of saliva on her fingertips.
My hand — my hand is covered in his spit... I need to wipe it off somehow.
Her brain misfired. Moved by some impulse she couldn't explain, she slowly raised her hand — and, under Jhin's death glare, wiped it clean on his face.
"Right," said Jhin. "You're doing this on purpose. Provoking me so I'll retaliate. You absolute masochist."
"I am NOT a masochist!" Megumin sprang off his back and took off running. Her fingertips felt like they'd been dunked in chili water — waves of scorching heat kept radiating up from them straight to her cheeks.
Oh no. Oh no no no. I just grabbed a boy's tongue with my bare hand. The books say you can only get pregnant from kissing someone on the mouth — I just pinched the tongue, so I should be fine... right?
Megumin's grasp of biology was, to put it generously, unusual. Her thoughts dissolved into pure chaos, and she wasn't paying the slightest bit of attention to where she was going — which was straight toward Jhin, who was already standing in front of her, holding her staff, having gotten there first.
"Do what you want with me — but don't you dare kiss me on the mouth! That's perversion! I am not ready to get accidentally pregnant!"
Megumin's declaration was so utterly unhinged that Jhin felt his neurons briefly give up. He stood there in genuine, pained bewilderment.
Is sex education in Another World really this catastrophic? Actually — no. I should be questioning Megumin specifically. How does she manage to sound like she knows everything and absolutely nothing at the same time?
"Forget it. I'm not wasting energy on this nonsense. We've got commissions to finish — pull yourself together, or you're not eating when we get back."
Megumin nodded so fast her head was practically a blur. "Yes yes yes, let's go, let's go right now."
____
👻🔥+40 ch: Walnut-chan🔥👻
🔥 New history: Danmachi: Summoning Ruri Gokou, And other Chuunibyou Brats
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