Megumin took the letter and inspected it from every angle, only to find that the whole message came to five characters. No tiny print hidden in a corner, no joking line on the back saying "Did that scare you?"
Jhin leaned over, read the contents, and asked, "Did something happen back at your home?"
"No... if there were any real danger, they'd have used Teleportation Magic to run over here to us ages ago."
"Do you people of the Crimson Demon Clan always communicate in this bizarre way?"
"Not always. Most of the time we're pretty normal about it." After spending so long with her companions, Megumin's speech and behavior had settled at roughly the level of a normal person these days, provided she wasn't horsing around with Jhin or unleashing [Explosion magic]. "It's probably some trivial nonsense again and they just want me to make a trip back."
"Then should we set out right now?" Pecorine had already untied the kitchen apron she'd only just put on.
"No need to rush. Leaving tomorrow morning is fine."
Seeing how casually she brushed it off, and guessing she'd been strung along by this sort of message before, the others relaxed too, stowed their weapons, and started preparing a late-night meal.
They had restored normal communication with the Crimson Demon Clan before coming to the Golden Sea Dream, and the sales revenue that had piled up in the meantime had been shipped over by Teleportation Magic as well.
As for the cola business, Kyaru had planned it out so well, and Jhin had secured about half a year's worth of supply before the incident, that nothing had gone seriously wrong. All they had to do was swing by the Adventurer's Guild in Landosol later to collect the money.
Fat dripped into the glowing charcoal with a sizzle, igniting a small burst of flame, and the steaks resting on the grill took on a golden sheen under the orange light.
Playing the shameless rascal, Jhin tore off a piece of steak and sidled up next to Megumin, chewing loudly with grease running down his chin while offering commentary on the meat. "Truly the finest cut on the whole Nine-Tailed Savage Bull. Not a speck of fat on it, yet it's full of juice, never dry, never heavy. Mmm, mmm, mmm."
Megumin was grinding her teeth hard enough to crack them, repeating to herself over and over: I can't eat, I can't eat, today is the last day of the diet plan, I can't fall here!
With tremendous willpower she dragged her eyes off the steak, then clapped her hands over her ears to block the auditory assault beside her. But she didn't have a third hand, and the smell of roasted meat drifted straight into her nose and seized her stomach, which let out a long growl.
Saliva flooded her mouth the way it does after biting into a sour plum, and she began swallowing again and again.
"Megumin... what a pitiful sight," Pecorine said, though the speed at which she shoveled food into her own mouth didn't slow in the slightest. Thanks to the three powerful pieces of equipment she wore, everything she ate was converted into energy and burned off in battle, so gaining weight was a worry she simply didn't have.
She did think that being unable to eat your fill was an exceptionally cruel fate.
Kyaru glanced over and saw that Megumin had already gouged two pits in the sand with her toes. She shook her head helplessly. "I'd say she's about to snap."
"Let's hope she can hold out until the day is over." Kokkoro added vegetables to the grill at just the right moment. Her Master's balanced nutrition was something she had to guarantee properly.
None of the three moved to stop Jhin. They all knew that if any of them actually stepped in, the first one to object would probably be Megumin herself. That was simply how those two got along... uniquely.
If they ever saw a day when the pair suddenly stopped tormenting each other, that was when they'd start wondering whether the two had had a fight.
Just as Kyaru predicted, Megumin soon decided the diet plan could go to hell.
He's provoking me this openly. If the Death Explosion Archmage of the Jet-Black Wings doesn't respond at all, wouldn't that ruin the reputation of [Explosion magic]?
The more she thought about it, the more sense it made. She lowered the hands covering her ears, twisted around, and pounced on Jhin like a starving tiger, sinking her neat white teeth down hard on the bare bone with a screech that set everyone's jaw on edge.
"Wh... where's my meat?" Megumin ran her tongue over the bone twice and couldn't find so much as a shred. Then she caught sight of Jhin's bulging cheeks working away, and fury boiled up out of her. "You actually made me gnaw on a bone!"
She pried his mouth open with both hands and, under the awed gazes of everyone else, bent down and stole the meat right out of it.
"That's Megumin for you. She did the thing nobody else would dare, and she did it so naturally."
"Did it never occur to her to just take some meat off the grill?"
"Eating like that with Master doesn't sound so bad, actually..."
"!!??"
Megumin and Pecorine whipped around to stare at Kokkoro in horror. Seeing something like this once in a while was funny enough, a little seasoning for daily life. But if they had to watch her and Jhin eat mouth-to-mouth at every single meal, the whole house would end up with a basement dug out by everybody's curling toes.
She ate the grilled meat in Jhin's mouth down to the largest remaining piece, but no matter how she curled her tongue, sucked, or even clamped down with her teeth, she couldn't get it out. Only after something rapped her on the head twice did she open her tightly shut eyes and discover that the thing she'd been fighting with was Jhin's tongue.
Her small face went red. She sat up and said stubbornly, "Th... that's what you get. Now you know how formidable I am. Provoke me like that again and there won't be a scrap of grilled meat left in your mouth!"
Jhin's skin was even thicker than she'd given him credit for. He smacked his lips a couple of times as if savoring something, then declared with absolute certainty, "You snuck a cola today!"
"I d-d-d-did not! Don't go slandering people!"
"Heh heh. After a kiss that long, it'd be strange if I hadn't tasted cola."
Megumin insisted, "That was not a kiss. I was pillaging the grilled meat in your mouth. Understand? Pillaging!"
"Don't change the subject." Jhin sat up with an arm around her waist, his right hand pinching her delicate chin and forcing her to meet his eyes. "Did you or did you not sneak a cola before we went out?"
"I did not!"
"The nerve on you, still trying to argue. Do you think I haven't kissed you enough times to tell the taste of cola?"
"I... I..." Megumin stammered, on the very verge of confessing. But Jhin's next words lit the fuse on her competitive streak.
"That makes the score in the battle between the Jet-Black Explosion Mage and the Stand User thirty-nine wins to seventy-two. I'll hit a hundred soon, and then you'll remember this humiliating moment forever!"
A blazing light kindled in Megumin's eyes. She clamped a hand on the back of Jhin's head and shouted with terrifying momentum, "I just think you haven't kissed me enough! As if I would sneak a cola! Behold my Crimson Explosion Wave!"
Then she turned into something like a Beastman-in-heat, one of the Beastmen, clamping onto him and devouring his mouth with the clear intention of not letting go until every drop of saliva was gone.
"So... about this situation. Should we go break it up?" Pecorine watched the two of them rolling around on the sand and asked her two companions for their opinion.
"The moon is very round tonight..."
"It certainly is..."
"Eh? What's that supposed to mean?"
____
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