Gamble Scramble!

by Natsume Akatsuki

  …But just as I was thinking that:

  “Ahem, may I sit next to you?” Megumin asked, and then without waiting for an answer, she came and seated herself on the bed. Geez, she was sitting awfully close to me.

  …Then it hit me. I remembered something from before. What had I said to Megumin? I think it was: “If you ever feel like you’re finally free of the bad feelings surrounding you and that woman, and you come to me just because you want to be with me, I won’t have any reason at all to say no.”

  And she’d said: “Is that so? When that time comes, then, I’ll visit your room again.”

  My heart rate shot through the roof, but I said as calmly as I could, “S-sure, go ahead. And what brings you here tonight? Can’t sleep and looking for someone to play a game with? I think Iris is a better opponent for you, closer to your ski—”

  Megumin slid closer to me, cutting me off. Maybe it was excitement that made her eyes look so red; it was obvious from her expression that she wasn’t going to get any of my jokes right now.

  I swallowed. She said, “I want you to sleep with me tonight. Or…would you…rather…not…?” Her voice got smaller and smaller, her hand squeezing mine gently as she looked away in embarrassment.

  At long last, the day had come.

  After so much waiting and delay, the moment of my triumph was here.

  But calm yourself: The first thing to do was to lock the door, make sure no one could barge in. Then, as the older partner and the guy, take the lead, totally cool and not freaking out at all.

  I put my hands on Megumin’s shoulders, shifting her gently away from me, then went to lock the door…

  “Um, Kazuma? I’m not as, er, big as Darkness. Is that…going to be a problem?”

  “No, no! I’m a man who can love big and small equally. Please don’t take me for such a small-minded person.”

  Megumin pulled back a little at my somewhat combative answer. “I—I see. In that case…er, I’m somewhat embarrassed, so perhaps you could avert your eyes?”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “Th-that makes it harder for me,” she said, thrown by my immediate answer. “The room is still bright. Please, just a little…”

  Fine, I guess all I could do was obediently close my eyes. I at least wanted to lock the door, though. Otherwise, who knew what meddling, moment-spoiling buffoon would show up?

  So, still somewhat worried but also full of anticipation, I closed my eyes. And at that instant…

  I went unconscious.

  “…Could… But you…”

  “…No, Dark… I… And you…”

  I could hear a man and a woman arguing. I tried to force my pounding head to sort out what had happened…

  “?!”

  That was when I realized there was a ball gag stuffed in my mouth. What was worse, my hands were securely cuffed, and I had been tied with a rope to keep me from moving. I couldn’t toss, couldn’t turn, couldn’t wriggle my way out, and when I used my skills to help me see in the dark, lo and behold, I was in a goddamn closet.

  Not this agaaaaaaaiiiiinnn!

  As I struggled in the cramped space, I heard the voices once more.

  “B-b-but, Kazuma, we come from such different stations in life—it’s not that simple… I mean, of course I’m not saying I hate you or anything! I just think maybe it’s a little soon for this kind of thing…”

  That was Darkness’s voice. But while I was still trying to figure out what she was babbling about, I heard the other voice from outside the closet, and it made my blood run cold.

  “Forget social station! I throw away my social standing and swear to love you and you alone, Darkness. So come on, let’s—!”

  It was my voice.

  “You throw away your social standing? What would that even mean for a commoner?”

  “Huh? Wh-what?”

  That dumb stuttering was definitely my voice; I knew it all too well.

  “You’ve been acting a little strange ever since earlier. We’re alone together in my room, yet you’re so calm and composed. I don’t like it.”

  Damn her. I wanted to burst out of this closet and lay her out flat. There was such a thing as overconfidence; she couldn’t expect me to be a pushover forever…

  …Well, okay, maybe for a while yet.

  “N-no, I’m definitely nervous being alone with you, Darkness, y’know? But come here. Look into my eyes—”

  There was my voice again. But before it could go anywhere with what it was saying, Darkness interrupted.

  “…Hey, you haven’t looked at my chest once since you came in here. What’s with that? I can’t imagine that, in these circumstances… You aren’t the real Kazuma at all, are you?!”

  “Hrk!”

  I was really starting to worry about what exactly Darkness thought of me. I didn’t know quite what was going on out there, but I surmised it was some kind of doppelgänger using my voice. I wasn’t sure whether to be thrilled that she knew enough to see through it or enraged that she would say such awful things about me behind my back.

  “Now we’ve come too far. I’ll just have to overpower you! This may be his room, but have you noticed he’s not around? And if you resist me now, I can’t promise he ever will be again…!”

  Crap, things were going south in a hurry here. Knowing Darkness’s pride and her love for her friends, I was sure she would…

  “Wha…! You monster, taking hostages is no fair! Wh-what do you plan to do to me with those handcuffs and that rope? Tie me up?! Do you mean to handcuff me, then tie me up, and then do the most awful things to me?!”

  “I don’t particularly intend to do anything awful to you; I’ll stop at tying you up… G-geez, you’re making this unusually easy.”

  “Hrk—it doesn’t matter what happens to me, but leave my friends out of this! Oh, these handcuffs are so cold…! Hey, you, keep using that voice and say, ‘Heh-heh, that’s a good look on you, Darkness! You know what happens next, don’t you?’ Give it a touch of arrogance.”

  “Why, you… A-ahhh, forget it. Here, rope’s next, so stop squirming! Hey, I’m not doing anything weird to you, so quit blushing!”

  “It’s just, you’re doing this, with that face…! Hey, what do you plan to do with me? You’re not going to stuff me in that cramped, dark closet, and then…!”

  I could hear her voice getting louder, and then the closet door opened.

  Darkness and I found ourselves eye to eye.

  “…Let me guess. You heard the whole thing?”

  I nodded.

  So there I was in the closet with Darkness, a gag in her mouth and a blush of shame on her face, the two of us looking at the handsome guy in front of us.

  “Now then, allow me to enlighten you as to who I am and why I’m doing this.” He loomed over us, looking just like me if I were cool as a cucumber, apparently bent on monologizing even though he could have easily kept his mouth shut.

  My face, which is to say his face, started to melt until only a dark, humanoid silhouette remained.

  “My name is Lugkraft, the doppelgänger. Chief of the Intelligence Bureau of the Demon King’s army. And let me tell you, you’ve put me through the wringer.”

  The monster with the prime minister’s name had a featureless blob of a face, no eyes, or nose, or mouth. But he began to talk to us, despite the fact that we hadn’t asked him for any exposition.

  “It was more than thirty years ago now. I was finally accepted into Elroad’s civil service after many, many attempts, and then I spent every day working like a dog. My colleagues were happier at the casino than the office. The royal family was mad for gambling and so were the nobility. You have no idea how I toiled, with them divesting their assets at the gaming tables day after day… There were times when I thought it would do more for the Demon King’s cause merely to leave this country to its own devices.”

  I thought he was going to brag, but it turned out to be a sob story. Normally, this was where the villain would share h
is evil plot with the captured hero right before sending him to his doom. But apparently, this guy just had some things he wanted to get off his chest.

  Lugkraft, with his tendency to work instead of gamble, quickly gained the trust of the royal family. That was all according to plan. But once he was given a high office and near-complete control of the country’s politics, he realized the state the nation was really in. Elroad was collapsing under a pile of debt. The royals and the nobles were willfully ignoring it, just gambling away each day.

  “Do you see? These people had gambled away the fortune amassed by their first king at games of chance and had brought the country to the brink of ruin. And how did they come back from the precipice?”

  I guess Lugkraft loved his job, because he worked really hard at it. He had been sent as a spy, but his inherently diligent nature and overachieving streak led to a meteoric rise through the ranks. At last, he forgot he had ever been a double agent and dedicated himself to the betterment of Elroad. It was only when he arrived at prime minister, the highest post in the land, that it occurred to him.

  “I realized that maybe I hadn’t needed to do quite so much work.”

  I see. He’s not diligent; he’s just stupid.

  “Having become prime minister, I finally went into action. Yes: The moment had come for me to work on behalf of the Demon King. I’m aware you’ve been spreading rather salacious rumors about him, but the truth is that he’s a fine, upstanding individual whom I’m proud to serve…”

  This tale of woe and work and pride went on for a while longer until Lugkraft finally gave a contented sigh. “Phew. I’ve wanted to unburden myself about all these frustrations for so long. I thank you for listening to me.”

  So he was just complaining.

  “Ahem, now then, I’ve been considering how best to take my revenge on you lot, who have reduced all my decades of effort to nothing. At first, I was seized by an almost irresistible desire to kill you, but I forced myself to reconsider.”

  This sounded like it was going somewhere strange. Darkness, trapped beside me, seemed to have a bad feeling about it, too.

  “I thought of the thing you would hate most of all. Namely, for harm to come to your little princess, Iris.”

  At that, Darkness exclaimed “Mrrff, mrrf!” and squirmed violently. But she was tied up so securely, she could hardly move.

  “Ah yes, that’s the look! That’s the look I wanted to see on your face! Ha-ha-ha-ha, I’ll just leave you two here. I shall now assume your identities, find your other friends, and tie them up in the same way. And then, once I’ve told them the same thing I’ve told you, I’ll head to Princess Iris’s room!” Lugkraft looked right into my eyes. “I’ll have to bear with your pathetic body a while longer. Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha, yes, that’s it! The pain! The suffering!! Fantastic!!”

  What a jerk, I thought as he assumed my form and left the room.

  6

  Darkness and I tried struggling for a while, but we quickly saw that we weren’t going to be forcing our way out of this one. Lugkraft had been careful to close the door, too, so no one could hear us in there. Why couldn’t our resident moron show up and spoil this moment?

  Come to think of it, what had Darkness been doing in my room at this hour?

  “Mrf! Mrrrf!!”

  Whoops. Darkness, the gag still in her mouth, had tried headbutting the door but to no effect. She was on the brink of tears with the thought that her beloved mistress might come to harm, when something in her eyes changed, like she’d had an idea.

  Could we roll out of here? Maybe with a little more struggling?

  I made eye contact in an attempt to ask these questions, but Darkness didn’t seem to understand; she just edged closer, her eyes bloodshot.

  “Hrmf, mfff!”

  Sorry. I don’t know what you’re saying.

  I tried to communicate that fact to her, but Darkness kept huffing and struggling. Finally, inching forward like a caterpillar, Darkness brought her face closer to mine.

  Er…really, really close.

  As in, here we were in a crisis, practically cheek to cheek. Heck, she was almost pressed up against me—and look how close our lips were! I had no way to object that this wasn’t the time to be doing this; I just had to abandon myself to—

  “Hrgh!”

  “?!”

  She bit down on my ball gag. Despite the gag in her own mouth, Darkness was trying to use her teeth to pull the one out of mine. I started nodding in time to her movements—toward me, away from me. Until finally…!

  “Kindle!”

  The gag loosened just enough that I was able to utter a single word of magic. The fire spell caught on my gag, setting it alight…!

  “Eeeyow-hot-hot-hot!”

  The gag eventually crumbled to cinders, but not before scorching my bangs. I wanted to cast Freeze on my forehead, but there was no time for that.

  “Darkness, I’m going to use fire magic on you now. If I use Kindle on the ropes that are holding me, it’ll take time for them to burn away, and I might not even be able to cut through the scorched ropes. But you…” Darkness nodded vigorously, as if to say she understood already. “Kindle!”

  I set the ropes holding her on fire.

  We ran down the gloomy hallway without so much as a light. Darkness and I tried to navigate the castle, free of our bindings but still handcuffed.

  “Okay, Darkness, where’s Iris’s room?!”

  “No idea—it was the prime minister who found places for us. The only room I know about is yours!”

  So we didn’t know where Aqua and Megumin were staying in this huge castle, either.

  I took the opportunity to ask Darkness something that had been bothering me. “Why did you know where I was staying? And what were you doing there so late? I know the prime minister wanted to tie us up so we wouldn’t get in his way; did he tell you to come to my room?”

  That produced a flinch from Darkness. “A-about that… Look, you did so much for us on this trip, again… This time, I thought maybe I could reward you with something less childish, not just a kiss on the cheek…”

  “Perv! I knew you were Perviness! We’re in the middle of a crisis and you were making a booty call! You sick, twisted woman!”

  “Y-y-you’ve got it all wrong! I wasn’t going to go that far! I was planning on something a little more soft-core…! And anyway, it meant I was able to save you, so it was for the best, right?!”

  I did seem to remember Darkness saying something back at the inn about wanting to thank me properly this time. I wished she had waited until we were back home to do something so important. Not that I was one to talk, seeing as how I had been about to cross the final frontier with Fake Megumin just a few minutes earlier.

  “Ahhhhh!”

  I knew that voice! An idiot who was willing to point and shout at me, never mind how late it was.

  “Now I’ve found you, you sexual-harassing NEET!”

  “So this is where you’ve been! You are the lowest, the worst, the vilest!”

  Aqua and Megumin, in their pajamas, emerged from the darkness.

  “‘Sexual-harassing NEET’?” That was a new one. What was with these girls? “Hey, don’t go around acting like I’m some sort of criminal. I don’t have time for your little games! Where’s Iris’s room? Do you know? This is an emergency. If you know, then spill it.”

  Aqua and Megumin looked at each other. “Iris’s room is just up ahead, but I think you owe us an explanation first. I never imagined, Kazuma, that in the middle of the night, you would sneak into Aqua’s room of all places.”

  I practically exploded at that. “Don’t screw with me! I have the right to choose who I want to be with!”

  “That’s rich, after the way you came into my room and tried to chat me up!” Aqua said. “If Megumin hadn’t come by for a visit, I don’t know what you might have tried!”

  Darkness and I exchanged a quick nod.

  “Look, we need to get to Iris’s roo
m! And I didn’t sneak into Aqua’s stupid room! I never touched her, even back when we were sleeping in the stables together! Even at my favorite shop, she’s the only one I’ve never picked!”

  “You should be ashamed of yourself! You sounded so passionate! And when I shot you down, suddenly nothing happened? If you really wanted to get with me, there are ways, you know—like giving me all your money or bringing gifts of expensive wine! Then I might at least let you hold my hand!”

  I seriously wanted to smack this dumbass.

  Better yet, I wanted to wring Lugkraft’s neck for putting me in this position!

  “That was a fake me who was talking to you, a doppelgänger! A shape-shifting double has infiltrated this castle! And he’s after Iris!”

  Aqua and Megumin looked at each other again.

  “Hey, so you mean all those nice things you said about my blue hair, that was an imposter talking the whole time? You didn’t mean that weird stuff you said about how I would be perfect if only I didn’t belong to the Axis Church?”

  “And you told me that I would be perfect if only I didn’t belong to the Crimson Magic Clan, and I won’t be satisfied until I’ve blown you away for that.”

  They guided us along, all the while saying things I would have been happier not hearing.

  Quit it! I don’t want to know how that jerk tried to hit on you! Seriously, stop already!

  Given his modus operandi, would he actually try to chat up Iris, too? He was convinced she was my little sister, so I didn’t really think so, but…!

  “This is it! This is Iris’s room… Hey, you can hear something from inside.”

  Crap, he was already in there!

  Darkness and I got ready to kick down the door when—!

  “Exterion!!!”

  That happened.

  A brutal slash flew directly over my head. An instant later, the door came crashing down, and…

  “E-Elder Brother?!”

  There stood Iris in her pajamas, blushing furiously. However Lugkraft had tried to get to her, it had caused her to draw her sword—along with a black puddle I assumed was the former prime minister spreading on the floor.