Part 5
"So this is the mansion."
It was a mansion in the suburbs.
According to that man, the number of rooms were few for a mansion, the fact was contrary to this.
It was several times the size of a single mansion in Japan, and used to be the villa of a noble clan.
But that aristocratic family had abandoned this villa.
As the villa was about to be sold, evil spirits appeared within it.
"Not bad! This place is great! This is where someone like me should be staying in!"
Aqua shouted while hugging a small bag. Megumin who was also carrying a bag was blushing from emotions.
Living in this villa.
This wasn't one of Aqua's delusions.
Because the mansion was huge, there were plenty of evil spirits within. As a result, it had been widely regarded as a haunted mansion.
And the reward for the exorcism was a free stay before the bad image of it was gone.
Which means that after completing this quest, we won't need to save up our money to get by winter.
I felt lucky to meet with such a great opportunity.
"But can we really exorcise the evil spirits? I heard new spirits would keep coming no matter how much you clear them."
Darkness who was carrying a large pack said.
That's right. Going by common sense, finding the reason why the spirits kept coming and resolving the issue was the best strategy.
But the quest we took was limited to exorcising the spirits.
To be honest, thinking about it in the long term, the longer we dragged on the quest, the longer we could stay in this villa.
"But it feels like this place had not been occupied for a very long time. Didn't the disturbance of the spirits only happen recently? Could it be, this mansion already had issues before the spirit problem hit the entire town…?"
Megumin said uneasily.
"Yes, but even if this mansion had problems, we will be fine. We have Aqua with us, right? No worries, she is an expert in fighting undeads."
Even though I felt a bit uneasy while saying that, but I still think her abilities as an arch priest was very strong.
… Probably.
"Leave it to me! … Fufu, I can see it, I can see it! From the observation of my spiritual eyes, the maid who had a relationship with the noble who was just fooling around and bore a child, and was kept here as the illegitimate child of the noble clan! The noble died from illness and the maid went missing. The young girl left here contacted the same disease as her father, and died without ever seeing the faces of her parents! Her name was Anna Filante Asteroid. The things she liked were her dolls and the stories of adventurers! But please don't worry, this spirit won't pull pranks on us. She will not harm us! Ara, she might be a child, but she liked matured things like drinking fine wine. So, prepare some wine as an offering!"
Aqua kept clamoring on like the cunning psychics that appears on television all the time. I looked at her with the eyes I reserved for doubtful con man, and asked Darkness and Megumin at the same time.
"… Nah, what do you think? I want to ask why this girl knows such unnecessary settings and names… Is she alright in the head? Or perhaps I judged her too hastily?"
"..." x2
I don't know if they harbored the same uneasiness as me, but they didn't answer my question.
Part 6
Late at night.
We took off our equipment and settled down in the mansion.
We had decided the distribution of the rooms, and brought our respective luggages there.
Aqua would be staying in this mansion from today onwards, so I held on to the faint hope that the evil spirits would be exorcised because of that.
On the other hand, I was worried that her physical traits which attracted undead might bring more of them here.
But she was an arch priest after all, and her real identity was the goddess Aqua.
She wasn't the type that allowed spirits to do as they pleased in the place she lived.
I took the biggest room on the 2nd floor of the mansion, and slept quite soundly.
"Ahhhh!? Wahhhhhh!!"
At this moment, I heard wails coming from Aqua, whom I had placed so much hope in.
"What is it!? Hey, Aqua, what happened! Are you okay!?"
I rushed to Aqua's room and rapped on the door.
No reply. Judging that something was amiss, I rammed the door open.
Before me was…
"Boo… Woooo… Ka, Kazumaaaahhhh!"
In the middle of room, Aqua was cradling an empty wine bottle and crying.
… Hey.
"Well, what happened to you? Say something, why are you hugging a bottle? If you made that sound because you were drunk, I will wake you up with create water."
"That's not it! I didn't drink the wine! This was my precious and valuable wine. I was looking forward to enjoying it after my bath! But it was empty when I returned to my room ahhhhh!!"
I decided to go to sleep after a shower.
"I see, good night, see you tomorrow."
"Ahhh!? Wait Kazuma! A spirit! This must be the work of an evil spirit! The wild spirits that congregated here, or the illegitimate child that was bounded to this mansion! It must be either of these two! I will make my rounds around the mansion and destroy all the spirits I see!"
I don't know if wild spirits existed in this world, but since Aqua said she would exorcise them, I had no reason to stop her.
"… What happened, what's with that ruckus?"
"Is something wrong? It's getting late, so please behave yourself."
Darkness and Megumin were here too, probably drawn in by Aqua's wailing.
"This girl said her wine was taken by evil spirits and wants to exorcise them now. I was thinking about retorting ' why would spirits want to drink spirits'. But there were too many things to retort so I didn't manage to. I think I will sleep, I'll leave the rest to you."
As I returned to my room, Aqua was still lecturing me from behind, but I didn't mind.
If the spirit was just mischievous to the extent of drinking people's wine, it would be fine letting it be.