I love time travel the most!

Aqua's face brightened when she saw that the two bickering lovers had agreed to help.

the next day.

Early in the morning, the group, excluding Wiz, headed to the Adventurers' Guild in the town.

The Lich Girl stayed behind as a liaison.

We've already asked the guild to gather intelligence everywhere, so if there's any news, we need someone the guild can contact.

Youyou said worriedly, "But even if we find the culprit, what are we going to do? Even if we find a suspicious person, if we can't catch him when he mixes the poison into the hot spring, we can't make an arrest, right?"

She's right, but we already had a clue who the culprit was.

It must have been the dark-skinned, brown-haired man who appeared at the hotel, since neither the older woman nor the man showed up at the hotel later.

"Senior Kobayashi..."

"My eyes are searching with all their might."

The mark on his forehead kept flashing.

Kobayashi thought the same thing as Kazuma Sato, and even much faster.

In fact, I already knew last night that the busty older sister, Wobbak, had left the hotel.

It wasn't that she planned to raid the place at night to do anything bad; she just wanted to confront the other person. She had clearly told them that someone was looking for her and that they were comrades. Normally, after hearing how hard-working and diligent the little girl was, shouldn't she have met up and caught up? Why did she turn around and run away?!

My mood suddenly soured.

"Hehe, don't worry, Youyou. I've already taken action to find the culprit."

Aqua, who rarely uses her brain, puffed out her chest and said:

“Listen carefully, the criminal must have visited the hot springs several times on the same day. Because if you want to poison someone, it’s the easiest way to sneak in as a guest. So I asked several hot spring hotels to observe what kind of guests they were and to remember their characteristics. I asked them to fill out questionnaires at each hotel.”

"You really put in a lot of effort... wait, could it be that Kobayashi-senpai taught you this method?"

“It was Aqua’s own idea.”

"Liar! Is she really a genius?"

Upon hearing Kobayashi's words, Sato Kazuma was stunned.

It seems she truly loves her followers; her usually muddled mind is surprisingly clear. If only she could always be this dedicated, he wouldn't have to worry so much.

“I see. Even if a guest likes hot springs, it’s unlikely that they would frequently visit several different hot springs in one day. By combining the guest’s characteristics with the amount of eyewitness information, we can identify the suspect.”

"And if there's been any disturbance at the hotel where our target has been, then we can be sure he really is the culprit."

Huihui and Darkness were incredibly impressed by Huihui's ability to apply what she learned to other situations.

seriously.

If only she always behaved like this.

Aqua proudly declared, "That's it! Alright, let's go collect the questionnaires from the hotels I asked them to!"

Surprised by the exaggerated abilities of the idiot goddess, the group split up to collect the questionnaires from various hotels, then gathered in the town's park, placed the questionnaires on benches, and began to investigate and compile statistics.

"The survey results are in!"

After tireless efforts, they are finally about to find the culprit!

"Let me see... People who frequent hot spring inns are characterized by... light blue hair and eyes, and a woman wearing a light blue haori... So you're the culprit!"

All these characteristics combined perfectly describe Aqua!

The silly goddess quickly retorted, "No way! I did go to a lot of hot springs, but that was for purification! Looking at the questionnaires from those hotels where problems occurred, they must have described the characteristics of the last guest to enter. The last person to enter is the most suspicious!"

With a suspicious look in my eyes, I followed Aqua's instructions and began to investigate, looking at the characteristics of the last guest who went in.

"A woman with light blue hair and eyes ran in and caused trouble, turning the hot spring into hot water... Aqua, and you still say it wasn't you!"

"Why?! This questionnaire is awful, it's completely useless!"

Aqua got angry and pretended to tear up the questionnaire. But to outsiders, her actions seemed more like an attempt to destroy evidence.

"Wait, Aqua."

Huihui stopped her, pointing to another section of the questionnaire and saying, "Isn't it strange that this dark-skinned, short-haired man appears at various hot springs second only to Aqua in frequency?"

"So it really was him..."

As he took the questionnaire from Huihui, Kazuma Sato naturally sighed.

"Wait a minute, how does Kazuma know?"

"Actually, when I first arrived in town, I happened to overhear him saying something in the inn's bathhouse, and that's how this hateful cult came to an end..."

Why didn't you tell me something so important sooner!

"What?! Whoa! What do you want to do?!"

Hearing him say that, Aqua grabbed his neck. If only she had known about this sooner, she wouldn't have had to go through so much trouble.

Kazuma Sato retorted angrily, "Damn it, let go! How could I possibly get involved in something this troublesome? Besides, even Kobayashi-senpai didn't interfere, so why are you yelling at me?"

"Kobayashi... that's right, he has his own considerations! As for Kazuma, I'm sorry, but I don't think you'd think about anything long-term."

"Isn't that just plain discrimination?"

The man who thought it was better to avoid trouble finally got his comeuppance. It was predictable that his companions would condemn him, but what was unacceptable was that he was the only one blamed. Why?

Aqua turned her head: "Kobayashi, if you knew, why didn't you stop it? There must be some special reason, right?"

"Hmm...too much trouble?"

"Wow! You said it! You said it out loud!"

This answer caused the silly goddess to break down in tears on the spot.

Kobayashi didn't want to do this, but he was also a little angry because he had been poisoned by the Axis cult, especially since these guys had ruined his good reputation. How could he not make them accept some punishment?

This is also the reason for letting things drift.

It has nothing to do with the Demon King's army officers or whether it will affect others; it's purely to make this town suffer a bit.

Of course, they also turned the town's hot springs into holy water.

Look, hasn't that silly goddess been working really hard lately?

Unfortunately, he couldn't articulate his inner thoughts, which caused his prestige within the team to decline.

Based on the characteristics written on the questionnaire and Kazuma Sato's testimony, Aqua drew a portrait of the man, and the level of completion was terrifyingly high, almost indistinguishable from a photograph.

The group then returned to the Adventurers' Guild, hoping the guild would issue a warrant for the man's arrest.

but……

"We cannot accept this request so suddenly. You claim you overheard it while passing by, but based on such a one-sided account, it would be difficult to issue a warrant for your arrest. If you were an adventurer with a good track record and high credibility in this town, that would be one thing, but we don't know you well, and we can't unconditionally believe your testimonies. Without more concrete evidence, I'm afraid..."

The counter staff looked troubled.

Ultimately, it comes down to a lack of substantial evidence.

Just as Youyou said, if the perpetrator is not caught poisoning the victim on the spot, it cannot be proven that the other party is the criminal.

Moreover, these guys with dubious backgrounds come up and claim they're going to issue arrest warrants for others; it would be a miracle if you believed them.

At this moment, Aqua brought her face close to the guild counter staff and said, "Since you live in this town, it means you are also a follower of Axis? Take a close look at my face, do you feel like you've seen me somewhere before?"

The silly goddess is trying to use her face again.

But has she forgotten that proving herself a goddess will get her stones thrown at her?

“I’m not an Axis,” the clerk explained, then recalled, “Now that you mention it, I do think I’ve seen that face before… Ah, you were the second most popular girl at that shop on the red-light district!”

"No way! You'd better watch out! I've never worked in that kind of shady place! And having a second 'red card' is even more unpleasant!"

Aqua shouted angrily.

Kazuma Sato leaned closer and asked in a low voice, "I hope you can tell me more about the red-light district. Of course, it will be for a fee."

“I’m happy to tell you, guest.”

The two men were laughing in an extremely lewd manner.

Is the red-light district really that attractive?

Although she had never been there, Kobayashi thought the Succubus Shop was more appealing, since even the Demon King frequented that shop.

"Sato-kun."

"Ahem, excuse me."

Kazuma Sato coughed lightly, gestured to Kobayashi with his eyes, and then, while the others were confused, gave Darkness a nudge.

Do you know who this young lady is?

He spoke in an arrogant and condescending tone from the very first word.

Then, without giving her a chance to speak, he introduced her in a sycophantic tone: "This is the daughter of the renowned noble family known as the 'Kingdom's Blade'! Miss Dustinis Ford Laratina! To regard her as an adventurer of unknown origin is far too rude!"

"Eh, eh—" X2

Darkness and the counter staff screamed together.

Is that really what you're thinking?

Since the other party is not an Axis follower, the title of a kingdom noble is more useful than that of a water goddess.

Kazuma Sato's mind works incredibly fast!

Kobayashi then said, "Young Miss, please produce the token of the Dustinis family and let this clueless employee see it for himself."

"Even Xiaolin is like this... Waaah, I really don't want to bring up my family's name because of this..."

Perhaps they didn't want to use the power of the nobility.

Darkness shrank back embarrassedly and took out a necklace from his pocket.

"Th-that is...! My apologies for my rudeness. I'll immediately issue a warrant for this man's arrest!"

The necklace was extremely powerful, and the counter staff quickly took the portrait from Aqua's hands.

Upon seeing this, Aqua shouted, "As expected of Darkness, this is how nobles abuse their power, isn't it!"

"Don't, don't say such harsh things!"