Ah time for the next chapter. I had hoped to get around to it sooner, but some things got in the way. However, I shouldn't be complaining about that since I'm doing it now. Man, do I have some plans for this fic.

Hope you enjoy.

Chapter 2

Months have past since Souichiro had fought Masataka. Since then the dojo has been restored thanks to the reconstruction being funded by Mitsuomi. Everyone who had been hurt in the explosion had recovered, the Juken Club among them, and things have returned to normal since then.

Inside the dojo sat Masataka and Tsumuji, Masataka holding a coin in a robotic hand that Tsumuji had connected to his arm to make up for the hand he lost. Masataka folded the coin without much effort. "See, the output on this is too high Tsumuji-kun," Masataka complained.

"Really? It's pretty convenient to be able to crush concrete like it is tofu," Tsumuji replied.

"I already told you I don't need that... I want it to feel more natural," Masataka said.

As they continued their conversation about his arm, Bob and Madoka entered the dojo, two freshmen greeting them. "Hello! Masa-kun! We're here!" Madoka waved. Bob remained silent.

"Oh hey guys," Masataka replied.

Then he noticed Aya walk in. He fell silent as she appeared as gloomy as she was during the past months. Bob and Madoka noticed her as well and followed Masataka's example. They all knew what was eating at her, but none of them could build up the courage to bring it up.

Aya was feeling down because they had failed to take down Sohaku and free Souichiro from him. And not only did they fail to do that, but Souichiro took off before anything could be done and right afterwards, Mitsuomi used his connections to try and get some info of where he might be, but that led to dead ends. It was as if Souichiro has just dropped off the face of the earth.

Mitsuomi had started putting some people on the job of keeping an eye and ear out for anything on Souichiro just in case, but so far there hasn't been so much as a single mention of his name anywhere. This worried everyone greatly. After all, considering that Souichiro is the true warrior, him disappearing like that was quite disturbing to happen taking into account how much power he possessed.

All of them stayed silent and changed into their training gi. As this occurred, Emi and Mitsuomi himself showed up by the entrance, their arrival going unnoticed. They didn't mind this since they merely stopped by to check on them. Even though they graduated last year along with Maya, they felt compelled to stop by, Emi in particular now that she was working as a teacher part time at Toudou Academy.

"They're still not over it?" Emi wondered aloud.

"Well, it's understandable. The boy has been gone for months and there hasn't been a single sighting of him," Mitsuomi commented. He had hoped that there would have been some word of Souichiro when some of the investigators he had on his payroll stop by earlier, but the briefing had ended the same as every time before.

"Still no word on him, Mitsuomi-san?" Emi asked.

He shook his head. He watched with disinterest at the Juken Club's training that was going on, not a single one still noting their presence. Mitsuomi observed each and every member. Bob seemed to be holding up quite well , which was expected of him as he was Souichiro's best friend and is also a powerful fighter in his own right. Aya didn't seem to be holding up though. In fact, she didn't try to hide her despair over this at all.

The same could be said of the remaining members. The only one that is doing his best to keep it cool like Bob was Masataka, but Mitsuomi could easily see right through his act. Ever since Souichiro vanished, Masataka has seemed to blame himself, most likely thinking that he should have tried harder. And Maya seemed to feel the same way, judging by the last time he saw her.

Now it was stressing enough practically having a small army of people keeping a lookout for Souichiro, but Maya was another thing altogether. He knew that Maya had planned to sacrifice herself to purify Souichiro, but whatever had happened prevented that stunt. Nevertheless, Mitsuomi knew that Maya probably wouldn't hesitate to try something like that again. Given the way she sees herself as responsible for Souichiro, it would be a surprise if she didn't try again. Just thinking about that gave him a serious headache.

Mitsuomi sighed and turned to leave. "You're going already? You just barely got here," Emi said.

"No point in me coming if I don't have anything to say to them," Mitsuomi replied as he walked off, sounding a bit colder than he had meant to. Emi reluctantly followed him after a minute or two, leaving the Juken Club to their training, unaware that Masataka had actually been watching them from where he was. "Nagi... just where the hell are you?" he thought.

In another city, a boy with somewhat spikey brown hair running down the street trying to catch up with a girl. "Dang, I overslept!" he nearly yelled. He continued his running until he was right behind the girl, a curvaceous blonde. "Ah, Miu-san!" he said as he placed a hand on her shoulder.

The girl, Miu, without any warning quickly grabbed him and threw him over head. He cried out as he didn't see it coming. "Oh no, I reacted automatically..." she thought. However, the boy flipped through the air and landed perfectly on his feet.

"Morning, Miu-san!" he said.

Miu smiled at him. "You've improved a lot Kenichi-san."

He chuckled nervously. "If you hadn't let go during that throw, I'd end up in the hospital on the first day of school..."

"You're embarrassing me..." Miu replied with a small blush.

They both shared a laugh and continued to walk to school. Months have past and the new school year was beginning with them now being second year students. Kenichi was looking forward to what the year might have in mind for him. As long as it didn't involve any near death experiences of course.

"How does it feel to be home again?" Miu asked.

"I can't stand the never ending questions by Honoka. I told her that I entered some martial arts tournament and won and that's why I got injured all over my body." Kenichi thought back to when he had finally arrived home with a fake certificate saying he was the winner, something that Apachai had made.

"That's pretty close to what actually happened," Miu commented after a quick giggle.

They continued to talk until they got to school and checked out the class roster. To their joy, they were still in the same class. Their friends, Takeda and Ukita, who were third years the year before, however weren't blessed with the gift of graduating as they were delinquents for a good part of their school lives.

Both sat down, their sulking obvious. "We're delinquents, of course we didn't graduate!" Takeda said a bit gloomily.

Ukita scratched his head. "Damn, I guess we have to start studying this year."

Kisara passed by them and overheard their little comments. "Then you're in the same year as me?" she asked, which made Ukita cheer up.

"Hey Shirahama, you're still alive?" Tanimoto, who just showed up, said. He let loose an annoyed glance at Kenichi.

"Oh Tanimoto-kun! I haven't seen you in forever, I really missed you!" Kenichi looked ready to give the guy a hug, but Tanimoto quickly pushed him away with his foot.

"I don't need you to worry about me!"

"Everybody is watching, Mr. Fake Nice Student," Kenichi pointed out.

With just those words, Tanimoto swapped personalities in an instant, getting Kenichi in what could be called a crushing hug, although it also looked as if he was trying to strangle him. "Hello there Kenichi-kun! My best friend! I'm glad I could collect enough credits for the second year!" he said in a happy voice, trying to play his part of the nice guy to the fullest.

Meanwhile, another friend of Kenichi's, one that he would prefer not call that, was checking some things out on his portable computer system. "First of all our new formation!" Nijima, or as Kenich liked to him, the alien, said, getting cries of "yes, general!" from his Shinpaku underlings.

After Tanimoto let go of him, Kenichi bumped into two other people he knew: Izumi, who was in the gardening club with him and Izumi's friend, Makoto. "We're in the same class again!" Izumi remarked happily.

"It's always the same," Makoto commented, eliciting a chuckle from Kenichi.

Izumi held up two tickets. "Umm... even though it's a bit sudden, how about... on Sunday..." sh didn't finish though as Kenichi was called over by Miu, completely ruining her chance to ask him out, which Makoto pointed out.

However, as Kenichi moved towards Miu, two shadows blocked out the sun from his eyes and he turned to see two tall students, delinquents by the looks of it, smirking arrogantly at him. "This is the Kouryou High School, right? We are newcomers. You too?" When Kenichi didn't respond, he bent down low to him. "Your face is annoying me... huhhh..."

Kenichi merely looked away, but then received a bonk on the head from Tanimoto. "Yo, you guys are first year students, right?" he asked of the two.

"Ha, so that's what a second year looks like!" the guy seemed to ignore Tanimoto.

"I'm getting sick of these losers... what's wrong with this school?" Tanimoto muttered to himself.

"Hey you there, go to the aula! You worms..." the guys turned to see Nijima riding atop the shoulders of one of his men, the others members of the Shinpaku Alliance standing at his side. The guys immediately apologized, having heard of Shinpaku.

"That man over there is our captain Shirahama!" one of the guys pointed out, which made the guys freak out more. They started to bombard Kenichi with apologies, to which he kept saying it was okay. After the guys left, Nijima let out a sigh.

"Give me a break... Kenichi... the champion of D of D cannot be afraid first year high school students, you get it?"

"But I'm still afraid of delinquents!" Kenichi shot back furiously.

This led to a little debate between the two as they headed to the opening ceremony. Eventually, Nijima and the Shinpaku guys went in one direction, but before Kenichi could let out a sigh at Nijima's lecture, Kisara, Takeda, and Ukita approached him. "Huh, you look more mature. Your body is fine now?" Kisara asked.

"Yeah, after this long rest at home, I feel great, but now I'm afraid I got a little bit rusty." Kenichi said with a smile. It was great to see his friends again after the D of D tournament. They had all fought some desperate battles at that time, but they had made it alive and recovered from the ordeal.

"Ever since that incident on Despair Island, YOMI hasn't done anything yet," Ukita pointed out.

Takeda nodded. "Don't underestimate them. Even though I have master James Shiba to train me..." He trailed off as the principal came up to the podium.

"Everybody, please be quiet. The opening ceremony has begun! By the way, I have good news!" he said. This got everyone's attention. "Our school has accepted an exchange program and you will have some foreign classmates for a period of time from Thailand, Russia, and America!"

With that said, three people walked out onto the podium, making Kenichi and his friends freeze as they saw who they were. Before them stood three members of YOMI, fully dressed in school uniform. "YOMI... is here?" they all thought in shock.

"And to add to that good news," the principal continued, "we also have a transfer from another school here in Japan..." he trailed off as a look of absolute fear came over his face.

The same could be said of everyone else in the room as a powerful presence could be felt approaching. The room fell deathly silent as everyone felt terror grip their hearts. The room was so silent that a few seconds later, they could all now hear footsteps, heavy footsteps by the sound of it and cracking could also be heard.

Slowly a figure emerged from the side door of the room and made its way onto the podium. It was a boy, but unlike any of them have ever seen. The guy had pitch black skin, like that of coal and with long silver hair that went straight down to his feet. His head was leaning downwards, causing his hair to cover his face.

As he walked, everyone glanced down at his feet as with every step he took, a small crater would appear where he had stepped. They all looked ready to drop anything they were holding and run. Kenichi and his friends all looked ready to take up a defensive posture in case something happened, but not a single person moved. They felt that if they had moved, something truly terrifying would happen.

The guy finally stopped next to the YOMI members, not paying attention to the way that they flinched at his presence. He slowly raised his head, exposing what could be golden markings on the side of his eyes and on his forehead, standing out quite a bit from his coal like skin. His sclarea were as black as his skin and his irises were a fierce gold. He stared outwards to the crowd before him. They all slightly squirmed beneath his gaze.

Kenichi would have loved nothing more than to run from the sheer amount of Ki that was coming off of the guy. Not even Kano had as much as him and the amount of bloodlust that was coming off the guy as well was just as large. Kenichi has gone up against quite a large bunch of people and they were all pretty bloodthirsty too, but they didn't hold a candle to this guy, something that Kenichi never thought possible.

He glanced at Miu out of the corner of his eye and saw that although she hid it well, she was shaking, most likely for the same reason as him: fear. Then Kenichi looked over to Takeda, Ukita, and Kisara and wasn't surprised to see them reacting the same way. It was obvious that this newcomer was beyond anyone they're ever fought.

As Kenichi focused his attention back on the podium, a girl had appeared next to the petrified principal and grabbed the microphone from his hand. "I'm first! I am the extremely charming girl from America! Rachel Stanley! Second year!" she said enthusiastically into the mic, ignoring the feeling in the room. Her eyes narrowed a bit. "It's nice to meet you all."

And that's a wrap for this chapter! Phew, the first part of this had me rethinking my original scenario, but as no alternate scenes came to mind, I just stuck to what I already had planned. Anyway, chances are I won't be putting up the next chapter to this for a few more weeks, depends on how my other fic goes and how much school is going to make me rework my schedule.

I hope you liked it and please leave a review.