Important! Next chapter we are officially enter MY canon time. What I mean by that is that I changed canon's timeline. I saw it, and it's just stupid. Basically, they go through a Volume each month… am I the only one that thinks that's ridiculous? Especially considering everyone in Rias peerage's growth rate. It doesn't make sense. It also shames possibly one of the more badass characters of the series, Sairaorg. Why? Because you have Issei, who has been basically a loser all his life and Sairaorg that has been working his ass off. And then Issei beats him because reasons… No, just, no.

So, that's why I'm starting canon earlier and spacing canon volumes to give them more time to get stronger. Everything happens as the light novel says but in MY canon everything starts on Issei's first year. I think I had to explain this here, because then it would have been confusing from now on for some people. Also, we are just entering canon TIME. But having Seekvaira's peerage enter canon will take another year of timeline. But don't worry, it won't take as long as it sounds.

GGPD: That's something I really wanted to change from canon, all the shit happens to Rias's peerage. That doesn't make sense, if the WORLD is being threatened by a terrorist organization, then why the hell are they constantly attacking the same country? That's actually why I made this Arc in the first place. I would have thrown them in canon earlier if I didn't want to change this. Anyway, thanks for the review.

Zephyr47: I understand man, you just get annoyed if it looks more as an original story than an actual fanfiction, that's kind of what I get from what you said at least. As for being on a story of mine for 20 chapters, don't worry, I don't have it in me to write an arc that long. And as you may or may not have read on the note at the top, canon is coming. Thanks for the review.

faithful despair: Man, I just want to say that you are awesome. It's not really criticism that I want (it's welcome though) but I want to know what people like about my chapters too. It's really refreshing to know that I did something right.

I really like those moments too to be honest. The pseudo-death of Issei in canon was probably my favorite moment of canon, shame that we didn't get as much detail on everything as I would have liked. And as for something like that happening in my story, I wouldn't put it past myself.

I know, I wanted to write something like that too, but I feel Seth and Seek haven't connected too much for now. At least not as much as him with the new recruits. You'll get that scene though, so there's no need to riot.

And don't worry, I have just been writing as the story comes to me. I'll probably be slowing down sometime this week or next one. Thanks for the review.

WOW, that took a while, on with the story.

Disclaimer: I don't own Highschool DxD, neither do I own any of the multiple resources that I will use for the story in the form of (but not limited to) references.

Nilrem Arc – Open Your Eyes

Months had passed.

We never relaxed, even with that. If Nirlem had achieved something it was making us keep our guards always up. We never stopped training, not that we would anyway. We still had to back Seek up anyway.

Everyone's training was going great. Sadly, I hadn't found something new to train so I mostly polished what I had. I did get some pretty amazing spell circles to work. Maybe they would come in handy in the future.

Trina was already an unofficial Knight, even without promotion. And that wasn't even counting her talent for Senjutsu. Seek had managed to get a book on the subject by New Year's Eve. Once we had that we learned that she had advanced pretty well for someone that hadn't had any idea what she was doing. I could only praise her luck.

But when she got the book and actually learned what she needed to do she improved a lot. She still isn't even near the point of using it on battle, but she can speed up her recovery time enough to be of notice. She still exhausted herself after a bit of doing this, but that didn't make it less amazing for someone that wasn't a Nekoshou or even a Youkai.

Then there was the cute oversized puppy. He had grown another foot. He now towered above us. That didn't make him act any less cute though. Sparing with him was still a struggle for everyone except me. They usually did a three on one with either of us.

Seek had improved her reserves and Wind magic a lot. With all her focus on the subject her Wind magic was on par with my Ice magic, and that wasn't even counting her clan trait.

Lucie for her part had improved her reserves a lot too. She could make her shields work through a whole spar now or heal pretty much every wound one of us had at the end of one. That was a real difference to before, much to my pride and her delight.

Liam on the other hand had improved a lot on everything. He reminded me of myself when I started training. He seemed especially proud of that when I told him. He can already match Trina, much to her chagrin.

His magic also improved a lot. He can put almost everyone into a tight spot with his Earth bindings and prisons. Except for Iorek and I, we can power our way through them. But if he managed to make them a bit sturdier, I would have to be really careful. Getting stuck against him was dangerous.

Then there was Leonardo. He didn't train per se but he would occasionally lend us a hand if I asked and he felt like it. And by that, I mean that he would create his golems for us to fight against. Was really good to practice battle against a number of enemies. He was treated to the same shuffle of hair as Liam every time. It seemed to annoy him to no end but he still did it so I continued.

He still hasn't opened up to anyone but me. Although I had seen him talk occasionally with Lucie and Liam. That was good, it would be pretty sad if he didn't talk to anyone while in the house. He also seemed to enjoy listening to Trina practice with her guitar, which was something both of us started doing each time she did it.

All in all, Seekvaira and I thought we had pretty good chances for the Young Devil Gathering. She still fished for information on the others and everything pointed that the only real danger was Bael. All we had pointed at him being able to match Longinus users. His seven valued pawn that we could find nothing about also worried us. And that wasn't even counting Kuisha Abaddon, magic was pretty much useless against her, and getting close to someone of that clan was a difficult affair. That peerage would be a pain to deal with.

The others we were still struggling to find anything solid. We were only working with rumors and past relationships at most. We hated having so little information, especially Seek. Information was power in the hands of someone like her. Having nothing made her feel powerless. I just hoped this year would be more fruitful in that regard.

I guessed I understood her feeling some. I felt pretty bad about not having something to specially work on. Just improving on what I had made me feel like I had hit a wall. If this was how far I could go it would be frustrating. But I had hope. I still had an idea I needed to test, but I needed a magician's soul for that. And the only one I had at the moment was the idiot. And believe me when I say that I was astounded that he still was acting like an idiot. I firmly believe he is a masochist.

Another thing that I noticed, and apparently everyone else had too, was that my eyes changed colors a little bit. It went from normal green eyes to a mint green that reminded me of the tone that my chains would shine when the light hit them. Our only guess was that I had started connecting more with my Sacred Gear. It was also our hope that it may mean I was closer to Balance Breaker. We weren't holding our breaths though.

Seekvaira's birthday had passed and it had been a quiet affair, much like her. Iorek's on the other hand had been hilarious. We somehow ended up playing a game of tag that lasted the entire morning and part of the afternoon. I had even seen Seekvaira and Leonardo laughing like mad. That was a pretty good day. Maou bless our behemoth cub.

Little over four months had passed. And that's when Nico came with interesting information.

[}-o-{]

'Master, I found a hideout of Nirlem.' She had said bluntly. I stopped on my tracks and my mind took a second to reboot.

'Is Seekvaira in her study?' When I received an affirmation, I continued. 'Let's go, this could lead somewhere.'

Once we were both informed of what Nico had found we had a long talk about what to do. Our group was battle ready. The only doubts resided with Lucie, but seeing some battle would help her. And having an emergency heal or two could come in handy. Everyone else could hold their own.

There were some pretty good gains we could get from this. First, I informed Seek about my plans on testing with magician souls. Second, we could find some magic books aside from what we could probably get out of the souls themselves. Third, maybe we could find some information on the organization. Forth, there was a chance that we actually found out their way of finding Sacred Gear users and use it or just some info on potential users would be useful too.

There were several pros, though most were simply probabilities. And while the cons weren't as many, they were equally serious. A lot could go wrong when going in enemy territory. But the deciding factor was, it was located in a secluded area. That only meant one thing, Iorek could come and play if needed be. That reassure both of us that this was too good an opportunity to let it pass.

With the decision made we informed everyone else. The kids were understandably nervous, this was their first real battle. I reassured them that I would keep an eye on them to make sure nothing happened. What surprised me was Leonardo.

"Can I go too?" He asked simply.

"Um, of course…" I looked at Seekvaira, we hadn't thought about this but she was quick to nod in acceptance. "Sure, just stay near Lucie and Liam. With you three working together I have nothing to worry about at all." I send them a smile that they quickly returned, some more than others obviously.

And like that we went. Soon we where standing in front of an entrance going underground covered with magic to keep it hidden that took Dovray a while to break. Once inside we still hadn't seen anyone. There were two paths to go.

"Seth, take the kids to the left. The rest of us will go the right. If something happens contact us. We will do the same." Said Seekvaira.

It had taken him a good two months but Dovray had finally made the communication devices. We used them as accessories. I had a neckless with a wolf head and a gem the same color of my eyes in its mouth. Trina had a guitar with a sapphire gem. Seek had a King piece with a pink gem. Dovray had what looked like a medallion with the Agares symbol on one side and the Demiurge's on the other. Liam had one like mine but with raccoon much to everyone's amusement, and an amber colored gem. Lucie had a pair of wings with a light blue gem in the middle. We didn't really know what to make for Leonardo and he didn't seem to have a preference so I just said to make him a wolf one like mine with a purple gem. He seemed pretty attached to me after all. Nobody objected.

So, according to orders we divided. We found a living room and a couple of halls with bedrooms. We also crossed paths with several magicians but they were dealt with pretty quickly. Liam just trapped their feet and they were finished with a swipe of my chains. The wolves were already having fun teaching manners to the souls. Bella and Poll were in their element.

That is until we reached a room that looked like a really big study. There were a lot of magicians working there. I quickly build my most powerful shield before they had a chance to attack.

"Lucie stay by the door, Leonardo, guard her with a couple of golems, send every other you have to attack together with Liam and me." They nodded and I dispelled the shield before it exploded on us.

Several Ice lance circles appeared above me while I charged. My spells didn't hit but that was not what they were meant to do. They were just meant to distract them until they were within chain range. Their weak shields and barriers couldn't stop my wolf enhanced chains. They cut through them as if they were simple paper.

That's when I heard Lucie's scream. When I turned and saw that she was ok I looked for Liam. He was standing there looking at the corpse before him. One of his attacks had been too much apparently.

'Sirius, wrap the cub.' I send the flail to him and pulled him towards me. "Hey kid," I said and built a shield before us and continue talking. "You've done enough, go back to Lucie and help Leo cover her, will you?"

"But-" His eyes focused and he looked like I had just kicked his puppy.

"Don't worry, you did great." I shuffled his hair. That always seemed to relax him a little, it didn't disappoint. "First time with this is always difficult. We will talk about this later, now go." I gave him a little push in the others direction before going to deal with the magicians that were still standing.

I didn't think Liam would kill someone. Neither Seek nor me had accounted for that. We had to be more careful with that. Leave their fights to be small ones. Like leaving the ones that we had found alone to them instead and dealing with this group on my own. 'Yeah, that would have been better. I'm an idiot.'

"We cleared this side, how's it going over there?" I asked Seekvaira.

"Done, we found the library, it was the place with the most enemies."

"We found a study of sorts. We will start sorting it out, but first I have to talk to the kids… Liam killed one of them." That was all I said.

"We are in our way over there." She said. I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. 'When did my life become so complicated… Right, from the beginning.' I thought bitterly.

"Liam." I called him; he was standing there emotionless looking at his right hand. "Kid, come over here." I put a hand over his head and guided him to the side on the hall, away from the corpses. I had to lift a hand to stop Lucie from coming. "Liam, talk to me." I said guiding his eyes so he looked at mine.

"I… I killed him…" I saw his eyes lose focus again.

"Liam, look at me." I said causing him to do just that. "Do you see me?" He nodded. "Do I look like a bad person to you?" He shook his head, there was a part of me that felt relieved but it was not the moment nor the place. "Sit down" I sat down next to him, our backs to the wall. I put an arm around his neck and held him in a one-armed hug. "You didn't do anything wrong, you know them. They have killed who knows how many people for their Sacred Gears. And I could continue telling things like this, but you already know them." I made him look at me again. "What you need to know is that I'm going to continue being your brother." A saw a spark of light return to his eyes. "Lucie may be uncomfortable for a while, but she won't go anywhere, we are your family, and we won't go anywhere. You get that?"

Tears started forming in his eyes until he was openly sobbing. He held my chest for dear life. His head under my chin, and his tears wetting my shirt. I just sat there patting his back. When Seekvaira's group arrived, I motioned to Leo and Lucie with my head. She went over Lucie and held her in a hug. She wouldn't show it but after all that magic training they had become somewhat close.

I had to comfort Liam some more before we left to the house together with Leo, Seek and Lucie. Dovray and Trina would search the facility for everything that could be useful and we would sort it out later.

I went outside with Liam and we both sat there petting Iorek for a while. I was showing him my personal therapy methods from when I started dealing with death. After he had calmed down enough, we went inside again. The girls were reading something. I had heard that was Seek's method, she said it helped keep her head away from things. It looked like it was working for Lucie too. Maybe they were more alike than I thought.

Leonardo was also doing some light reading. That church training seemed to have trained him to deal with this apparently. He didn't look affected at all.

Together with Liam we cooked some simple things for everyone. After eating I played a quick game of chess with him. And between things like that we spent the rest of the day. When night came Lucie went to bed with Seek and Liam with me. Maybe I couldn't prevent them but I would sure as hell comfort him if he had any nightmares. More than once had I woken up sweating like I had been running with Iorek just seconds ago. My brother would not suffer that alone.

[}-o-{]

A week had passed since then and the kids had slowly come onto themselves again, at least a bit. You were never the same after dealing with death after all. Lucie had started to smile again. And Liam no longer avoided eye contact with everyone but me. He even smiled sometimes when he was with me or Lucie.

They were getting there. I couldn't be prouder of my brother and sister. They hadn't dealt with the dark side of the supernatural world until now. But they were dealing with it pretty well. They were doing better than I had done. Telling them that seemed to improve their states quite a bit.

Seekvaira and I wouldn't leave them alone for anything during this time. Trina practiced with her guitar more often, I thanked her quietly every time. Dovray always handed us some tea or snacks every time he had some free time.

One time surprisingly I had seen Leo trembling, like he was one push away from crying his eyes out. I had put a hand on his head. That seemed to bring him out of whatever he had been thinking. After that I pitted him against Liam on a chess board.

From there I took both of them under my wings. Maybe Leo had an easier time, maybe there was something else that bothered him. But I didn't care, I wouldn't have him suffering alone no matter the reason. So, we went over every coping mechanism of mine over and over again. It was like taking a vacation for a week. At the end of it we all looked even more relaxed than before the raid.

Maybe it would be good to set apart some time to rest once in a while. I talked that with Seekvaira, she seemed to agree.

After the week we still got the kids to continue relaxing while doing some light work. We wanted them to just relax for a week more at least but they wouldn't stay still. So, while they worked a bit with Dovray and Trina, Seek and I looked over what we got from the hideout.

Sadly, we didn't find their way to find Sacred Gear users nor any user they were targeting at the moment. What we did find was a lot of information on magic and a lot of notebooks with research done by them. That together with what I was getting from the souls would add quite a bit to our library. The wolves had had a lot of fun breaking the stubborn ones. Fortunately, none of them were like the masochist.

I was also pretty happy, I finally had magician souls to try my little experiment.

And then there was this:

'Making animated constructs with my Earth magic is proving to be challenging.' I read from one of the notebooks. 'I suppose it makes sense; Getting it to move on its own without a true mind would be complicated. The most I have achieved is some glorified robots, following simple orders, or doing very basic tasks. But they can't think on their own, and what little they do is too stiff to actually be useful. I theorize that getting a construct to actually be alive would take the work of a circle, arithmancy and raw power that is simply not available. Sadly, free will is out of my reach.'

I had gone over those lines so many times I had lost count. It had been a couple of days. I couldn't keep that out of my head. I had the means, I didn't only have minds, I had souls, souls that had free will. And I could theoretically put them in Ice sculptures made of my magic. After all, they used my magic without problem when they coated the chains.

I would have to test this. I was trembling in excitement. I had things to work on. And my Sacred Gear was proving to be awesome once again. If people didn't rise my Sacred Gear to at the very least to mid-tier after they saw me using the techniques I was working on, then I would have to start kicking some godly asses for them to jump it to Longinus tier.

I was pretty close to laughing like a mad scientist. But I refrained myself and dived in the notebook's information about the constructs the guy had used. Adapting them to my Ice magic. Improving them.

And so, I started my projects. Secret from anyone except Seekvaira. I needed her to know just in case. We didn't know when something could happen. And she would need all the information I could give her to plan better. She was thrilled by the prospect, and honestly who could blame her. I was more than thrilled.

[}-o-{]

Project medium had been a resounding success. I had been grinning like mad for an entire day. Sadly, it was limited and had a pretty bad drawback. But it was still awesome.

Project sculpture on the other hand was… taking time. The magician hadn't worked a lot on the constructs, deciding that he could work on that once he could get the AI to work. Which he never did so the circles remained at the very basics. And on top of that I had to adapt them to the wolves, which were the souls I would be using. I didn't trust human souls to be outside the Sacred Gear.

So, I decided it was better to just start from the beginning. I wouldn't see success or failure until I reached an acceptable level on the constructs to be able to tie the soul correctly. That was a shame, because it meant that all the time I was using could be a waste in the end. But Seekvaira encouraged me, telling me that the chance was worth a little gambling. Which I ended up agreeing with.

Hopefully we would have an answer before the Gathering.