Disclaimer: I own neither Naruto nor Highschool DxD

(AN): Didn't expect to start picking away at this so soon.

Rias' heart had risen to some point in her gorge, throbbing more and more sickeningly the closer she rushed to where her father coordinated economic and military activity over vast swathes of Gehenna. By virtue of his pedigree, his reputation, and his previous experience in war, the Duke had been chosen to supervise a full quarter of their realm.

Zeoticus' responsibility had pulled him out of the Gremory territory and to one of the sprawling stately complexes in Lilith. The former capital of the Lucifer territory had been speedily rebuilt after the civil war as an expression of triumph, and then detached into a self-governing region under the direct auspices of the Senate.

For their kind at large, Lilith served as a glorious nexus for the power of the nobility and the beating heart of their state.

For Rias, the city was just an annoying obstacle she had to cross in order to talk to her father and protest her Pawn's conscription. Sasuke himself might have reacted to the prospect pretty amiably, but Rias wasn't going to accept it just like that. She remembered Shamond and the way her peerage had almost died based on the mere whims of those stronger than them too clearly. If Sasuke went to fight, he might die; and that wasn't an outcome Rias wanted to even imagine. Like any of her servants, Sasuke had become precious to her in a dozen different ways.

The world without him would have much less joy in it.

"We're here, my lady."

Turning her teal eyes to the chauffeur, Rias nodded at the woman. "Circle around the block until I come back."

Like many other important government buildings in Gehenna, the Semiramis Guildhall was covered by a spelldome that prevented teleportation by all but the strongest magical beings. So the Ruin Princess had to teleport as close as she could get and then travel by car the rest of the way. Normally the wait wouldn't have bothered her too much, but she needed to speak to her father before Sasuke went and got deployed.

The fool had already packed his bagand dressed in uniform.

Rias practically flew up the granite steps, pushing through the door and blasting past security with a flash of her noble credentials. Normally even having a pureblood lineage wouldn't be enough to fast track her through a state complex, but everyone practically fell all over themselves trying to suck up to the boss' daughter. Rias just slipped on her polite smile and bore it until the elevator carried her to the top floor.

"Is my father in?" she asked the secretary, barely waiting for confirmation that her sire was in his office and not currently meeting anyone before she slipped through the doors.

The sudden creak of hinges drew Zeoticus' gaze from the report on his desk, and he peered up in surprise at his daughter through square eyeglasses. Even though he had perfect eyesight, the Duke found wearing glasses helped him focus. It was one of the more obvious quirks he shared with his daughter. "Rias?"

She marched right up to the Duke, pulling a rumpled square of paper from the pocket of her skirt and dropped it on her father's desk. "This came in the mail today." Rias swallowed, lowering her gaze. "I was hoping you'd be able to help me with it."

Zeoticus blinked, picking up the square and unfolding it to reveal the first of conscription orders for one Captain Uchiha. "Ah." the man made a noise of comprehension, mouth tugging down into a frown as he considered how exactly he should proceed. Setting the letter aside, the redhead pulled his glasses off and threw them onto his desk with a quiet clatter.

"Take a seat." Motioning to the armchair across from him, Zeoticus watched as his daughter primly obeyed. It was easy to see the frustration and worry in the girl's face, but she hadn't flown off the handle and started raging at him like a less mature child might. He was proud of Rias for that, which made Zeoticus feel all the more guilty that he couldn't comply with her implicit request.

"Rias, I love you." the Duke began, lifting a hand to rub at the stubble of his beard as he searched for the right way to put it. "But this isn't something I can help you with. I would in an instant if I could, but I'm just one cog in the machine, and my hands are tied right now."

"I don't believe you." Rias disagreed, fisting her hands in her skirt but managing to keep her voice soft and polite. "You're a Duke, your son is a Satan, and right now you're basically ruling over a quarter of the country. Are you telling me that with all that power at your fingertips, you can't countermand the conscription orders for a single soldier?"

Zeoticus tapped absently at his desk, shifting his eyes away in thought and then back to his daughter with a sigh. "It's not a question of ability. Could I theoretically do what you're asking me to do? Yes, I could pick up the phone and place a few calls. It's a question of responsibility. Should I do what you're asking me to do? How could I ask other nobles and the commoners to do something I'm not willing to do myself? Sasuke has unfortunately been called to the lines, along with every of age member of every noble's peerage, provided an individual's deployment wouldn't lead to catastrophic escalation."

Smiling grimly when Rias assumed an expression of shock at that little tidbit, Zeoticus shook his head. "As nobles, we have obligations, and part of those obligations is to make sacrifices for the country when we have to. Otherwise, we're just tyrants abusing the masses. Our peerages are extensions of ourselves, and right now we've been called on. I know it hurts, I know that you're going to worry about him every day until the war ends, but I raised you to be a good person Rias. And you know that you have to let him go. For Gehenna."

Drawing a slow breath, Rias fiddled with the button of her blazer. "I think you see me as a better person than who I actually am." the Ruin Princess commented bitterly. "Maybe I don't care about nobles or commoners or anything else. I just want to keep my friends close to me and keep them safe, no matter how it looks or what it costs other people."

"You might feel like doing that." Zeoticus conceded. "But I also know in the end you're not going to." His daughter's denial had the air of defeat rather than resistance, so he could already tell she wasn't going to try something reckless like smuggling her Pawn out of Gehenna.

Rias clenched her jaw, but didn't deny her father's assertion. After a moment, she rose to her feet and half turned away. "I should go. Sasuke will be leaving soon and I need to see him off."

Without waiting for acknowledgement, the redhaired girl moved to go.

"Wait." The idea had come to Zeoticus in a sudden rush of inspiration. His daughter and her friends were going to go stir crazy as long as the war went on, and they'd do well with something to do. If that something actually contributed to the war effort, it would be even better. "I just thought of something that might be of interest to you."

Blue-green eyes flashed with intent as Rias twisted back to consider her father. The man looked contemplative, but not fit to bursting with some grand proposal or great idea. Truthfully, after being denied so handily she was feeling a little uncharitable, and prepared herself to be underwhelmed. "Yes, father?"

"I can't help you keep your servant off the front lines, but I can tell you that the sooner this conflict ends the quicker he'll be back home and safe. So what do you say about doing something that might help shorten the war?"

Reluctantly intrigued, Rias folded her arms over her chest and turned fully to face the man behind the desk. "Alright, I'm listening. What did you have in mind?" She doubted it would be anything too important, considering that the Senate would rather let almost every male devil die before letting the women in general go off to fight. The old mantra of 'sperm is cheap' was deeply embedded in the Gehennan psyche, and if she wasn't going to the front lines as well Rias didn't see herself doing anything that would contribute much.

Her father would probably propose she start working in a factory doing something similar to what Naruto had done during his brief punishment, and honestly, Rias doubted she'd even deny him. The Ruin Princess had magic to burn, and every little bit helped the war effort.

"One of the greatest issues we have military is the lack of quality soldiers." Zeoticus steepled his fingers together. "We've tried to make up the shortfall with military tech and numbers, but we're only able to stalemate them. We've called up the reserves to replace attrition losses, but our population was never that big to begin with. Soon we'll have to conscript just to keep the flow of manpower steady."

"This is where you come in." Zeoticus winked at his daughter. "There are two things you can do for us. One, join some of your peers like Sona and Seekvaira while they go around playing ambassador and trying to persuade some other factions to lend us a hand. And two, take some of Ajuka's standalone Evil Pieces to convert interested humans into commoners that are willing to fight for us."

Rias felt her eyebrows shoot up in surprise at her father's second idea. Typically speaking, Evil Pieces were registered to a noble devil who would then give them to people they wanted in their peerage. There was a symbiotic link where the greater the power of the noble, the greater the power of the Evil Piece, and the more powerful the being that was being reincarnated into a devil or bonded into service could be.

Standalones weren't linked to any noble, and as such had much less power in them. The only being they could really reincarnate were regular unremarkable humans, who had limited use to a ranking devil.

Still, there were many otherwise unremarkable humans that would be willing to play Gehennan cannon fodder for the chance at a ten thousand year lifespan, and they wouldn't be much weaker than the untrained commoner devils of Gehenna's armies anyway.

It was an interesting idea.

"Alright, I'm in."

Sasuke drew his service katana, Sharingan flickering on as he examined the cut of the blade in greater detail.

It was an ugly thing. The demonic steel was less pure than he would like, but what else could he expect from a sword that had been churned out in mass production by one of Azmarin's many factories? There was no art or care forged into the weapon, only a blunt intent to kill. It was a pale shadow of the katana Rias had once gifted him, but they'd had no chance during wartime to commission Sasuke a better blade. The only option he had was the backup blade.

It didn't really matter to him all that much. The Uchiha wasn't looking for a sentimental keepsake. He just needed something to hold the charge of a Chidori or Koujin on the front lines as he slashed the Mictlanese invaders to pieces. It wasn't like the pistol they'd given him would be worth a damn. Sasuke was too powerful to rely on charged crystals, and the weak blasts of fire spellguns could produce weren't worth piss in the wind compared to his own sorcery.

Slipping the katana back into its sheath with a click, Sasuke turned to the mirror and gave his appearance one last look over. Trousers? Check. Tunic? Check. Service cap? Check. Knee-high black leather boots? Check. Deep crimson cloth all over? Check. Single gold officer's cord? Check.

The bars denoting his captain's rank and the patch acknowledging his clan loyalty pulled his gaze again and again.

Sasuke wasn't sure how he felt about what was essentially a brand of ownership by the Gremory clan. He'd seen the symbol enough times when Rias summoned her magic circles, and for years it had sat smack dab in the center of his own runic circles as a symbol of his allegiance and the Pawn pieces inside of him. But once he'd awakened his Sharingan, it had been replaced by the six-pointed star of his Eternal Mangekyou. Every time he saw the new symbol, it raised questions he wasn't sure how to answer.

What were his long term goals? What was the Uchiha name going to mean in this Underworld?

"Oh my, aren't you looking snappy?" Akeno greeted as she drifted in, violet eyes darting towards the Uchiha's small trunk of permitted luggage. The forced cheer in her voice did little to cover up her underlying stress, but she was trying. "You know what they say, the ladies love a man in uniform. Rawr."

Turning away from the mirror before the Thunder Priestess could accuse him of vanity, Sasuke shrugged one shoulder and gave the woman a bored glance. "That so?" he deadpanned, all carefully cultivated disengagement and arrogance. It had the desired effect of making Akeno puff up in challenge, worry getting buried a little deeper by their familiar tit-for-tat.

Akeno hummed in mock thought, closing the distance and plucking the service cap off Sasuke's dark strands. "It is so." she drawled, setting the crimson cap on her own midnight hair with a flourish. "Not that I'd expect you to know anything regarding the tastes of cultured women, you uncultured brute."

Very slowly, Sasuke tilted his head to the side and committed to a mocking stare. Then he reached up with hands clad in white gloves and pinched Akeno's cheeks. The stretched out slobby pull of the girl's mouth lasted about four seconds, after which the Queen began to wiggle her tongue and splutter a great spray of saliva at him. "Ablugahah!"

"Gross!" Sasuke barked, jerking back and wiping at his face with the crimson sleeve of his uniform. "You're such a vulgar woman." he complained. "You're exactly the kind of girl I was warned about growing up."

A mischievous twinkle sparkled in Akeno's gaze, and she waited until Sasuke turned away to glance at the clock before rushing forward. Wrapping her arms around the Uchiha's neck in a choking grip, the Thunder Priestess purred lewdly. "Yes, I'm a very naughty girl." Then sticking her tongue out, she dragged a wet and sticky lick right up over Sasuke's cheek.

"What are you, four? Heaven above, woman." Sasuke shot back, frowning in disgust. A short push at Akeno's midriff quickly revealed her unwillingness to release him, so Sasuke turned to a more unconventional solution. Grabbing the back of the woman's skull, he forced her head down and proceeded to wipe her cooling slobber off in her hair.

Akeno wailed at the feeling of chill wetness, giving Sasuke enough of an opening to wrap and arm around her waist and hoist her up and over his shoulder like a potato sack. The wind flew out of her stomach with a woosh as she landed, and Sasuke readjusted her to hang more comfortably.

Rolling his eyes when she began to wriggle, Sasuke gave her rear a harsh spank before turning his attention to his gear.

A spark of magic levitated his little bag, and he was able to bundle up his greatcoat over his other shoulder. "Pipe down you." he ordered once the stun of his slap wore off, spanking her a few more times in succession to quiet her struggles before striding out of the room. As fun as it was to tease Akeno, he was running short on time and really should be leaving. After a quick round of goodbyes he'd be out the door.

In a way, perhaps he was betraying his friends' feelings. Despite all their worry, Sasuke was excited. No amount of hand-wringing from the girls or stony silences from Yuuto could change the fact that part of Sasuke was eager for war. Shamond had given him the first taste of fighting in years, and he wanted more. Sasuke wanted the rush of the fight again. He craved for a taste of victory that came with crushing his enemies. It wasn't something he felt like Rias' peerage would have understood, though Naruto probably would have.

Trundling down to the front foyer with his cargo, Sasuke peeked his head into the room before pulling back. Yuuto and Koneko were already waiting, so he was in a bit of a quandary. Just walk in, or set down Akeno first? The former would give him a sense of sadistic amusement, and the latter would give him... nothing really.

Just walk in it was.

Unfortunately, Akeno took the choice out of his hands with a desperate wiggle. She squirmed out of Sasuke's grip, sliding down to plant her feet on the floor and give the Pawn a red-faced pout. She had no problem with a good bit of teasing, but all the spanking was a going little too far. After all, she was both sadist and masochist; and there were certain switches that shouldn't be flipped. "No more spanking, you perverse animal."

"I'll spank you all I want." Sasuke taunted, circling on past her and into the foyer.

"There you are." Yuuto groaned, scuffing at the tiles with one absent heel. "We've been waiting forever for you to make it down here." The blond Knight blinked when Akeno drifted in with pink cheeks that slowly regained their natural pale hue. "Did you preen in front of the mirror long enough, or do you need a little more time?"

"I think I'll survive." After dropping the dry rejoinder, Sasuke turned his attention to Koneko. "Cat got your tongue?"

"Fuck you."

A sharp clap cut off any further insults as Rias stepped into the foyer. "No fighting, children." Her dark business skirt and blazer looked a little rumpled, and the displeased tightness around her mouth already told the peerage exactly what her father's response had been. "No luck." she muttered, more for clarity's sake than any real need. "Do you really need to head out so early?"

Sasuke nodded, prompting the redhead to visibly deflate. Truthfully, he was cutting it a little too close. He should have left hours ago, but he'd indulged Rias' desire to try and get him out of deployment. Even if Sasuke wanted to fight, he would have stayed if he was allowed, because she would have asked him to. The point was moot though, because he wasn't allowed. He just hoped he didn't get too much shit if he showed up a little late.

"Well." Rias began, crossing the room and joining the crowd of young devils. "I guess this is goodbye." The poorly concealed sorrow in her face was enough to put a thick lump of guilt in Sasuke's throat, and when he gave a short affirmation it came out a little strangled.

Holding out his hand, Yuuto went for a forearm clasp. At almost fifteen years old, the Knight was still not legally old enough to be called to the front. It was a good thing, because even though it made him feel like a bit of a coward, the swordsman knew if he was conscripted too Rias would be doubly devastated. "Stay safe." he demanded, drilling the older man with grey eyes as Sasuke met his hand with a firm shake.

"You too."

"I know you'll be looking for ways to impress the women." Akeno began, teasing and a little misty eyed as she stepped forward. "But try not to collect too many scars, hmm? It'll be such a hassle to massage them all away with herbal creams once you get back, and if you want to get a little slippery with me all you need to do is ask. There's no need to get all wounded just to have an excuse."

"I weep." Accepting the Thunder Priestess' hug, Sasuke shoved back the natural masculine enjoyment at squeezing that soft curvy form to acerbically needle her. "I weep for the children you're going to have one day, because their mother will be such an utterly twisted woman."

"Twisted is the way you like it, isn't it?"

"Freak." Sasuke sighed fondly, turning to Koneko only to blink in shock. It wasn't that he disapproved, but he hadn't expected the random decision to satisfy his childhood obsession with felines.

White furry ears twitched at the weight of more than one pair of eyes, and flushing faintly Koneko directed her amber gaze resolutely off to the side. "Just this once." she mumbled, jerking slightly when a smirking Sasuke pet her cat ears. "But you owe me. Don't die."

"Fine, but isn't that the opposite of what you usually ask for?" Agreeing to the so-called trade with an eyeroll, Sasuke dropped his hand and turned to Rias. "Do you have any sage advice for me?" he wondered sarcastically, dark orbs weighing the Ruin Princess with a hint of expectation.

Rias just shook her head, wrapping Sasuke up in a bone crushing hug. She smelled like vanilla again, the Uchiha realized as he gingerly wrapped his arms around her waist and softly squeezed back. There was a depth of feeling in the embrace that didn't need words, and with a swooping sensation in his stomach Sasuke realized he wasn't ready to confront the strange bloom in the back of his mind.

Friendship was one thing.

But not this. He wasn't ready for that yet.

Stepping back, Sasuke looked back over the peerage with new perspective. The broken and reforged people surrounding him weren't merely friends, they were the beginning of something like family. Something like home.

The Uchiha settled his greatcoat around his shoulders, straightening the service cap he'd stolen back from Akeno and picking up his bag. Maybe there was something touching he was supposed to say, but he couldn't make his lead tongue obey him, and settled for a much gruffer goodbye he hoped they understood.

"I'll see you kids in a while."

"My lord, I really have to insist this is a terribly unwise course of action! Will you not reconsider?"

"Denied!" Naruto honked back, making a sound that was more at home on a game show than in the halls of power. Tansea looked mortified, but Ravel looked amused, so it was all good. "I hope you and the boys in blue are ready old Nerg, because there are no breaks on the Naruto train today."

There was a little more silver in the constable's beard than there had been before the war, but other than that the greying officer was much the same as he'd been. "Everyone is already in place, Naruto." Tawny eyes glimmered at Nergal turned his focus back to the villa at the top of the street. Centuries he'd been on the force, and not once had he been allowed to put Ximen in the slammer where the mob boss belonged.

Despite being an officer of the law, there was much less enforcement in 'law enforcement' than Nergal had hoped. There was a certain way of doing things. Favours were traded, order was maintained, bribes were placed, and everyone went home happy except the citizens that ended up suffering under Ximen's criminality. Men like Nergal were the idealists that didn't understand how things operated in the so-called real world.

Well now the 'real world' was under new management, and there was a new way of doing things.

Nergal had heard of Naruto's intent the first day the Gremory heir took over governing Azmarin, and knew that it wasn't something that could be leaked to the force at large. The mobsters had too many dirty cops on payroll, so instead Nergal had shaken up a few officers he knew were clean and rounded them up for the operation. When they went in to bust Ximen and his crew, there would be no escapes and no threats of calling good friends like Judge So-and-So.

There would simply be some long-awaited justice.

"Well good." Naruto grinned, patting at his hip and confirming his spellgun was locked and loaded. He doubted he'd use it if things got rough, since he had another spell in mind, but there was a certain presentation he was worried about. He couldn't exactly be the new sheriff in town without a trusty ol' pistol now could he? "Let's get going then. Tansea, you stay here. Nergs, you coordinate your lads. Ravel and I are off to knock on the front door."

Without waiting for confirmation, Naruto squinted up at the sunny blue skies and began to stalk forward. "Lovely day for a stroll, wouldn't you say my dear?" he commented airily to his fiance, prompting a giggle.

"Oh yes dah-ling. The warm breeze mixed with urban stink is simply sublime."

"See, if you say it like that I might think you're being sarcastic."

"I would never."

"Oi, stop right there!" the shout from one of a pair of beefy bodyguards was enough to cut off their exchange, drawing Naruto's attention like a shark to blood.

Grinning with just a touch of malevolence, Naruto flounced right up to the men and beamed at them. There was an unnerving amount of teeth in that smile. "Hello gents." he greeted merrily, waving Ravel over in good cheer. "Would you two fine upstanding citizens do me the favour of fucking right off?"

"Huh?" the other guard blinked stupidly.

It only took a very light blast of Naruto's magic right to the face to knock what had to be the most overpriced and under-performing pair of guards in Gehenna out of the game. "Really?" the redhead wondered with a bit of disgust as he stared down at the twitching unconscious thugs. "From all the notoriety, I was expecting a little more, ya know?"

Ravel just sighed. One day, hopefully soon, but probably soon too soon, her fiance would clue in about just how much more powerful he was than the common man. It wasn't like the nobility made a habit of educating commoners in magic, and the few sorcerers that didn't directly serve one of their families had patchwork knowledge at best.

But until that day, she just keep quiet and let him throw his weight around a little bit.

"Shall we go on?" she suggested, deliberately stepping her booted heel onto one of the bald bodyguards' hands. "Not that I want to ruin your dramatic entrance, but you might want to keep up some momentum."

"You want to see some momentum?" Naruto winked, lifting one hand and conjuring up three balls of the Power of Destruction. The crimson and black sorcery migrated to float behind his back, pulsing slightly with ferocious intent. "I'll show you some momentum." Then he rocketed forward, churning up the soil of the mob boss' carefully manicured lawn as he went.

It kind of pissed Naruto off that after putting so much work into it, that he was only able to create a spell that only peripherally resembled his Guudodama. There weren't enough of the orbs for one, and while they could move about and change shape based on his intent, they didn't shift to being solid enough to hold. The only thing the new 'Truth Seeking Balls' had managed to really duplicate was the whole 'rotting everything away' thing Madara had just fucking loved.

Oh well, it was a work in progress.

Singsonging in a chipper tone as he blasted the magnificent double front doors of the manse right off their hinges, Naruto lazily floated in and waved mockingly at the milling crowd. "Little pig, little pig, won't you let me in?"

"The fuck do you think you are, shitty brat?" Some tattooed geezer roared, lifting his hand and firing a volley of pink fire right at Naruto's face. Several other devils joined in, determined to drive back the sudden absurd assault on their feared criminal syndicate by what was basically a child.

Crooking his finger, Naruto pulled at one of the pseudo-Guudodama floating behind him and swiftly manipulated it into a glowing sheet of crimson-black annihilation. The magic instantly broke down the attacks his self-appointed enemies had launched at him, leaving Naruto standing unharmed and bored. "My name is Sabaku no Gaara." he droned, folding his arms over his chest and doing his very best to look like a murderer just out of his nappies. "I will kill you all and prove my existence."

What, couldn't a man have a little fun in a while?

Gaara would have appreciated the joke, god damn it!

"That's enough."

Ximon didn't look at all like Naruto had expected. He'd been looking forward to a fat and swarthy little man that would remind him of the fun times he'd had beating Gato. Instead the mobster was tall and trim, barely into middle age for a devil, and on the whole rather distinguished. "I don't know who you are, my boy." the criminal started amiably, waving off one of his sweating attendants as he walked in from the garden doors. "But that doesn't mean we can't do business."

Cocking an eyebrow at the blond man, Naruto couldn't help but wonder incredulously. "Dude, I just blew up half your house and you're talking like I came over for a bit of tea and scones."

"So?" Ximon did a good job of hiding his anger, but Naruto could still see the glint of it in his eyes. "A home can be repaired. The tradeoff would even be worth it considering your obvious skill. Who sent you? Falzar? Lan? Why don't you come and work for me instead? I can easily match what they're paying. As for the damage?" he shrugged nonchalantly. "What are a few mistakes between friends?"

Drawing in a slow breath, Naruto pulled back his strands of power into their three Guudodama. "My name isn't Gaara, and I'm not here to kill you." he admitted before grinning with just a hint of bloodlust and cracking his knuckles. "But I'm definitely here to open a few cans of whoop-ass."

(AN): 5000 words here. I really didn't expect to post this. It was really the result of two factors. One, I can write this anywhere with an internet connection because of the doc manager, so if circumstances conspire to prevent me for accessing the tools I need for school, all I can do is write. And two, after doing 25% of my ethics course in two days, I figured I could take a little reward before getting back to it :3.

Boruto stuff - I'm not saying I write it off entirely. But I am saying I would be very hesitant about it, and if it appeared it would do so differently.

Why did only Sasuke get conscripted - Yuuto is too young, and the rest of Rias' peerage is female. Sperm is cheap and all that. Gehenna would call in the adult reserves, then start conscripting adult commoner men, then lower the age requirement, and then start letting commoner women fight. After that it would be 'nonessential' male purebloods, then all male purebloods, then 'nonessential' female purebloods, and then finally everyone.