Level 13
At the heart of my questionable decisions in obscuring the truth lies a disturbing lack of faith for this world's humanity. My brushes with death and the existences of tropes that make life in this universe so much more different from my first life had colored my expectations to expect the worst of others under certain circumstances.
Honesty was not an option for me back then as I believed that I wouldn't be accepted as I was by my parents and humanity as a whole due to certain qualities that the humans of this universe had that made them… so much lesser than the normal humans of my first life.
The origin for such beliefs laid in what I knew to be the foundation of this universe and it's conception as an idea turned profitable venture rather than the actual science of it all.
I couldn't rightfully fling accusations upon anyone after reflecting on the harem light novel genre as a whole given that it's my guilty pleasure too. Even so, it was this universe carrying elements of my most disliked part of the genre that drove me to keep secrets from my parents.
From my own experiences with the majority of "mediocre, at best" light novels, which is to say, anything that has bad execution, lack of creative ideas, demonstration of a lack of talent and effort, etc… I had come to noticed a peculiarity that caused me to fear the reactions of my parents.
Essentially, I couldn't help but come to see the particularly mediocre or worse harem light novels… as the bashing fics to the Isekai genre as a whole.
Protagonists with "original" personalities developed by the setting's lore or those with a mish-mash of "stock" personality traits that actually make for a compelling character thanks to proper story-telling are a rare breed.
On the other hand, one only needs to take a look at the other 90% of titles out there to know that most would only purchase them for the strange title or the cute girls on the cover, with little care to whatever personality or "viewpoints" that the stock protagonist has unless it's actually funny.
The worst ones would have the lack of engaging "personality" from the protagonist viewpoint character be made all the more apparent when literally any other character has more depth than them, even the generic waifus.
How can anyone actually like such a being as a "character"? Why would anyone even read about such an unlikeable and unrealistic "character"?
Well, there's an answer to that. The formula has been cracked. Rejoice, young authors!
You just have to make every other character so unbearably evil or stupid that you'll be able to derive a scrap of catharsis from the main character's triumph over them and getting the girl while they're at it.
Now, imagine this. A generally upright protagonist with some "flaws" that due to the narrative, are actually his greatest "strength" and the world pretty much runs along with it. He has many peculiarities regarding one of his most defining parts of his personality that makes readers either love him or hate him.
In-universe, however, if one considers all the other people of the same race that has the potential to be just as interesting as he does… naturally, it doesn't make that much sense to suddenly make him the center of the universe and black hole to the affections of almost all women that the readers take a liking to.
Unless of course, the vast of the faceless majority that makes up the human population is generalized as individuals that act out in fear of the unknown and those with power. As was the case with Asia when she kindly healed a little boy resulting in his mother taking him away quickly out of fear back in the first volume. And that was a very, very tame case.
Sometimes such a cliche had been overdone in some light novels to the point where you start to wonder if it really isn't a bash fic in disguise. It's done in a low-key manner in DXD as a way to excuse the status quo and whatever political situation within the Underworld for the more human-like population of devils.
In this particular context, it's a way to not only to place certain characters like Asia and Akeno in a miserable position but also for the protagonist to always have the higher moral ground for simply being an honest, kind and accepting person.
While I can't say that I'm honest all the time, I will admit that I do fit into some of the stock criteria in terms of action, even if my reasons are due to both meta and maturity reasons.
I digress, the point is, humans are pretty shitty in this world and having my parents reject me out of fear or some paranoia on par with Anakin's mental state nearing the end of the Clone Wars wouldn't be surprising at all.
The only reason why Issei got away with it was due to his status as the main character.
Having the love and acceptance of his parents when they found out about the truth was pretty much necessary for both plot and story development.
As a side character, I didn't have any of those plot advantages.
I was somewhat convinced that the world might conspire against me as an attempt to turn me evil or bitter to the point where I would do something I would regret.
I wouldn't be surprised if the world would try to push the "evil ex-boyfriend" plotline as a way to steal the people I love and give them over to some other character as if they were possessions.
Rejection from those that I love is but one of many stock tropes to excuse negative character development.
None of that happened today.
"Ooooh! My brave little boy has grown up so much! You're a Jedi like you've always wanted to be too!" My mother Haru had run up and hugged me right after I left the monster in pieces like a Separatist leader.
"M-mom! I'm glad that you're alright." And didn't just run away in fear.
"Hoooooly shiiiit! H-how! Why! Son! That was so coooool!" My father Gotou had completely forgotten the part where they all almost died. Figures. He wasn't a big Star Wars lore fan but whenever a lightsaber battle is on-screen, hoo boy, he changes into a completely different person.
"I am so touched by your concern…" I drawled at his over-enthusiastic reaction.
"Big brother! I wanna be your apprentice! Teach me how to spin like you." Gosei started to pester me, hey, where is he going?"
"Oi! Back! Back I say!" I swing my hand around at the side to keep him away from my lightsaber. "Dangerous laser weapon here! And no, you're not going to be my apprentice if you annoy me."
"That's not a no." Kouho pointed out, I can see that she's going to be the witty one of the twins sometime in the future.
"... You got me there. Anyways, hold on, let's stop for a second… are you all alright?"
Turns out that the guards did a pretty good job of detecting the threat, escorting them to a safe place (until the Oni caught up) and protecting them from it long enough for me to make my appearance.
I made sure to thank them all for their hard work and loyalty before promising them something special later down the line.
"Wait a second, before I start explaining things, dad, could you explain what you mean by knowing I would be coming just like in London?"
"Well, you did save me from the serial killer… I put the pieces together over the years."
"That's what I don't get… how did you know?"
"You didn't change the shoes that I bought for you."
Wait a second… oh, right… when I rushed past him and was swallowed in by the shadow portal, my main disguise was the unfamiliar hoodie that my grandparents got for me without them knowing.
I wasn't the type to ask for many things or want for new things (like clothes) outside of very specific Star Wars merchandise on holiday events. My father was the one that usually bought shoes for me so it wasn't surprising that he managed to recognize them when he's the type to carefully choose his gifts to others.
"After that, I thought about how you would always stay near us or even skip school to guard us whenever you had a "bad feeling". And before you had those feelings, you would often come to talk with us about it and… we didn't believe you. I think, somewhere down the line, we did start to believe there's a small change of it happening but… we didn't find any evidence of it happening again."
That was my father's evidence collection.
My mother on the other hand…
"Gen, you can't really fool me by putting pillows under your blanket. I'm your mother, do you think I won't check up on your room whenever I feel worried? Even at night?"
Ah.
I totally had that coming.
How unfortunate that I only got my human shadow constructs living and breathing after meeting Valerie. Well, perhaps this is for the best, they do seem accepting of all of this.
A strange thought came into my head. I'm likely misremembering this, but I may have read somewhere in a forum back on normal Earth that canon Saji's family knew he was a devil. Yet I also remember reading that his family was dead… why am I remembering it now? I highly doubt I'm remembering anything at all. It's likely just some false memories being made up in my head.
Even so, that left me wondering about what would have really happened, had I failed to save my parents. No doubt, the twins and I would have been living with our grandparents that could have died due to "natural reasons" once the plot decides to be unreasonable, and have them die of old age or sadness or something.
"Well… while I do have a lot to tell you, there's also a lot I shouldn't tell you, if only so that any other monsters or people that would consider me their enemy can't just hypnotize the answer out of you, learn my weaknesses then put us all into greater danger."
The twins were disappointed that I wasn't going to show them everything I could do while my parents were much more understanding of the matter.
At any rate, it was time to properly introduce everyone.
"I apologize for concealing my true nature from you all, but in accordance with Gen's decision to reveal the truth, I will be introducing myself to your family once again." Atago introduced herself after removing the glamour over her fluffy ears.
She later entertained the twins by letting them touch her ears a bit, although she found it slightly annoying since they didn't know how to do it right.
And now it was time to play translator.
"Everyone, this is-"
"- I am Valerie Tepes, it is an honor to meet the family of my hero."
She spoke Japanese.
Huh?
"Since when can you speak this language?"
"I have no idea."
I hadn't gotten to putting our language into her mind with my abilities yet as I did with my father when it came to his English language skills.
My mother and father quickly decided to take her in after we explained her circumstances.
Valerie had the foresight to have me make some looting tours back at the castle, so we had some jewelry, gold and other valuables that could be sold for money, which should ensure our financial status from hosting one more person wouldn't be at risk.
Even then, Valerie could just subsist on my blood, although my mother insisted that she eat normal food too since she's part human, and therefore, should learn to appreciate the cuisine of normal humans too.
I'm pretty sure that my family was behaving in a way that can be classified as "non-standard" at best considering how well they are taking this. The twins were kids, so they focused on the cool parts and settled with that.
My parents had their suspicions that I was more than they assumed years ago, yet hadn't confronted me about it because they saw I was still their son in every way that counts. And that they thought I was happy so everything was still alright.
They were different from my first set of parents. Thankfully, not the standard DXD adult kind of different, as if it was anyone else (outside of comedic minor characters), then I would have been on the edgy OC with shitty parents timeline.
A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one.
Spring break ended and things have started to settle down for my family.
Raiga and Sakura came over to our house for a more detailed debrief into the supernatural world one day while Atago and I helped her auntie Sophie settle the turned vampires (and human family members) into their new life. We had helped out since they were more familiar, comfortable and trusting the us two who helped them escape. Atago got some chuuni title that seemed to be the norm in the supernatural world while I got the "respectful" title of "Lord Bobby" from the group.
That said, I had to fight off various attempts by her thirsty aunt to drink my blood, as if Valerie's case was any indication, the special energy content of my fluids was something addictive to vampires.
I've been working on fixing Valerie's condition which could probably improve through training and researching the Holy Nail we got from the castle, but for now, I'll just put that off since Valerie should be able to recover from her ordeal first.
Well… she seemed to be dealing well in that regard. As she was a few years older than me, she could do a bunch of things within the financial sector that I could not. Valerie had kept a portion of the liquidated treasures upon my parent's insistence and then started using that money to buy and sell stocks.
I don't know why, but she's ludicrously good with numbers and money matters… I don't get it at all. She's picked up her computer skills from me easily enough then immediately went to try her hand at "making a living" from the safety of her bedroom.
Within a week, my parents made her the family's portfolio manager.
I had no intentions of taking advantage of her talents, especially at this point of time, but she insisted on investing what money I had, from my "share" of the loot and the apparent "bounty" placed on the Oni.
When I protested, she walked out of the room, took out the folded marriage registration forms from her bosom and placed it in front of my parents. My mother had some pretty "convincing" arguments on why I should let Valerie do this.
Before I knew it, I was eating late night Ramen with my father as we discussed the economic and cultural origins of why women handled all the finances in Japanese households. You know, father-son bonding time...
It took a while for the revelation to hit me, but I soon realized that my parents wanted more grandchildren than I expected. Personally, I blamed Raiga and Sakura for softening them up to the idea of multiple spouses so early. Not that I'm not appreciative of their efforts, I just thought that they wouldn't all be pushing this so soon.
Ironic. I could rush into training every scrap of ability I have, but not relationships.
It was hard to organize a time to meet with Asia these days. I had to keep up the appearance of a normal human too, so I couldn't just sleep at irregular hours to meet with Asia, even so, things did work out as Asia managed to gain some good control over the passage of time within the dream world. Nowadays, she could just "sleep" until I joined her (in the early morning for me, late night for her), automatically waking up from the bed in her dream world's cottage whenever I entered the dream world.
I was still my usual training junkie self, however, which my parents accepted even if they didn't necessarily liked it, and so neglected my sleep until it was nightfall in Italy. I only slept around 3 hours a day so that I could catch Asia just as she turns in for the night, before going about my day in the morning back in the real world.
Things were starting to settle down nicely… until of course, I totally forgot that I hadn't been as discreet as I would have liked about my philanthropic healing activities.
"And sent!" Jeanne cheered as she finally sent her message to her friend.
After about two weeks of training interspersed with helping the rescued victims of the vampires, Jeanne had finally gotten the approval to go over to Japan in order to research the outbreak of miracles happening in Tokyo.
She had received a holy artifact that replicated a miracle that would allow her to communicate in a different language, just for this mission, she had to return it later.
"Hmm, hmm~ It's dinner, then." Genshirou replied that they could meet up for dinner after he dropped his school stuff back at home.
Her intentions for coming to Japan weren't as pure as she would have liked. She wasn't doing this to do her duty, considering that most of her duties were purely extermination missions, she certainly wasn't being very dutiful by deliberately seeking an investigative mission.
Jeanne's motives could not be considered pure if a large part of why she was doing this was to not only meet her friend but to avoid killing for a little while.
She berated herself for such selfishness yet couldn't help but feel at peace with the decision. Feeling God's peace to fill her heart, she truly began to believe that this was the right choice and that God brought her here for a reason.
Jeanne spent her first day, after checking into the hotel in the afternoon, gathering the testimonies of those healed. She followed the reports the church had compiled of news articles talking about mysterious healings and went to speak with those people.
Most were happy to talk about how it changed their life, some simply thought of it as good luck, and very little of them believed it had something to do with divine intervention. Jeanne thought it was unfortunate but there was nothing she could and should do, about it.
There wasn't much useful information, however.
"Okay! Let's go, one more for the day!" And if she was quick enough then she would be able to make it to the restaurant they were to meet at right on time.
"Hello there!" She rang the doorbell of a certain household.
A rich looking man with a bright smile greeted her at the door, "Good evening young miss, how can I help you?"
"Are you Mister Hanakai? The one in this article?"
"Why yes, yes I am. Ah, I see, you want to hear more about the best day of my life outside of my daughter's birth!"
"...Yeah sure, let's go with that!"
The house felt a bit… off. There was magic in this house.
He was one of the most vocal proponents about a supposed miracle man she had met. One of his suspicions was a teenage boy of all things… for some reason, the features he listed sounded very familiar to her.
"Oh, I think my daughter is home. Ah, it's really nice to take a break and greet everyone at the door for a change!"
Jeanne got the impression that he's someone who really knew how to find joy in the little things in his life after getting healed miraculously.
"I'm back!"
"Momo-chaaaaan!"
"D-dad! Stop it! M-my friends are here…"
"Aww…"
As some beings entered the house, Jeanne's senses flared to the max as she recognized the foul sensation.
Devils, she thought.
She controlled her motions, she didn't want to alarm the friendly man, especially of the fact that his daughter's friends were devils.
But what if he knows and he's a collaborator? Jeanne wondered, and then shook her head, dismissing the idea of eliminating him.
He's done no wrong as far as she could tell. So long as she wasn't attacked by him then she would not raise her blade against him.
"Guess what? A schoolgirl from France dropped by because she heard about what happened and wanted to hear more! Isn't that amazing?"
"W-what? Dad, what are you talking about?"
"Jeanne-san! Please meet my daughter Momo!"
Behind the white-haired girl was a powerful devil with a short bob cut and violet eyes, the other being behind the devil was a weaker one with shoulder-length, reddish-brown hair and brown eyes.
Jeanne ignored the wariness, fear, and modicum of something akin to a promise of death coming from the devil who was likely the King of a peerage and simply greeted them all with a cheerful smile.
She didn't overstay her welcome, however, and quickly excused her self citing that she's running late for a meeting with a friend.
"And just where do you think you're going?"
"Oh, for dinner!"
The stern looking devil slipped away and followed after her in about a minute after she left.
"The church has historically ignored Japan for the most part."
"Is that so? I didn't know that. I never got the chance to read up on all the mission logs Miss Devil~ I was too busy traveling the world killing your extended family wait a minute...um, how many generations away are you from Lucifer again?"
"I will not let you do as you please here."
"The whole of Japan isn't devil territory, devil-chan! Oh hey, the honorifics are coming out again. Stupid weird relic."
Suddenly, the devil started to look particularly interested in the trinket Jeanne was carrying.
"Is that a relic made with a fragment of the Tower of Babel?"
"I think so. Look, if it works, it works."
The female devil started to mutter something about it being wasted on her rather loudly. Well, with those glasses, Jeanne supposed she shouldn't have been surprised that the devil is a bookworm type.
"A-ahem, anyways, what is your purpose for being here?"
"I would say none of your business… but I think it's pretty obvious."
"The elusive miracle healer, hmm, does the Church suspect that it's a holy type Sacred Gear?"
"Well, it's- wait a second… you aren't getting information out of me that easily, points for trying though! You almost got me."
The devil smirked a little, "Throwing around accusations already? My my…"
"Oh my, devil-chan, could it be that you're trying to provoke a fight from me?"
"Certainly not. I know better than to risk igniting a war. I will not hold back from retaliating, however, if you intend to harm the family of my peerage."
"Don't worry about that, I'm not going to kill them. It's not like they count as heretics anyway. Besides, if I had to kill every heretic I find, then… I'd like to think I could get to the 6 digits within a year."
"How reasonable…" The devil spoke with a flat tone, not finding her words amusing at all, "Hmm perhaps… would you be interested in exchanging information then?"
"I'm not giving up church secrets that easily."
"Don't jump to conclusions. I am speaking of your investigation into this miracle maker. I too, have come to Tokyo in order to… finish my business with the being responsible." The devil glanced back at the household she was just in.
Jeanne didn't know what was going on but it sounds like one of those devil pride matters that she should avoid.
Jeanne was surprised that she even considered it.
Blasted devils and their silver tongues, pretty lips, beautiful eyes and…
What the heck was she thinking? Damn devil! The harlot was obviously trying to confound her!
Before she could reply, she heard a familiar voice shouting something in her direction.
"Oh! Jeanne! What are you doing here?"
She looked to the right to see Genshirou calling out to her from the road's junction.
"Genshirou! It's you! What are you doing here?"
"I was just on the way to the restaurant. I didn't think I would see you on the way. Want to walk together?"
"Sure, let's go!"
Jeanne followed his lead and was going to start talking about her busy week until someone interrupted them.
"Wait a second, your answer, if you will." The devil behind them wanted a response so quickly?
Genshirou turned around to look at the devil, and looked back at Jeanne without stoping to stare at the pretty devil, "Friend of yours?"
Jeanne smiled, "Nope~"
"Okay then, shall we be off?"
"Yup! So, what are we going to be eating? I didn't understand the restaurant name at all."
Jeanne spared a second to glance back at the devil fuming at her rudeness, and perhaps a little bit of indignation for being ignored by the both of them?
It was surprisingly fun. Who needs to kill devils when you can just annoy them to death?