part two: love, too, had to be learned.

or

Saya and the Sakamaki Brothers meet Yui.

When Saya stepped into the car, the Mukami brothers were already seated inside the vehicle. Her eyes went to the biggest one, tall to the point where his head was in threat of brushing against if not outright staying in contact with the ceiling of the car. The shortest one, on the other hand, looked a frail boy – frail enough to pull off her cover story of having missed school due to poor health, if that was his false background. The scars he had only further supported that. On anyone else scars might have made them more intimidating – on this one, he just looked like someone beaten up by the world one times too many.

Next to him, a blond with magic glinting in one of his mismatched eyes sat. It wasn't a threat to her, and so Saya did not say or do anything other than the brief once-over. The final once-human vampire, with black hair, had the air of the leader and it was he who greeted her and introduced themselves.

"Lady Saya," he said, with a small bow. "I am Mukami Ruki, and these are my brothers – Yuma, Azusa, and Kou. As our master bid us, we will be your humble servants from now on."

Saya wordlessly peered at him, and the three others that he'd pointed out. Yuma was the tall one with the wild air, Azusa was the scarred one, and Kou was the blond. They treated her politely enough, and she remembered that Karlheinz had said they were loyal to him.

Loyal enough that to a virtual stranger they would put on a polite act of servitude without question on his orders. What would Karlheinz had told them?

"What did he tell you about me?" she tossed out. Part of it was curiosity. What would the vampire king say of her, to someone who was not raised in the demon world? Who was of human origin before falling to the darkness that had originated from her?

Ruki smiled, and it struck Saya that it was different from Karlheinz's – a crooked smirk instead of the bilateral upturn of the corners of the lips in the gentle controlled way, no curve of his eyes as if to discreetly hide the windows to his soul. What made it most different, however, was that it lacked the emotion that was present behind Karlheinz's eyes whenever he looked at her.

It was an uncomfortable realization, and Saya pushed the thought out of her mind. Between Karlheinz and Yui, she was getting too used to people looking at her with fondness and affection and trust recently. It was undeserved and unhelpful.

"Our master has been clear that you are to be treated with the utmost respect, and that your orders are on par with his in importance and urgency."

To someone not in the know about who she was, that would imply a delegation of sorts, of the authority Karlheinz had over them. Saya looked into his eyes but did not see any evidence of him knowing who she had been, once.

But then again, he had been human. Perhaps even if he knew, the name would not bear enough weight in him to change him.

That, Saya was fine with.

"Is that all?"

Ruki's smiling mask did not shatter. "He has also seen fit to order us to learn from you, Lady Saya, and make the most of this valuable opportunity."

A very silver-tongued man, this vampire. Just like his master.

The rest of the drive was silent, with Saya staring out the window in an unspoken declaration of her lack of desire to speak any further. When they arrived at the Mukami manor, she did not wait for them, opening the door and stepping out herself.

"Is there a clear area?" she asked.

The courtyard of the Mukami manor might have once been clean, but right now the ground was broken and uneven from the multiple people having been tossed into it. For the sake of whoever had put in the effort into the gardens, Saya avoided damaging the plants on the side, but everything else was fair game.

"Azusa," she said, when the smallest boy kept jumping at her without trying to fight back. "The point of this is to see how well you can fight – not how tolerant of pain you are."

"Yes, Lady Saya," he said obediently, but Saya didn't see many improvements in his offensive efforts even after that. At least she had to give him points for perseverance – he never gave up.

That wasn't to say the others gave up either. It was just that they weren't very successful.

"Don't assume you'll have size or strength as an advantage," Saya said after kicking Yuma in his stomach. He was tall, far taller than she was, but like the rest of his brothers, he'd never once managed to land a hit on her. "The Nephilim are always going to be bigger than you. Stronger than you. Magic will not work on them."

She jumped and flung herself into the air, touching and pushing off the ground with her hand to flip her body back and landing just as Ruki lunged for her throat. When Kou attacked – at least they had good coordination, that they had in spades compared to the Sakamaki, to the point where it almost seemed an insult to compare the two sets of brothers – Saya grabbed his arm and threw him at Ruki. Given that she couldn't just break their bones or stab them, this was the best she could do.

Then Saya ducked Yuma's attempted attack and kicked him between his knees to make them buckle. Before he could regain his balance, she switched her balance to the other foot and snapped upwards with a powerful vertical kick that landed cleanly under his chin and knocked his head back. While Yuma stumbled, Saya changed her leg's direction, and landed a horizontal kick to his throat.

Yuma gagged, a natural response to such an attack, and he couldn't resist in time as she lifted him above her head and then slammed him down onto Azusa's head.

Ruki was beginning to lunge at her again, when the alarm they set went off, signifying the end of the agreed-upon twenty minutes.

Saya looked at them all, clothes rumpled and dirtied from the abuse. They could have been worse, but that was in part because she held back.

"At this rate," she said bluntly. "You will die against the Nephilim."

Given that they were originally humans, they were less affected by daylight – an advantage that would be helpful, should the Nephilim fight like they used to and move under the sun. The ones with her had never been as affected by the differences between day and night, but somewhere down the line, the weaker demons had developed weaknesses towards the sun. As if their very being was rejected by half the time.

Still, daylight resistance was only one aspect. Strength, speed, skill –

Saya sighed. Karlheinz wanted them to have the ability to survive against the giants. She had her work cut out for her.

Azusa had a gloomy downturn to his eyes, Kou looked like an offended cat, Yuma fumed with bruised pride and Ruki –

Ruki looked at her with burning resentment, an emotion far more honest than the mask he'd been wearing in the car. Saya met his gaze for a second longer before continuing.

"It might be hard to imagine, but try to fight like you have a large disadvantage in height."

Even the smallest of Nephilim were double Yuma's height. Saya, on the other hand, was far shorter. She rarely had an advantage in height during battles, but if the standards of victory were to be the last one standing alive, then Saya had always been victorious.

Whether they would be like her against foes bigger than they were . . .

Who knew?

"Again."

When Yui greeted her upon her return and said her food was ready, Saya realized she'd forgotten about her request.

"Thank you, Yui-san," she said. She might have forgotten about the rather arbitrary request to keep Yui away from the Sakamaki while she was gone, but she couldn't let that show.

Yui fidgeted while Saya ate, and it could not be clearer that she had something to say. Saya asked just that, while reminding herself that she couldn't be as blunt as she was with the Mukami. For one, she would not and could not put Yui through what the Mukami went through.

"I made my choice, Saya-san," said Yui, when Saya put her chopsticks down. The tamagoyaki had been good, as had been the surprise item Yui had made – French toast. The two surprisingly didn't clash.

Saya blinked. That had been faster than expected.

It's a good thing, Saya reminded herself, stopping the words asking if she was sure before they could leave her mouth. The sooner Eve chose her Adam, the sooner the plan could bear fruit, and the sooner this could all come to an end.

"Then we'll announce it at dinner," Saya said. In the Sakamaki mansion, dinner was the one time when all six brothers were gathered. An order by Karlheinz, from a time before her own arrival – possibly so that they would have time where they could check on each other, in the loosest sense of the term. The vampire king had many enemies, and many turned their ill attentions towards his progeny when they were unable to face the king directly.

Saya had chosen to respect his authority in the household and follow the schedule as well, and Yui, after her arrival, also followed it.

"Not now?"

"It would be better to announce to everyone," Saya explained. "So that there is no need to explain separately six different times."

Yui nodded in understanding, but there was a line of disappointment in the slight slump of her shoulders.

"Is it alright if I ask who it is in advance?"

It was rather incredible, Saya thought, just how that small, insignificant question made Yui look so happy, as if she'd offered her priceless treasures.

That quiet observation was soon overshadowed by Yui's choice.

"I choose Shu-san."

Saya did not let her face change, did not react in any physically discernable way. She nodded, so that her first response was to accept the answer, and only once that was done asked the question. "Did something happen?"

While Yui explained, Saya silently pondered the possibility of her having ruined the plan by influencing Yui's decision. If she hadn't sent Shu to watch over Yui while she was gone, if she hadn't sent Yui to go grocery shopping, if she had just done something else, would Yui's choice have been different?

Sakamaki Shu as Adam. He was strong, among his brothers, Saya would give him that. The small taps she gave to the Sakamaki brothers during her stay in the mansion had been nothing compared to what happened in the Arctic, and with Karlheinz's pitting him against her, but even with Saya not attacking to kill – at least, not after the first time, when Karlheinz appearing prevented her from dealing the finishing blow – he had lasted fairly well.

But was he capable of being Adam? He was very unmotivated, and love –

Saya's breath caught, quietly.

Love, from what little Saya knew of it, took so much. The dearer the wish, the greater the price, the shopkeeper would say, and such was the rule of love. The greater the love, the stronger the commitment and everything it meant.

Saya had seen the kind of love that drove a man to condemn all of humanity for the sake of one person, directing an elaborate, intricate web of shadows that she had starred in as the unknowing star until it was far too late. Nanahara Fumito changed his way of life, diverted his resources into creating a fake town filled with people all dedicated to the experiment of giving 'Kisaragi Saya' a 'normal' life. It was dedication as much as it was obsession.

It was the only kind of reference she had, to compare to something like the plan for the new Adam and Eve required, and Saya could not imagine Sakamaki Shu, lethargic and listless, being capable of such a thing.

But it was fine, wasn't it? Because Saya did not want Yui to have the end she did, and if so, then perhaps Sakamaki Shu would be a good choice – someone who would not do what Nanahara Fumito did.

"Thank you, Yui-san," said Saya, deciding that in the end it was Eve who would choose her Adam, Eve that would revolutionize and redefine the nature of the new humanity, for a new age. Eve who had all the power. "And I'm sorry."

Yui, Saya could see, assumed that the gratitude and apology was towards the explanation for what happened that day. In a way it was, but it also went far beyond that.

Quietly, Saya hoped that she had not just destroyed everything the way she always seemed to.

AN: if people are asking, hey, if Saya beat up the Sakamaki bros in their first encounter, and the Mukami bros on their first encounter, does that mean by the end of part four, the Tsukinami bros will be beaten up by Saya when they first meet, then congratulations you've guessed correctly, that's fifty percent of the story, you're basically done reading it what's the point on sticking around (this person).

Jokes (?) aside thanks for reading.