I woke up with the sound of beeping next to me, but unlike my alarm in my phone, this was slower, resembling a heartbeat, I looked towards my right side and saw a medical monitor and a plastic tube attached to my arm and a blood bag, I widened my eyes in surprise but just as I was about to stand up, I heard someone speak with a motherly tone.

"Careful now, you don't want to stand up too suddenly"

I looked to the direction of the voice and saw a familiar woman with raven hair and hazel-coloured eyes, Shuri didn't have the smile I remember her for, instead she had frown and for a moment I thought I saw red in her cheeks, as if she had cried earlier.

"Miss Shuri?" I stuttered "why am I at the hospital, where is Akeno" referring to her formally seemed to bring back some mirth to her as she giggled.

"I thought we were over this, but oh well, Akeno-chan is in the waiting room, Fu-kun had to drag her back home so she wouldn't sleep with you, she was deathly afraid someone would try to stab you in the night" she explained, her frown soon returning "what do you remember?" What do I remember?

"I was stabbed by some sort of spear of light, the last thing I remember was laughter and Akeno's shocked face, but it was a nightmare, right?" maybe some sort of lucid dream, I reasoned to myself, even though I could feel the pain as if it was real life, maybe that's how lucid dreams are, but it felt so real and so vivid. Shuri looked thoughtful for a moment, looking with an unfocused sight, suddenly the door to my room opened abruptly and, in a blur, someone hugged my chest and buried her face in it.

"Subaru-kun, you're okay, you're okay, thank the heavens you're okay!" she cried and sobbed, surprised by her interruption I returned her hug and patted her back, she looked at me and I smiled softly.

"Relax Akeno, I'm still here, right?" I said to her, she smiled while tears were still coming out of her, from behind her came a guy, he was wearing a school uniform identical to mine, he was blond, quite handsome, he looked like a prince, Akeno noticed him and composed herself.

"Subaru-kun, this is Yuuto-kun, he happened to be near when the mugger attacked and helped take you to the hospital" she explained "he is my junior in the ORC" I stretched out a hand and the guy took it.

"I finally meet my vice president's friend, it's nice to meet you, Subaru-san"

"Nice to meet you too, Yuuto-san, and mugger? Sorry, my last memory seems to be of a dream, what exactly happened last night? I can only remember up to when we were at the park" I asked, Yuuto then started to explain.

"You were mugged, the man who attacked you stabbed you with a knife near the stomach, Akeno-sempai managed to subdue him, she pressed on your wound and tried to stop the bleeding until the ambulance came"

"Really?" I asked while looking at Akeno, who nodded, I smiled "whatever I did to have such a dependable friend, thank you very much Akeno"

"No, no, don't thank me for something that I should have done, I'm just glad you are okay" then came a nurse that stopped right in front of the bed.

"Subaru Kazuma? You are getting discharged today, your fees have already been paid, you only have to sign these papers" said the nurse as she gave me the papers and a pen, I signed and gave the nurse the papers back, "your clothes are over there" she pointed to my school uniform neatly piled on spare chair next to the door "unfortunately I advise you replace them, the shirt has a large gash almost the size of a fist from both the back and the front, how did that happened by the way?" she asked me, I almost flinched in surprise, a hole the size of a fist, wasn't I stabbed? What kind of knife is that big?

"Can I take off the syringe?" I asked.

"Hold on, let me do it" the nurse took off the syringe after sealing the bag and disconnected the electrodes from my body, I stood up and went to my clothes, indeed, there was a messy cut going from the front to the back of my shirt, "we found them like this, the ones who brought you were said they used the cut out parts to make some bandages to at least stop the bleeding" explained the nurse, I looked towards Akeno, she looked at me back.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing" I found the whole thing strange now, there is something wrong here, the hole in my shirt is it was in my body should have been enough to kill me in seconds, yet I apparently lived through, and they told me it was only a stab wound from a knife.

After changing into some spare clothes courtesy of Yuuto-san, I left the hospital and went home, Akeno came with me, already telling her mother she is probably not coming home until next morning, during my walk back home from the hospital in the centre of the city, I pondered on last night, I could only remember the dream of the spear of light, I called it a dream and yet it felt so vivid, so real, as if it happened yesterday, then why can't I remember anything else? As if I truly blacked out from that point onwards, was it amnesia or something worse?

In any case, I went back home after a silent walk over to my house with Akeno right behind me, as I sat in the kitchen, she went right to making lunch for me.

"Aren't you supposed to be at home?" I asked her, she smiled.

"I told school I would take care of you since your parents are away" ah yes, my parents are "away", it's a topic I don't like talking about, I doubt even Akeno knows what happened to them, but that's for me to tell for another time. I raised my eyebrow at the answer.

"We literally started school yesterday, and they just let you skip school to take care of someone who is mostly okay by now?" I asked, she looked away, suddenly focussing a lot on the food being cooked, I understood what that meant.

"You didn't tell them I am fine now, did you?" I asked more firmly.

"I didn't know until I saw you, and it's not like you know how to cook, besides, what if it happens again? I must be here atleast until the end of the week" she replied, I sighed, she giggled "is me doing what I'm supposed to do really so horrible for you?"

"Only if it stunts your grades" her giggled turned into a laugh.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you're trying to get rid of me, did you forget that I'm the one who tutors you during exam season?" she replied, "come on, nothing is going to happen if I miss one day, let me do this for you, I know you want to anyways" I sighed once again.

"Alright, since you did technically come here with the school's permission" I replied as she set down a katsudon bowl.

"I remember you used to like it when you were young" replied my friend now doing her best impression of a housewife, what with the jersey and the apron. I blessed the food and started eating.

"So, are you just going to stay here until next morning? Even though you are going to see me again on Sunday after mass?"

"Hehe" she replied

"What do you mean "hehe"?

"Well, actually I'm not seeing you on Sunday, I have extra activities from the club starting from Saturday"

"Right, and it's going to last for the rest of the weekend"

"Not really, up until Sunday evening"

"So yes" Akeno nodded. I kept eating, and so we stayed in silence until the end of lunch, from then on, we stayed at home, catching up with work, playing some games, and when evening came, we decided to watch a movie. This would take me back, Akeno was always a very affectionate girl, ever since I met her, and I wasn't even too enthusiastic with her at first, her clinginess and acting like we were always together unnerved me at first, but my parents were good friends of her parents, so they dragged me with them, I don't think she noticed that I didn't like her at first, but slowly but surely her teasing, optimistic, upbeat and almost maternal personality won me over, she wormed her way into my heart and ended up being, next to my adopted parents, the closest person in my whole life, so much so that I didn't just want to be friends with her, but would she want to?

Suddenly someone knocks on our door, something that surprises me since we didn't call anyone, Akeno's face turned into a frown.

"I'll go, Subaru-kun, you stay here" but just as she was about to stand up the door was torn down, I looked behind me and I saw a two-meter man, wearing a fedora and a black suit, a malevolent smile was directed at me.

"Well, well, well, did I interrupt your little date? Worry not, you can continue it in death" as he said that he made some sort of lightning bolt and threw it at me, fully intent on impaling me, just then my whole life passed through my eyes, especially, what I thought was a dream, me being killed by that same spear, I was about to die by that same weapon.

But just then a barrier blocked the spear from going any further, the responsible for it was my best friend, her hands crackling with some unknown power, I could only watch in wide eyed amazement and paralyzing fear.

"Leave" she simply said, the "fallen" went on to look at her and snarled.

"You, what would master Azazel say about this? Do you even know this is our mission, recruit?" he blocked what looked to be a literal thunderbolt coming from Akeno.

"I don't care" and as she declared this she rushed to the man in the blink of an eye, lighting enveloping her right arm, the man got surprised and took a direct hit to the gut, completely taking away the air from his lungs, then she summoned the same lighting from earlier right from her hands and it struck the man as if he was struck by a storm, screaming in pain as electricity enough to overload a transformer flooded his body. This continued for five seconds before the man shot in desperation a spear of light at Akeno, forcing her to stop the attack to protect herself, giving the man time to counter attack, throwing spear after spear which Akeno dispelled or dodged, but this was all a distraction, because as the spears exploded upon contact slowly Akeno's vision was blocked by the smoke and dust he rushed towards me, panicking I dodged the first spears thrown to me, but the last one forced me to look away as I dodged to the side, allowing the man to rush towards me as he held me upwards by my neck, all of this taking a full ten seconds, fully intending to choke me, Akeno came out of the smoke cloud and looked at me being held by the neck by the strange man, distressed she was about to rush to me when the man snarled.

"Stop right there, if you don't want your precious boyfriend to die, you will stay where you are" Akeno gritted her teeth but didn't move, the man grinned.

"I guess it really is true and this boy doesn't know of the supernatural, well boy, your girlfriend has been keeping you a big secret now hasn't she?" she clearly did but that was not my main concern then, "allow me to enlighten you, your girlfriend is a fallen angel belonging to master Azazel's governorate in the Underworld, and you, my boy, have to die because you possess something that is very problematic for my race, so nothing personal but I must cut your life short here" as he declared this his grip on my neck and my vision started to become blurry. But just then a cry of pain came from the man, his legs buckled over a hit that had essentially shattered the shinbone in his right leg, the responsible for that was someone I would have never expected, a small white-haired girl had kicked him, the injury forced him to release me and drop to his knees. Akeno slowly walked towards the man with a frown of cold fury, the man ignored the pain and snarled at her, almost like a feral wolf trying to scare away a bear, "you will not get away with this, I have friends that will finish my job and execute you for treason" Akeno said nothing as she electrocuted the man to the point of not even ashes remaining, only a shadow of when he was down on the ground remained, his screams of pain filling the whole house, so much so that I was surprised nobody came to see what was happening.

After that I stood there paralysed again, my brain too occupied by what just happened to notice that some other people came inside my house, first Yuuto-san appeared again, then a boy with brown messy hair and then the same crimson-haired girl I saw yesterday, she bore a frown directed at the shadow imprinted on the floor.

"How could the fallen be so blatant as to just raid a human's house? Have they disregarded the ceasefire?" The girl then noticed me and widened her eyes.

"Oh my, I guess you were his target" she said, Akeno then approached me, concern written all over her face.

"Are you fine, Subaru-kun? Let me see your neck, he almost strangled you" she fussed as she tried to look at the marks on my neck.

"Calm down Akeno, he almost got killed" the woman looked at me, "you must be the friend Akeno talked about so much, I'm sorry, you were almost killed because of my laziness I never thought they would try to kill you this way, don't worry though your house will be back to normal in no time and I will make sure something like this never happens again" only then did I find the strength to respond.

"What just happened?" I replied slowly and surprised, Akeno kept her concerned expression.

"Subaru-kun, you might want to sit down" she took my hand and lead me to the kitchen, I sat down, and she sat on the chair opposite to me, the red-haired girl then approached Akeno.

"We will be fixing the house, after you finish breaking the news your job will be to guard him until I say so"

"But Rias-sama, what about tomorrow?"

"Protecting your friend right now is more important, he has something that apparently was enough for the fallen angels to target him, after we finish, we will leave" the girl then turned to me and made a small smile "in any other circumstance I would be thrilled to meet you, but since now is not the best time, could we meet maybe next week, maybe this monday?" she asked, perplexed by her nonchalant attitude I could only nod, "perfect, don't worry about paying me for the repairs of the house, it's on the house this time" she giggled at her own pun and left to do her thing, Akeno looked at me now, I returned her gaze, having recovered from my shock enough to now focus on her.

"Subaru-kun, I know that you are still in shock from, all of this" she gestured to the warzone that was now my living room and kitchen "but nothing that I say must leave the house, only mother and father should know, okay?" I nodded, then she started explaining to me everything she knew, of the supernatural world, the supernatural races and mythologies, and of the magic of this world.

"How do you figure into all of this Akeno" I asked the million-euro question, her mood suddenly became rather sad.

"Remember what I told you about the reincarnation system?" I nodded "good, then remember back when, that happened?" I know what she was talking about, we were almost nine years old when it happened

I ran with A-chan holding my hand, tears running from her eyes, I know those bad men were much stronger, but what about Miss Himejima? She looked scared, what would happen to her? I stopped running making A-chan stop running.

"Su-chan, what are you doing?"

"I can't run anymore A-chan, I can't run knowing Miss Himejima could, could" I started to cry, why am I crying? Men are not supposed to cry.

"Su-chan, no, please we must go on, we must run and wait for father" but I slipped past her grasp

"No, I will go back and save Miss Himejima, wait for me here" I said as I started to run back to the house.

"Su-chan no, please, don't leave!" she screamed, I hated it but Miss Himejima is A-chan's mommy, if she died A-chan would be even more sad than now. When I came inside the house I could hear the bad men on the kitchen, Miss Himejima looked tired and she had a broken knife on her hand, she threw it to the ground and slowly walked backwards to the wall, quickly I grabbed one of the knives on the ground and quickly got between Miss Himejima and the bad men, holding the knife, I was scared but I also didn't want Miss Himejima to die.

"Get away, get away, get near her and you will die" I screamed as hard and loud as I could

"Step away, child, that woman is impure" said one of the bad men.

"No, Miss Himejima is A-chan's mommy, if miss Himejima is dead A-chan will be sad"

One of the bad men suddenly swung his sword to me, it was so fast but I managed to stop it but the sword slowly came close to me, I looked towards Miss Himejima.

"Miss Himejima, run, run to the forest, A-chan is there" Miss Himejima then saw one of the men go towards her, I got scared and then Miss Himejima pointed her hand towards the bad man, fire came out from the hand and hit the man in a huge explosion that also hit the other bad man and me, my eyes started seeing black but I went to sleep with the thought that Miss Himejima was ok.

"Yeah, I remember, I woke up in the hospital, with Miss Shuri sitting next to me, you know what I asked her then?" I replied

"What?"

"Miss Himejima, was I a hero? Are the bad men gone?" I smiled lightly "she kissed my forehead and said "yes Su-chan, you're the best hero in all of Japan'" Akeno looked down and started sobbing.

"You were supposed to die that day" she replied almost quietly and with a small sob, once again I was shocked.

"What?" I asked completely taken by surprise.

"You were supposed to die, when you ran to save mother in any way you knew I followed you, and I saw my mother cradling your half burnt corpse, you were in a coma with third degree burns and your lungs were filling up with your own blood, the fire reached all the way down to your muscles and organs, mother knew you were going to die and wanted me to prepare a grave for you in our house, that's when Rias-sama showed up, in exchange for reincarnating me as her servant and queen, she would heal you and bring you back to life, back to me" she confessed.

"So all those times when you said you had club activity"

"I was working for Rias-sama" she replied for me before I could finish the sentence, I was about to die and she saved, words could not describe how I felt about that, she joined these "devils" to save me, she started to cry.

"I know you must be so angry with me, I know you think I did a terrible mistake, but Subaru-kun, I had to save you, I couldn't let you die, you were my only friend, the only person outside my family I truly loved, I couldn't let you die, if you died then I, I" I shushed her, I stayed silent for some seconds before standing up, I went to a counter which held my holy water, took of my golden crucifix and blessed it and myself with the holy water, the I went back Akeno.

"Hold this crucifix" I said, Akeno was surprised.

"Sumaru-kun, I"

"Hold this crucifix" I repeated more firmly, she hesitantly took the crucifix from my hand and closed her eyes, she opened them and looked surprised when her hand didn't start burning.

"What, how?" I smiled.

"It's just as I thought" I replied, "if you were possessed by anything remotely demonic the mere sight of the crucifix would repel you and the holy water would have the demon cry out in pain, but you, Akeno, you are no demon, demons are not kind to humans, they hate them, they hate all of humanity so much they want us to be damned with them, if you were a demon you would have tried to seduce me, you would have tried to make me stay away from Mass, you would have even made me choose between you and God without a care for what I thought" I walked towards her "but you didn't, in all the opportunities you had you didn't do any of those things, you respected my faith even when you were a pagan, you even wanted to go to Mass with me but your father warned you against it, so don't insult yourself by saying you are something you clearly aren't, you are no devil" Akeno looked at me, still sobbing "for me you are no fallen angel, no devil, no mix between the two, no nothing, you are what I always wanted you to be, my best friend, besides, you saved my life even if it meant literal slavery, how can I be angry at you?" I replied "maybe more than just your friend" I muttered. Akeno stood up suddenly and hugged me, sobbing what I imagined was from happiness.

"Thank you, for always being with to me, even now" she replied looking at me in the eyes with a smile more beautiful than any gem, those eyes that I now notice were more beautiful than anything in the world.

Just then the girl whose name I supposed was Rias came to us, smirking.

"Wow Akeno, I didn't know you would be so forward" she teased, she blushed for a moment but then smirked.

"Ara ara, and what if I was? Look at him? He might not have a rugged look or bulging muscles, but he is handsome and cute nonetheless, besides, you haven't seen him show how strong he really is" I blushed lightly as she said this with her left hand around my shoulders.

"Right, just don't tease him too much" she looked at me now "so, Subaru Kazuma, or do you prefer Kazuma Subaru? Anyways, Akeno is going to stay for the weekend, we can't have a repeat of today, don't worry about her parents, we will tell them"

"Okay" I simply replied

"Good, I'll see you in Monday, oh, and you're always welcome in the club, any friend of Akeno is a friend of mine" and with that she and the other people left, with that out of the way I now turned to Akeno.

"I'm going bed now, do you want me to set up the spare bed?" I asked her, she nodded.

After she went to the spare room I have in the house I did my nightly prayers and went to bed, and then I had the dream, I will never forget that dream, I was in a wasteland, the sky was dark red with what looked like smoke covering the sun, then a dragon, large enough to cover the whole world opened his mouth, ready to swallow the world, but then a bright white light disintegrated the dragon, blinding me until my whole vision was just a gentle white light.

I woke up at 7:30 am, but I noticed two different things which further added to the lists of surprises and mysteries this week, a black sword sat next to my bedside, it was black, about half my size, a vine of thorns chiselled upon it wrapped around the blade and ending on the end of the handle, and the handle itself had figured sculpted on them, upon closer inspection I gasped, the handle of the sword had the Passion sculpted upon its handle and the Final Day too and some sort of procession with angels alongside humans with a grotesque figure running from the procession, and the other change was that of some sort of golden, ornate little rectangular box with a glass pane on it, the pane showed a small piece of cloth, I looked at it and the sword for a while and wondered what this could mean.