A Game of Cat and Cat

by Zantetsuken Reverse

When supernatural crime strikes, as a wielder of magic powers, it's your responsibility to fight. If you're an endgame protagonist, a few criminals should be easy, right? Except your powers aren't exactly legal, and the cops are after you. And you're not the only endgame protagonist out there... A tale of cops, crooks, and everyone in between.

7. Chapter 7: Don't Drink and Dash

The OC Agents are all stock character parodies, so have fun trying to figure out what they parody. Here's a freebie: Agent Ninja is the one with a Dark Past that haunts her to this very day, and it manifests itself in bizarre ways. You still don't need to know who's who to enjoy the story; it's just a fun extra.

If you do want to know who's who, I changed Agent Violet to Agent Peony to avoid confusion with Phantom Thief Violet. It was supposed to be a generic flower name; how was I supposed to know it was taken? Agent Peony is also not related to the dream fairy from Fire Emblem Heroes. I am not changing it again, or else there'll be someone named Daisy in Grimoire of Souls or the Netflix series.

Also, for everyone late to the party: Agents Reaper, Dragon, and Lily are Eikichi 'Michelle' Mishina, Lisa 'Ginko' Silverman, and Jun Kurosu of Persona 2: Innocent Sin. I haven't forgotten about the rest of the cast, either. Except for the ones from Persona 1; I don't know them well enough.

At the end of Aria, after Soma and Julius's fight, Soma says that Julius was holding back. His specific words are: "The strength of a Belmont… No… the strength of a vampire hunter is greater than this." I've heard that this means that the average vampire hunter is even stronger than Soma or Julius, but I disagree. I think it just means that Soma acknowledges Julius's strength as a vampire hunter rather than a descendant of a clan; he sees Julius as his own person.

I had a dream where for some reason there was a Fire Emblem show or something, and Salem finally appeared. Except the only thing he did was poison a nosy journalist's meal. Guess he's frustrated about getting his poison privileges revoked.

Then I had another dream about a Megaten fan comic. The only thing I remember was that the Embryon were riding the subway, and Heat wasn't happy about it.

I'm watching the show The Good Place, and I think it has a lot of crossover potential with pretty much anything. Especially with dead Megaten characters.

In the hypothetical event where Soma has a Palace and the Phantom Thieves try to steal his heart, all of his souls will appear in his Palace, but won't appear as masked Shadows. Any of Soma's souls can tell him that the thieves are there, but he also can't kick them out because he thinks can't kick out his souls without Yoko's help.

Looking back, I should have given Captain Nobeard the nickname Billy the Kid (which makes it obvious who it is). He'd still talk like a pirate.

Even though Persona overshadowed vanilla Megaten as the cash cow, I'm not upset. Even if I didn't like Persona, its popularity means that the company won't run out of money to make Megaten games. There are a lot of franchises that won't see the light of day because the companies went out of business.

Who knows what secret:

The only people who know that Soma is Dracula are the Castlevania characters who know in canon. Kazuya knows that he is the reincarnation of some powerful wizard and thinks he only has the power to create fire, weapons, and curry.

The only person who know that Naoki is a demon is Aoi. The way I interpret the Freedom Ending, it's left ambiguous whether anyone except for Yuko, Lucifer, and the Demi-Fiend remembers the events of the game, so Hikawa, Hijiri, Isamu, and Chiaki may or may not know.

A lot of people know Aoi's real name. Some people know about her gang activities, including Yoko, the Agents, and of course, her gang. But only Naoki knows both.

Soma and Mina know that Kazuya is a demon summoner from another dimension. Technically, Aoi knows, but she doesn't know he's even there.

Neither Kazuya nor Aoi know that they're both in the same dimension and town.

Soma, Mina, Aoi, Aoi's gang, and Naoki know that Yoko and the Agents are in town, but not what they're doing there. Naoki, Aoi, and her gang think they're just generally cleaning up the city rather than looking for a specific target, while Soma and Mina know they're after something specific, but not that they're doing lots of other stuff. Kazuya only knows they exist.

Technically, lots of people know that Julius Belmont is in Haruhata, including Kazuya. But only Soma and Mina know who he is and why this is important.

The only person who knows the identity of the murderer is the accomplice.

The only person who knows that the murderer has an accomplice, and the identity of the accomplice, is the murderer.

Your Daily Public Service Announcement Against Underage Drinking

"Underage drinking laws are terrible and no one should follow them."

-Diary of Kazuya Kawamoto

The call was on such short notice that it couldn't have even been called notice. Agents Seal, Tiger, Ninja, Peony, and Wolf were all on patrol duty when Agent Fireball ordered them all to the site of the explosion that levelled half a dozen trees.

Agent Seal, who was used to this sort of thing from his training as a member of the Japanese equivalent of the US Navy SEALS, quickly took stock of the situation. The remains of a small campfire stood in a corner, embers glowing faintly. Besides the obvious line of destroyed trees, there were empty cartridges and bullets scattered around, also still hot. Here and there were puddles of blood and another strange, faintly glowing liquid (Agent Peony took samples of both). And if anyone could see past those, they might even notice the burn marks on almost every other tree, ones that looked like fire from miniature lightning strikes. And then there were the two sets of footprints.

All those could wait. For now, the line of broken trees was the biggest priority. After partitioning off the scene and taking pictures of everyone's footprints (so that they could tell theirs from the culprits'), Agent Seal sidled towards the tunnel of fallen trees—

"YOU'LL NEVER TAKE ME ALIVE, COPPER!"

X

Kazuya's behavior warrants some explanation. It would be accurate, but not sufficient, to say that he was acting this way because he was drunk. To fully encapsulate what was going on in Kazuya's head, it is important to know the following facts.

First, Kazuya was one of those people whose mistrust of authority ran deeper than mere hatred. This wasn't because of any sense of inferiority or jealousy; if he were crowned Supreme Overlord and Dictator of the World, he would still disbelieve political figures on principle and cross the street to avoid police officers while glaring suspiciously (although these were all perfectly reasonable things for anyone to do if the title of Supreme Overlord and Dictator of the World was ever implemented). Most encounters with the law were resolved either by bribery or murder. And since Kazuya had a tight budget, and had just dipped into his 'comfort demon' allowance twice in one day (without even getting food out of it), he was not in the mood to bribe anyone.

Second, Kazuya hated hiding. That is, he was fine with lying low so that passing demons wouldn't notice him; avoiding fights was just common sense. He was also fine with lying in wait for ambushes; dirty tactics saved his life an innumerable amount of times. And of course he was fine with concealing his belongings in case of theft. Hiding was cowering from enemies who knew you were there, but not where. Hiding was the hand over your mouth, the feverish prayer to whatever god out there that your heart wasn't beating as loudly as you thought it was, the silence when the person next to you is dragged into the street, the bitter tears when your allies are executed one by one as you do absolutely nothing to save them, and the blunt, dull pain of tomorrow, when you realize that you could have saved your friends if you had all just ambushed your enemies before you sacrificed all of your allies to feed the faint hope that you'd come out unscathed.

And third, and most importantly, Kazuya was a sixty-something year old man in the body of a late teenager. Specifically, an man who had spent an unhealthy number of years drinking heavily, and a teenager who had never drank more than a pint of liquor over the course of his entire life (although this was more out of convenience, laziness, and stinginess than any moral argument). As a result of this dissonance, the amount of alcohol he thought was enough to make him appear to be drunk was greater than the amount of alcohol that would actually get him drunk. Especially since he hadn't eaten anything since lunch.

X

The drunken teenager hurtled out of the bushes, catching Agent Seal completely by surprise. Before he could fully process that he had been attacked, he was already on the ground, knees and elbows locked and two cold fingers pressed against his jugular.

Luckily, Agent Seal was a former member of the Japanese equivalent of the US Navy SEALS, and knew a maneuver that could throw any would-be restrainer and turn the tables on them, regardless of size.

Unfortunately, a second (less) drunk teenager, yelling, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!" (in English) tried to yank the first teenager off. This teenager, while less drunk than the first one, did not seem to know how to break someone else's hold. Merely dogpiling the first teenager (and Agent Seal) was a perfectly reasonable technique, one that Agent Seal could easily escape. However, for some reason, this second teenager's idea of breaking a submission hold was to grab both people, lift them above his head, and shake them until he let go.

X

Soma's behavior warrants some explanation.

First, Soma was strong. That is to say, in terms of raw physical prowess, on a scale between 'look at how many pull-ups I can do!,' and 'I did the math, and without physics getting in the way, you can punch a kilogram of ice to the temperature of the sun's surface' (a region reserved for individuals such as the Demi-Fiend), Soma scored somewhere between 'unexpectedly strong for someone of his build, but he could be ripped underneath that shirt' and 'I am almost willing to accept that vampires are real if it can explain this'.

Second, while Soma had a handful of abilities that could restrain Kazuya without hurting him (usually by asking Arachne to make webs that weren't poisonous), none of them fit the 'fire and metal' theme, and he wasn't yet desperate enough to show off his extra abilities in front of Kazuya.

Third, Soma was Spanish-Japanese American, and due to some very determined parents, was also trilingual. His father wanted Spanish to be his first language, his mother Japanese, and they compromised on English. As a result, when surprised and tipsy, he defaulted to English.

X

Neither Agent Seal nor the first drunken teenager had expected being shaken apart, and since the first drunken teenager kept him restrained by pushing his joints against the ground rather than tangling their limbs together, it wasn't long before his grip broke. Agent Seal was unceremoniously thrown to the ground, more startled than in pain.

Now, the situation could have still been salvaged, had it not been for the drunken foreigner and his bottles.

X

Julius's behavior warrants some explanation.

Julius had spent most of his life as a homeless drifter, and homeless drifters are not exactly known for their material possessions, nor for their friendly relationship with the law. As a form of petty revenge, he stole from every police officer he could (except for the ones who looked as poor as he did). He did not usually need what he stole, and the fences did not always appreciate the random junk he gave them, but it made him feel better. As Julius Belmont, head of the Belmont clan and bearer of a debit card (but not a credit card; 36 years of being off the grid wrought havoc on his credit score), he could no longer act on the urge to rob police officers. Unless, of course, he was drunk.

Julius was also slightly infamous among the Belmont clan for being surprisingly bad at whip techniques, at least for a wielder of the Vampire Killer. This was like coming in last place in an Olympic 200-meter Butterfly Semifinal race; Julius had his doubts about winning against most of the elders and professional hunters of the clan, and he would be the first to admit that he'd lose in a straight fight with his esteemed predecessors, but being able to fight effectively with a whip at all required years of training (unless you were a Persona user, someone who used whips regularly for non-combat purposes, or Leon Belmont), and it was hard to laugh at his record after seeing how many Belmont cousins he defeated in duels.

Still, since he had spent most of his life using every weapon in the Belmont arsenal except for whips, Julius's first instinct was to fight with either martial arts or subweapons. While some could beat him in single contests of throwing axes, crosses, or bottles of holy water, none of them could beat him in all three.

X

The drunken foreigner's boot caught Agent Seal in the solar plexus, leaving him choking and sprawled all over the ground. While he was down, the drunk rummaged through his pockets, nabbing his knives, gun, candy, tissues, napkins, compass, flashlight, matches, and money (but was nice enough to leave the wallet), before tying him up.

From the edge of his vision, his comrades began to realize what was happening. Agent Tiger began to charge. Agent Wolf started chanting a spell. Agent Peony was looking around in panic, all three guns still in their holsters. He couldn't see what Agent Ninja was doing, but that was probably fine.

"SHADOW NINJA STRI—"

Without even looking, the drunken foreigner hurled two glass jars behind him, hitting both Agent Tiger and a bush that turned out to be hiding Agent Ninja. The jars bounced off of the Agents, but shattered when they hit the ground, spilling their contents everywhere. [1] The glass vanished, but whatever was in the jar turned the dirt to mud.

Agent Peony did nothing, as usual, but Agent Wolf had the perfect shot for a spell—

And would have taken down everyone in the area, if it wasn't for that third meddling teenager (who was also, it should go without saying, drunk).

X

Mina's behavior warrants some explanation.

Mina, as the audience may have surmised, suffered from feelings of inadequacy, and inadequacy often leads to stupid impulses to overcompensate. While common sense usually holds such impulses back, drinking is not exactly conducive to common sense.

As a miko, spellcaster, and player of video games, Mina also knew that the highest priority targets should be medics (unless restricted by the Geneva Convention), and the second highest were glass cannon wizards.

And lastly, to protect her precious bow and arrows from the elements, Mina kept them wrapped in oiled cloth and slotted into a sturdy case, which was as long and solid as a quarterstaff.

X

With a mighty whack, Agent Wolf was knocked to the ground, spell broken. Agent Seal couldn't tell who was more surprised (and not just because it was dark and the drunken foreigner stole his flashlight).

"What now?!" the third drunken teenager yelped, still holding the quarterstaff like a bat.

"Run!" shouted the second drunken teenager (or was it the first drunken teenager?).

"Kill!" screeched the first drunken teenager (never mind, that was definitely the second drunken teenager).

"Furați totul!" bellowed the drunken foreigner, throwing more of those bottles at anyone who tried to get up. [A/N 'Steal everything' in Romanian].

"Into the power plant!" shouted Agent Peony. In a different voice still recognizable as hers, she added, "Yes, into the power plant! We can shake them off there!"

"I DON'T TAKE ORDERS FROM YOU!" roared the first drunken teenager, dodging Agent Tiger's flying kick despite being dragged back by the second drunken teenager.

"If you don't pipe down and stop squirming this instant, I swear to God I'll shove a spear so far up your ass it'll come out of your goddamn mouth," growled the second drunken teenager.

The drunken foreigner was busy tying up Agent Wolf while fending off Agent Ninja and stealing Agent Wolf's canteen. The third drunken teenager seemed to realize that her friends weren't paying attention to her, and dashed down the mountain path alone.

That's when Agent Peony finally called for backup.

X

"The world ended last year."

To this dramatic proclamation, Aoi just nodded and said, "Go on."

"…Your lack of reaction is a little worrying," said Naoki.

Aoi crossed her arms. "Unless I missed something, the world is still here, so you've clearly done something about it. Please stop being unnecessarily dramatic."

Naoki shrugged. "It all started… well, it goes deeper than what I ever saw, but I got involved in April, in my last year of high school. The CEO (or some important position) of Cybers Corporation, Hikawa, thought that the world was broken and needed to be remade, so he found this ritual that let him. He was a member of this cult called… um…"

In one universe, the Demi-Fiend had never entered the Labyrinth of Amala, and never spoke with the Old Man in the Wheelchair. In that universe, the Demi-Fiend only heard the name of the cult once, in a magazine.

Not in this universe. In this universe, he spoke with several former cult members, learned where Hikawa learned how to summon demons, and why he was kicked out of the cult. "Gaia," he said.

This got a reaction out of her. "The Cult of Gaia tried to destroy the world?" Aoi asked incredulously.

Naoki blinked. "How did you know their full name was the Cult of Gaia?"

"I knew them in the future," said Aoi. "They were…" Aoi's expression was comparable to a free speech activist trying very hard not to ruin their message while standing next to a fascist on a pulpit. "They were half 'harmony with the ancient gods wrongly slandered as demons' and half 'anyone who tries to control us is evil'. The least I can say about them is that they wouldn't destroy the world."

Sounds like Isamu would fit right in.

Naoki nodded. "Actually, even the cult hated Hikawa, but he killed them before they could stop him. I don't know much about them."

Aoi gave him a hard look. "You said that you became a demon after getting on a cult's bad side."

Naoki shook his head. "The distinction between 'cult', 'one cultist', and 'one rebel cultist' didn't seem important. That's not a lie; it's a simplification."

This seemed to satisfy Aoi, so Naoki continued. "Somehow, Hikawa conned my teacher into helping him, but my teacher wanted me to live, so she brought me and… she brought me to the place where they were holding the ritual, which was the only place guaranteed not to be destroyed."

Isamu and Chiaki are personal. She doesn't need to know about them.

What about Hijiri?

Eh, if he comes up.

"How did Hikawa destroy the world?"

Naoki shrugged. "I don't know how he did it. He fulfilled a prophecy?"

"No, what was the vehicle of destruction? My world was destroyed by nuclear war."

Naoki blinked. "Hold on, when you say 'destroyed', do you mean a terrible cataclysm, or the literal end of days?"

"Cataclysm," admitted Aoi.

"My world literally ended," said Naoki. "I woke up in a place called the Vortex World. Vortex Worlds are… they're like little mini dimensions that form after a world ends, and whatever happens there decides how the next world is born. If a surviving human finds a… fulfils a bunch of conditions, they can shape the new world. Long story short, despite having the body of a demon, I'm human enough to count, so I fulfilled those conditions and created a new world exactly the same as the old one, so nobody noticed." Naoki hadn't realized how stiff his shoulders were. "And that's how the world ended."

Aoi nodded. "You restored the world?"

"Of course I did," said Naoki. "Every other option was terrible. Did you think I'd leave it behind?"

Aoi gave him a strange look. "No. I was just jealous. I left my world behind in pieces."

"Literal pieces?"

Aoi shook her head. "At the time of my death, we no longer had to live in a wasteland, but Tokyo was still not a pleasant place to live."

Aoi took in a deep breath. "As I've already told you, I'm from a completely different timeline. I was born in alternate year 2025, but that isn't where my story begins. Do you believe in reincarnation?"

"Yes."

Aoi blinked. "You seem certain. Do you know someone who reincarnated?"

"Jyoji Hijiri," said Naoki. "I'm not telling you anything else; it's not my place to tell you his secrets."

What else is there to tell? I don't even know who he was.

Yeah, but I know about that curse of his.

"I'm my own aunt and niece," said Aoi, crossing her arms. "Complicated is meeting your father as your cousin whom you must treat as your younger brother. But I'm getting ahead of myself. I only remember some of my past life, but I do know that in 1999, a scientist accidentally opened a portal to the world of demons, and demons invaded the world."

Naoki gulped as his stomach lining turned to lead.

"Naturally, there was mass panic. I don't know about the rest of the world, but in Tokyo, a Japanese general named Gotou attempted a coup and declared marshal law to fight the demons. He was a member of the Cult of Gaia. The American ambassador Thorman (who was Thor in disguise) also tried to restore order and brought in American troops from a nearby base, but his solution was to destroy Tokyo to stem the source of the demon outbreak. Naturally, both sides fought each other to the death."

"I had some bad experiences with Thor," grumbled Naoki.

"Did he nuke your country and kill your past life?" asked Aoi icily.

Naoki froze. "He nuked you? With his troops still in the city?"

Aoi sighed. "In his mind, they'd go straight to Valhalla for their sacrifices, I'm sure. I don't think any of them knew their commander was going to kill them; I remember this one soldier right bef—"

Aoi stopped. "Regardless, I wasn't happy with the way they were handling things, so I gathered a group of like-minded fighters and led a Resistance movement."

"Even though they were keeping you safe from demons?" said Naoki.

Aoi scowled. "All the safety in the world doesn't matter if we're living in fear. And who were they to decide that we had to die for them? They were worse than the demons."

Holy cow, this is some déjà vu.

"And then he nuked you."

"And then he nuked us, yes," sighed Aoi. "Twenty years after doomsday, I was born to the cousin of my past life. By then, the Cult of Gaia had grown into a powerful sect, but they were opposed by the Order of Messiah, which—don't tell me you heard of them, too."

"I know they exist and they hate the Gaiains, and that's it," said Naoki.

"The Gaians and Messians are bitter enemies," said Aoi. "I was born into the Order. And before you ask, no, I don't follow their teachings, and no, I don't hate the Gaians. I left when I met one of my companions from before—he was transported to the future by my past life—and together we fought both the Messians and Gaians until we could settle a peace treaty and rebuild society." She scowled. "A mere ten years later, the Messians manipulated the upper echelons so that only their supporters remained in power, and made the Gaian religion illegal. They couldn't kill or exile me, so they shoved me into a slum post until I was too influential, and then decided I was less dangerous dead."

Naoki blinked. "And then reincarnated again?"

Aoi shrugged. "I can't tell if it's reincarnation or memory manipulation, but three years ago, I woke up in the body of another Aoi Miyama. Ever since, I've been living her life." She sighed. "I hope she's all right."

"That's all you can do," said Naoki in a conciliatory voice.

Aoi stretched. "I have one last question. How did Lucifer turn you into a demon?"

Bug in my eye, bug in my eye, bug in my eye, bu—

Lust for power, murder of innocents, muddy—

"Worry not, I have no intention of attempting it on anyone, myself included," Aoi said, raising both her palms. "I have borne witness to countless tragedies after similar transformations. I just want to check something."

Is my poker face really that bad?

Yes. Yes it is.

"What do you want to check?" asked Naoki.

Aoi took out a piece of paper. "I want to see how you'd be classified. People who are both demon and human aren't uncommon in my world, so forgive me for curiosity."

"Both demon and human?" repeated Naoki.

That's a little wordy.

"It's wordy, but it's the most neutral term the committee came up with," said Aoi. "Hybrid sounds like something you'd call a plant or a vehicle, half-human or half-demon favors one side, and sub-human was just wrong."

"Sub-human?" repeated Naoki.

"Exactly," said Aoi.

Am I the only person who was given the Magatama?

If there were a lot of demons where she was from, then they must have caught one at some point.

It's still not that intuitive, letting it eat your eye.

No, I don't think every demon has a Magatama, or I'd be up to my neck in them. Besides, Jack Frost didn't recognize them when he sold them to me.

Still can't tell if I'm the only one out there.

When Naoki paused for a little too long, Aoi shrugged. "If you still don't want to tell me how, you don't have to. I can just ask the other questions."

"Oh, um… fire away."

Why didn't she just tell me the categories?

Too many, I suppose.

Or result bias.

"Question one," said Aoi. "Did you use the Cathedral of Shadows to fuse with a demon?"

"You can do that?" Naoki said without thinking.

Didn't I just say that I wasn't going to tell her how?

Yeah, but it doesn't count if she already knows that way.

Aoi nodded. "I've seen it done, and it rarely ends well. Question two: were the other Fiends former humans like you?"

Naoki shook his head. "I don't know. The question never came up." [2]

Aoi nodded again. "Question three: can you transform other humans into demons?"

Naoki's throat clenched. "I don't know. I've never tried."

I mean, it's not really a lie if I didn't do it? Chiaki was the one who tried shoving Marogareh down her eye socket.

Would it have worked if I helped?

Come to think of it, why didn't Hijiri ask me? It's not like he knew about the whole 'only humans can have a Reason' thing.

Or that he's cursed.

Would it have worked on Manikins?

No. I would never do such a thing.

Of course not. But wondering never harmed anyone.

"Last question," said Aoi. "Do you know anyone else who was turned into a demon the same way as you?"

"Not as far as I know," said Naoki.

Aoi nodded. "Thank you."

"That's it?" asked Naoki.

"There are only three categories, and I know you're not a Nephilim," said Aoi.

"What do fallen angel children have to do with anything?"

Aoi shook her head. "It's just a word for people born part demon and part human. The other two categories are Demonoids, which are humans who fused with demons in the Cathedral, and Vectors, humans who were transformed by another demon, like vampires or zombies."

"What about ones who are basically dead people?" asked Naoki.

"The last time I checked, people were still arguing over that," said Aoi. "We generally consider ghosts to still be human, but there was an argument to make them Vectors, since you can come back as a ghost if a ghost kills you."

"No, like real people who died and got shrines," said Naoki.

Aoi shrugged. "It depends on why they were deified. If they were originally ancestral spirits, they're human ghosts until they're honored out of tradition instead of love and ascribed supernatural powers when prayed to, at which point they undergo apotheosis. If they were worshiped upon death like the Roman emperors, they're deities the moment they die. If they were enshrined and honored out of fear of what they could do in the afterlife like the scholar god Tenjin, they're deities the moment they're honored. I don't know about living deities like the Egyptian pharaohs or… I can't remember which country or countries still do that, but I've never encountered one and so I don't know where they fall." Aoi shrugged. "I suppose the Messians failed to consider this category, because there is supposed to only be One True God. Perhaps they would consider them to be unquiet ghosts, saints, or charlatans with supernatural powers should they still live. But I suppose you're right, gods are as human as sentient Vectors, and there should be a fourth category."

She really does love the sound of her own voice.

Hey, she told me in one conversation more than what Ms. Takao told me the entire time we were in the Vortex World.

Aoi looked at the clock. "It's getting late. I need to go back to the doctor tonight, so you can have one more question." She wrote down her contact information.

"Oh, right," said Naoki. "I was wondering about that."

"My number?"

"No, why do you need the doctor if you already know healing magic?"

Aoi sighed. "Have you ever played a video game where healing magic is readily available, and yet someone will inexplicably die of their wounds for the plot?"

"Final Fantasy V had a good explanation," said Naoki.

"I haven't played that one, but you get the idea," said Aoi. "The point is, they're not entirely wrong. Are you familiar with the Dia line? Media, Diarama?"

"Yes," said Naoki.

"Dia heals you with what you already have," said Aoi. "It's easy, fast, and doesn't cost a lot of magic. The more advanced healing spells work by regenerating body parts, accelerating the natural healing process, or even turning back time. They're better than Dia, since they can return lost blood or replace failed organs, but they take years of dedicated study. Medics who learn them are generally too valuable to send on the front lines; fighters stick with Dia."

"Why—?"

"Don't I learn those spells?" said Aoi. "I never had the time. I was either surviving or holding down a job."

Naoki nodded. "I get it. But if you already have your rib, why can't you reattach it?"

Aoi turned the rib over in her hands. "Right now, this rib technically isn't part of my body. I could put it back, but I don't want to get the wound infected."

"You could dip it in alcohol," suggested Naoki.

"And I could drink the rest of the bottle to numb the pain as I cut open my own chest and jab a rib inside," said Aoi in an aggressively level voice. "Even the best doctors would rather enlist a complete amateur than operate on themselves. I'd either almost pass out from the pain, or I'd be too high to keep my hands straight."

Naoki shuddered. "…I won't keep you, then. Good night."

Aoi picked up her bag. "Good night."

X

That one turned on a radio transmitter, said Mothman.

Wait, if you can hear radio, how are you not deaf?

Really? Is that really what you should be focusing on right now?

Soma, who only took a few sips of liquor, quickly realized that Mina had the right idea.

"You can't kill every cop in town, K—iriyama!" Soma yelled, substituting the name at the last second. "We need to run!"

"We can't run!" Kazuya yelled back, a voice of fury laced with… desperation?

…Was Kazuya scared?

Then it clicked. Soma had seen—no, Dracula had seen it hundreds of times before. The most dangerous opponents were the ones who were cornered, the ones who had nothing left to lose. There was that old adage about a cornered rat, warnings about chasing rattlesnakes, and a proverb about a Chinese general who destroyed his own cooking pots and boats to force his men to fight.

Time to mend those pots.

"I know spells for night vision and speed," said Soma soothingly. "If you just calm down, we can get away."

Kazuya, however, was still as jumpy as a squirrel on cocaine. "They know our faces, they'll—"

Julius cracked his whip, and all eyes were on him. "Never kill police," he said in a low voice. "I don't care how much you think they deserve it, they won't rest until their comrade is avenged. Who do you think they'll care more about, some drunk teenagers or a cop killer?"

"Um…" said… Violet? Rose? Rhododendron? Peony, the one who had just stood there when her comrades fought. "We… well, you see, n—not to be rude or anything, but we're just checking out those trees. So, um… we don't care if you've been drinking and camping. We won't take you in if you surrender… I mean, if it's fine with you."

"Even though we beat up your comrades?" Soma asked warily.

Peony nodded vigorously. "We don't need to fight! We just need you to tell us what you saw, and then you can leave! Our backup is really strong, and you don't want to fight them!"

That sounded good.

"All right, then," said Soma testily.

The agent called… Walrus? Dolphin? Porpoise? Seal stood up. "All we need is a statement, and you're free to go. What are your names?"

Don't do it, warned Killer Clown.

Why not?

How are you going to explain how you got up there in the first place? Killer Clown pointed out. She thinks you've been camping, but there's no tent. If you were hiking, why are you hiking at night?

He's drunk. It's a universal excuse, said a Ghost Dancer

No, it's not, said a Zombie Soldier. One, he barely had any. Two, even if they believed you were drunk enough to climb a mountain at ten at night, you're too clean. A drunk would have tripped and gotten dirty. Three, I forget three, but four, if you're interrogated separately, the story's bound to crack.

Crap, you're right, said Soma. Peeping Eye, get ready.

Aye-aye, captain!

Soma squeezed his eyes shut, switched the souls, and opened them. Using the Peeping Eye for was like taking off a pair of half-melted prescription sunglasses that belonged to an old, cat-loving grandmother. While there was a sensory overload problem, it was also great for night vision, even if random details kept on screaming for attention, like how one of the Agents was wearing a hilarious shirt, or how the ghost of his best friend was staring at him, or how the vines on that tree was poisono—

He blinked. A blonde, pale knight was observing the battlefield, muttering inaudibly with his hand on his chin. When their eyes met, the knight gave him a look of surprise, pointed at him, and said something that Soma couldn't hear. When Soma pointed at his ears and shook his head, the knight shook his head, shrugged, and then pointed at Julius, then down a path.

Soma had no idea what this meant, but he could always come back later.

Does anyone know who that is?

There was a discussion.

We think it is best for all of us if you hear it from him, not us, said Alura Une gently.

He means you no harm, added White Dragon.

Don't stop for him! We need to get out of here! Waiter Skeleton screamed.

"Are you all right, buddy?" asked Agent Seal. "You look—aaah!"

With one fluid motion, Soma swept Kazuya off his feet and into his arms, bridal style, and sprinted down an animal trail in the direction the ghost pointed.

"What the hell, S—what the hell are you doing?!"

"The drunk hiking excuse falls apart after any serious questioning," said Soma, activating the Black Panther Soul, which allowed him to run faster. "It's better that our names stay off the records. Besides, it's not like they got a good look at our faces in the dark."

"What about—"

"My friend can take care of himself," said Soma. "Remember how I said there was one person I couldn't keep up with? That was him."

This seemed to appease Kazuya. For what seemed like hours, there was nothing but the rush of wind, the smell of greenery, the taste of wet fog—

And then the ground turned to liquid.

X

With a second cast of Traport, Aoi popped into the waiting room. It looked almost exactly the same as it was an hour ago, except Agent Dragon was now reading a nature photography magazine and Mr. Adams was reading manga.

"Good evening, Mr. Adams," she said in English.

"Good evening, Madam Pain," he said back in Japanese. "Doctor five minutes before finish Cowboy."

"Horrorshow," said Aoi, and she plopped herself onto a folding chair and picked a magazine at random. It turned out to be an Ayakashi Monthly, the magazine with a reporter who apparently looked a lot like Aoi. She began to read. Most of it was rubbish with a handful of pearls of wisdom, not unusual in a field with no fact checking capabilities. It was full of articles like DIY Exorcisms, 5 signs that your neighbor is possessed by a cat, The difference between Episcopalian and Pentecostal exorcisms, The one-headed Cerberus, the—

That last one piqued Aoi's interest.

Cerberus was a three-headed dog that guarded the Greek Underworld. Everyone knew that. Everyone except for Aoi. To her, Cerberus was a one-headed white-blue lion-dog with a snake for a tail, who loved belly rubs and was named Pascal. She'd been on the receiving end of too many condescending lectures on Greek mythology from people who couldn't tell the Cocytus from the Styx.

According to the article, Cerberus could have any number of heads, and was sometimes a raven demon… Nebiros? The necromancer?

And the writer's name was Jyoji Hijiri. Interesting.

A tiny bell on a string rang in the operating room, signaling the end of an operation. The doctor wheeled Agent Cowboy into the waiting room in a swivel chair. "Done. Do doctor magic now," said the doctor in halting Japanese.

This was the cue for Agent Dragon to cast her strange brand of healing magic on Agent Cowboy. His leg healed completely, but he did not respond.

"He's still in shock," said the doctor in English. "Be careful with him; I think he's still in the cleric cooldown."

"Be careful," said Mr. Adams. "He will not work. He has… cleric cooldown."

"I can speak for myself, thank you very much," grumbled Agent Cowboy. "I'm in shock, and I have Rapid-Regen Syndrome. I'll be fine, but I can't put any weight on my left leg right now."

This was one of the many complications of healing magic, also called the Dia Bends. If the body recovered too quickly from a severe injury with magic, it did not immediately acknowledge that there was no longer any need to repair the body. It was rarely life-threatening, but it could put someone not used to healing magic out of commission for a while.

"We can take him from here," said Agent Lily. "All we—"

Vmmmm! Vmmm!

"Go go Phoenix Rangers!"

"Baby we were born to ruunn…!"

A swell of music timed with rhythmic gunshots.

"Wo ai ni, ni ai wo, wo men shi ge kuai le jia…"

Five phones rang in unison.

"Huh," said Agent Lily, checking a text. "Looks like the others need backup."

"Finally!" said Agent Dragon, standing up. "Cowboy, you stay here."

Agent Cowboy gave a melodramatic, offended gasp, and said in a sarcastic tone, "No, don't leave me, I can still fight." He turned to Mr. Adams and said in English, "I'm going to call a cab. Could you please help me get into it?"

"How are you going to get out?" said Mr. Adams.

"Worry not, there will be people to help me when I get there."

"So you're good?" said Agent Reaper. When Agent Cowboy nodded, he and the other Agents left.

The doctor eyed Aoi. "What is it this time, Madam?"

"I healed myself without my rib," said Aoi, holding it out.

The doctor sighed. "Only you, Madam. Only you."

The doors burst open, and three women and one man burst into the room, carrying a second man. "Mr. Ochre was shot!"

The doctor stood up and examined the body. "Yes, he was definitely shot, all right. He looks saveable. Hey, Adams, could you give me a hand with this one? It's… ooh, hollow point bullet, someone's going to jail tonight."

Aoi sighed. This was going to be a long night.

X

"Why did you just stand there?!" shouted Agent Tiger as Agent Wolf checked her for broken bones. "They were right there—two of them weren't even moving!"

"B—because…" Agent Peony said, shrinking. "I just couldn't shoot them!"

Agent Ninja sighed. "In our line of work, it's kill or be killed. Why can't you comprehend something as sim—"

"Agent Peony is right," said Agent Seal suddenly. "I mean, even though they attacked us, they weren't carrying any weapons."

"Ahem," said Agent Wolf.

"Nothing with a blade, and nothing even close to a firearm," said Agent Seal. "They weren't malicious, they weren't supernatural, they were just a bunch of drunk kids in the wrong place at the wrong time. That's not worth shooting anyone over. Besides, our star team is in pursuit."

There was another long pause as they tried to forget how easily the drunken foreigner had evaded their grasp. All four of them—minus Peony—had struck at once, from all directions, but he simply jumped, dipped, and tripped his way to freedom, bounding into the wilderness like they were as insubstantial as mist.

"What made you think they'd surrender, anyways?" Agent Ninja grumbled at Peony.

Agent Peony turned red. "I… I just thought everything could be resolved without violence… You know how much I hate violence."

Agent Tiger gestured at her injured arm, the bump on Agent Ninja's head, the scrapes on Agent Seal's face, and Agent Wolf's shattered glasses.

"I'm sorry I'm so useless…"

"Come on, guys!" said Agent Seal, clapping. "Don't sweat the past. We can still check out the crime scene!"

That cheered up the rest of the squad. While none of them enjoyed detective work, it meant they were Getting Stuff Done instead of moping around. After a while, they concluded from the footsteps that there were two people (or multiple people with the same two kinds of shoe, which was deemed unlikely but still possible), at least one of whom used lightning or fire magic (judging by the scorch marks on the other trees), and one of whom made that hole. Careful counting of the bullets and cartridges had shown that all the bullets had hit something in the clearing, but bounced off.

"So we've got a bulletproof person—or something that can fly or float," concluded Agent Peony. "Maybe they made up and flew away?"

"That's ridiculous," said Agent Tiger.

"Actually, that makes sense," said Agent Seal. "There aren't any tracks leading away from this spot, so after getting blood spilled everywhere, and—"

Agent Tiger cursed and stood up. "We did get blood samples, right?!"

The ground was practically mud at this point. What blood hadn't sunk into the ground had been rolled into someone's clothing (and still rendered useless by a thick layer of mud), or diluted with whatever that foreigner had in those jars.

"I—I…"

"What?!" snapped Agent Tiger.

"I already took them…" Agent Peony said in a small voice, holding up a few small vials.

X

Mina burst into the 24-hour doughnut shop, panting. "One chocolate doughnut with Bavarian cream filling and bacon on top, please," she said.

"Coming right up."

Mina dug change out of her bag, hands shaking. Of course there would be Agents; she already knew they were in town.

Her hands went to her phone, but she stopped in the middle of unlocking it. If they were holed up in the darkness somewhere, a call would give away their position instantly. The thought made her stomach turn with worry, but she would have to wait until tomorrow.

She sighed. It's not like I can do anything about it—

No. That kind of thinking leads to damselhood. Let's think positive.

Don't worry about what I can't control. Worry about what I can. The others can take care of themselves. Just focus on keeping yourself alive.

"Your doughnut."

"Thank you." Mina took two bites before she realized that she couldn't taste a thing, wrapped it in napkins, and put it in her purse. She was tired and wanted a hot bath and a soft bed, but she couldn't afford to make a mistake.

Think. How has the stupid party member messed up the chase?

Led the chasers right where the others were hiding. In my case, right where I live.

So go somewhere with a lot of people, preferably away from campus. If I can't lose them in the crowd—

Then they're probably using some esoteric magic trick that I won't be able to figure out from here. Don't worry about it, just find a busy spot.

What kind of a place is busy this late at night?

If I'm being followed, wouldn't it be simpler to just mug me for my ID? They are the magic police, after all.

If it's that simple, there's probably no elaborate ruse to allow me to show them where I live. Still would be safest to lose them at the nearest busy spot…

"Excuse me, but are there any bars open this late?" Mina asked the cashier.

The cashier gave her a Look, but pointed down the street. "Try the Inebriated Walrus, it's two blocks down, then take a left, down five blocks, and to your right."

Mina thanked him, and left.

Walking home alone at night with no superpowers is not a pleasant experience, but knowing there was someone after you just made it worse. The usual advice of keeping to places with lots of people her age didn't help in an empty part of town. Well lit streets were supposed to be safer, but she'd be spotted a mile off by anyone looking for her, so she ducked into as many alleyways as possible, scrambling as silently as she could through cardboard boxes and dumpst—

"Umph!"

Her leg caught something soft. What she thought was a bag of trash was a person, curled on their side.

"I'm so sorr—"

"It's all right," said the girl. "Spare some change, Mis—?"

Urgent footsteps rang from the street.

"Hide me!" Mina hissed, and the girl gestured towards a large, convenient cardboard box.

It shouldn't have worked, but Mina didn't have a choice. She crawled under it.

And then the girl sat on the box. She wasn't heavy, but Mina almost choked in surprise.

"Excuse me, but have you seen someone run past here?"

Mina stifled a choke. Yoko?

"Maybe I did," said the girl. "It'll cost you… say, 2,000 yen?"

There was a quiet rubbing noise accompanied by jingles, and then the girl said, "She went right down this way. What did she do, ro—?"

"Thank you," said Yoko, except the sound moved from in front of Mina to over her, and then to behind her, so it sounded like, "Thank yooouu." A series of metallic thuds and rustling garbage bags behind her signaled that Yoko was parkour-ing past her.

"Coast's clear," the girl whispered, easing off of the box. She was slight, wearing a middle school sailor uniform that was a size or two too big. "Sorry about crushing you, but you can never be too safe."

Mina breathed. "I can't thank you enough," she said, opening her purse—

"Don't worry about it; you've had a bad enough day already, being chased and all," said the girl, handing her back the case with her hama-yumi. "Besides, I already got money. Wouldn't say no if you have any candy in there, though."

"Er…" Mina reached into her bag for the doughnut, but stopped when she realized it was rude to offer half-eaten food.

"It's all right if you've taken a bite," said the girl, as if reading her mind. "It's better than the dumpster."

Mina gave her the doughnut. "Do you like chocolate?" said Mina, pressing a handful of cheap assorted chocolate into the girl's bony hands.

The girl's face lit up. "Thanks! You're one of those college girls, aren't you?"

Mina opened her mouth, but realized it might not be safe to say.

"Don't have to say nothing if you don't want to, but if you were one, there's a bus stop with a map right that way," said the girl. "Takes you to the center of the city. You can shake them off in one of those clubs or somewhere with a lot of college kids." She stood up. "Come on, I'll take you."

The girl took Mina by the hand, and together they traversed the winding streets and alleyways, before stopping in front of another alleyway mouth. Mina tried to join the other people waiting at the bus stop, but the girl dragged her back.

"Go when the bus stops, or else they'll see you faster, if they're still out there," the girl hissed.

The bus took an agonizingly long time to arrive. Under normal circumstances, the cold January air and the stench of damp garbage would have been the most of her worries, but it was eclipsed by fear.

Yoko was a professional mercenary. Mina hadn't even taken down a single monster with her bow. Yoko fought and investigated for a living. Mina only trained in her free time. Yoko had braved Castlevania. Mina cowered in the entrance.

If anything hurt more than fear, it was shame. By running, Mina was betraying her trust. Yoko had risked her job, and her client's trust, to tell her that she was in the area, precisely so that they wouldn't panic and do anything stupid. And what had they done? They'd attacked the Agency and ran, and hid from the one person who tried to help them.

The bus arrived. Mina stood up, but the girl stayed behind.

"Aren't you coming?"

The girl shook her head. "Nah. The boss'll kill me I ran. Besides, you're the one in hot water as is. Now go!"

Mina boarded the bus, but not before giving a passing glance at the homeless girl. The girl flashed her a grin was she waved goodbye.

X

Naoki was alone when he arrived at the dorm. This was good for him, because he could change Magatama without anyone noticing.

Let's see… other than Masakados, there's nothing good against both ice and electricity…

How about I change to Misama? It's not like I have to be immune to electricity, I just can't be weak to it.

Yeah, but then I can't stand the heat.

So? I can just take cold showers.

Yeah, but the dorm gets warm, too, and Soma and Kazuya can't take the cold like I can.

Does that really matter? I can just take a lightning immunity and wear more clothes.

Or I can just change to Adama when we meet up, and change back to Wadatsumi when I return.

We go to the same school. We're bound to run into each other at some point.

Does it really matter? We're allies now. I shouldn't have to worry if she'll zap me again.

What if it's an elaborate ruse to—

No, she could have attacked me down any time.

No, she couldn't have. She knows I can kill her.

But I'm not bulletproof. She could—

Shoot me ten thousand times? From where? Without anyone noticing?

Come to think of it, it didn't just hurt, she stunned me. I'll take a lightning immunity just to be safe.

In the end, Naoki changed to Adama (which nullified electricity and was only a problem on windy days), and resolved to wear more clothes from then on. He took a hot shower, brushed his teeth, and plopped into bed.

Come to think of it, why aren't Soma and Kazuya back yet?

Probably partying. What kind of people go out and party on a weeknight?

No, I'd say the same thing if they went out on a weekend.

Am I jealous that they're having fun?

Probably.

Am I not having enough fun?

Maybe?

Should I ask Aoi out?

Wait, what?

This is like the start of a romance in an action movie. The hero and the heroine always get together in the end.

Yeah, but this isn't a movie.

Remember when the world turned inside out?

That's different. That isn't a popular movie tr—

Crap, I didn't do my physics homework!

Naoki sat up, stock still.

…Oh yeah, I did it before I left.

…I still want to know what kind of fun Soma and Kazuya are up to.

X

To explain how Agents Dragon, Lily, and Reaper found Soma and Kazuya so quickly, one must understand something called Resonance. Resonance is a little known perk of being a Persona user; basically, Persona users can sense when someone else uses their Persona. The range of this ability is short enough to have not alerted up the Agents every time Soma made curry for a midnight snack, but not so short that they couldn't just squint to see if someone had a glowing avatar behind them. [3]

While Soma is not a Persona user, he uses the power of his soul. Well, other peoples' souls. Which is close enough; he technically qualifies as a Wild Card. He cannot sense Resonance, but his power is close enough to send a weird tingle down the spine of passing Persona users. With a good sense of direction and a steady, receptive mind, it was possible to extrapolate the target's general path and set up a wall of ambushes.

It is also important to note that passive abilities do not set off Resonance (even if they were something as obviously magical as walking on water or jumping in midair), or else Soma would have been caught ages ago.

Now back to your irregularly scheduled fanfiction.

X

Agent Dragon and Agent Reaper were earth and water elemental Persona users, respectively. As hard as they bickered, they were platonic childhood friends and comrades in arms. They had come up with this quicksand trap ages ago, as one of the many nonlethal techniques used to incapacitate the Masked Circle.

The fleeing suspect turned out to be two people, one carrying the other. An arm computer dangled from the left arm of the person being carried. All three Agents took note of this COMP, but not enough for them to ignore their job.

The three Agents advanced on the trapped duo. "We got you now, cul—"

The carrier spun his companion onto into a Fireman's carry. His left arm free, he shot a jet of orange flame towards the ground, rocketing them both into the air, his charge shouting something incoherent in a tone reserved for cursing.

"Give me a boost," said Agent Lily. Agents Dragon and Reaper knelt down, picked up a leg each, and flung Agent Lily skyward. "Chronos!"

The winged god of time and harvest caught Agent Lily in midair, and blasted a gust of wind at the falling duo, guiding them into the next quicksand trap—

And then a bunch of things happened at once. This was not an exaggeration, because it all occurred in a single moment of frozen time.

If there was an order to any of this, for the sake of grammar, time stopped. Agent Dragon froze, Agent Reaper froze, even the fallen leaves strewn up by the sudden gale froze. The only ones who did not freeze were Agent Lily and the carrier suspect. Their eyes met.

Agent Lily threw one of his sharpened daffodils at the suspect, who dodged by blasting another jet of fire, landing in the sea of trees. Agent Lily dove to pursue, flinging daffodil after daffodil, but it was too late. The carrier had vanished into the darkness.

Time resumed.

Agent Dragon and Agent Reaper, who had the culprits in their sights and ready to launch water-boosted rocks, looked around, confused. "What the hell was that?!"

Agent Lily floated down to the ground before releasing Chronos. "He stopped time," said Agent Lily flatly.

"Stopping time and fire, eh?" said Agent Reaper. "Sounds like T—"

"No, the build was wrong," said Agent Lily, rubbing his temples. "Too wiry."

Agent Reaper backed off. "Sheesh, it's just a comparison."

A tingle of Resonance ran down the spines of the three Agents. As one, they sprinted towards it.

However, they ran into a few problems. First, while they knew where the targets were, getting from Point A to Point B was a lot more difficult. Namely, all the rocks and trees in the way. The swift Agent Dragon could sense the shape of the earth and stone from her earth-elemental Persona Venus, but not the trees. Agent Reaper could see in the dark from his water and dark-elemental Persona Hades, but wasn't agile enough to run down a steep goat trail. And while the agile Agent Lily could avoid all other obstacles by flying with Chronos, keeping his Persona out for too long was exhausting.

By the time they reached the parking lot at the foot of the mountain, the suspects were nowhere in sight, and the Resonance was gone.

"That was no ordinary Persona user," said Agent Lily grimly.

Agent Dragon looked around. "Do you think he felt more like the Reverse Persona users, or our Shadows?"

Agent Lily shook his head. "Neither. Those were twisted, but they still felt like Personas. His was still wrong, but it felt more like something cobbled in the… shape of a Persona."

"How do we know it's even a Persona user we're looking at?" said Reaper.

"How could we feel Resonance, if he wasn't a Persona user?" retorted Dragon.

There was a pause.

One other detail lingered in the minds of the three Agents: the COMP. All three of them had seen something similar in the past. In fact, it resembled a device owned by an ally, a device used for summoning demons, owned by a certain Tamaki Uchida.

In one universe, this detail would have gone completely unnoticed.

In another universe, Tamaki had never summoned demons in front of them using that device, leading them to believe that it was just fancy wrist armor.

And in yet another universe, Tamaki had successfully negotiated for her teacher's laptop.

In this one, however, all three of them recognized the device as something similar to Tamaki's computer.

Reaper saw the device, and thought, Hey, it's been a while since we saw Tamaki. I wonder how she's doing?

Dragon saw the device, and thought, Cr—I mean, Aiyah, I forgot about Tamaki! She has to know that demon summoning is illegal!

Lily saw the device, and thought, That computer looks a lot like the one Tamaki uses to summon demons. I thought those had gone out of style ages ago.

Fortunately for the suspect, while they all knew that it was the same kind of COMP that Tamaki used to summon demons, and they heavily associated wearable tech with demon summoning, they also knew that computers could be used for more than just summoning demons. In fact, all three of them were wondering why anyone would mount a keyboard on their arm, if it meant that they could only type with one hand.

"Let's split up," said Agent Lily. "They couldn't have gone far."

None of them noticed the storefront for the antique furniture store, or the reflections of two teenage boys.

X

To Julius Belmont, exploring mountains and wilderness was just like taking a stroll in his own backyard. Well, the Belmont family hideout/manor #2 was hidden deep in the mountains of Romania and his backyard did in fact stretch into a thick forest, and Julius had scarce memories of getting lost on boyhood romps through those backyard woods with his cousins, but regardless of how overgrown his backyard was, Julius was good at mountain survival.

He was also good at hiding from the police. In fact, he was hidden safely in a tree lining the path up to the power plant, comfortably listening to every word the Agents said.

"…team, you said," said a voice that was distinctly Yoko's. "Adding you to our lineup would just screw up our teamwork, you said."

"L—look, I'm not saying that you're bad, it's just—" said a blustering male voice.

"And you couldn't catch someone carrying someone else?" Yoko retorted.

"…I don't see you with a prisoner," said a cold male voice.

"Yes, because I didn't have any backup!" snapped Yoko.

"And look who it is, our star Agents," said Agent Tiger smugly. "Back with our invisible prisoners?"

"Now, now, even the best of us make mistakes," said Agent Seal soothingly. "What have you learned about our escapees?"

"One can stop time and use fire magic," said the cold Agent. "We didn't get a read on the other, but we think they like older technology."

Julius's blood turned cold. He could imagine Yoko's throat clenching at the news.

"One was blonde, and the other was…" the brash Agent paused. "His hair wasn't light and it wasn't dark."

"What color?" asked Agent Peony.

"No color in dark vision," said the brash Agent. "You know how when you go to the paint store, there's dark blue, light blue, and blue? His hair was blue. But, you know, I don't know if it was blue, or if it was just brown."

"Which gets us absolutely nowhere," said Agent Tiger, sighing dramatically. "Want to hear what we found out?"

"Yes, of course," said Yoko tersely. Julius knew that tone of voice.

Julius only made phone contacts for other members of the Belmont family, because there were so many scattered around the world that it was impossible to keep track of them all. Everyone else went into a small journal he kept on him at all times, from Yoko's cell to the takeout number for that great German Korean place (that sold Korean food in Germany).

There were only three numbers he committed to memory (not counting emergency numbers, numbers he didn't mean to memorize, and his own number): Alucard's, Soma's, and the one for his contact in the Portuguese Mafia. By eschewing caller ID, Julius disguised those three numbers in a sea of random numbers, if his phone were ever stolen and unlocked. Julius had wondered if it would be more suspicious to find three numbers that weren't in the journal or three numbers in the journal with no context, but decided that it didn't matter, because the former would be harder to discover than the latter.

It was too dark to read this journal, so Julius only texted Soma.

'Yoko knows you were there last night. Tell everyone else who was there. We need to make a plan.'

After a pause, he added, 'That is to say, Yoko knows that Soma was there, but not anyone else specifically'.

Then he sat and listened to what the Agents gleaned from the crime scene.

X

As a demon summoner, Kazuya did not like losing control of the situation. Well, nobody likes that, but especially not someone whose life depended on being in control.

Now that they were out of immediate danger, he could see that Soma was right. Kazuya was another face in the crowd, in a city with competent law enforcement. If only the former or (or xor, haha) latter were true, then it would have been fine; back when he was another wanderer in a lawless land, he could skip town without a care, and back when he was a famous former revolutionary in Tokyo Millennium, no one was brave enough to try to take him in (but eventually someone was brave enough to take him out).

His rational mind told him that Soma absolutely was in the right by stopping him from screwing up and being arrested. It still bothered him, having someone else make decisions for him.

Soma laid Kazuya out on a soft surface, more like a couch than a bed. "We're safe here," he said, not even breathing heavily.

Kazuya blinked as his eyes adjusted to the light. "Where the hell did you privodeet me to now?" he said in a weak voice. The alcohol was bad enough without the motion sickness.

'Here' was superficially a large room that oozed the implication of dusty brown. Nothing in it was that shade of brown; the walls were a creamy off-white, golden mirrors adorned all four walls, and everything was illuminated with stark, industrial light from the streetlamps outside. What gave the impression of sheer dust was the furniture. Hardwood chairs and tables and velvet cushioned ottomans and sofas alone did not make a room look this dreary; it was the cramped arrangement of pseudo-parlors and attempted cheer with baubles and fake flower vases.

'Here' would have been more useful not in the context of what 'here' looked like, but with the words 'how we got' appended to the front. The last clear(ish) thing Kazuya saw was that cop's face before Soma yanked him away. After that, it was just darkness and a few lines of light, then blindingly bright industrial light, and now brown. And for some reason, Soma had yellow flowers stuck all over his sweater.

Soma seemed to understand his drunk mutterings, because he said, "We're in a parallel world called the Mirror World. I can use it with my metal powers because metal is shiny, but I can enter it from any reflective surface. This was just the closest entrance." He tugged at one of the yellow flowers, and winced.

"What's with all the stoolies?" demanded Kazuya. "Are we in a shop?"

"…We're in a furniture store because we were out on the street and came in through a window," said Soma uncertainly. "If I try to enter using a transparent surface like glass or water, and there's space, I come out on the other side. I'm not sure why." He opened the door, which jingled. "As far as I know, there's no one else here. Well, there are mirror—I mean, I know mirror monsters exist, but I've never encountered one here."

"And you're sure the bruiseboys can't viddy us while we're in here?" asked Kazuya. His sense of danger was as finely tuned as a microscope aimed at an atom. As anyone who has ever handled sensitive lab equipment will tell you, a finely tuned microscope is notoriously hard to recalibrate after a stiff breeze.

"As long as we stay away from mirrors and windows, we're fine," said Soma. "Or if there's a lot of people. I use it all the time." He chuckled. "I haven't had to pay for a train ticket for ages, and the baths are never crowded for me. You can even take back some of the stuff you find here, but keep in mind that they don't show up in mirrors. The safest thing is food, and even then I think you end up with invisible waste. Haven't checked, though."

"Like… vampire pischa?"

Soma flinched.

"No… vampire food?" Kazuya groaned. The last time he felt this sick, he'd been camping out near what turned out to be an irradiated lake.

Soma's shoulders unclenched. "Never mind, I get it. Yeah, I guess you could say that it's howthehelldidyougetinhere?"

This was directed at a rather ugly velvet ottoman.

Soma held up a hand, and said, "Wait, I can't hear you. Let me try something…"

Kazuya stared and said nothing. He began to drool on the ugly floral print.

"…Wait, what?" For some reason, this was said in English.

Pause.

"If you definitively assert that the level of your comprehension is adequate, we shall converse in the tongue that I am using to communicate with thee," said Soma in Japanese.

Silence.

"If you couldn't understand that, then don't trouble yourself on my account," said Soma, switching to English again.

An inexplicable, and yet pleasant, absence of noise.

"You're welcome, now who are you and why are you here?"

Then Soma said something in a language that Kazuya didn't even recognize. This was no mean feat, considering that he was a demon summoner who had to pronounce every demon's name correctly. It sounded vaguely Germanic, but it wasn't German.

Soma took a step back, eyes wide, and said something else.

This went on for a little while before Soma held up a palm, and turned towards Kazuya. "Je sai—" he stopped, and switched to Japanese. "I know it looks wei—"

"Dook," said Kazuya simply.

"Dook?" repeated Soma.

"Ghost."

Soma blinked. "You can see him?"

"No."

Most ghosts were visible to pretty much everyone, but there were a handful that Kazuya just wasn't psychic enough to see [4]. Demons were, though, along with Gaian monks, Messian exorcists, and randomly gifted people. Cerberus was especially good at sniffing out spirits. Kazuya's 'belief' in these ghosts was well known, resulting in more than a few scams; one common technique was stopping in the middle of a conversation and pointing out a ghost, just like Soma had (although one person turned out to not be a conman at all, just schizophrenic). Still, enough of those people were genuine that Kazuya could not always write it off as a scam, and Kazuya did not think he had anything that Soma would want enough to con him for (maybe the COMP and the Demon Summoning Program, but that was password-protected and he doubted that Soma could guess the names of his eight biological children in order of birth month).

Turning this into coherent words, however, was currently beyond him. "I'll give you the four one one later. I'm sure you and your choodessny droog are having a lovely chat, but I'm right fashed and in need of a cheest, and I'm sure you are, too."

Soma nodded, a tad uncertainly, and turned towards the ottoman. "You're not bound to anything, right? It's late, and my friend needs help. Could this wait until tomorrow? Wait for us on the roof, okay?"

The ghost seemed to accept, because Soma turned towards Kazuya and said, "We're the only ones in the Mirror World, so we won't get caught as long as we avoid mirrors and windows, but that also means there's no buses. If you don't want to be seen, we can find a good route and walk back, or we can return to the normal world and—"

Kazuya typed in his password without even looking. Pascal appeared, and licked his face. It smelled like sulphur.

"…I'll spot you the fare."

X

The doctor's office had blankets and pillows for a reason. Mr. Addams had a mattress behind the desk for these late nights, and they always had a few gurneys to spare for patients (they were good about cleaning out the bloodstains).

Mr. Ochre was stable and probably going to live, and was sleeping off the anesthesia in the spare room. His associates had bailed the moment they realized that threatening someone who was busy trying to save their comrade's life was counterproductive, especially since the doctor only knew the Japanese words for 'cut' and 'kill', rendering the rest of their normally intimidating vocabulary useless. Sarcasm, dramatic irony, and metaphors were lost on someone who still had to read the Japanese version of Dick and Jane out loud.

The doctor strolled into the waiting room. He looked at the sleeping form of Mr. Addams, and sighed. "Madam Pain?"

Madam Pain did not stir.

"Madam Pain?"

"Owie?"

Madam Pain's eyes opened. She sat up and rubbed them, muttering something in Japanese.

"We're ready for you in the exam room."

"Aren't you going to put me under and send me to the bleedin' Sandman anyways?" grumbled Aoi.

"If you like sleeping so much, then you'll love going back to sleep," retorted the doctor.

"Really, Doctor Dude?"

"Of course not," said Doctor Dude. "I didn't want you to wake up from the pain and shank me again."

"Shock?"

"Shank: stabbing with an improvised weapon." Doctor Dude sighed. "It would have been fine if it was a scalpel, but the tissue forceps? Really?"

"I don't remember, but—"

"Don't apologize," said Doctor Dude sharply. "It's not your fault if you weren't awake for it. Now, which rib?"

X

The bus had in fact gone straight to campus, but Mina got off a few stops early and spent a few minutes at the library (which was full of students), before jumping out the ground floor window. Then she went into one of the halls that had an underground tunnel to a hall that was closer to her dorm, where she took a quick shower and then dove into bed.

Phone in hand, Mina wondered if it was more stupid to message Soma to tell him that she was all right (potentially giving away his position if he was hiding) or to not message him (which might cause a tragic series of miscommunications leading to someone dying). Mina concluded that while the latter scenario was less likely, Soma and Kazuya together would have probably escaped faster than she could, so they were probably fine. She sent Soma the message (and asked for Kazuya's contact information, just in case).

Yoko and the Agents wrapped up their investigation for the night, handing off their intel to the day shift. Yoko could not sleep.

Julius had slunk away from the Agents with relative ease, and climbed into his hotel room through the window. Some well-meaning busybody had called the police on him, so he had to groggily answer the door and prove that nothing was stolen.

After Cerberus told Kazuya that there was indeed a ghost, Soma, Kazuya, and the ghost rode him back to the dorm, jumping from rooftop to rooftop to avoid street-level windows. Soma would have preferred Marchioness Marchosias, but Cerberus explained that Kazuya didn't trust anyone but him to obey him while drunk.

Upon arrival, Soma persuaded Kazuya to return Cerberus, and placed him in bed in a position where he wasn't likely to choke on his own vomit, before going off to heal his wounds. He wasn't sure why that cop threw flowers at him or how they were hard and sharp enough to pierce flesh, but at least the entry wounds were clearly marked (although he had to use the Ghost soul to temporarily leave his body so he could find all the ones on his back). After washing the blood out of his sweater, he was a chair away from healing thanks to the Ouija Table, which healed him when sitting on chairs, and then a bath.

Then he realized that they were still in the Mirror World, so he picked Kazuya up, carried him to the bathroom, returned to the real world, and put him back into bed. Kazuya just snored and gurgled vaguely. Around that time, he got the text from Mina, who was fine, and he texted her back saying that they were fine, along with Kazuya's number.

Aoi had a successful surgery, and stayed the night at Doctor Dude and Mr. Adam's office.

Dawn came, and vanquished the night.

Mina woke up well rested despite the previous night's worries. This good mood lasted all of five minutes, when she read the headline news. She sent the news to Soma, and asked when they should meet up.

The Agents and Yoko had a lie-in and a late breakfast, due to their night shift. They ate eggs and sausages for breakfast, and drank coffee while doing paperwork.

Julius slept in late as well, because the police had woken him up. Besides, sleeping in safety was a luxury greater than anything else the hotel offered, from its central heating to its complementary swimming pool.

Aoi woke up in the doctor's office, and found Doctor Dude eating bagels and tea. He gave her some for the road.

The murderer and the accomplice went out to watch the sun rise, and then got cat food from the convenience store. They spent some time there looking for a new brand, because Selina didn't like the cheaper kind.

Soma was a night owl, so Kazuya had to shake him awake.

"Stanley, get off of my foot—"

"Wake up, Soma."

Even with Soma's blurry vision, Kazuya looked terrible. There were dark circles underneath his eyes, he reeked of sweat and alcohol, and his shaking hand was clenched tightly around Soma's bedpost in a manner that suggested that a tiny, localized earthquake was erupting underneath him. There was vomit on the floor in the spot where one of the shared trash cans used to be.

"I wanted to apologize about last night," said Kazuya, trying to rub one of his eyes but somehow missing it and pushing on his eyebrow. "Attacking those people was stupid, reckless, and completely unnecessary, and it put us all in danger."

Soma just blinked. "Don't worry about it," he said automatically.

"No, if it wasn't for me—"

"Kazuya, it's fine," said Soma, this time will full sincerity. If he didn't believe this, he couldn't go on living. "If you weren't in your right mind, I can't blame you for anything."

Kazuya shook his head. "Blame is shirking responsibility. An apology is a promise to accept it."

"In that case, I'm also sorry, because we all went together and you don't need to shoulder the responsibility alone," said Soma. He turned to look at his alarm clock. 7:12 am. "Now can we go back to sleep? You could have told me at lunch or after class."

"I know that," said Kazuya. "The apology could have waited. This can't." He swiveled his computer around to show Soma. Soma squinted as he tried to read the dim screen, but his vision sharpened quickly enough. It was a local news site.

Headless Corpse Found on Mountainside!

The only words Soma could say were, "…So, if the apology could wait, why didn't you show me this first?"

"What do you think it would look like if I showed you the graz I was in and then begged for your forgiveness?"

"…True."

Soma took out his phone. Mina had sent him the same headline, along with a request to text her as soon as he got the message, so he assured her that he and Kazuya were all right, and moved on to Julius's message.

If the headline news was a punch to the gut, Julius's text was a kick in the balls. Soma let out a strangled yelp. "Yoko knows I was there last night."

Kazuya just stared at him with bleary, pursed eyes. "…Who?"

Soma stared. "Yoko Belnades? Elemental witch merce—wait, I never told you her name." He paused to collect his thoughts. "She's the one who was chasing the one who was evil in the castle."

"And that's bad?"

"That's terrible!" Soma shuddered.

Kazuya winced at Soma's shout. "Is she stronger than you?" Kazuya's hand was already at his COMP.

Soma looked as if he were about to strangle Kazuya. "That's not the problem. She's my friend."

Kazuya stiffened. "Do you think she'll let you off?"

"No way. She's working for the Agency right now. Even if she lets us off, they won't."

Kazuya nodded grimly. "You didn't cut off anyone's head, did you?"

"Of course not!"

"Then we find the real culprit, turn them in, and get the millicents off our back," said Kazuya curtly. "She's happy, we're happy, and no one has to know we were ever there."

"Would you tell her if you were the one whose head was on the chopping block?" snapped Soma.

"If it means having a chance to explain myself, yes!"

There was a long pause. Kazuya shut his eyes tight, as if regretting this outburst. Not for the first time, Soma wondered what Kazuya didn't tell him.

"…All right, I'll do it," said Soma. If he forced the story out now, he'd lose Kazuya's trust forever. Besides, it wasn't like Soma was completely up front with his situation, either. "But we still need to get our story straight. How did we get there, why were we there, what were we drinking, what was the name of the—"

"Why?" asked Kazuya.

"Because they'll be suspicious if our stories don't match up," said Soma. "Haven't you heard that story about the professor who asked 'Which tire'?"

Kazuya stared blankly.

"…Some students missed an exam because they were up late partying, and the next morning gave the excuse that their tire was flat, so the professor said they could retake a special version of the exam, but it just said, 'Which tire'?"

"Did that really happen?"

"Of course not! It's an urban legend!"

"We were camp—"

"No tent."

"Hiking?"

"At night?"

"We were drunk?"

"How did we get halfway up a mountain without tripping once?"

"…I got nothing."

Soma sighed. "And that's why we should all…" He froze. "…Wait, are you sure that Naoki is sleeping?"

"Too late," said Naoki, pulling off the covers and crossing his arms. "So, where were you two last night?"

TO BE CONTINUED!

[1] Holy Water doesn't set things on fire: There is a theory that the Holy Water only burns when it comes into contact with someone unholy, such as the floor of Castlevania.

[2] No formerly human Fiends: In this story, the Demi-Fiend met Raidou during Nocturne, not Dante. Unlike Dante, Raidou's race was not listed as Fiend, so Naoki has only met the skeletal Fiends.

[3] Persona Resonance: No, I did not make this up. It's something I read from outside sources rather than from the game itself; it's supposed to be the bad feeling the characters get before encountering a boss. Whenever someone says that their Persona is scared, that's Resonance.

[4] Ghost vision: while ghosts are common enemies in both SMT and Castlevania, there are a few that can't be seen by normal people. The hospital ghosts in Nocturne are presumably there from before the Conception, but the Demi-Fiend can't see them until he's a demon. Navarre as a ghost in Apocalypse is initially invisible to most people, the only exceptions being the undead Nanashi, the fairy queen Nozomi, the half-demon Hallelujah, the spiritually attuned Toki… pretty much half the party. In his spirit cameo on Lake Mikado, Issachar is invisible to even those characters, only appearing as a voice. Those two highly spoilerific ghosts in Digital Devil Saga only appear to Serph while he's semiconscious and having a vision, despite Serph being part demon at that point.

Even though Kazuya says that he can only see ghosts that don't require spiritual awareness, there's still that scene where the Law Hero's ghost tells the Hero to shut down the robots. My handwave is either that the Law Hero is a ghost that doesn't require spiritual awareness, or he isn't, but he can allow people to see him.

A history teacher once told me that a longbow is basically a bent quarterstaff and can be used as one (this was in the context of English longbows in the Hundred Years War). While I'm sure that hitting someone with a bamboo yumi wouldn't break it, I figured it wouldn't be in shooting condition afterwards (and even if it would be fine, Mina might not know that), so I compromised and made the wooden case the weapon.

The Agents, sans the Persona cast and their boss Agent Fireball, are basically in their 'Season 1' stage. They're extraordinary rookies who impress their mentors with their skill and strategies, but they're still rookies. They take hours to defeat what a seasoned squad of Agents could kill in minutes. Unless they have the advantages of number, intel, and planning time, they'll lose against pretty much any endgame protagonist. This also has a bit of snobbery in place; no one wants to see the Demi-Fiend taken down by random mooks, especially not OCs.

That's not to say that they're weak; in Season 1, Goku broke bricks with a single finger, team RWBY takes down everything from a room full of gangsters to a giant raven demon, and the Straw Hat Pirates decimated the largest fleet in East Blue. The rookies haven't had a single casualty from the giant mecha, the flying robot shark, the werewolf, etc.

Technically, the term 'endgame protagonist' does not refer to an exclusive club of characters at or above a certain power level. It refers to the current state of the character. Yoko isn't an endgame protagonist because Julius Mode never took place, but she's not someone endgame protagonists like Kazuya can take lightly. It's still a convenient shorthand for 'powerful character'; pretty much all endgame protagonists are strong, but not all strong characters are endgame protagonists.

Soma outran Eikichi, Jun, and Lisa for a few more reasons than I gave. Castlevania requires platforming, but Persona 2 does not. As Mina guessed in the last chapter, Soma is strong enough to carry someone of her weight without difficulty, and Kazuya is not much heavier than her (compared to a boulder).

If I wanted him to get caught, I would have gone with the excuse that he got sick of platforming and just flew everywhere in bat form instead.

OMAKE #1: Too easy

"So you can talk to ghosts?" said Kazuya.

"Yes," said Soma.

"And ghosts are self-aware, retain memories, and usually spawn from people who died violent deaths?"

"Yes."

"And we can assume that the kidnappers are actually murderers who are very good at corpse disposal?"

"I guess so?"

"And you are acquaintanced with another ghost who was a hero in life?"

"Yes."

"Then what are we waiting for?"

A reasonable amount of time later…

"All right, that plan's a bust," said Soma. "My ghost friend looked everywhere, and he hadn't found a single victim."

Kazuya shrugged. "I guess they really are just kidnappers, then."

Meanwhile…

"The ghosts of your victims have been sent to their eternal reward," said the exorcist who specialized in this sort of thing. "That will be 200,000 yen."

The accomplice handed the exorcist a small paper bag smelling of takeout. "Pleasure doing business with you."

"No, no, the pleasure is mine," said the shady exorcist. His eyes widened as he took a step back. "Curses! I missed one!"

The accomplice glared at him, arms crossed. "There's nothing there."

"No, really! It's the spirit of a… a… college boy, with spiky hair and ridiculously long sideburns and—"

"Cut the crap right now, or I will eviscerate you and turn your small intestine into a handbag."

The shady exorcist fell silent.

"Seriously. I am a serial killer. What part of any of this made you think that extortion was a good idea?"

"I thought you were only the accomplice."

"I have bad days too!"

Omake #2: 'Master' is so cliché

"What do your demons call you?" asked Maya Amano the journalist, a pad and pencil at the ready.

"Anything they want," said Soma. "I've stolen their freedom, so letting them have that is the least they can do. Unless they're swearing at me."

"I ask them to call me Sir, but Boss and Master are acceptable," said Kazuya. "If they just called me anything, they wouldn't acknowledge my authority. And if they don't acknowledge my authority, how could I command them? I do make an exception for Pascal, of course."

(I put this here because he doesn't have the context and he'd never admit it: Kazuya is stricter than later characters with his demons because as one of the first summoners in his timeline (as far as he knows), he has less faith in the efficacy of the Demon Summoning Program. Unlike most protagonists, he doesn't have a generation of predecessors who successfully proved that demons can be tamed; he is one of the predecessors. He made all the mistakes, pushed all the buttons, and did everything the book tells you not to do because he wrote the book from experience).

"My name," said Aleph. "Why would they call me anything else?"

"You didn't forget about me, did you?" said Tamaki Uchida. "It was always some variant of Uchida, unless we were really close. It is a professional relationship, after all."

"Aniki, Boss, Bro, Chief, just Naoki, stuff like that," said Naoki. "I don't really have contracts with them, so I'm really just their toughest guy who tells them what to do. We're kind of casual, though. Boss is the best word for what I am."

"Just Flynn," said Flynn. "I grew up as a Casualry and a peasant. Only elders, healers, and teachers receive honorifics, and I do not think I am worthy of those titles."

"I prefer Miss Isabeau, or Isabeau-san, but just Isabeau is fine," said Isabeau. "Anyone who calls me Lady or Madam sounds like a sycophant."

"Sir is the proper term for a Samurai, so I am Sir Jonathan," said the Jonathan whose last name was not Morris (and might not even have had a last name).

"Aniki and Boss," said Walter. "It feels good being in charge of something for once."

"I have insisted on being called Lord Navarre, and yet not a single one of my lackeys has used it," Narvarre sighed dramatically.

"…Do you need to ask?" said Sir Gaston the Magnificent.

"All demons employed by members of the Hunters' Association are required to use the Hunter's registered name while in combat," said Nanashi. "If they didn't, we'd have a dozen demons all screaming 'Master' and 'Boss' and whatever in the middle of a firefight, and no one can tell who said what and whose demon it was. I saw that happen a few times to the Ashura-Kai and the Samurai. I don't know enough Gaeans with demons to know how they handle it, though."

"That's why all Hunter names are unique," said Asahi. "Unless it's your real name. You can still use your real name even if you have a different Hunter name, but you're not supposed to work with anyone with the same name as you unless it's an emergency. People started giving their kids unique names a couple years after I was born so they wouldn't run into that problem."

"You can still shorten your real or Hunter name, as long as it's longer than one syllable," said Nozomi. "While it's not forbidden to have them call you something else when you're off the clock, it's frowned upon. Honorifics are strictly prohibited."

"Unless you're former CDF," said Akira from Blasted Tokyo. "There weren't enough of us for it to be a problem back then, and it got grandfather claused in for us. My demons called me Akira-san. Only one person could use a given prefix honorific at a time, though; Kenji got to be called King after winning an arm-wrestling tournament with half the men, and I had to step in when Kiyoharu and Hiroshi's prank war over who got to be called Don became a sanitary concern. The title of Marchioness was retired after the discovery of the demon Marchosias."

"Same with me, until I founded Mikado," said Akira who founded the Eastern Kingdom of Mikado, aka King Aquila. "My samurai could make their demons call them whatever they wanted, since there weren't enough of us for there to be a problem. My full title was King Aquila of Mikado, Lord of Shinjuku, Protector of the Peace of Pie, Conqueror of—"

"We'll be here for a while," said Akira from Infernal Tokyo. "I can't summon anymore, but now I'm just Akira to my Demonoid subordinates."

"Do I count?" said Hallelujah. "Because Chiro is my only demon, and he just chirps and I understand him. I… guess I'm—" (Halleujah made his best impression of a fox's chirp) "to him, and it is a unique combination that refers to me, but it doesn't sound like my name."

OMAKE #3: This also explains King Aquila's legendary feats

"Hey, Isabeau?" said Hallelujah. "Mikado is nice and all, but why is it… Western?"

"I do not understand the question," said Isabeau. "This is the Eastern Kingdom of Mikado."

"No, like, the buildings and clothes and your names and stuff are what we here in Tokyo call Western style," said Hallelujah. "I mean, aren't your ancestors from Tokyo?"

"I was wondering that, too," said Nanashi. "I get that you don't use Japanese style clothes and buildings; your ancestors didn't take any books with them, and it's not like everyone knows how to design a shrine or kimono. But if your ancestors couldn't make Japanese clothes and buildings, how did they know how to make Western clothes and buildings? I thought you'd make your own styles."

"Yeah, and why do you use the English alphabet?" said Asahi.

"Roman," said Nanashi.

"Whatever it's called," said Asahi. "Everyone knows how to read and write, so why bother switching to Romaji?"

"That is curious," said Isabeau. "We call your language the Mystic Script, and only a few of us can read it. The shift was probably deliberate."

"What I want to know is how we can still understand each other," said Nozomi. "My aunt once said that five hundred years ago, people spoke almost a completely different language from today. You've been up here for over around times that long."

"And what's with your names?" said Hallelujah.

"Your name means 'Praise Allah' in Hebrew," said Toki.

"My mom really liked Leonard Cohen, okay?" lied Hallelujah. "Besides, I've never met anyone else with the same name as me." He paused. "Actually, that's my point. Even in Tokyo, you get weird names like mine or Nanashi's; the only one I found in Mikado that even sounds Japanese was the dead king's name, Ahazuya. Are Japanese names illegal or something? And where did you get several thousand genuine Western names?"

"And you know the names of everyone in the country?" asked Navarre, ghostly eyebrow raised.

"I skimmed the pay ledgers back in the chapel," said Hallelujah. "It's just monks, Samurai, and castle staff, but that's a good cross-section. A Samurai named Fecundity is embezzling from the librarians' retirement fund, by the way."

"And yet your soldiers are Samurai, your underground is Naraku, and your country is Mikado," said Toki. "All Japanese words."

Isabeau sighed. "Unfortunately, the angels burned most of the historical texts. The answers to your questions may be lost to time."

There was a collective groan from the rest of the group, except from Asahi, who asked, "What language were they written in?"

ONE THOUSAND FOUR HUNDRED AND NINETY-SIX (or almost exactly twenty) YEARS AGO, THREE YEARS (or two weeks and four days) AFTER THE FOUNDING OF THE EASTERN KINGDOM OF MIKADO

King Akira surveyed the crowd gathering in the courtyard of the newly completed Mikado Castle.

"Say, Reiko, do you remember when you asked me why I wanted to build a castle?" he said to his wife.

"You still haven't given me a real answer," said Reiko.

"And remember how I said that it was because the Middle Ages was when humanity was at its most pious, and it would please the Archangels?"

"And remember how I said that it was actually the Renaissance, and that I knew you were lying to appease them?" retorted Reiko.

"And remember how I told you that it was because we needed a large, sturdy structure with small gates so that we could keep people from destroying the entrance to Naraku, we had to station soldiers around it so demons don't get out, that it was a good landmark and cultural center, and emergency shelters in case of bad weather?"

"And remember how I told you that we could have just built some barracks and a series of watchtowers?"

Akira nodded. "Well, today's the day you're going to find out." He walked outside and unfurled the massive banner emblazoned First Annual Mikado Game Day and Renaissance Festival.

Reiko sighed. "Really?"

"Really," said Akira, and he turned to address his people. "Citizens of Mikado! We are gathered here for three things: free food, free booze, and a whole week of games!"

The crowd cheered.

"Well, not you, Hotarou, you're just too tall." Akira laughed. "I'm just kidding. We will be playing football, basketball, volleyball, and even sports that don't have balls! And for those of you with a more adventurous bent, we will having the first annual LARP event, where we shall journey into the enchanted castle and slay the evil Black Knight that holds it in thrall! I myself will be joining you, as the grumpy Paladin Aquila!"

There was more cheering.

"Signup sheets are in the Great Hall through that door, and for those of you without costumes, we have plenty of free clothes through those doors! You can even take one home for yourself!"

The crowd cheered King Akira's name again.

"Let the games… BEGIN!"

The crowd cheered for one last time, and then began to disperse.

Queen Reiko crossed her arms. "You built this entire castle," she said, making a wide sweeping gesture, "just so you could throw a LARP event?"

Akira grinned. "Secret's out."

Queen Reiko smirked. "You know what? We could make a dungeon, so next year we could do something like 'escape the evil sorcerer's lair'."

"Ooh, and we'd have to hide from the guards, or convince some of them to join our side," said Akira.

"Yes, and they can send us back to prison if they catch us, but if a free person reaches jail, they can free everyone!"

The royal couple chatted happily, blissfully unaware of how this day would go down in history.

(Queen Reiko is unrelated to the SMT IF… character Reiko Akanezawa.