Chapter 2

My life since becoming a campione has become a lot less predictable. A couple days after encountering Inari a large moving van drove up to my house. My father and I went out to meet it.

I didn't recognize the driver but as soon as we came out Inari hopped out of the passenger's seat "Hi." She said happily and ran up and hugged me. It was a bit of a surprise but I hugged her back, she seemed like an affectionate person.

"Sorry to keep you waiting. I had to take care of some business at the temple" She told me as she let me go.

"Ah it's fine." I was still shocked.

"What the hell is going on? Who are you?" demanded my father who in the best of mood at this point.

"Ah you must be Raven's Father." said Inari warmly reaching out to shake his hand. "I am Inari god of fertility, rice, tea, sake, and industry. It's a pleasure to meet you. I am Raven's new mentor and fiancé."

"What?" said both my father and I.

She turned to me undaunted. "Ah yes Sorry I got a bit ahead of myself…" she began. "it's been so long since I had a wife and you seem so wonderful. I know we haven't known each other long but I have good instincts and I believe I can make you happy. I mean we both have time it doesn't have to be soon. But would you marry me?" She asked getting down on one knee.

I think my heart stopped and my face felt like it was on fire.

"Wh-what?" I managed.

"No… No way, no how, get your clown show and get the hell out of here now." demanded my father.

Inari seemed to ignore him for a moment. "Ah I understand, take as much time as you need to think about things. Understand though this is a great honor to be wed to a god." She said before turning to my father.

"I am sorry, perhaps I should have asked your blessing first. However before you turn me away I must ask if you think that's such a wise idea?"

"Get out now."

"Ah but the world is a dangerous place, heretic gods can appear anywhere at any time and many of them are very powerful. I know the human organization is trying to train your daughter but they will never be able to give her training anywhere near as well as I could. I can actually teach her what it is to fight a heretic god. I can train her until she can protect herself, more than that I can protect her if the need arises. Which is something you can't do." She said the last part rather bluntly.

My Father's eyes narrowed and I thought I saw a slight grimace at being informed he could not protect me.

"Is there some reason that you need to live here to do that?" He asked the harshness not leaving his voice.

Inari smiled "It is as I said an attack by a heretic god could come at any place at any time. What's worse is that she also has to worry about the other 7 Campione, some of whom have been killing gods and acquiring their powers for centuries."

My father sighed.

"Listen You want to stay here, fine. You want to train my daughter, fine but I am not listening to any more of this fiancé bullshit. You stick to your job and that's it."

Inari nodded with a smile "I shall be whatever she wishes me to be."

With that Inari turned to the house and frowned "Well that's a problem. I had hoped this place would be much bigger."

My father got a sour look on his face at that.

"I suppose I'll just have to leave most of my things at the temple." Inari resigned herself too.

She turned back to my father "Oh by the way, I do not wish to be a burden to you so I have managed to secure some funds from the temple. You can say it's for room and board. I had intended it as a dowry but for now we will call it that." She said taking a folded up check and handing it to my father.

I thought for a moment my dad was going to rip it up and throw it back at her or something dramatic like that but he paused and his eyes widened looking at the check. I leaned up and looked and coughed. I wasn't sure that I was worth that much money honestly.

With that we gained a new member of our household. It was… awkward. Inari tried her best to ingratiate herself to my parents. She cooked, she cleaned. She did everything a daughter in law could to prove her worth. I admit she was a hard worker and her efforts were impressive. Even a finicky person like me found her cooking to be exceptional, and the house never looked cleaner.

It was not long before my parents started to become outrageously lucky as well. My father, always the collector, found several deals that were awe inspiring on items he collected. We also won several sweepstakes. We would be the 1000,000th customer at a store, or would receive something from a sweepstakes that none of us had even entered.

This finally led to my parents winning a long all-expense paid trip to Hawaii.

At first they weren't comfortable with leaving me alone with Inari but she managed to get them to agree somehow.

I was given a talk, not to do anything improper with my mentor before they left.

I was a bit worried because this left just us home alone and I had no confidence on how long I could or would want to resist her advances. I liked her. I liked her a lot but didn't know her well. I also bore the knowledge that she might have been affected by either the perk I had purchased or the drawback I had taken, if not both. If that were the case I wasn't sure that it was right to make a move. Were the feelings genuine or induced by the powers I had gained.

All in all it was a weird situation that Inari made more difficult by the day.

As she said she would, Inari took over my training from the HCC. In her opinion apparently they were doing a terrible job at preparing me for actual combat.

Through intensive mock battles I quickly learned what it was to face a heretic god. She had called herself a weak one but was incredibly formidable. With her shapeshifting and speed she was a terrible force to be reckoned with. It often left me grateful it was a mere mock battle as I was unsure how it would have turned out otherwise.

It was not long however until the HCC came calling again. This time they reported that they were tracking a powerful Grimoire that had entered Japan through the black market.

We were paired with a relatively new agent. Her name was Kiku Michi Hayashi. We were told she was a miko but she looked more like a punk with a nose ring and leather jacket and short hair dyed blue. She was young, probably only a few years older than I was.

"Umm are you the miko that we are supposed to be working with?" I asked her.

She just rolled her eyes at me. "For fuck sake, yeah I am the miko you are supposed to be working with. Look I know I don't look it but you aren't exactly a brutal looking god slayer either so how about you quit judging people by how they look."

I cast my eyes down "Um sorry I didn't mean to."

She just sighed "Look sorry I don't mean to be hard on you but I have put up with this shit ever since I got here. Everyone expects every fucking Miko to be wearing the proper robes and acting like a perfect little priestess and shit. That's not me" She said relaxing.

"I haven't even been here that long… They sort of helped me out of some trouble a while back and I agreed to help them out." She admitted.

It was then Inari Stepped up and wrapped her arm around me. "Well now you have to have tougher skin if you are so determined to stick out. Raven's question was perfectly reasonable." She pointed out

Kiku grimaced. She clearly knew she was talking to a heretic god.

Inari merely smirked. I had noticed that Inari was rather harsh with other women around me. Then I remembered the drawback and cringed. I hope that wasn't the reason that Inari was acting that way and I especially hope she could keep her feelings under control if it was. Still if that was the case I could slightly understand while not exactly my type Kiku was certainly attractive, though in spite of what she wore rather than because of it.

So we started our investigation which basically meant going to the people that had brought in the Grimoire in to the country and trying to get them to release the information of who got it.

The Grimoire had apparently been purchased from a used book store in one of the poorer sections of town.

As we entered you could smell the musty smell of old books. It was a scent I was familiar with and not an unpleasant one. The place was small and crowded with shelves of used books. Mostly paperbacks that weren't that old.

The place itself was an anachronism in this day and age but it was merely cover for someone who sold magical goods.

The rather short round balding man with glasses behind the desk who perked up as we walked into his shop despite his looks was one of the most successful grey market dealers in magical trinkets. His name was Ichiro Hoshino.

Our information on him was that he usually skirted the line between legal and illegal goods. He also would provide enough information on the magical underworld to the HCC that usually they would look past some of his more illegal transactions. This time however he had passed over the line of what was acceptable.

We had also heard he was a man with a great weakness for pretty girls which was why we were sent here to get the information. Apparently Amakusa had tried to get the information out of him earlier but he wouldn't budge so as Amakusa had put it this needed a woman's touch.

I cringed a little as I slipped behind one of the shelves and undid a couple buttons on my blouse. I took a deep breath as my heart pounded. Amakusa had privately suggested this to me. I couldn't believe that I was actually going to do it. However none of us had any skills in information gathering or interrogation. I was afraid if I didn't Inari would just turn into something and threaten to eat him which might work in the short term but we had been told he was a valuable resource of information. So we were encouraged not to do that for fear he would flee. Despite the fear of never having done anything like about what I was going to try before I forced myself to go ahead.

"Oh hello ladies, how can I help you?" he asked happily, clapping his hands together in front of him and rubbing them together as he eyed the three of us, I noticed his gaze lingered for a good moment on my cleavage.

I learned in "Umm yeah we are looking for something… special." I told him with a smile.

"OH what do you mean?" he asked, crooking his head a bit.

I giggled "Well I heard that you are a man who gets in many special things. Some might even say magical."

Realization dawned on him "Oh. I see." He said with a nod and grinned. "So you are into that stuff well you're lucky I got some nice stuff in."

He said reaching under the display case he was sitting behind and pulling out a jeweler board with several trinkets on it and laying it out before us.

I gasped "oh my how nice." I said picking up a gaudy crystal necklace.

"My you have a good eye. That little lady is a powerful charm of protection."

I could tell with my will of magic authority that it had a few minor spells on it. It was a cheap charm at best.

I set down the necklace. "You know I know these are nice but do you have anything else?" I asked.

"Oh like what?" he replied curious.

I took a small breath. This wasn't working and I didn't know how to make it work so I decided to be a bit more direct. "Hmmm maybe something like an old Norse urn."

He stood straight up. "What?" he said.

"Oh." He said looking disappointed and annoyed.

"You're here about that then." He said frowning. "Look I'll tell you what I told the other clown. I know nothing, I saw nothing. There is nothing to tell."

I sighed and batted my eyes "Please… it's really important to us." I said bending over a bit. I caught him looking at my cleavage. This felt… disgusting.

"Look, you seem like a nice girl. Let's say I had the urn, and let's say I sold it. If I told you anything about whom I sold it too. I'd be out of business. No one would want to do business with me."

I feigned a pout "But we will make sure it doesn't come back on you. We have no interest in hurting your business. However we happen to know that Urn is very dangerous and if something happens you could be in much bigger trouble than if someone found out."

He sighed and rubbed his temples "That's the same thing the other guy said."

"Look I know you're just a businessman, trying to do your best. I know it can't be easy running a place like this with an incredibly niche market."

"You aren't kidding."

"No one can blame you if an item you got was more dangerous than you first thought. However now is your chance to do the right thing. You can wait and let people get hurt or you can correct your mistake here and we will try to minimize the fallout for you."

He frowned and rubbed his chin.

"You can make sure this doesn't come back on me?"

"Of course." I said with a smile

He sighed and shook his head "I never should have messed with that damn thing in the first place. I knew it was going to be nothing but trouble." As he said this he wrote down a name "Here. You didn't get it from me." He said.

"Thank you."

He looked down and grinned at me "by the way how about you and I get a drink some time."

Inari cleared her throat "She is still in high school." She said, stepping up next to me. I could tell from the look on her face she was displeased.

"What? Really I didn't know." He was obviously shocked.

I was pulled away from there.

"Wow what the fuck were you doing in there?" asked Kiku laughing.

I frowned "Well Amakusa said the guy was a big perv so I tried to flirt with him."

"Never do that again." growled Inari.

"You actually listened to Amakusa?" Kiku asked Incredulous.

"Well I had no idea what to do, I mean it worked." I said.

"Yeah take it from me. Just… just don't do that again. It was awkward to watch." said Kiku.

I sighed "alright."

After a long car ride it was a relief to arrive at the mansion of the buyer. His name was Hideaki Maeda, he was some rich guy who was really into the occult. He was somewhat of a mage but he had a lousy reputation for doing illicit stuff like this.

The mansion itself was huge. It looked to be 3 stories tall and was sprawling. It was surrounded by a tall stone fence. At the entrance there was a tacky golden colored gate and a guard booth complete with bored looking guard. Through the gate it looked like there were more guards.

It was pretty safe for us to assume the guards were armed.

"So how are we going to handle this? That place looks rather hard to get in to." I asked my companions.

"I am getting tired of running errands for this human organization. Why don't we just smash through the gate and finish this?" said Inari who had not been in the best of moods since the bookstore.

"Umm I'm not bulletproof and I am guessing neither is Kiku. I have a feeling the people in there likely have guns."

"Wait, you're not bulletproof? I thought you killed a god." asked Kiku.

"Well apparently it didn't have a gun." I answered.

Inari rolled her eyes and sighed. "I thought I trained you better than this. Alright I'll smash through the gate and scare everything away. You two fallow along when it's safe."

I winced feeling like I had disappointed her but in truth I only knew a few spells and only one of my authorities was good for combat.

"Fuck it I like this plan let the fox go wreck everything and we can just walk in once things are clear."

We got out of the car and Inari immediately began to change growing larger as red fur covered her and she leaned down on all fours soon she was a huge fox the size of a large horse.

Without a word she charged forward. The guy in the booth was startled as she slammed through the gate tearing through it like it was paper.

The guard was reaching for something looking absolutely terrified but apparently changed his mind as he started running.

Inside the gate we watched as she made a Beeline for the door crashing through it like a bulldozer. The wood exploded inward from the impact.

Normal humans aren't normally able to see Heretic Gods but whatever they saw terrified them as the other guards quickly fled.

Apparently there were a few wards but Inari's natural magic resistance took care of those.

We walked through the now busted open gate. "Wow I knew she was a bitch but I didn't think it was literal." She commented.

We walked through what remained of the doorway to the mansion to find Inari in her normal form waiting impatiently.

"Well we are in, let's get the grimoire and get out of here." Said Inari

This led to a slight problem for me. The mansion was huge and while I did have magic senses and under normal circumstances could have probably sensed the grimoire, Inari had just used her Authority and flooded the place with magic. Also likely there were other magical trinkets around.

"Uh yeah, this place is huge, any idea where it might be?" I asked Kiku

She frowned and thought for a moment "Yeah I think I can find it but it's going to take a few minutes."

So we wondered about the mansion. As we did I noticed an Occult theme to it, there were Items with mystical symbols all around. There were little statues of different gods and things from foreign cultures that looked occult.

As we looked around Kiku took the opportunity to swipe a few things.

"Umm are you sure you should do that?" I asked her.

"Yeah, what is he going to call the cops?" she asked as she slipped another item into her bag.

Eventually whatever magical abilities Kiku was using led us to the library. It was packed full of old books. I could sense even that a few of them were magical.

It turned out to be a Cliché; Kiku led us to one of the shelves against the wall. She reached out and pulled one of the books out and part of the shelf swung inward.

Beyond the doorway were stairs leading down.

Despite the modern appearance of the rest of the house the way here was lit by torches and as we went lower we heard chanting.

We found a group of a half dozen people kneeling and chanting around the Grimoire which sat on a pedestal. It was a Norse Urn decorated with scenes of the ocean just as described.

Behind them was a short stocky man also in robes with a large old book in his hands apparently casting a spell. This was Hideaki Maeda, the man who we were out to stop.

"It's over, stop your spell Hideaki!"

Hideaki Maeda yelled back "No you idiot you're going to ruin everything, we can't stop now it's too dangerous."

Then the room started to shake, Looks of fear flashed across the faces of Hideaki and his followers as the urn began to glow and cracks started to form. Water began to leak out of it.

Despite his girth it turned out Maeda moved pretty quickly when he wanted to be as he ran past us out of the room. His cronies in the robes soon started to follow as the room began to shake more. Stuff started to fall from the ceiling and it occurred to us that maybe we should be escaping too.

So we ran, I grabbed Kiku who was falling behind. Outside of her gifts she was just an ordinary person and there wasn't much chance of her keeping up with a God and a Campione.

We made it out we had a moment to catch our breath and look back before a giant monster exploded out of the mansion.

"Oh Shit… This was my vision." said Kiku.

The monster was a huge serpentine looking creature. It looked like an oriental dragon without any arms or legs but it was made entirely out of water.

It let out a earth shattering roar as it emerged.

"Ok, what the fuck is that and more importantly what do we do now?" I asked my companions.

It was Kiku who answered "that is one of the Norse goddess Rán's Authorities. Ran was a goddess of the sea and without her to guide it that now that authority is running wild."

The thing was huge it's length dwarfing the mansion and it moved with a serpentine speed and grace.

I realized at this point that we were located at the center of a heavily populated area. We had a giant monster about to do a Godzilla impression all through the neighboring mansions and this upper class section of Tokyo.

There was a moment of absolute terror as I saw how huge the thing was and honestly wanted to run away. I wanted to give up. I really did but a horrible realization dawned on me. If I didn't stop it, who would?

"Shit, shit, Shit, Ok… We have to lure it out of here or a lot of people are going to die." I said trying to calm myself down. I called upon my stolen godly power for Hunter of Immortals.

The shape shifting authority took the form of an orb for a moment hovering before me before becoming A bow with a flaming arrow. I took the item in my hands and grimaced. This was going to suck and suck hard.

"We need to move, get on." shouted Inari as she once again took the form of a horse sized fox. "You're going to need my help to defeat that thing." she added.

Almost immediately it turned to us and Inari began to run. I drew back my bow from my position on her back and fired. Somehow the arrow actually hit its body and caused it to his and steam rose from the area that was struck.

I am not sure how Fire was the best weapon to fight a creature made out of water but that was just one of the odd sorts of things that come to your mind when you're running for your life.

Hunter of immortals was a very special authority; it allowed me to drain the strength of my enemy and add it to my own. I could even steal powers if the process went on long enough.

The big problem we had as we ran through the city being chased by a giant pissed off serpent was that I realized my weapon was meant for prolonged fights and this thing wasn't going to give me that chance.

All in all I couldn't kill it quickly. I shouted for Inari to find a park or someplace where the risk to ordinary people wasn't so big. She ran as fast as she could and I kept plucking away with Hunter of Immortals and Kiku clung both to me and Inari as hard as she could.

It took longer than I would have liked and left a larger train of destruction than I would like but finally we made it to a park.

Normal People couldn't see magical things but I think they instinctively knew danger was coming as I saw people ahead of us fleeing the park and the destruction coming their way.

So that left us with a vacant park.

"Inari let me down. Then take Kiku someplace safe."

"Are you sure about this?" The fox goddess turned as I got off of her.

"Yeah this is my best chance to finish this."

I could sense her apprehension but she nodded.

Inari took off running again.

I didn't know if I had weakened it enough that I could take it. A crazy Idea came to mind but if it didn't work I was either going to be crushed or eaten.

I ran thankfully smashing through the trees seemed to slow it some and I managed to get in a couple more shots.

I had drained it of a good amount of its speed and strength. I didn't know if it was enough. One good thing though I had certainly pissed it off enough that I knew it was going to attack me as soon as it got in striking range.

I stopped and turned around to see the serpent bearing down on me. With its roar I felt the ground shaking. I crouched down and shifted Hunter of Immortals form to that of a flaming sword.

If this thing was any more than a stupid animal I was about to be in trouble.

The moment came.

The serpent struck out. If I didn't time this right I was dead.

Putting all my Ill-gotten strength into my feat I leapt as high as I could.

I was almost surprised at how high I was launched into the air. The Serpent crashed down into the ground below me getting a mouthful of dirt and grass.

Sometimes simple tactics are best. I let gravity take over and plunged myself sword first into the beast's skull impaling it. It immediately lost cohesion and I wound up coughing and sputtering soaking wet on the ground. I could feel the authority of the goddess flowing into me so I had won but I looked around and saw that we had left a huge path of destruction in our wake.

My heart pounded in my chest as I lay there. I didn't want to admit it to myself but somehow this had made me feel alive in a way nothing else could. A part of me loved this. I vaguely remembered something about a drawback.

It wasn't long until the girls came back.

Looking at the damage around me Kiku said "we should go." And we did.

It was a while later; it took us some time to get back to the HCC headquarters. It was a very ordinary looking library.

There waiting for us was Amakusa and a few members of the HCC I didn't recognize. They were a couple older men.

"So I see that the Authority escaped the grimoire." He stated not seemingly thrilled about that fact.

"Uh yeah… You see we got there as soon as we could but we caught Hideaki Maeda right in the middle of some sort of ritual with it."

Amakusa sighed and shook his head "Idiot. He was probably trying to claim the Authority. He didn't realize an ordinary human doing that would be killed."

One of the men spoke up "There is a lot of damage that means we are going to have to send lots of agents out to hypnotize witnesses and a lot of money to create a cover story about a natural disaster."

"Yeah, go ahead and get started on that." Amakusa answered less than thrilled.

He turned back to us with a slight smile "Well it didn't turn out like we hoped but you were still successful. I take it that you claimed the authority?" he asked.

I nodded "Yeah… I think I can create nets out of water now to crush and drown things."

"Good. I had hoped you would."

"Well thank you ladies you have done a good job and saved a lot of lives. The historical compilation committee thanks you."

With that our meeting ended.