It's early the next day and I'm on the roof enjoying my morning smoke break. It's nice and quiet before I see a giant porcupine fly through the air. "Didn't know porcupines could fly. Good to know.", I say to myself before heading back inside the main building.
As I make my way through the hallway I think about what Cerbero said about being involved more with school events and ponder what sort of events he might have meant. When I turn the corner, I hear Nekonome shout, "There you are ! I've been looking all over for you!", as she rushes toward me.
I stop and ask, "What did you need me for? Need some stuff moved or something?"
She nods her head and says, "Some chairs for the Entrance Ceremony today to be exact. We have a lot of new students so we have a lot of chairs to set up. Could you be a doll and help a poor girl out meow?"
With a heavy sigh, I groan to her, "Fine, how many chairs are we talking about?"
The teacher looks to me with a smile and says, "Just follow me please."
I follow her to the auditorium to see that they have nine other people setting things up for the ceremony. "We have a lot of people here already, but none of them want to setup the chairs. Could you get started on that pretty please?", Nekonome asks before pointing to the hundreds of folded up chairs in the corner.
"You want me to set all of those chairs up...by myself?", I ask the teacher with a sigh. Unsurprisingly, she nods her head with a smug look on her face. "Fine, I'll do it.", I growl as I make my way towards the chairs.
"Oh goody, the ceremony will be starting soon so please do hurry. We have a little under an hour before this all starts.", she adds before rushing off to help the other students working on the lighting.
"WHAT!? This all starts soon!?", I shout as it all sinks in. I rush over to the chairs and grab fifteen at a time before setting them all up in rows, leaving enough room for people to get through. After what felt like just about five minutes, I finally setup all the chairs.
"Wow, you sure did that quickly. Some of these people have been here all morning and you've done more work than them in just five minutes.", Nekonome says as she eats a fish shaped biscuit.
"Anything else that you procrastinated, Nekonome?", I ask sarcastically as I cross my arms and glare at her.
The cat puts her hand on her chin and says, "Well, there are a few things, but most of them aren't school related so you shouldn't worry about them."
I look around and see that Moka's also helping with this thing. "Moka's here too?", I ask the teach, to which she nods.
"Yep, she's the most popular student in your class, so it just looks better to have her here. Isn't she just wonderful?", she replies after finishing her biscuit.
"Well, I'm going to bail if that's okay. There isn't anything you guys need me here for so I'll just go check up on Tsukune and see..", I begin while walking towards the doors before she grabs onto my arm and stops me.
"We might need you for other heavy lifting Mister Oni. I would rather not have to go hunting for you again so stay here until the ceremony is over, okay?", she says before giving me a surprisingly intimidating glare that I haven't seen from her before.
I shrug this attempt off and walk over to Moka. "So what are you working on over here?", I ask Moka causing her to jump a little.
The pink haired girl turns to me and gives me a confused look before saying, "Reiji, what are you doing here? You aren't the type of guy to volunteer their time to help others."
"Nekonome roped me into this mess. I can't leave either so I guess I'm stuck here until it's all over with.", I reply as I sit down in one of the chairs I setup.
"Well, at least we have a heavy lifter now. I think I could lift more than some of these guys.", she says as we watch two students fail to move the wrestling mat.
I laugh and say, "This is the help you get? Shouldn't those guys be on electronics?"
Moka just shrugs and asks, "Could you possibly go help them out. That mat needs to be out of here ASAP."
I give her a quick nod before heading over to deal with the mat. One of the students says, "Hey buddy, we got this. We'll have this thing out of here in no ti-", but before he can finish, I pick up the whole mat and begin to carry it over to the storage room.
"W-what!? How can he just lift that whole thing like it's nothing?", the other student asks.
"Because I'm not weak like you. Now go make yourselves useful or something.", I growl at them as I throw the mat into the storage room.
They run off and I return to Moka to see if there are any other things that need lifting. "Anything else that needs to be moved?", I ask Moka as I look around the room.
"Nope, we should be set now. The electronics people say we're all set on that department and you setup all the chairs and moved that mat so we should be golden.", the vampire replies as she goes down her checklist.
"So now I just have to sit here and wait for this thing to be over, then I can leave, right?", I ask her, and she replies with a quick nod.
I let out a sigh before going backstage to find a nice place to nap. I find a nice corner where the speakers are harder to hear and there isn't too much light, but Nekonome manages to hunt me down and when she finds me, she says, "Now now Mister Oni, you can sleep later, we have to watch over the ceremony and make sure nothing goes wrong."
I only groan in frustration as the teacher drags me to the side of the stage where we're hidden from the crowd but we can see most of the students.
As we watch the students fill the seats out in the crowd, I sit on the floor next to Nekonome, who decides to stand instead. I peek out through the curtains to see what kind of potential these freshman have, but I don't see that many students that stand out, at least not in a good way. While I'm skimming through the monsters, searching for any signs of strong monster energy, I see a girl that seems to stand out. She's sitting near the middle of the crowd with redish brown hair in pigtails, she seems to have a bit of potential based on how she carries herself and her body language, not to mention her monster energy in perfectly sealed, though I can still sense a bit radiating from her.
The Headmaster walks over to me and says, "Ah, Mister Oni, what a pleasure to see you helping your fellow classmates."
"It wasn't exactly my choice, but I did my best to help.", I reply as I continue to scan the crowd. "There doesn't seem to be too many strong monsters out there. You'd think there would at least be a few good ones.", I mutter under my breath, causing the Headmaster to look to me with a raised eyebrow.
"Yes, I noticed that too. Perhaps there just aren't that many strong monsters anymore or perhaps they just don't find human coexistence appealing.", the Headmaster says as he peeks out the curtains too. "Look at that girl though, she seems a bit strong.", he suggest, referring to the red haired girl from earlier.
"Yeah, I saw her already. She might be good, but still that's only one.", I reply while desperately scanning through the crowd.
"What exactly are you looking for ?", Nekonome asks, confused by our odd behavior.
I stop my search and reply with, "I'm looking for new members for the Newspaper Club. We might want to get some new blood in so the club doesn't die."
Suddenly a voice from the stage says, "And to welcome you here to your new school, here is your Headmaster."
"Well, I guess that's for me. Be safe Mister Oni.", the Headmaster says to me before making his way on stage to greet the freshmen.
"Welcome to Yokai Acadamy! I hope you all have a wonderful semester here and learn to live in harmony with humans by the end of your stay here.", he says to the crowd causing them to cheer for some odd reason.
"Well, that's that. You can go now Mister Oni.", Nekonome says as she points to a nearby exit hidden backstage.
"See you later Nekonome.", I reply as I head towards the door.
Before I can leave she says, "Mister Oni, I'll be sure to give you a reward later. I'm certain you'll just love it."
I don't even want to know what she might be referring to, whether it's a fish or something fishy I don't want any part of it.
I quickly make my way to room 2-1 where Kurumu, Yukari and Mizore are all waiting. "Where have you been and where are Tsukune and Moka? Were they not with you?", Kurumu asks as soon as I enter the room.
"I was roped into helping with the Entrance Ceremony. Moka was there helping out too, but I didn't see Tsukune so he must be off doing his own thing somewhere.", I reply as I throw myself into my seat and put my head down.
"That explains why you look sort of tired. What did they have you do?", Yukari asks as she inspects my condition.
"I had to setup the chairs. All of them! Without any help from anyone!", I growl under my breath, trying to enjoy the quiet.
"That sounds like a pain. Good thing I didn't have to do any of that work. I would've melted just standing under those strong lights in there.", Mizore says from behind her desk.
Suddenly the door to the classroom swings open and I hear someone ask, "Is this Moka Akashia's next class?"
I lift my head up from my desk and ask, "Who wants to know?" As I turn I see the girl from this morning with a little bat looking thing on her shoulder. "Hey, didn't I see you at the entrance ceremony?", I ask the girl as I point at her.
"Yep, I'm a freshman now.", the girl replies with a confident look on her face as she puts her hands on her hips.
"Why are you looking for Moka?", Yukari asks her as she squints at the equally flat girl.
"I just wanted to see this Moka for myself. I heard she was really interesting.", the girl replied with a sly grin. I don't like the way she looked there and I decide to keep a close eye on her.
Before we can ask her any more questions, Moka busts through the door saying, "Her target is my life!"
As soon as their eyes meet, the girl says, "Found you."
With a concerned look on her face Moka says, "Kokoa", which I am guessing is the girl's name and that they know each other.
The girl begins to look at Tsukune then says, "Hey, it's that tasty guy from this morning! How unexpected to bump into you here! Seems there's some sort of connect-", but before she can finish Moka seems to block her path to Tsukune.
Moka, now blocking Kokoa's path to Tsukune with arms spread out, growls, "Tsukune is my friend. Hands off."
This is getting interesting. Is this some sort of rival she had in her old school? The red haired girl snaps back with, "Don't get your panties in a bunch", and grabs a desk from the back of the room and holds it like some sort of weapon. "It's alright. You opponent is ready.", the girl continues as she waves the desk around. Then she swings the desk down at Moka and Tsukune shouting, "Now die Moka!"
I'm still tired from this morning so I can't react immediately to this and can only shout, "What the fuck is going on!?"
"Is this some sort of brawl!?", Kurumu asks as we all look on in shock.
The rampaging redhead continues to swing the desk around wildly while shouting, "Now c'mere! This is why I followed you here!"
Moka manages to somehow trip on what I can only imagine to be nothing, leaving her helpless against this desk wielding maniac.
I quickly throw a cigarette in my mouth and light it to give myself a bit of a pick-me-up. As she lifts the heavy desk up in the air, the redhead shouts, "Now fight me for real!"
Tsukune, however, steps in the way to block the attack.
Lucky for him that cigarette gave me just enough energy to get over here in time to block the hit with my hand. "You're really loud, you know that, right?", I say as I glare at the girl.
"You stay out of this!", the little girl huffs as she pulls the desk away from my hand. Sadly, she makes the mistake of swinging at me.
I slap the desk out of her hands before kicking her through the middle of the room causing her to go flying through multiple desks on her way across the room.
"Reiji stop! You can't fight her!", Moka begs as she tries to stop me.
"Why not? I fight guys and girls alike. Gender equality and what not.", I reply in a smug tone as I blow smoke in the girl's direction.
"You're pretty tough. That hurt a little.", the girl chuckles as she stands up from the pile of desks she was buried in.
"She isn't just some girl. She's my little sister! Don't hurt her!", Moka exclaims as gets up off the floor.
I don't really see how that's supposed to make me stop, but whatever. I crack my knuckles and say, "And I give a shit because?"
"You aren't who I'm after. I'll catch you another time, Big Sis.", the girl says before walking out through the front door in the classroom.
Later, the whole group meets up near the stairs and Kurumu says, "You better start explaining what's going on Moka."
"That girl's name is Kokoa Shuzen, and she's my younger sister. There are four of us, but Kokoa and I are the youngest. We all lived under the same roof even though Kokoa and I had different mothers. Back then we sparred everyday, but my power wasn't sealed away so I always beat her. I ended up having to move away with my mother in the human world and she has been following me ever since. She even followed me into the human world looking for a fight even though my power was sealed by the rosary.", Moka explains, leaning against the nearby railing for support as she recalls her violent childhood with her younger sister.
"So she's doing all this just to win your sibling rivalry? And she went as far as enrolling in the same school just for that?", Kurumu asks with a somewhat horrified expression on her face.
"Haven't you made it clear that you can't fight her with your power sealed by the rosary?", Tsukune adds as he looks to Moka for an answer.
"I've told her that so many times, but she never listens. She thinks that if she just swoops down on me hard enough I'll suddenly awaken and fight back.", Moka groans in frustration.
"How annoying, want me to make an ice cube out of her?", Mizore asks as she forms her ice claws.
"You can't! She's still my little sister!", Moka begs, still trying to defend her little sister.
I just sigh at her attempts to protect Kokoa before saying, "If she's going to be a problem then we'll just have to kick her ass just like we've done to every other problem we've come across."
"I wonder if winning against Moka is really all she wants.", Tsukune says as if he knows something we don't. We all look at him with confused looks and he says, "Well, she saved me from the Headmaster's Porcupine this morning."
"So that's why that thing was flying through the air like that.", I reply as I suddenly realize that Porcupines can't really fly.
"I think she's a kind person deep down. So I wonder if chasing after Moka in itself isn't her real motive.", the boy replies with a smile on his face.
Moka looks over the nearby banister and says, "Thanks, but it's alright. It's always been just a sibling rivalry. But I've got to something about her this time."
"What can you do? With your power sealed she'd definitely kick your ass. There isn't any way you can talk her down either.", I reply while leaning back with my back against the railing.
"Then I'll just lose. She'll finally have what she wants and she'll leave us all alone.", Moka replies as she runs off.
"Where does she think she's going?", Kurumu asks as we watch the vampire take off.
"I think I know where she's going to end up. Follow me.", I say before making my way to the graveyard.
We all wait patiently at the graveyard for Kokoa to show up while Moka simply stands out in the open all by herself. "Should we do something?", Yukari nervously asks as she glances up to me for an answer.
"Nope, she chose this and now she has to go through with it.", I answer the little witch as I light myself a cigarette.
"But we can't just let her get killed.", Yukari replies in a concerned tone.
"We won't. If it get's that serious and Inner Moka hasn't awoken then I'll step in and fight, but until then it's all on her shoulders.", I say as Kokoa appears, walking towards Moka with a gleeful grin.
"It's unreal, my big sis called me out here. So you finally have the guts to fight me?", Kokoa says as she looks to her older sister with a wild look in her eyes.
Moka continues to look down at the ground and says, "I guess I don't have a choice. If I ignore you any longer everyone will just get sucked into another brawl like last time." She suddenly looks up at her little sister and shouts, "So here I am! Let's end this here and now Kokoa!"
"You have no idea how long I've waited for you to say those words!", Kokoa gleefully exclaims as she lifts her hand to the air and her pet bat begins to change shape.
"What's going on?", Kurumu asks as she stares at the bat.
The bat then transforms into a giant warhammer with spikes all over it. "This time you're for real big sis!", Kokoa shouts as she grabs onto her new weapon. The small vampire swings the hammer down at her screaming, "Morning Star!" With that one swing she shatters the ground barely missing Moka. "This is my demon bat Ko's weapon transformation ability! How do you like it!? With this I'll crush your defenses like they were nothing! If you don't want to die you better awaken big sis!", Kokoa shouts as she continues with her attack.
Moka, trying to arm herself, grabs one of the decorations from the nearby tombstones that got smashed, it looks similar to a cross though if you turned it upside down it could be used similar to a sword. Moka however isn't smart enough to turn it around and tries her best to use it to block Kokoa's attacks.
"What's that? You plan to fight me with such a shoddy weapon?", Kokoa asks as she swings at Moka. With one swing Kokoa disarms Moka, launching the cross straight towards me. The thing knocks the cigarette right out of my mouth as it hit me in the face, which causes everyone around me to look at me in horror.
"Reiji!", Yukari shouts as the cross hits the ground and I spit out a bit of blood.
"That little shit I'll..", I begin to say before I realize that Kokoa has the head of her hammer at Moka's head.
"I guess I lost Kokoa. I gave it everything I had.", Moka says with a slight smile on her face.
"Why?", Kokoa asks as she moves the hammer away from Moka's head. We all look at her confused before she shouts, "Why won't you fight me for real big sis!?", then she starts to cry. "Do you even realize how long I've waited for this fight? Our house became so quiet and there were no opponents left for me. Ever since the day you left, have you ever even though about my feelings?!", the redhead barely manages to say through her tears.
Tsukune starts to walk towards her and says, "So it's true, you were lonely because Moka went away." Moka looks to us and smiles before pulling herself off the ground. "You just wanted to feel cared about, am I right? Even hunting down Moka was because you wanted to spend time with her, wasn't it?", Tsukune continues causing Kokoa to look down as if she's lost in thought. "But you don't have to resort to these kind of actions anymore. Now that both of you are at the same school you can see each other as much as you want.", Tsukune finishes as he looks to the small, crying girl with a kind smile.
Moka walks over to Kokoa and says, "Kokoa, is that how it is? I'm sorry, I didn't know when I was giving you a hard time back there." Moka extends her hand out to Kokoa and says, "This is a long awaited family reunion, right? Let's be best friends, okay?"
Kokoa continues to cry a bit more before tightening her grip on her weapon, which causes me to grab a hold of that cross from earlier just in case. Kokoa then replies in a shaky voice, "wrong..." Swinging her hammer around wildly, Kokoa continues her rampage as she shouts, "You're wrong! You still don't get it!"
"I get it then!", I shout as I rush in with the cross in hand. I swing down at her, forcing the young vampire to take the defensive as she holds her hammer up to block my attack. "You just want someone to kick your ass then! Is that it!?", I shout as I continue to strike down at her, but even though she blocks the attacks, the shockwaves from the impacts are strong enough to push her back each time. "Come on Kokoa, show us some of that vampire strength! Are you just this weak?! If that's the case then you might as well give up on trying to beat your sister and head back home!", I shout as I charge at her again.
"Leave me alone!", the helpless girl exclaims as she swings her hammer at me, but I manage to catch it in the middle of the cross.
"Is this the best you can do?", I ask the girl in a disappointed tone as I swing the cross once more, launching the hammer into the air.
She's left dazed by this and I kick her into a nearby tree. With one flick of my wrist, I send the cross flying straight at her neck. Luckily for her I threw it with just enough force to pin her to the tree while not decapitating her. As the hammer comes down I catch it and begin to twirl it around in one hand while walking up to Kokoa.
"Reiji, stop!", Moka pleads, but I want some answers so I keep walking towards her. Moka looks over to Mizore and Kurumu and asks, "Are you not going to stop him?"
"She did hit him in the face with that cross...", Kurumu says as she sits on a nearby tombstone.
"He won't go that far. He wouldn't kill a little girl, right?", Yukari asks as she looks to the others with a slight worried expression on her face.
I swing the hammer at the tree with as much power as my human form will allow, launching the top half of the tree flying across the forest.
With her eyes widened in complete fear, Kokoa is more or less paralyzed in fear. "What is it kid, almost piss yourself? Now next time you hit me, I'm coming at you for real and you better be damn sure you can take a hit like that, got it?", I growl down at the shaking girl as I point the hammer at her.
Sheepishly, she nods her head in response and I pull the cross away from her neck freeing her while throwing her hammer onto the ground.
The prideful vampire get's up and asks, "You think I'm just going to let you get away with that?", before launching the hammer right at me with as much force as she could muster.
I dodge under the weapon with ease, but I suddenly see that it's now heading for Tsukune and Moka.
Before I can do anything else, there's a sudden flash of pink light and we hear someone say, "That was quite the throw, little sister." Moka then throws the hammer back at Kokoa to reveal it's actually Inner Moka, who would've thought? Moka bolts towards the stunned Kokoa and kicks her through a row of trees before she comes to a stop.
Moka looks to Tsukune with a slightly kinder glare before fixing her hair and saying, "You saved me Tsukune. If you were even a second off it would've been all over." Tsukune tries to hand her the rosary, but she puts her hand up and says, "It isn't over yet. She's still a vampire and a kick like that won't be enough to put her down."
Suddenly a giant pillar of monster energy bursts out from the pile of trees where Kokoa was laying and she now seems to be stronger than when I fought her.
"You should have this under control. She's your sister after all.", I say as I walk back over to the others.
Kokoa lets out a terrifying scream that shakes the air around her as she powers up even more.
"Moka's kick wasn't enough? Never mind that, her monster energy is off the charts! It's almost as strong as Moka's!", Kurumu exclaims in complete disbelief.
Moka readies herself for a fight and says, "Come Kokoa, it's been a while since we've last sparred. I'll fight you until you're satisfied."
Suddenly Kokoa stops powering up and says, "Big Sister!"
We all just stand there for a minute, confused by what she meant by 'Big Sister', and she suddenly runs up to Moka before hugging her older sister.
"What is this nonsense!?", Tsukune shouts in confusion as the younger vampire cuddles up with her older sister.
"What are you planning Kokoa? You said you hated me.", Moka asks cautiously as she tries to pry the little sister off.
"I don't hate you, I hate that other dumb Moka. She's nothing compared to you Big Sis!", Kokoa proclaims as she hugs the Inner Moka even more.
After a while of just them hugging Yukari says, "Umm, so Kokoa likes the stronger Moka then? And her constant attacks were to awaken that side of her?"
"In other words it's an 'Inner Moka exclusive' sister complex.", Kurumu adds with a slightly disappointed sigh.
"My my, they're pretty troublesome siblings, aren't they.", Mizore notes as she rubs the back of her head.
"I still say she needs her ass beat.", I growl as I crush the destroyed cigarette from earlier.
"So, when Moka changes back will all this start all over again?", Yukari asks as she looks to Tsukune for an answer.
We all think about it for a moment and later that day, sure enough, it does go back to Kokoa trying to awaken Moka with violence.