Ahhh... well... my internet still sucks so I had to go to McDonalds and upload this... dedication

Remember that if anyone wants to alter the story, just leave a review and I'll try to get it in... and as an added note to the guest 'a fan' I may be adding your suggestion later in the story... during a 'special' instance... but I can't reveal much

P.S... PANCAKES!

Naughtbeast

Chapter 28:

WHY… does… it hurt so much?

Demon groggily awoke from his alcohol-induced sleep and opened his eyes… only to close them after he found the light to be too bright. He tried to get off the couch but only succeeded in rolling off the couch and landing on his face.

"Urrrrrrgggg…." He mumbled, sitting up on the ground but not getting up.

He opened his eyes again and kept them open to adjust to the light, making his eyes water. He saw a spanner next to the couch and picked it up, tossing it at Vanessa and hitting her on the optics, activating her OS.

"What's happening!" she almost screamed as she activated in a flash.

"Ineed…hwelp"

"Are you drunk Sir?"

"Nah… just bee bit tired"

"Sir you are very drunk… my scanners show your blood alcohol levels are far above the recommended levels"

"Dat don't meen notin"

"You are obviously not fit to attend class…"

"Classs… dah shit…" he mumbled as he saw the time… it was already 10 o'clock. He stumbled around the pod collecting his stuff before heading for the door.

"Sir, I highly recommend against this course of action"

"Shatup!"

"No swearing!"

He flipped the bird back before walking out the door and stumbling drunkly to class. It took him some time to get to class with his alcohol-addled mind, but he eventually found the class he was meant to be in, Grimm studies with Professor Port. He opened the door and stumbled in… before stopping. He had just walked into a third-year class and everyone staring at him.

"Ahhh… soryjust got da rong classs"

"Mr Demon?"

"Yeaa?"

"Do I smell alcohol in your breath?" he asked, sniffing the air… even though he was on the other side of the room.

"Nah…"

"Really?"

"Ya… jut gota go now"

Demon quickly backpedaled out of the class and shut the door. He pulled out his schedule and squinted at the table, struggling to see the small writing. He took off his mask to see and found he had History with professor Oobleck. He then realized what he had done and hastily re-attached his helmet, glad that no one had seen. He made his way to the class he was meant to be in, stumbling through the abandoned corridors. He was stopping at about every door, not sure which was his, until he eventually found his way to the one he was meant to be in. He opened the door and everyone had their heads down writing notes furiously while Professor Oobleck seemingly teleported around class. Demon silently tried to get into class but drunkedly managed to kick his foot on the side of a table.

"SHIT!" he complained as he felt as though his toe was broken.

"Mr Demon… why would you be late may I ask?"

"Vel I kinda sleppt in sar"

"Ok then… so why do I smell alcohol?"

"Why da peple keep aksin dat questin? I tried ta hav som coffee and som one spikd da drink!"

"I'm not sure if I believe you..."

Josh piqued up from his work and saw Demon complaining with the Professor. He scanned Demon and found just how drunk he was… more than Tempest on happy hour in the middle of Vegas after receiving his pay check.

"One second Sir, I'll take care of this…" Josh walked down to Demon and pulled out a small needle, trying to inject him with the yellow liquid inside. Demon obviously complained and shouted obscenities while twisting out of Josh's grip. Josh just shook his head before putting his hand in a specific position on Demon's shoulder and applied a bit of pressure… producing an interesting result. Demon whimpered a bit and collapsed to the floor, unable to move. Josh just lent down and injected the liquid into his arm before pressing another point on his shoulder to unlock him. Demon whimpered again before becoming limp on the floor, limbs flayed out on all sides.

"Don't worry, it's just pressure points. He'll wake up in a while and I've sped up his metabolism so that he purges the alcohol in about an hour"

"Why thank you Mr Dakkery" Oobleck acknowledged, using Josh's last name.

"Its Doctor actually… I didn't earn a PHD for nothing you know!"

Oobleck was a bit taken back by this.

"I couldn't have said it better myself, but for what did you earn yours for?"

"Well… I managed to get it after I confirmed that this gauntlet worked" he mentioned, motioning to his gauntlet, the small grey vials flowing around a bit.

"How could that gauntlet commend you for a doctorate?"

"Well… this baby costs around the same amount as 10 Titans and can do things you can't even imagine. It took me about 10 years of research to complete it and I needed military funding by joining the military just because the government wouldn't support it because it was too 'unlikely' to actually work as they didn't really believe in a single 13 year-old completing it"

"YOU WERE 13!" Weiss shouted in disbelief.

"Yea… I was born into a very rich and prestigious family…" He looked down a bit, regreat and anger filling his eyes, facing back up after half a second "It wasn't that hard for them to pull a few strings and get me into medical school early, mostly due to them wanting me to become a doctor. I studied with people 2 to 3 times my age and picked up everything I needed to know about medicine. I finished when I was 15 and my parents immediately forced me to go for a doctorate so I had to come up with something that would actually get me one. Being 13 I didn't really think it through much so I just thought of the most ludicrous idea, being a cool gauntlet that could fix people without anyone needing to do anything… so I petitioned for funding and obviously the government just laughed at a 13 year-old trying to get government funding. I spent the next two years drawing up plans and finding the cheapest way possible to complete the design, but when I finally looked old enough, I joined the military under false papers and began getting money. I got enough for the entirety of the body but the nanobots and sealant chambers were ridiculously expensive to procure… so I had to sell Vanessa to get enough"

"Is that why she's annoyed?" asked Ruby.

"Yeah… one thing I forgot to tell you guys is that Vanessa is a special kind of AI that was developed… something I didn't know at the time. She was specially designed to form deep emotional bonds with her pilot to ensure they performed to 100% of their combat ability and always had a reason to keep fighting. So when I sold her without a second thought after an offer came up for extra-cheap parts… and then forgot about her after building it for a year… turns out that Demon was the one that had exchanged her for the parts… so when we met again on the field… things got hectic"

Demon took this opportunity to wake up right at that moment and hear his last words.

"Meaning he was nearly crushed and half the building he was in got turned to rubble" He blurted out before falling unconscious again.

"So… that is my story" Josh concluded, grabbing Demon and dragging him up the stairs, ensuring that he hit his head on every step, propping him up in a seat next to him.

The rest of the class went pretty ordinarily, with the exception of Nora drawing a mustache and goatee on Demon's mask. He woke up about a minute before class ended and groggily sat up, rubbing his neck as he did, before noticing the mustache in his field of vision and wiping it off.

"Did you have to use that pressure point?" he asked, still massaging the point that was utilized by Josh.

"You were drunk… and it's revenge for not giving me access to the armoury"

"That was literally a month ago!"

"I hold grudges…" he explained before turning his attention back to Oobleck who was finishing up the lesson.

"And that is how 300 faunus warriors were able to hold off an advancing army of thousands to protect their city!" The bell rang to interrupt his speech "and now time is up, so I bit you all adieu and remember to complete pages 435-45 for next lesson!" he mentioned before speeding out of class at the speed of light.

Demon groggily got up, still rubbing the back of his head, until he met the very much annoyed eyes of Yang.

"You… were drunk…" she said, a hard look on her face.

"Yes I was… and your point is?"

"You did it without me?" she said, obviously annoyed.

"Don't worry… I still got a couple of bottles left" Demon assured her, Yang smiling at this.

"YANG! No drinking!" Ruby scolded, slapping her sister on the wrist.

"Oh come on! Just one?"

"NO!"

"Dammit!"

Demon whispered into her ear "Don't worry, just stop by and grab one, it's under the workbench"

"Ummm guys? Lunch is going to be over in about 10 minutes and I have a feeling that this talk could go on forever…" Blake deadpanned.

"PANCAKES!" Nora happily shouted, grabbing onto Ren's arm and dragging him off to the dining area.

"Nora it is lunch… pancakes aren't on offer"

Nora didn't seem to notice and continued to pull him out of the door. Everyone just laughed and walked off after them. Demon had to stay back a bit after Miss Goodwich found out he had been drunk on campus and gave him a solid 5-minute speech on why he shouldn't do it. He made it there and found everyone was already thoroughly through having lunch. They were all sitting at the usual table, with Nora telling another one of her ridiculous stories. He made it to the serving station and rung the bell a few times as no one was at the counter. The usual, chip server came up and gave him a warm smile.

"Well hello young man, quite the show you've caused over the past couple of weeks"

"Sorry about the window by the way…" Demon mentioned, remembering that he never actually paid for the window he broke.

"It's fine, I don't even have to pay for it. So what do you feel like for lunch?"

"Umm… anything really" that caused the woman to smile and she held up her finger, signalling for him to wait, as she headed out the back. About a minute later she walked out with a massive plate of pancakes.

"We keep spares for every time that Nora manages to make it in here before everyone else…" she reasoned, explaining how she was able to get it done so fast.

"Ha, I can see why you'd need them…" he added before taking the plate and giving her one final smile and walking over to the others. He managed to get about 50 metres away from them before Nora began sniffing the air vigorously. In a few seconds, her eyes instantly turned to Demon, her head turning at an unnatural angle and making her look like she was possessed.

"PANCAKES!" she shouted before running at him with her mouth drooling.

"NO!" he quickly shouted as he sprinted away from her to the back of the dining hall. When he realised he was cornered, he turned to see Nora with an evil grin on her face.

"Hand over the pancakes and no legs will be broken…" she reasoned, cracking her knuckles as she did.

"Ummm… how about no!"

Demon carefully held his tray and ran up the wall with his parkour-kit before latching onto the wall with the small gravity hooks in his gauntlets. He smiled at Nora who was pouting on the ground, looking at him with a face of… betrayal? Demon pulled out his grappling hook and stabbed it into the wall so he had both hands free and began eating his pancakes, one arm holding the tray while the other lifted his helmet up to eat the food.

Nora never moved from her spot and continuously eyed him as he ate. He made it to the last one and stopped just as he was about to eat it…

She'll probably break my legs if I don't do this…

He chucked the last pancake down and she happily gulped it down, jumped to bit it like a dog. He just laughed and un-latched from the wall, dropping to the ground and not even making a sound. He walked back and put the tray back at the serving desk before moving to the next class, Combat class with Miss Goodwich. He saw that everyone was already inside so he quickly made his way in, earning a glare from Miss Goodwich.

"Mr Demon… why do you continuously disappoint me?" she deadpanned, looking down at her scroll and tapping a few buttons.

"Ummm… no offense but I hate time constraints and authority… the last guy who was my boss kinda tried to kill me"

"I see…" she replied, obviously not caring at all.

"Now, the Vytal festival is in a few weeks and we need to complete the qualifying rounds, so for this week we are going to be running a tournament style competition that will determine which teams will be accepted into the festival. You will all be matched to someone that has been deemed at the same level as you so you will have to rely on skill alone to come out on top. Today we will only have time for 3 battles so let's get started"

Miss Goodwich pressed a button on her scroll and the image on the screen began spinning. It eventually stopped on a picture on the entirety of team CDNL. The second spinner began and when it landed, everyone was confused… it only showed Demon.

"Would team CDNL and Demon make their way to the lockers and prepare for battle"

Demon nodded while CDNL went up to Miss Goodwich and instantly began complaining. After receiving an iron-cold stare for a minute they gave up and went off to get prepared. Demon was already half-way through preparing and was polishing his gun and cleaning the slide to ensure it didn't jam. He was just mining his own business until Cardin walked right up to him and kicked him in the knee.

"What's your problem?" asked Demon, shrugging off the hostility.

"You're going to lose you know?" Cardin taunted.

"Nope… you're going to end up crying for your mother before the end of the battle" Demon deadpanned, still not even bothering to look up from cleaning his weapon.

"And you're going to be sitting in a puddle of your own tears you dimwit"

"OOhhh, look out everyone! Cardin's using big words now!"

He heard a few snickers from the rest of CDNL but that was silenced when Cardin sent a hard look their way.

"You're going to die punk!" threatened Cardin before heading back to get ready.

Demon just laughed in a demonic fashion as he walked away.

"Don't worry… someone is going to die by the end of it"

He made it to the arena and took up his position on the left side of the arena. He took off his odachi/chaingun weapon and loaded in a belt of ice-dust rounds. He had altered the firing mechanism, with a bit of help from Ruby, so that the chaingun could chamber small rounds with an increased firing rate while still being able to fire his signature 50. Cal AP explosive rounds. He put the gun on the ground and began a system diagnosis of his armour, remembering that it had been some time since he had properly used the enhancement he had added.

"Initiate self-system checks, code Beta"

"Initiating system check… please wait" chimed the AI that he had installed in his helmet.

The system showed a progress bar on his helmet, blocking most of his line of vision. Once it reached 100% it came up with the working capacity of his systems. Most of everything was slightly above 75% efficiency with the only thing at 100% was his armour integrity. He shook his head in disapproval before initiating the repair of the systems. A small grey haze emanated from the centre of his back and spread around to the different system areas, restoring them to full efficiency. Once he was done testing, he pulled out his pistol and tested the shields by firing a few shots, small, blue hexagons stopping them before they hit, but decreased the shields by half. He was waiting for even more time, wondering where team CDNL was and looked over to Miss Goodwich in question, only receiving a shrug in response. They finally came out with scowls on their faces and set up in a defensive formation on the opposite side of the arena.

"Are all combatants ready?" asked Miss Goodwich, receiving a nod from Demon and a shout from Cardin. "Ok… Begin!" she announced, backing out of the arena as it began.

Demon immediately began firing his chaingun, hoping to slow them down. They were smart about it and split off to avoid his fire. Cardin and Dove were heading left while Sky and Russel were heading right. He aimed for the right group and Russel somehow managed to block some of his bullets with his dual knives, although he instantly regretted the decision as shard of ice began crystallising on his blades. Demon focused fire on him and in a few seconds his arms and chest were covered in ice, keeping him essentially out of the battle. Once that was done, he heard a small whistling sound and jumped to the side, narrowly avoiding an overhead mace blow from Cardin. This action sent him closer to Sky who tried to hit him with a horizontal slash with his massive halberd. Demon jumped over the blade and kicked out with his legs and set the boy back a few paces from the strength of the blow. Demon quickly recovered and pulled out his odachi and putting the sheath on his back.

Dove charged at him with sword raised and began taking slashes at the pilot. Demon narrowly blocked the strikes most of the time until something he didn't expect happened. He failed to notice a gun barrel that ran through the middle of the weapon. Dove fired a couple of times and the shots flared his shields, draining them significantly. Dove was shocked a bit by this and didn't follow up from the shock, something which Demon instantly took advantage of this and swung out with odachi, channeling his aura into it and setting it on fire as he did. Dove tried to block but was hit on the full and sent flying into Russel, knocking them both back. Before he had a chance for a pause, Cardin came in with another swing with his mace, although he was still a fair way away from Demon.

Cardin slammed the mace into the ground, producing a wave of explosions that headed in a line towards Demon. Said pilot didn't have any time to react and tried to jump away, being hit with the shockwaves and being sent a few metres away from where he was. Demon quickly jumped up and blocked an overhead swipe by Sky that was sent his way, parrying it and jabbing him in the gut with the hilt of his blade. Sky recoiled and Demon swung round with his flaming odachi and sliced him multiple times in the gut, cutting down his aura by a significant margin. Before he could finish it off, Cardin came in and managed to hit him in the back while he was distracted. The blow slammed him into the floor and his shields instantly broke underneath the stress and about 10% of his aura went down as well. Demon rolled out of the way as Cardin went in for another strike and barely avoided another strike from Sky. Demon dropped his odachi and grabbed Sky's halberd and wrenched it from his grip, swinging it around and taking out Cardin's legs while knocking him to the floor. Demon threw the halberd to the other side of the arena and picked up his odachi, quickly focusing on the weaponless Sky. He kicked out with his leg, barely managing to be blocked by both of his forearms, Demon following up with another kick to his chest with his other leg and sending him to the other side of the arena.

"Sky Lark is out of the fight" Miss Goodwich commented, tapping a button and causing a large cross to appear over the boy's name.

Demon smiled and put his odachi back in its sheath, cracking his knuckles afterwards. He heard gunshots and saw that Dove was back up and firing with his sword. Demon activated the vortex shield and caught some other the shots, most of them getting to his aura, but sent at Cardin who was running at him in rage. Cardin got distracted for a while so when he swung at Demon, said pilot stuck out his leg and tripped up Cardin, sending him sprawling to the floor. Russel charged at him and began attacking with his duel knives… although it didn't really do much. His armour was practically invulnerable to the attacks and the boy didn't really seem to be aiming for his weak points so Demon just stood there, letting the attacks hit and slide off his armour. When Russel was finally finished with his flared attack and jumped back to assess how much damage he had done… which was nothing.

"This… is why you wear full-body armour" Demon lectured, before jumping towards Russel.

The boy held up his daggers in defence… and found them to be suddenly grabbed. Demon had gripped both of them by the blades and wretched them from his grip, sending them flying next to Sky's halberd. Russel just gave up and held up his hands weakly in defeat, a smile meekly crossing his face asking for mercy. Demon obliged and let him get off unharmed, gesturing to the side of the stage… his fight was with Cardin.

"Russel Thrush has surrendered and is now out of the fight"

Demon turned to see Cardin and Dove standing next to one another again, an angry look on their faces.

Hmm… Kalazar? You there?

"As always I can hear you…"

Good… I was wondering if you want to join in the fight a bit

"Is that really the question to ask? Do I get to kill them?"

No, but you can have as much fun as you can… and make sure to scare the crap out of Cardin

"With pleasure…"

Demon's vision became hazy and no one noticed how his shadow had somehow grown to look like something that resembled a monster, the shadow being slightly obscured by the dimmed lighting. Kalazar smiled as he saw two weak mortals standing in front of him.

"Hmmm… fresh meat to play with…" he spoke through Demon's mouth, his words sounding dark and demonic.

Both the boys faces flushed with a tiny bit of fear before Cardin swung his mace in a war cry, hitting Dove as he did, and charged at Demon. Kalazar just stood there with a smile, wondering how much fun he could have. When Cardin swung, Kalazar just responded by reaching out and grabbing the mace by the head, stopping the strike completely. Everyone in the audience were completely shocked, not even Yang could block a hit from Cardin without needing to activate her semblance. Kalazar began crushing the mace in his hand, causing the metal to begin wailing in pain as it began to crumple. Cardin panicked and punched out with his fist, hitting Demon in the nuts… which did absolutely nothing. Kalazar laughed at his attempt, filling the room with a dark, bass cacophony of mockery.

"Ha, ha, ha… you really think that would do anything… I don't feel pain anymore… but you will"

Kalazar ripped the mace out from his grip and threw it full-pelt at Dove who had no time to dodge, and as a result he was slammed into the wall of the arena, creating a small crater. Cardin backed up a bit, looking positively terrified, as Kalazar was just eyeing him off like a hunter would to a lonely beowolf. Kalazar finally decided on how he should humiliate this boy and unsheathed his odachi, the blade now covered in a sickly red haze as Kalazar channelled his aura into the blade. He stood there for a second before running forward at speeds that would rival Ruby. His odachi continuously slashed, becoming a blazing red blur as the blade made contact with Cardin, although those who were watching his aura gauge would have noticed it never actually went down. When Kalazar was finished with his work, he jumped back and sheathed his odachi. Once Cardin opened his eyes and checked his aura… which was the same as it was before his attack.

"You missed dumbass" he taunted, a smile growing on his face.

Kalazar responded by stomping the ground… and causing something that Cardin hated… a lot. All the straps of his armour were cut, so the armour pieces fell off, his belt was cut, so his pants fell down revealing white underpants with hearts on them, and his shirt was cut into shreds. He desperately tried to cover his pants as everyone in the audience erupted into laughter, turning Cardin's face red.

"You're going to pay fo…"

His sentence was cut short as Kalazar dashed forward and placed the blade of the odachi at his throat, silencing him instantly. The red hue seemed to leech from Cardin and glowed brighter as it edged closer.

"You have no power anymore… you will not harm, mock or injure anyone in any way or I will ensure that you will be subjected to a fate worse than death…"

His words were met with silence as Cardin hesitantly shook his head.

"Good…" Kalazar spoke "Besides… killing and hurting things is my job"

Kalazar then looked up to the audience and saw hundreds of faces of happiness and joy coming from the audience at the sight of the bully getting humiliated.

"Hmmm… this feels wrong… I don't like it…" Kalazar spoke to himself before slowly beginning to let Demon take back control. After Demon regained consciousness again, he looked around to see Cardin in his underpants and his face red with anger and embarrassment. He walked off the stage and received several pats on the back from everyone.

"That was awesome!" Ruby commented, a massive grin sprawled over her face.

"How'd you do that?" Yang asked, still a bit confused at how he managed to grab the mace.

"My little secret" he riddled, smiling a bit behind his mask.

"Don't worry, I'll get it out of you while we play truth or dare tonight while we're drunk"

He looked over to Rosaline and saw a small blush on her face.

"Sorry Yang but I have other arrangements tonight"

"OOOHhh… what you doing?" she asked, a scandalous smile crossing her face.

"Just going to get coffee with someone"

"OOOH! DEMONS GOT A DATE!" she screamed out loud, drawing the attention of everyone in the room. Demon just sighed and punched her in the gut, stopping her from saying anything else.

"Yes I do… now if you don't stop then I'll tell everyone about your little fiasco tonight as well…"

Her eyes went wide and she grabbed him by the neck.

"How do you know?" she asked, growling a bit as she did.

"It's surprising what you learn when you're out for a casual night walk while cloaked… sometimes you pick up on some bits of conversation that people might not want you to hear" He explained, smiling under his mask.

"Tell anyone and you're dead…" she threatened.

"Well it might be a bit late for that considering everyone is listening in on this conversation" Demon mentioned, motioning to everyone who was crowding around them and listening, the crowd dispersing after Yang gave them a look that would put Weiss' death stare to shame. She put Demon down and composed herself.

"Ok… just make sure you don't interrupt ok?"

"Sure…" Demon agreed, promising to make sure to piss her off by interrupting.

Demon walked over to where Rosaline was and tapped her on the shoulder, getting her attention.

"So… need help with your homework?"

"That would be nice thanks…" she replied, smiling at his request.

Ahhh… the chance to actually live life…