Chapter 25: The Demon's School

And so the real story begins. I'll still be skipping around a bit, mostly over things that happen the same, but hopefully this is a good start to show that I'm not just going to rewrite the arc 90% the same with only Satan's snarky commentary as the main difference.

On the day they were due to leave for True Cross Academy, Shiro gave them a parting gift. Well, he actually gave them several (up to and including the sword that held Satan's powers, seals refreshed for all the good that would do), but this one was the only one Satan cared about. It was something he had craved and coveted for over a decade but hadn't been able to find even with the help of the internet's vast resources. He had given up any hope of finding it for the time being, only to have the damn priest drop it in his lap as if it were something simple. The only reason he wasn't holding it jealously to his chest was because Yukio needed to see it more than he did.

It was a picture of Yuri.

It wasn't a very good picture, slightly grainy and blurry with both age and the cheap film, off-centered and tilted a bit to the left. But it was still a picture of her, smiling daintily for whoever had taken what must have been a test picture. She was exactly as he remembered, with her wavy hair and big blue eyes.

"You have eyes just like her…" Satan muttered softly, barely restraining himself from brushing his hand over Yukio's face and tracing his moles, his nose, the tips of his ears, everything that was so much like Yuri. With her image before him, he could remember that cursed night, could remember his rage, but it had dried and washed away like blood.

"Rin…?" Yukio asked curiously, glancing over his shoulder where his twin stood, and Satan realized just how wistful he must sound.

He embraced the 'now' and poked Yukio's cheek, "Look, you have moles just like her!"

"Stop that Rin."

"But look, you even have the same number! One, two, three…" Satan listed, punctuating with a light tap only to fall short. He grabbed Yukio's face and started to examine it curiously, "Huh, I forget, do you have another one hidden under your hair?"

A hand sharply grabbed his hair and yanked him back Yukio could properly glair at him, "Your breath stinks, back up."

"Ahem." Shiro interrupted Rin's overdramatic whine, "As entertaining as this is, I do have something important to tell you both. You shouldn't show this to anyone else. In fact, I should have destroyed the entire camera when I found it, but I decided not to."

"They want to scrub her from history, don't they?" Satan filled in. It would explain why he couldn't even find a candid photo of her online, because the Exorcists had gotten rid off them all. He couldn't even be sure that they had kept a copy for their master records, though he had had plans to search once he got free access. And if they were hidden away, well, he had always been good at sniffing out things that others tried to keep away from him.

"Yes, that's pretty much correct. It makes things easier for you two in the long run, but I think you two should at least know what she looked like."

Shiro, for all his supposed openness, still refused to tell he and Yukio the details of that wretched night, Satan noted. They had been told about the Blue Night, and Yukio was smart enough that Satan was sure he had at least put together part of the story even if he was keeping his thoughts to himself for now, but the shitty priest wasn't quite ready to confess that he had a direct hand in trying to murder Yukio's mother.

He probably wouldn't ever be, even as he raised her cursed children.

Satan wasn't ready to tell Yukio that story either because, no matter how much he hated it, Yukio cared for the shitty priest, and surely such a revelation would destroy him. He still wanted to tear down the shitty priest and have him confess his sins, have him admit that Yuri was both right and all that was righteous but…But it was different now. It was a different kind of hurting, a differing kind of revenge that ended with an apology and not a casket.

Satan knew he was going soft, but he didn't care.

Instead, he cared much more about the things he could have and change now. "Do you have the camera? I want it."

Shiro stared at him for a long moment, "Really? The camera doesn't even work anymore, and I've already developed all the pictures."

"I still want it. It was something she held."

And that was how Satan's most prized possession became an old, off-brand camera from the 90s.

Later that day, when the boys had reached True Cross Academy without incident and he had received plenty of reassuring texts from Yukio (and one brief one from Rin Yukio had clearly bullied him into sending), Shiro took out yet another picture. He had seen a lot over the past week as Rin had sorted through his excessive number of albums in order to find the ones he would take. He had obviously taken all of the ones from Yuri's camera, no matter how generic they were. All of them, except the one Shiro hadn't shown the boys.

It was a simple picture that had been near the beginning of the film that Yuri had taken of herself by accident- or at least, that's what anyone else would assume. Yuri was staring hard at the camera with obvious unimpressed confusion as she held it, a frown pulling at her lips and her pupils dyed red from the flash of the camera. That's how anyone else would see it, and maybe Shiro was just paranoid, maybe it was just the old film, but he swore her eyes looked a big jagged and distorted. A bit too blue.

Other than that, there was nothing remarkable about the picture. It was mundane, taken as a mistake, and nestled between pictures of both people and scenery. A mistake.

"He really isn't what you think he is."

A mistake indeed.

Satan hadn't been at True Cross Academy for more than a couple of hours before he realized he was being stared at.

Oh sure, he knew he had always had some admirers, but said admirers also knew of his reputation, and knew to keep away. Plenty of boys would try and talk themselves up, but they hardly knew what it meant to be an adult, much less a man, and so they fell behind him if they ever tried to follow. Some girls might gush about 'bad boys' but the moment they met one that wasn't all talk and teenage bluster, they fled. Which was good for Satan, because he really wasn't interested in being hit on by girls his youngest son's age. That was weirdly pedophilic, and Satan had a tendency to react violently murderous to those people. Yuri had at least been nearly twenty.

So yes, Satan knew when he was being watched by curious children who held a bit more than a passing interest in him. He just wasn't entirely sure how they already knew he was different since the opening ceremony had barely ended. Sure, Yukio, the first-year representative that he was, was getting plenty of attention in general, but Satan was nothing more than the genius' average brother. He didn't look that interesting since fighting the dress code was more trouble than it was worth (though his hair was getting a bit long again) and hadn't made any real waves. Not that he was planning to- Yukio had made him promise to "be good" and not pick any fights. He had managed to get Yukio to agree to spar more in exchange, so he was perfectly fine with the trade.

It took a few minutes and a few false leads, but he realized that the attention wasn't on him, but a tiny slip of a boy with black hair and blue-green eyes trailing behind him. For some reason people were fascinated by the unremarkable boy, probably because he was clearly trying to muster the courage to approach him like some girl and her crush.

Satan didn't give a flying shit about the gays despite what the church might try and say, but he really didn't want to deal with a confession on his first day.

It was best to just get it over with.

He whirled around too fast for the boy to escape into the crowd around them again and raised a brow, "What do you want?"

The boy froze like a mouse before a predator despite being noticeably taller than Satan's current body. He looked actually terrified, like he was afraid Satan was going to rip him apart, which, while flattering, was a bit annoying when he wasn't even trying to be intimidating. Hell, if he tried to actually pressure the boy then he might actually pass out!

"Well? I have to go meet up with my brother soon."

That seemed to snap the boy out of it. He swallowed, and Satan braced himself with a mental sigh, "I'm…My name is Minoru Tanaka, Rin, sir!"

Oh great, he had a stalker since he knew for a fact that he hadn't given his name yet. "Oh? And how the hell do you know my name?"

The boy, Minoru, tensed, "We've…met before once before. It was a long time ago and it was very brief, and you were…b-busy 'handing' some bad people," Minoru strutted, shivering for some reason Satan couldn't fathom unless he got queasy at a couple of punches, "And I was just hoping that you would…remember me. But I guess not…"

Satan actually had a very good memory, but he had learned to be selective about what he did and didn't remember. One thing he did remember was at least the face of every people who had ever started a fight with him who he had a feeling would be a repeat offender and give him trouble later down the line. He also tended to remember who he may have protected intentionally or otherwise so he knew who he could later cash in favors with. And Minoru wasn't ringing a single bell.

"I can't say I remember you at all." Satan said and internally winced as he saw the boy visibly wilt at that. He looked too much like a younger Yukio when he did that, "Look, whatever shithead bully's head I was kicking in," Satan drawled as if he were bored, though he didn't miss how Minoru shivered yet again. The kid just could not handle any violence, yeesh! It wasn't like he actually murdered petty playground bullies, "just know, you don't 'owe me' or anything. I didn't do it for you."

"I know that, just…" Minoru took a deep breath and bowed, "Thank you very much for saving me!"

Minoru ran away before Satan could even say anything, which was probably for the best. He really didn't know how to handle other kids misinterpreting his actions and pretending that he did the things because of them. Minoru was hardly the first kid to do such a thing, but it hadn't happened in a while.

"'Saving me', huh? That's a bit overdramatic."

What a weird kid.

"I would love to join you two on your first day in cram school, but alas, I have more important matters to attend to! Just use that key in any door!"

And that was how Samael essentially abandoned Satan and Yukio in the middle of True Cross Academy with nothing but two keys and vague directions, disappearing in a flourish of pink smoke. Satan refused to sigh and instead investigated his key and wondered just how san Samael even was to be passing around artifacts like this like cheap party favors. He could practically smell the magic coming off it and it was a wonder it didn't explode like a bomb in his hands!

Yukio sighed at Rin as he held the key at arm's length, looking at it like it would come alive and bite him, "Come on, Rin, or we'll be late."

"Fine, fine…" Satan huffed, finally determining that the key's magic was perfectly inert unless something drastic happened. He sharply whistled, "Come on, Kuro."

"Ok, Rin!"

Yukio unlocked the door to what looked like a random storage closet and blinked at the change in scenery. It wasn't like he had doubted Mephisto, but it was something else to see how the keys worked for himself. No wonder Shiro could do missions and still be back in time for dinner. "You still have that special permission form for Kuro, right?"

"Right here." Satan assured, holding the door open for said Cat Sídhe and lightly nudging the small demon when he started to get distracted (again), "But what we should really be worrying about is that…uh, Mephisto didn't even tell us what classroom we have."

"Don't worry, I checked and it's 1106. Come on, we don't want to be late."

Despite the long hallways they arrived at the door they needed quickly- the key had to be programed to drop them off near there then. Satan would have to make sure of that later and see if they would exit out the same door they came in or not. Otherwise, things might become difficult for them.

The hallways were impressive and overly grandiose with stupidly high ceilings that would be perfect to hide it if needed, but the classroom itself was…less so. The room looked like it had been hastily cleaned and was, well… "Man, it sure is empty here. There's…" Satan did a quick head-count: two girls who were sticking together, a group of three guys, and one freak with a hand puppet sitting all alone. "only six other people here."

Yukio stepped forward, "Hello there, my name is Yukio Okumura- Yukio is fine. This is my brother, Rin. I hope we can all worth together this year."

The small bubbles of conversations screeched to a halt as Yukio stood there, forced smile twitching a bit as the occupants stared at him. They had all clearly formed their own social groups already, but Yukio had thrown a wrench into that. After all, if they were to be working together to fight demons, then they had to at least know each other's names and get along well enough that no one would just let someone else die. It was that mindset and initiative that had let Yukio become top of his class when others would have backed off after all.

Finally, one of the girls, nervous looking and with brown hair, stood up, "Um, I'm Noriko Paku, please call me Paku. It's good to meet you too, Yukio."

Earnest, but Satan could already tell she was weak. Physical strength didn't matter nearly as much as mental fortitude, and this girl clearly lacked both, even if she seemed fairly nice.

The girl next to her rolled her eyes and didn't bother to stand up, "I'm Izumo Kamiki. Hi, I guess."

Satan instantly knew that that girl was going to be difficult to deal with. There was something wrong with her, yeah, but like hell he was going to let her potentially get Yukio hurt just because she was in the middle of some shitty teenage angst. He seriously doubted that she had any serious problems in her life and was just being a brat because she could.

One of the three guys perked up- the one with oddly pink hair, "Hey there, I'm Renzo Shima, call me whatever you want! By the way, I love what you've done with your hair, Rin."

Satan blinked and looked at his hair to notice the slight blue tinge that had crept into with him noticing. And not 'blue in certain lights' but actually a very dark blue just a shade too bright to truly be black anymore. Well, that couldn't be a good sign and it was surely going to get worse as it lightened more and more to reflect his demonic self. "Thanks, I wanted to try something, but nothing super crazy just yet. I might change it later." He might as well cover his bases for the future in case he woke up an albino.

"It's probably a good idea to be cautious like that. I wanted red but the dye failed, and I ended up getting pink. But I kind of like it, so I've kept it that way ever since."

The boy with the dyed hair spoke up with a grunt, "I'm Ryuji Suguro"

"K-Konekomaru Miwa." The short boy (who had shaved his head for some reason) stuttered out, not wanting to be the odd one out.

Satan didn't bother evaluating the other two boys other than generic statements like "tough-guy" and "small, nervous" because Renzo was a bit off. It wasn't anything major, but the boy felt fake in a way. Nothing that really set Satan's instincts off, but just enough he could tell that he had an ill-fitting mask in place. Fakes were good at spotting fakes, so he would have to be a bit more careful around him.

"And you? Excuse me, what's your name?"

Oh, it looked like Yukio was trying to get the loner with the puppet to speak up, to no avail. Now that was a boy who set off something deep inside Satan. Satan was bad at gauging other's general abilities beyond if he could take them in a fight or not (the answer would, without fail, become yes if enough time passed) but even he could tell that that boy was powerful, too powerful to be in a classroom like this. The other humans wouldn't be able to tell, but the boy smelled too strongly of mid and higher demons to not dabble with them regularly. Satan would bet that he was here on Mephisto's orders, probably to watch 'Rin'. He would watch him, but it was unlikely the boy would do anything for a while, if ever.

In the meantime, he watched as Yukio tried to get the stoic boy to respond.

"Excuse me, but-"

"Don't you get that if someone's silent they don't want to talk to you, or are you just too stupid understand?" The puppet on the boy's hand snapped.

Alright, all bets were off now, "Hey, you trying to start something, asshole?"

"Easy, Rin." Yukio reassured, one strong hand on his shoulder and the other petting Kuro (who had jumped on the table) to calm him as well, "If he doesn't want to interact, then we can't force him."

"Whatever." Satan grumbled and scooped Kuro up to follow Yukio to a desk in the front row. He really hated being in the front, but he didn't have much choice if he wanted to plant himself firmly between the weirdo probably-a-spy's direct line of sight and Yukio.

The twin-tailed girl, Izumo, stared at him strangely, "Isn't that a Cat Sídhe?"

Satan lazily waved the paperwork given to him earlier, "Yeah, but he's mine. I have a form for him and everything."

"But why-?"

Yukio coughed and made a point of blocking Kuro from Izumo's sight, "Wasn't class supposed to start before now?"

"Yeah, we were!" Renzo piped up from across the room, "And aren't we allowed to leave if the teacher doesn't show up or something?"

Satan groaned, "That's only a stupid and shitty rumor. Trust me, I've tried."

"You sure do swear a lot…" The pink haired boy muttered with a small laugh.

"If you have a problem with how much Rin swears, you should do your best to make peace with it now." Yukio explained with clinical detachment, "Trying to get him to stop is hopeless, like a lot of things are with him."

"When the hell did you get so mean, Yukio?!"

"See?"

Renzo really did laugh at that, "Oh no, it's fine, really! If I had an issue with that, I wouldn't hang out with Bon."

"The hell does that mean?"

"See?"

Before things could escalate anymore the door to the classroom slammed open. In rushed an older Exorcist with ridiculous sideburns, arms filled with supplies that he barely managed to set on the table before they could tumble out of his hands. Yukio made a gesture to help, but Satan stopped him. It was one thing to take the initiative to try and make everyone get to know each other, but he would lose any respect others might have if he looked like a teacher's pet, never mind how ridiculous that mindset was.

The man spoke up after he had collected himself, "Hello there, my good students, my name is Kaoru Tsubaki- You all may refer to me as Mr. Tsubaki! Sorry for being tardy, I had other things to attend to first, but…"

The door, never properly closed, drifted open again, and yet another person appeared, poking their head into the room.

Satan did not expect to recognize this person. In fact, he didn't know what the actual fuck Amaimon was doing in an Exorcist stronghold. His hand drifted to one of his concealed knives and he tensed, ready to spring at a moment's notice. Hell, he might have to break the seal on the sword he was now very glad he had been nagged into not leaving in his new dorm room if things got bad.

Amaimon, oblivious as always, shouldered his way into the room. His arms, as well, were filled dangerously high with heavy-looking metal equipment and boxes. "I'm here with the stuff you wanted…Oh. This is…the wrong room, isn't it?"

A hand reached out from the hallway and carelessly yanked the Demon King back. Amaimon let it happen, though for a second his eyes met Satan's curiously, and with obvious purpose. There was no sudden recognition, no exchanged thoughts through that look alone or anything, but Satan knew that he had just been evaluated. Sized-up, and probably for a future fight knowing Amaimon's violent tendencies.

A scruffy looking man wearing an off-brand safari hat stuck his head in with a laugh, "Sorry for that folks, please excuse my companion here, he's a bit…ah, you know…"

"I'm a bit like what?"

"I think I'll omit the rest for now, haha!"

The man ducked back into the hallway, taking care to close the door properly. Satan waited, but no sounds of violent murder echoed from the hallway, so either that human actually could handle Amaimon or he was satisfied with his trip for now.

Not for the first time, Satan wondered just how stupid Amaimon actually was.

"Ahem," The teacher began, trying to regain control of his class, "now if we could get started?"

"Hold it, hold it!" The punk, Ryuji something, shouted, standing up sharply, "Wasn't that Arc Knight Lewin Light? What's he doing here?"

Lewin Light, what kind of unfitting name for such a shady looking man was that? Well, at least him being an Arc Knight explained why Amaimon hadn't broken his spine yet, even if he hadn't gotten the memo that said Demon King had officially joined the Exorcists with Samael.

Kaoru tried to explain as quickly as possible, "He's been designated handler of Amaimon, who is who you saw with him. Now, I'm sure you all have a lot of questions…"

"That was the Demon King Amaimon? I hear he's supposed to be super strong, but he really didn't look it."

"I still can't believe that they've decided to trust yet another Demon King…"

"Isn't it obvious?" Izumo sneered from the back, interrupting the surge of whispers before it could even properly begin to swell, "Things are clearly way worse than they want to let us know because they think that that will scare us off. Like I'm that weak! I know what I'm getting myself into! The fact that the schedule for this year is a lot more intense should have been enough of a hint anyway."

"I know all of you have a lot of questions, but as Ms. Kamiki pointed out, our schedule is much more intensive this year! So, we should get started now, shouldn't we?" Kaoru said, waiting to see if anyone would raise any more objections. "Good, good. Now, who here hasn't received a Temptaint?"

Satan stopped paying attention after sans taking note of which humans had been foolish enough to try and fight demons without even seeing them before. Instead, he ignored the gasps at the revelation that there were goblins in the room (he had felt them in the shadows, but they were tiny and weak and not worth his time) to instead try and digest all that he had learned in the past few minutes. Amaimon was openly working with the Exorcists which meant that big things had to be happening to force that of all things. It probably had something to do with Gehenna destabilizing, though he couldn't be entirely sure until he was actually given more information. There was also the fact that-

There was a goblin on his desk, no bigger than his hand, and it was clearly eyeing the way his hand idly twirled his pencil. He rolled his eyes even as someone gasped at how close it was to him and flicked its nose without a care for how wild the animal blood was driving it. It hissed angrily at him and so Satan growled back, easily catching the hand that made to swipe at him.

"Hey, stop that."

It hissed at him and tried to bit him. Annoyed, Satan jabbed his pencil into its mouth and let it stumble away and gag.

"Rin, can I eat it?" Kuro asked, looking hopefully up from the floor.

The goblin hissed again and, fed up, Satan snatched it off the desk, grabbing it by its back and rendering it helpless. It flailed for a few seconds before giving up and going limp. Happy that it had finally calmed down, Satan set it down on the floor. "Kuro, don't eat it or something. It'll give you a stomach ache if you do."

"Aww…"

He nudged the goblin with his foot until it got the message and tottered back to wherever it had come. Honestly, he didn't care much if it lived or died, and if it attacked Yukio then he would have shredded it on the spot. But it had been purposely driven into a blood frenzy by the Exorcist, so it left a bad taste in his mouth to kill something that was basically a victim.

"Wow…"

It looked like he had an audience, with every single person in the classroom (including the puppet boy) watching him with wide eyes. What were they so impressed with, it wasn't like goblins were even that dangerous! They were naturally pretty docile, so if you just held them down for a bit they would calm from even a forced bloodlust! Seriously, it wasn't any different than handling an animal! Even the teacher looked surprised, and he should know damn well that most demons tried to avoid humans!

"What? Goblins aren't that aggressive, and you're the one who made them frenzy, Mr. Teacher."