Cid breathed out slowly as he looked out the window of his dorm room. Stretching his arms high above his head before beginning to button up the shirt of his school uniform. The uniform of the mighty, and prestigious, Midgar Royal Spellsword Academy.
He'd been attending for three weeks at this stage, and he'd learned a couple things in that time. One, while they knew far more than his parents about the usage of magic and sword techniques, it was still woefully inadequate. Two, he doubted there was a greater collection of side-characters in this entire world than the one found in the Academy. And three, if the girls didn't all have greatly important jobs to be completing all over the continent, he knew that they would have found a way into the school as well.
Luckily for him and his sanity, though, they did. So, he didn't have to worry about that.
It also allowed him to, for the first time ever, make some friends completely unrelated to Shadow Garden or the Cult of Diablos; Po and Skel. Specifically, Po Tato and Skel Etal, two S+ grade background characters that Cid, at this stage, genuinely believed made him into an incomprehensible shadow just by being around them.
Once upon a time, in another world, Cid may have chosen to become friends with them specifically because a background character was meant to be friends with other background characters. However, in this world, knowing what he did about the Cult of Diablos, Cid had different, but no less selfish, motives for becoming friends with them. In this world he needed to make absolutely certain that he remained a secret from the Cult, though with Alpha acting as the stand-in leader of Shadow Garden and the sheer, unrelenting aggressiveness of Shadow Garden, that wasn't too difficult.
But nonetheless, Cid was a young man who made sure to cover his bases when it came to roleplay, so he went all in on his background character act in the Academy as well.
"Speaking of, I need to get going soon or I'll miss the train." Cid mumbled to himself, throwing on his academy blazer and beginning to quickly grab what was needed for his classes that day.
Leaving his dorm-room and getting to the train-station was a matter of a five-minute run for the average academy student, Cid knew this well. It was also pretty much a straight shot. An uninterrupted street where hundreds of Academy students went through at least twice a day, for five days a week.
It was the perfect place to put up a business-front if you happened to be a secret shadow-organisation that didn't want to be found out by the general public. And fortunately unfortunately, he wasn't thinking about Shadow Garden when he came to that decision.
Now he just needed to figure out which one of them housed members of the Cult and how he could organize a raid on it. Of course, he could always take it down himself, but it was so much cooler to have some of the numbered members of Shadow Garden take them down. Oh, he could totally use it as a teaching experience! Yeah, that was an awesome idea.
Though that brought him right back around to the original issue at hand, which one exactly held members of the Cult within their walls. Because quite simply not placing anything in such a prime position was just pure stupidity and if there was one thing that the Cult wasn't, that was stupid.
Overconfident and way too rested on their laurels, but not stupid.
"Ciiiid! We're gonna be late!" Po shouted as Cid came into view of him and Skel.
"Sorry sorry. I slept in." Cid muttered, nodding to the two of them before they made a dash for the train as it was just about to close the doors to any passengers.
"Sleeping in? Man, that's always great. Hey when I sleep in it's always because of a great dream. What did you dream about?" Po asked, even as the three of them were smooshed against the wall of the train.
"Uh…Nothing in particular." Cid answered truthfully, but his friends wouldn't be such perfect side-characters if they didn't take the opportunity to run into the far-flung distance with their ensuing tangent.
"Come on come on! Tell us! I dream about hitting it big all the time! Walking into a casino and getting a royal straight flush on my first hand! That's the kinda stuff that gets me raring to go!" Skel grinned and pumped an arm, squawking as it caused him to elbow another student and get an elbow to the ribs in response.
"Yeah yeah. And I dream about hot babes that see me and instantly know what sorta catch I am." Po smugly revealed, puffing up his chest as if multiple girls nearby weren't able to hear him and promptly tried to shuffle as far away from him as possible in the severely crowded train.
"It wasn't like-"
"Oh yeaaahhhh. Speaking of ladies~" Skel grinned as both he and Po leant into Cid's personal space, trapping him against the wall of the train. "You lost the bet Cid, so you know what you have to do."
"Yeah, I know…"
'How the hell was I supposed to know that you guys were going to actually try to avoid losing the bet?' Cid mentally sighed to himself, momentarily looking out the window and catching sight of the Royal Castle of Midgar.
Asking out Princess Alexia Midgar, and getting resoundingly crushed by her cold-hearted denials, that was the fate that befell the loser of the bet. Otherwise known as the one and only Cid Kagenou.
"However, I've got a fool-proof plan!" Cid smirked confidently back at his friends and held up a rather cheesily-enthused thumbs up.
"Woah really?" Po was awed at the confidence of his friend; at least that's how Cid chose to see it.
"Oh, really now?" Skel on the other hand seemed a little more, reasonably, dubious of his friend's confidence.
"Oh yeah, I spent all night practicing what I'll say and do. It'll go off flawlessly." Cid bragged in an animated, but rather out of character, display of side-character-ness.
'Of course, the plan is to get resoundingly denied but they don't need to know that. I'll cement my place as number one Side-Character once more!'
XXXxxxXXX
A few hours later, Lunch Time
Cid hummed to himself as he sat at the small table that he, now, routinely shared with Skel and Po. A small collection of rather subpar-quality food messily arranged on his tray as he placed it down. And like usual he expected to see the same on both of their trays as well, but to his genuine surprise he didn't.
Oh, sure the terrible food given to the lower class 'scum' like the three of them was still on their trays just like him, but the two of them also had the interesting addition of small paper bags with a symbol that seemed vaguely familiar stained on the side. What seemed to be a flaky pastry of some kind sticking out of Skel's bag for the dark-haired teen to catch sight of.
'A bakery? When the hell did they get these?'
"Hey guys, what're those?"
"Oh these? Po and I stopped in at one of the bakeries on the way to the train station this morning and got some stuff. Too bad you woke up so late." Skel smugly informed Cid, leaning back in his chair and taking a cocky bite of his regular school food.
The image was ruined a second later as the taste hit his tastebuds and his face screwed up in slight disappointment, but nonetheless his point had gotten across to Cid.
"That stuff doesn't actually look too bad…" Cid muttered, just loud enough for the others to hear, even though he'd meant it to just be a private musing.
"Isn't it just!? You should totally check it out after Princess Alexia deni- I-I mean after you ask Princess Alexia out!"
Cid just gave him a deadpan look and didn't bring up the very poor coverup of his friend's true thoughts.
"Yeah, that sounds great. What's its name?" Cid asked, pulling a small book out of his bag and flipping it open to a new page to write it dow-
'Not that page!' Cid flipped past another page with a list of other businesses along the street from the dorms to the train station that he believed would be the greatest hiding place for the Cult.
"Hilda's Bakery!" Po exclaimed excitedly, getting a much more subdued nod from Cid as he noted the name of the bakery down.
"Hey, grab us something while you're there too!" Skel added in, ever the moocher.
"Nah."
"What!? Come on dude! You gotta."
"Hmmmmmmm. Nah."
"Ciiiiiiid!"
XXXxxxXXX
That afternoon, Midgar Academy
"P-P-Princess A-Al-Alexia!" Cid yelped, red-faced and jittering on the spot while facing the girl.
He had to admit that even for him, who spent his early and mid-teen years surrounded by the beauties found in Shadow Garden, Alexia was a very pretty young lady. But without having to play up an act like this, he was hardly the kind of guy to even look twice at a girl that was just attractive, so he could pretty confidently say that this was a very new experience for him.
"I-I T-T-Thi-Think y-you're r-r-really p-pret-pretty! P-P-Please g-go out w-w-with me!" He held an artificially sweaty palm out to her, as was usual in these sorts of scenes.
Bow at the waist, tense the muscles, and lean too far forward to be comfortable. Scrunch up the face, shake the offered hand in nervousness, and let the occasional whimper out. These were the tenants of the perfect terrible confession, as penned by Master Side-Character: Cid Kagenou.
'Hell yeah! 10/10 performance! Now she's just gotta shoot me down and I'll go shooting down the street crying my heart out. The perfect denial!' Cid mentally grinned to himself, keeping his eyes screwed tight in fake nervousness.
And they were tenants that he performed and upheld beyond admirably. Too bad that Cid had no idea what sort of 'mid-level' catch his civilian persona was.
'Plain looks but it could be nicer with more work. It's not necessary but a good backup plan regardless. Typical nervousness like all the other spineless losers. And I only recognized his name because of Claire Kagenou two years ahead of us…..He's perfect.' Alexia thought to herself, keeping her expression carefully neutral even as she grinned darkly in the recesses of her mind.
"Very well."
"Eh?" Cid craned his neck to give a blank look to Alexia.
And in return she gave him a sweet-as-honey smile. The second Princess of the kingdom leaning forward and pinching his pointer finger between her own pointer finger and thumb.
"I, Alexia Midgar, accept your proposal, Cid Kagenou."
'fffuuuuuUUUUUU-'
XXXxxxXXX
Forty Minutes Later
"Are you freaking kidding me? Three weeks of non-stop denials to every kind of guy imaginable and she says yes to me?" Cid muttered to himself, scratching his hair as he walked down the now mostly empty street.
As he walked, he tried to figure out exactly why she had decided to say yes to him of all people. Was it just a random roll of the dice? Was there some kind of fetish or kink involved? Something else behind the scenes?
He knew it couldn't be because of his strength. He had trained himself extensively to hide his powers, strength and skill while in his 'civilian form' and knew that he hadn't dropped it at all since school had started. So, it clearly wasn't anything to do with that.
"So what is it then?...Ugh, this is getting me nowhere. I'll think over some food." Cid groaned to himself, remembering the bakery that Skel and Po had gone to this morning.
What was its name again? He had it in his notebook, right next to his list of suspects. That reminded him, he needed to spend the next weekend looking into all of them for anything fishy with the establishments or- Oh here it was.
"Hilda's Bakery. Hilda's…ah!" Cid perked up just the tiniest bit as he caught sight of the bakery in question just a little way down the street.
Like a, properly proportioned, bat out of hell he took off down the street towards the bakery. Sliding to a stop in front of the door and opening it with a quick bang after seeing that it was still unlocked.
'Side-Character Act #37: The obnoxious latecomer!'
"Excuse meee! Are you still open? I just got back from school!" He called out, having already caught sight of the attendant behind the counter before he'd even started speaking.
'Fairly plain actually. What a perfectly quaint little- Oh?'
The mana level of the middle-aged woman behind the counter was, to the average senses rather pitiful and weak. Like a regular civilian. But to Cid? Who had arguably one of the best mana-senses in the entire world, and that was being incredibly generous, it wasn't small or weak at all. In fact, it was like his own mana, only worse. Condensed and hidden in a way that regular civilians, hell even regular Magic Knights, didn't even know was possible.
In another world, at another time, he may not have noticed such a thing because he had no reason to suspect anyone. In another world where Skel and Po hadn't decided to stop in at the bakery he wouldn't have ever guessed to come in here. But this world was neither of those two worlds, and with a deflated breath that was played into his act of having run straight here from the train station, the realization of exactly what he was looking at struck him full force.
'The BAKERY was where they were hiding!?'
"Oh! Hello there dear. Yes, we're still open but some of our more popular treats have been picked clean. I apologize." The woman responded kindly, having no idea the monster that had just walked through her door, nor that he had sniffed her out within moments of walking through said door.
Her only saving grace. The one thing that kept her alive and unharmed at this very moment in time, was the fact that Cid knew he'd made a ruckus when he'd entered the store and the large, freshly cleaned windows of the bakery wouldn't go very well to hiding anything in the afternoon sun.
"Awesome, thank you." He smiled gratefully at her and started to peruse the available selection while carefully probing the woman and environment with his magically enhanced senses.
It didn't seem as if anything inside the store itself was hiding anything nefarious. Nor was there any kind of traps or weaponry hidden inside the immediate premises. A not unfair lack of protection when the act was as polished and refined as this one was.
'I need to get in touch with some of the girls, a lower numbered leader at the very least. Though finding any in a city as large as Midgar is going to be difficult…' Cid thought to himself.
Of course, there was always the option of doing it himself, it's not like he was lacking in any of the necessary skills, but leaving himself as far removed from a small operation like this was definitely better for his secrecy.
Which reminded him, all those other buildings he had been checking out were now just total busts. He'd been so sure on some of them too. But oh well, one couldn't be a proper Eminence in Shadow if they refused to accept reality.
Pulling out his small notebook he began to scratch out names as he ordered a simple pastry. Giving a small smile and thanking the undercover Cult agent as he walked out of the bakery.
Closing his notebook with a small snap he put it back in his bag and began to munch on the pastry. His eyes widening a little as the taste hit his tongue, and then the regret a moment later.
'Man. This actually tastes good. Too bad I'll have to take them out.' Another bite of the pastry was taken as he walked, his mind wondering about the cult's bakery and what to do about that matter.
And so busy was he, thinking about that issue, that another issue completely slipped his mind, not to be remembered until far, far too late. That issue being the platinum haired, red eyed second princess of the Kingdom, otherwise now known as his girlfriend.
XXXxxxXXX
The Next Morning, Midgar Capital Streets
Cid yawned as he left the train station closest to the Academy. Having actually gotten here a little earlier than usual due to the train running early for once. An odd occurrence for the black-haired teen, having grown up as a Japanese citizen for the entirety of his first life, but one he could appreciate in this context.
He'd like to say that he had sorted through all of his problems the night before in the solitude and sanctity of his dorm room, but he very much hadn't. He still had no idea how to get in touch with any of the Shadow Garden members, short of running to the headquarters, and even if he did, he didn't know who to delegate this mission to or what to order.
There was no telling what traps or secrets were in the bakery, and for all he knew he'd be sending one or more of his girls into a deathtrap without that knowledge. But he wanted to stay away from such a location as much as possible and if he went in to do recon he might as well take care of the whole thing right then and there. Since its not like anything the cult could possibly have in such a small premises would be capable of matching up to him, let alone even damaging him.
"Woooow! What luck~" The purr of a feminine voice froze Cid solid as that issue was pushed out of his head and a much more immediate issue was put in its place.
"Princess Alexia. Heeeyyyyyy." Cid smiled tightly at the platinum haired princess as she walked over to him, her expression and voice like honey.
"To think that you'd be here so early, I'm surprised. I totally took you for the kind of guy to get to school at the very last moment!" Alexia spoke, placing a splayed hand in front of her face as her voice went up in pitch slightly in surprise.
And Cid wasn't quite sure what it was, he couldn't tell exactly what tipped his instincts off, but Cid knew that the scene in front of him was wrong somehow. Not like an illusion or a delusion, no nothing as fantasy-like as that. Alexia was playing up an act, and Cid couldn't figure out how he knew or why she was doing it.
'Though it could always be that she's trying to make people think that picking me wasn't a massive mistake.' He thought, sweatdropping mentally as he shrugged and scratched the back of his head.
"Yeah, usually I am." In his usual manner of acting, that being cool and mostly aloof, he never noticed the slight widening of Alexia's eyes before they narrowed ever so slightly and then softened once more when he looked back.
"I see. Well, we're both here now and we have time before classes begin. How about we go for a walk together, just the two of us?" She asked with just a hint of demure suggestiveness while leaning forward a few degrees.
'I hate this. I hate everything about this.' Rang through both of their heads as Alexia pulled off this move.
And while Cid would have loved to say no, he knew what would happen if he did that and that most definitely wasn't the ideal scenario. So somehow, despite wanting to dump Alexia as fast as possible, Cid found himself agreeing to spend time with her.
"Yeah sure." He grunted with a non-committal shrug.
But that didn't mean that he had to be over the moon about it. Alread he'd figured out the rule of this 'game' of theirs. His goal was to break up with Alexia. Short, sweet, simple. However, the difficulty came in that he couldn't break up with her, since that would lead to the 'worst scenario' if things went south. So, the optimal route to achieve a win condition was to make her break up with him.
And as he noticed the slight twitch of muscles in her shoulder at his response to her, he knew that it would be a matter of just one day. He had this in the bag.
Meanwhile, Alexia was doing her darndest not to snap and strike the black-haired teen right this moment as the two of them began to walk around the school grounds. A lifetime of growing up in the political hellscape that was Midgar Royalty being the only thing that kept her sweet smile and enthusiastic aura about her as the two of them walked in silence.
'You're acting a whole lot differently today now aren't you. Was yesterday an act?' Alexia thought to herself, watching Cid out of the corner of her eye as he yawned obnoxiously into his hand.
'It has to be. The change is too drastic for it to be genuine nerves and given how aloof and flippant he's been so far; I doubt he's actually the type to freak out like that. So, he put an act on, but why? For those two nobodies that were hiding in the bushes behind him when he confessed? Was it because he thought that's what I should expect? If that's the case then there's clearly something going on here other than a plain-old confession.'
"Cid, isn't the weather great today?" She hummed pleasantly as the two of them lapped around the training hall that her group used for their lessons.
She knew that Zenon would already be inside, and if he happened to get a good steaming look at the 'happy couple' and blew his top then that was even better for her. But she couldn't check to see if he actually saw them or his reaction if she did, that would be ruining the act after all.
"It's pretty alright. I'd prefer a couple degree's colder." He hummed, almost as if he had no care for her or the conversation they were having.
His intent was to be such an uncaring asshole that Alexia dumped him, and with a normal woman of average intelligence and medium-class upbringing that would have easily been enough. But Alexia was much, much more than that. Immensely intelligent in interpersonal relationships and having grown up in the world of royalty, nobility and politics where everyone put on an act at all times, Alexia was a smart girl with a unique outlook on life. And unfortunately for Cid, he'd slotted himself so perfectly into her view of the world and shown himself to be such an interestingly unique anomaly that she could hardly let him go while he still had use to her.
"You're right. A few degrees' cooler would make it a perfect day." Alexia merely agreed with him, smiling and nodding her head.
'Oh Cid Kagenou, what corruption lies in your soul…' Alexia thought to herself and, unnoticed at the time, a small spark of something ignited deep within her soul.
Meanwhile poor Cid just mentally sighed at his attempt to be an asshole just being brushed off completely. Pushing his timetable of being single by third period aaaaall the way back to being single by lunch. So much lost time….
XXXxxxXXX
Side Story: An Eminence's lost snack
"It's great to finally have you here in the city, close by Cid." Claire smiled at her brother, clapping her hands together as they walked through the streets of Midgar.
"You know I'm here for school, right?" Cid mumbled, raising an eyebrow at her enthusiasm.
"School or not, you're close by now." Claire rebutted, placing her hands on her hips.
"Can't exactly argue with that logic…Is that a jerky stall?" Cid paused mid-step, as if not believing what he was seeing.
It shouldn't have been as surprising as it was to him, but somehow the idea of jerky being a thing in this world had completely skipped his mind entirely. Such a simple concept was discovered hundreds of years before the modern day in his own world after all, so there was no reason that same couldn't be said for here.
Jerky had never been his favourite snack in his past life, but it was one of the few that he did find himself partaking in on occasion, so it was pretty close.
"Oh yes! I'm surprised you've heard of Jerky. It hasn't made its way out to our lands yet. But no matter, should we go get some?"
It was at times like this that he thanked Claire's singlemindedness, since he didn't have to make up some lie about having discovered jerky without anyone else in the family doing the same.
"Yeah sure, I could go for some jerky."
XXXxxxXXX
Hello ladies and gentlemen.
I do not know why the idea of jerky invaded the side-story so intensely, probably cravings, but there you go XD
This chapter is a pretty simple opening prologue to the main part of the story that we all know thanks to the anime and manga and potentially even Light Novel. But despite its simplicity I like it, I think it sets up things to come fairly well and adds some nice differences in.
But other than that, preparations for my Japan trip are coming along well, though I'm still pretty nervous since its my first time travelling all on my wee-lil'-lonesome. Apart from that I don't have much else to say sooooooo
Discord code: ctMzhq3 or plasmaassassin
ONTO THE REVIEW REPLIES!
CrimsonDivision: While funny, not exactly rushing to add guns into the story
MEleeSmasher: The moment he shows even a little interest his life as a single-man is over. And as for first?...hmmm, who knows?~
Zubhanwc3: No no. In this timeline they start the academy at 17 instead of 15
Anikong: See the response above.
Sypho Dias: I'm glad you're enjoying it!
YuukiAsuna-Chan: Yeah he will….eventually.
York Lane: No no. Its not rude at all. I like the idea and might play around with it a little.
Lugal Kug-ga: Yeah, that's why one of my beta's refuses to watch the show tbh
The Liar Who Lies: Yes this is an alternate timeline.
Orchamus: You may have more story….as a treat.
END OF REVIEW REPLIES!
Alright that's all I have to say so farewell, stay safe, and know that Iris is top 5 EiS girls based on purely looks and I'll fight you on that.