Merry Christmas
As the Night turned to Day, the darkness had stolen the promised dreary normality for many in what has been named Area 11.
In the depths of the Shinjuku ghetto, the Britannian police puzzled over three victims of murder that had been committed in the night. One had been Britannian, stabbed in the dark with no noted legal business in the ghetto. Another, a young Number whose heart had been impaled with a force strong enough to puncture bone. The last and most perplexing of all was a skeleton, whose bones had scorched and still almost glowed with an inner heat, the sight perplexing all but the most veteran who had seen such sights rarely before.
In that same ghetto, the residents reeled, not from the new victims found in their mist but by having found the remains of loved ones, long since missing and long mourned as deceased. With grief opened anew, the new day was given to mourning by all those who had lost someone so long ago.
In a traditional dojo, hidden in a nearby mountaintop, a middle-aged man received the news that the youngest and sadly most foolish of his disciples had been killed. His heart hardened by such similar tragedy, he did not weep but he did allow himself a rueful smile when he heard that the young apprentice's killer was found dead slightly further away, killed with the young man's own weapon.
On the other side of Japan, an old man received similar news but discarded the messenger with a frown. He had no time to consider the fate of that waste of an initiate. For the new world to come, his attention needed to be elsewhere from blatant disappointments.
However the break from mundanity was the most pronounced for three individuals within the walls of Ashford academy.
A long-fallen noble who stayed up that night counting money out of a briefcase. Satisfied with the amount within, he removed the excess and placed it to the side of his bed. After placing a bloody jacket into a plastic bag, he disrobed and went to bed. Filled with a sense of accomplishment, the young man fell asleep in his bed, overseen by friendly shadows and enjoyed the first peaceful sleep he had in years.
In a dorm room not far away, an estranged royal tosses and turns well into the night. His deadening peace of mind having been shattered by worries of the future, brought by the image of a blond boy splattered red and his most unfortunate proximity to the only relation that the young man still cared for.
The last and least important of these individuals was the Accountant hired by Ashford Academy the next morning. She had settled in to what she had believed would have been another dreary day of wringing school fees out of Britannian Banks, only to be interrupted by the sound of the door opening and a polite Senior school boy without the black jacket entering her financial domain, wielding a suspicious bag full of money. She sighed to herself, and after having counted the funds, she listed that Isaac Cross had indeed paid his full tuition fees for that year. As the man in question left the office, she sent an email to the namesake of the school. Informing the Senior Ashford of the change to the account.
And what exactly, the young man had worn on his arm that day.
Isaac couldn't help but hum a tune as he left the office of Ashford Academy's accountant. It felt as though a heavy chain had dropped off his neck and, even if the weight wasn't literal, he definitely felt lighter than he could recently remember. For once in the many years he had spent at the academy he did not have the threat of upcoming tuition payments looming over his daily life as he got a good, and most importantly, safe education. It was hardly a concern for a normal student of Ashford Academy but they had sponsors, guardians or even the vaunted Britannian family to help keep the shockingly affordable fees for the average Britannian family. As a 'fallen' noble with neither family nor any inheritance to pay tuition with, such affordability became his only chance at paying it. It used to take an entire year of taking odd jobs and questionably legal… opportunities in order to pay those fees.
Isaac stretched as he looked through a nearby window, giving him an excellent view of the central grounds of the academy and a sense of peace. He had done so much over the years to keep being able to see this exact view everyday but he had never enjoyed it. To him, Ashford academy is a haven from the realities of living in the street, far away from his homeland and the promise of a better life. In Britannian society, you had to be better or you would fail as everyone laughed at your weakness. The academy was a place where Isaac could strengthen himself, take the time to get everything he needed to survive in the empire and far enough away from anyone who would have wanted to kick him back down. He had felt the bedrock of Britannia before, when he had been just a child, and he knew that no one would help him down there, content to see him suffer in his own weakness.
He had heard a few years ago that the Japanese used to have these things called "charities" that helped the bottom of society get to their feet and even some of their religious shrines were said to have helped those same people. Idly, Isaac wondered what it would have been like if he could have been helped back then and if it was a strength to help the unfortunate around you or was it a symptom of weakness that let them get conquered by a stronger Britannia.
Isaac was then shaken from his musing by flicker of movement in his vision. Turning his head, he saw the black silhouette of a pixie looking at an errant spiderweb on a corner of the roof. Isaac grinned. Just because he was free from one burden did not mean that another had not appeared in front of his face. The existence of demons, and other monsters was something he had to deal with, especially now that he was a summoner of two such demons, a pixie and a preta, which a quick search of the internet had revealed to be some sort of cannibal ghost which explained pretty much everything about it. However, the prospect of battling supernatural creatures didn't carry the same anxiety as meeting daunting financial goals and it even felt like he was…excited. He was willing to get to the bottom of this exciting new world, and with his tuition payed, he was more than willing to deal with any trouble he got into along the way.
Juni the pixie absently moved to the side, revealing that she hadn't been looking at the spiderweb like he thought but rather she had been making faces and laughing at what had been caught in it. Isaac felt himself involuntarily sigh as he saw that caught in the spiderweb was a small green paper man, struggling to get free and cursing at Juni under its breath. Absently, Isaac grabbed a rock out of his pocket that he had prepared for when Juni once again got stuck in such a web and threw it at the web. The rock flew inaccurately but true, damaging some of the web and letting the small demon get free. It immediately blasted off down the corridor with a gust of wind and a drawn out "THANKS DUUUUUDE!", zooming right by another student who had just entered the corridor and blowing all the papers she was holding across the trail of his path. As Isaac watched the young brunette student frantically scrabble for her papers across the floor, Isaac was incredibly glad that normal people couldn't see demons.
Isaac was then distracted by a dogs head with a large red spot on the top appearing from outside the window, of the third floor he was currently standing on and belonging to the longest dog he had ever seen, no doubt wondering what all that noise was. Indeed, Isaac was very glad for the fact that normal people couldn't see demons….
Because there were so bloody many of them.
Once dawn had come and gone and Isaac was no longer distracted by his need for sleep, one of the first things he had noticed was that demons were far more common that he had even thought. He hadn't had time to think about it with his mad rush to spend most of the briefcase of money to settle his academic future but unfortunately for him he had the rest of the day to notice the presence of demons almost everywhere in the school. If it wasn't the green paper men, called Kodamas by Juni, zooming all over campus, it was other almost identical pixies floating around and moving small un-attended items away from people while giggling. Eating his breakfast in the cafeteria, he had been under the watchful eyes of a cooked chicken thing like what he had fought last night and he swore he saw a floating Jaco lantern in a witch costume go into the kitchen with a small devious-looking snowman.
It made sense in a way. Juni had said, in a roundabout way, that demons wanted, if not needed spiritual energy from humans, this Magatsuhi as she said. What better place to soak up tons of human emotions than at a school. It only elevated this thinking when he had caught sight of what looked like a Kelpie, an old English spirit that led to drowning, in the school's pool when he walked by. He guessed the feelings of the smaller kids feeling that they were drowning during swimming practice was enough for it to be satisfied considering he hadn't heard about anyone actually drowning.
Maybe it just liked the water, he didn't know.
That was the order of the day as he experienced the rest of the school day. As for 'his' two demons, they surprisingly didn't do much. Juni was too busy taking in the sights around her to really talk and spent most of the time looking around or resting inside his COMP. Preta for its part didn't manifest except for mealtimes, begging for table scraps and stealing others when no one would notice it gone. As for the COMP itself, it had been a lucky break to notice that the headset could somehow fit into the COMP almost seamlessly, meaning that it just looked like a fancy wrist computer to everyone and plenty of people complimented him for it, despite the sight of the silver computer clashing with his second and now only school jacket after he had to throw away the last one. Not even the industrious Sophie Wood would be able to save the bloodied and torn up thing.
Of course, the issue of the COMP would come to a head as Isaac went to change for his afternoon Gym practice.
"Come on, Isaac." The aforementioned summoner heard as did the final adjustments to his newly changed gym shirt. "You can't seriously wear that thing to exercise, can you?"
The question was immediately answered by a look from Isaac, a peculiar look expressing a mixture of incredulity and daring.
"There's no rule to say I can't, is there?" came the verbal response.
The red haired student in-front of him rolled his eyes as he finished tying his shoes. He was known as Damien Smith and was by far the one classmate to talk to Isaac the most this year. They weren't exactly friends but from the trials and tribulations of being roughly equal in build and sitting next close to each other, they were definitely more friendly than not. Reflecting on it, Isaac wasn't sure he had any real friends, he had always been too busy to make them, but if he was going to have one, he guessed Damien was probably a good first contender. It was a far better shot than the other students currently in the locker room with them at any rate.
"You can't think it's going to be stolen, not at Ashford of all places? No Numbers here for that."
"Your faith in your fellow Britannians is astounding." Isaac deflected. "There are far less people willing to honour the unspoken rules of a locker room than you think."
"Sure, and you meet most of them doing whatever shady thing you did to afford it didn't you?" Damien shot back as he stood to his full height, his shoes now neatly tied. The gym uniform was a simple one, consisting of a white polo shirt with a green collar, dark green shorts and black pumps with navy blue socks.
Isaac stared at the student in confusion, hoping to mask a slight nervousness he felt at that comment.
"No, What shady business?"
"You come back to the academy late at night and covered in blood." This time the incredulity was on Damien's face. "There is no way you weren't doing one of your 'side jobs' last night."
"Dude." Isaac tried desperately to look affronted. "It was just a job at the butchers. I was stupid and left my jacket on and-"
"Yeah, yeah." Damien waved him off, clearly not listening. It was a deeply unfortunate occurrence for Isaac that the existence of his extra-legal activities were well known throughout the student body. The unfortunate consequences of a careless youth in crime. "Totally legal work, I get the song and dance. Although thinking about it, I don't blame you for not trusting your stuff today, I hear that good old Ice Prince is after you again."
Burdened with this new information, Isaac sighed. Lelouch Lamperouge could be amazingly annoying at times.
"What did the toothpick do now?" He asked.
"Nothing yet, but a girl I know says his fanclub caught him glaring at you. Probably about the blood thing last night."
"It couldn't just be the fact I caught him coming home from gambling, could it?" The question earned a scoff of amusement from the red-haired student.
"Considering almost everyone knows about it, no." Damien's answer was quick. "You probably jumped right on the sister button again dude, coming back looking like you killed somebody or something."
"It's always about his bloody sister…" Isaac grumbled. "How many times do I have to say that I was aiming for the maid and not her?"
"He doesn't believe you, dude." Damien said with amused finality. "And neither does half of the school."
Isaac let out a sigh of frustration as Damien walked past him, the other occupants of the Locker room having started to leave the room themselves, giving Isaac a pat on the shoulder as he did so.
"Come on." He spoke. "Keep your head down and the guy will eventually calm down again. Besides, this is our final year, you can't let someone like him get you down."
With a grumble, Isaac followed the crowd into the gym proper. It wasn't easy having the younger Vice-President of the Student Council as your self-declared nemesis, but it's the cards he had.
Plus, the whole summoner thing kind of put the odds in his favour anyway.
It was a little-known fact that Ashford academy was suffering from a critical lack of coaches for Physical Education. After all, the Academy demanded a high level of skill for all its educators and sadly the position of PE coach directly competed with the Britannian army in what skills they demanded. What physically fit man or woman with knowledge in physical education and discipline decide to work in an academy for a fraction of the pay they could get in the military in Area 11? No, one could not simply hire one of the defunct Japanese army members, even if they were honorary Britannians, chronically unemployed and had all the skills necessary for the job.
And so, with this almost self-imposed shortage, Physical Education times were thus cut in half, with the two sessions divided between girls and boys respectively. No one knew why but some said that Milly Ashford, grand daughter of the head of the school Reuben Ashford and other things besides, was behind it.
With the girls going first, that left the boys of the year with good amount of time to kill and as boys were want to do, started doing their own thing. Many groups were formed in the gymnasium, most of the boys within talking and joking around with each other. Two of the largest groups however, had started competing with each other about how well they could exercise. Things like how many push-ups one could do and how long one could do a handstand were fair game in the competition brewing between the boys. Isaac for his part, used the time to reflect and observe.
Well, it was mostly Observe. Specifically observing the two demons watching the brewing competition with obvious disdain on their faces. One was a large, red-skinned monster man, with a horn on the top of his head and white tusks prominently jutting from his mouth. It wore some sort of purple overcoat and pants combo, leaving its heavily muscled torso bare for all to see. Along with the heavy polearm in its hand, it left no mystery to what that demon's deal was. The other was man-sized and surprisingly just looked like a man in old Japanese armour, wielding a smaller but sharper polearm than its compatriot. The only supernatural thing about the demon was it solid yellow eyes, crunched up in disgust at the sight before it.
"Pathetic." The armoured one spat. "This is what they are teaching the children of my people's conquerors? Disgraceful that we lost to this…"
"Yeah, not the strongest, are they?" The red one agreed. "Bet the whole thing would have gone differently if I was there."
"Tough talk from a demon watching kids." The reply was automatic on Isaac's part, causing all three of them to be surprised. The armoured demon seemingly looked at him until he caught sight of the COMP and then glared.
"Do you have something to declare summoner?" The armoured one challenged while the other squared his shoulders.
Isaac sighed. He got himself into this accidentally but there was no way he was going to back down.
"Sure." Isaac walked towards them, filling himself with either confidence or bravado. "You are looking at the children of scholars and calling their warriors weak." He tried to sound as archaic as possible for the demon's benefit. "Isn't it rather dishonourable of you to avoid actual opponents and mock children for not being you?"
The Armoured demon's eyes flared in anger, the glow somehow getting brighter.
"You dare to insult the honour of Momunofu?" He hissed, his polearm almost blurring in his hand. "I will make you pay for your insolence gaijin!"
Isaac readied himself, his hand near his COMP for a rapid summon, the computer almost coming to life at his thoughts. This was a stupid idea. A summoner fight in front of his classmates with no weapon but there was no way he was going to let the demon insult all of Britannia like that.
The tension was thick and he could see Momunofu brace….
Until the tension was cut by a large red hand landing on Momunofu's shoulder.
"No." The large demon simply said to the smaller one. "I don't feel like dying in a battle with a summoner today."
"Hey kid!" The red one yelled out to Isaac. "You want us to stop shit-talking how weak these little wimps are right?"
At Isaac's nod, the demon grinned.
"Then show us, little summoner. Show us how strong you are."
"How and why?" was the simple question from Isaac. With the tension so thoroughly ruined, Momunofu un-readied himself as the red demon stepped forward.
"How about…" The demon looked thoughtful. "You do the exercises we tell you to do and in return, we tell you how to get stronger."
The deal was simple, and under the begrudging acceptance of Momunofu, the deal seemed legit. In all honesty, there was no real reason to believe them, but the lack of fighting was nice and, in the end, Isaac accepted for the simple reason that he had nothing better to do.
The exercises were seemingly undoable, a several hundred push-ups there, a couple of hundred sit-ups there but Isaac did do them, rapidly and easily. He was almost surprised how easily and effortlessly such simple exercises came to him, and this ease only seemed to excite the red-skinned demon more, causing it to give him more complex and arduous exercises as time went on, allowing Isaac to finally put some effort into it and start to feel the burn.
After five minutes, Momunofu had walked away grumbling quietly and after ten minutes, Isaac was breathing heavily.
"Haha." The demon cried out. "The second you squared up against the tin-man I figured what kind of summoner you were."
"What would that be?" Still breathing heavily, Isaac got to his feet, oddly energised from the exercise.
"You aren't one of those wimpy casters." The demon said. "You like fighting things. Getting up in the action without any of that complicated magic stuff."
"What does that matter to you?"
The demon looked at him incredulously.
"It means I like you kid." He said as though that answered everything. "And as a reward for getting someone like me to do that, I'm going to help get you even stronger during these… gym times of yours."
"Why?" was the obvious question asked, causing the demon to shrug.
"I've got nothing better to do. And I better make sure that my future summoner is at least as strong as I am!"
At his confused look the demon grinned and bowed.
"The name's Oni and you've got a long way to go before you can handle me."
Isaac looked away, trying to see the other demon from before only to notice the amazed stare of his fellow students, who had apparently been watching.
Silence as the amazed and the shocked stared at each other until a single comment broke the silence.
"Holy shit, dude. You win."