Disclaimer: I don't own Highschool DxD.

Raise You Like a Phoenix

"Off the top of your head, what's the best approach to set up wards for keeping the item safe?" Joshua asked, the illusions he used as a blackboard shifting so that only the exercise remained right in the center. He'd move it to the side if he needed to explain something or add things to the sides if that's what he needed for the lesson. For the moment, he waited a moment for his students to answer or remain silent long enough it'd be an answer of its own.

That last thing didn't happen too often though, which was great.

"Yes, Miss Fortune?" he asked, seeing – predictably – one of his Stars raising their hands. In this case, Dion Fortune. He didn't have too much of an impression on the woman, other than that she was good. She didn't express herself much or at least she didn't seem very excited in any of his classes, but she always put in the work for them, so he wasn't complaining.

"Several detection and monitoring wards linked to other defensive and maybe offensive wards? All powered by draining wards," the woman replied, more a statement than a question but with enough doubt there to cover herself if she was wrong. She was good like that. "If it's powered by draining wards and a lot of spells are used, it can be set up quickly, even if it won't be very strong."

"Correct, and a perfect answer," Joshua told her, making Fortune smile at him, even if it wasn't a very overly show of emotion. "Unless you really need strong defenses right away, it's always better to set up wards this way, it allows for a more thorough coverage, since you can set up specific spells for everything. It's always better to use many simple spells in an array than to try to find or – even more difficult – to make one that'll do everything. Besides, spells like that require more power and more skill than most people are likely to have, so it's better to know one's own limits and go for something more manageable. Miss Fortune?" he asked at the end, noticing that the woman had raised her hand.

He wasn't too surprised by what she said though.

"Unless you have a coven to cast the spell," the woman replied with a more expressive grin than she usually showed. It was a gesture that he shot right back at her, because it was what he'd come to expect from her.

She was a practitioner of Coven Magic, after all, so she always took any opportunity to point out the benefits of her magic in his classes. He suspected she likely did the same, or at least tried, in any other classes she might be taking. Not that he minded too much, since she wasn't actually giving false information and he found her magic fascinating.

What Coven Magic did was, essentially, support other magician's casting. The practitioners of that branch basically connected themselves and maybe other magicians with the person that would actually be casting a spell. That way, the person being supported would have access to the magic of everyone in the coven, together with their magical strength and even other benefits depending on what spell they used and how the spell was set up.

If he hadn't gotten so good at what he did and his Magic stat weren't so off the charts compared to what he saw in every single other magician he used Appraisal on, Joshua might have contracted Fortune for her services a whole lot. Hell, he kept a close eye on her just in case he might need to call for her help at some point. It was another reason why he let her do self-promotion like that too, admittedly.

"True enough," he agreed with a nod. "So, I want you all to make a list of every ward you'd use for a set up like this. Make sure they are all taken into account for an array arrangement and balanced for one, because after we check them in the next class, you'll all start a long-term project trying to work on that array."

Reactions to that were mixed, but homework was hardly ever fun, especially when Joshua tried to challenge them and push what they learned in his class every single time. He also usually gave them homework like that, where they couldn't just coast off class notes. No, they'd need to do research and look up other wards and array set ups to come up with their list.

He'd have felt bad for them, but that's what they got with him as a teacher.

"Have fun with that," he added, getting some less than pleased looks from all over the class. Even Meredith was giving him the stink eye. Truly… being a teacher was great. "For the rest of the class, as I said when we began, this is Ravel Phenex. The reason why she's here is because she's helping me with some things. For that, she will be interviewing all of you now, so that I can better teach you all," he announced then, making the students turn towards the girl that had been patiently sitting in a smaller desk next to his at the front of the class.

It had drawn a lot of attention, when she'd first joined, and even more so after he'd introduced her. He supposed, with how devils were deeply ingrained in magician society, it was no surprise that everyone knew the names of the pillars. Besides, Phenex wasn't what one would call a discreet name either, so there was that.

He'd have liked to know what was going on through their minds at that moment, but alas, Joshua had better things to do.

As Ravel got to work, interviewing his students for their magics and any other information she could fish out of them, Joshua moved to the side. He wasn't too sure what she wanted to achieve, admittedly, but she'd said something about knowing what assets all his students could bring to the table in case he needed them. After all, some private tutoring or services provided could get any of his students to do him a solid. They were already ingratiated to him through the classes, after all, so they were better than looking for someone else if they could do well enough for a job or favor.

He'd let the girl take care of that, which sounded like too much trouble and too much dealing with people for him.

Instead, he decided to do something else while he waited, with Cheshire surprisingly deciding to go and sit on Ravel's desk to watch her work… or maybe to unnerve the poor students. His familiars could be a little mean at times.

"Everything going ok?" he asked Meredith, giving a glance to George who nodded at him when he cast an illusion to cover their conversation. He often wondered if his group of Stars had become an actual friend group instead of just a study one, but that was in their personal lives and he wasn't curious enough to stick his nose there. He did enough socializing on a good day as it was.

"Yes, House of Water keeps behaving, Joshua," the girl replied, equal parts grateful and exasperated, somehow. "And yes, my family is still trying to talk to me and all, but Golden Dawn has backed off. I think the news traveling around about you have scared them."

"Nice," he replied with a grin. That wasn't quite what he was going for, but it was a nice side-effect. Soon enough, he'd be hit with the drawbacks of spreading information about him, but he'd take the benefits too. "And no, I don't have anything I need your help with," he said before the girl could even try to open her mouth to ask him, as she always did. "But I'll let you know if that happens. Or maybe Ravel will. She'll be keeping track of stuff like that for me."

"I see," the girl mumbled, giving the devil a narrow-eyed look. "So you really got a Phenex as a secretary? Just when we think you are insane enough a person, Joshua."

"I'll take that as a compliment," he replied with a grin.

"It was meant as one," Meredith shot back with one of her own. "I really wish you'd come up with something, Joshua. I kind of feel bad for just… getting all this kindness thrown at me for no reason."

"You needed help. I like helping," he commented, rolling his eyes and running his fingers through his hair. "Do the math. I think you are smart enough for that."

"Stupid," the girl said, with a small, shy smile. "I really appreciate it, Joshua. I still want to do something to pay you back."

"Well, if you are lucky, Ravel will come up with something," he replied, more to reassure the girl than anything else. He felt a little bad about it a moment later though, since Meredith seemed genuinely happy that there might be a chance. He didn't know what the devil could come up with for his students.

Especially with Meredith. She had nice magic talents and even an even nicer Sacred Gear, but Joshua didn't see himself dragging her to the battlefield, which is where she'd truly shine. His own spells did well enough for protection and her Sacred Gear's effect wasn't something he could see himself making use of.

'I guess it's not a bad thing to give her hope though.'

[}-o-{]

[Karin]

"As Joshua says, off the top of my head, I can think of several ways you could repay him for the special treatment in his classes," the young blonde commented, scribbling away at a notebook in front of her and without even looking up at Karin herself. That slight disrespect was inconsequential, however, because Karin could only be so happy to be talking like she was with a Pillar devil.

She'd heard some other students commenting that Ravel was likely far down the line of succession, since she was very young and the Phenex supposedly had many children, especially by devil standards. That didn't really matter either, because Karin herself had never been high up in any ranking whatsoever, so at most she'd thought she might be a contracted magician to some reincarnated nobody. She'd have been happy with that, really, if she didn't need to go scrapping at the bottom of the barrel like she'd heard some people do.

It was one of the reasons why she'd never dared to have her association try to get her a contract with a devil. Granted, her situation had changed a lot through her time as a student of Davis' and a member of the aforementioned's group of Stars. However, that unease had lingered.

That was one of the reasons why she was so in awe of the whole situation, with her doing what was more or less an interview with Ravel Phenex herself. She might look young, but she seemed to be doing a great job, she'd noticed. Karin was even more in awe of her teacher though, because how in the hell did one go about getting a devil of such rank to work with you as an equal?

Because most contracted magicians ended up in a situation of… not subordination, but close enough. It was certainly never an equal standing relationship. Devils had their pick of magicians to contract with, after all, so they could all search for someone that would give them the best conditions for a contract, which often ended with magicians offering much more than they'd like.

On the other hand, there was Joshua Davis, working with a Phenex without even having an actual contract, by the sound of things. And the devil was the one that seemed to be working for him. Hell, Ravel Phenex seemed to be doing her absolute best to do well in her job, which so far looked to Karin like she was some sort of assistant more than anything else.

How in the hell did their teacher get to the point where his relationship with devils seemed to be the opposite of the usual?

Ultimately, Karin decided that it didn't matter.

Why? Because Ravel Phenex might just be a godsent, ironically enough. Everyone and their mothers knew that interacting with Davis had a high chance of you somehow being indebted to the man. This was especially the case after more and more information about the man seemed to start circulating in the supernatural world.

Wherever he went, Joshua Davis seemed to do much better than expected and people inevitably found themselves owing the man. That was not really a bad thing, considering Karin's favorite teacher was that for a reason, being kind to a fault. The problem was that he was too kind, which meant that he often didn't really ask for anything back, leaving people scrambling to not be indebted to him anymore.

Everyone knew owing someone something could come back to bite you in the ass. Furthermore, not paying someone back could easily lead to a stain in one's reputation and reputation was about as important as power was in the supernatural. So, nobody wanted to be the one to go against the way things worked on such an… almost fundamental level.

So, Ravel seemed like the blessing that everyone had been waiting for, someone that would give them a way to pay Davis back, at least a little.

"I'm listening," Karin said eagerly to the blonde's words from before her mind went on a bit of a tangent.

"You see, Mr. Davis has an… acquaintance that takes care of a garden. They often provide him with the materials needed for his spells. I'm sure you, with your Nature Magic, could help them with that," Ravel commented, making her eyes lit up. Not only could she repay Davis, but she could do so with her magic? That sounded wonderful, truly. "I see you like that idea. I'll have to check some things, but I'm sure I'll be able to confirm something with you by the next class, unless something happens to delay me."

"I can wait, Ms. Phenex," Karin replied respectfully. "Thank you. Please do let me know."

"I will," the girl told her with a smile. "Now, I have others to talk to, but thank you for being so cooperative."

"Let me guess. Golden Dawn?" Karin asked, drawing a wry grin from the devil.

"Grauzauberer, actually. Don't talk about that though. I'll have a chat with Director Agnes about some things, and it'd help not to spread the word," the devil told her, her smile turning much more… devil-like. Karin nodded quickly, else the girl's ire be drawn towards her. She looked young, but she knew that looks could be deceiving. And even if that was not the case… She didn't think she wanted to know what someone that was working with her teacher could pull off when angry.

She rather liked living.

"Of course. Have a nice day."

"You too," Ravel replied, beaming as if her previous expression hadn't been there at all and turning to the next person. "Ah, Eliphas Levi, right?" the devil asked, making the man gulp nervously.

Moving away, like she was supposed to, Karin went to stand with the rest of the waiting Stars. There was no point going against what Ravel asked, especially if her guess was right about what the girl did for their teacher. Sounded like someone they should be on the good side of. If she was going to be in charge of dealing with Davis's business, then she could be a nightmare as much as she could be a blessing.

Not that Karin was very nervous. Call her overconfident or arrogant, but she didn't think Davis would let the devil screw them over. He was too nice for that and that was part of the reason he had the reputation he did. She didn't think he'd make a change so radical that they needed to be worried.

At least, not for as long as they didn't make any stupid mistakes.

"She had a lot of interesting things to say," Fortune said when Karin joined them, looking towards the devil in question. "She has ideas, that's for sure. Ideas I'm very interested in hearing, from what little she said."

"She didn't say much to me other than something about repaying Joshua," Karin commented, drawing looks from the others. "Definitely interesting, I'd say."

"A straight way to pay him back?" Meredith asked, looking at her intently. "She was very vague with me."

"Same," Fortune agreed, looking intently at Karin.

"She said someone helped him grow plants for his spells so… I could help with that," she mumbled, drawing into herself. Weren't the others the same? Then again, everyone had different magics. Maybe it was different for her than for the others.

"Lucky," George grumbled from the side.

"Didn't you get to help with one of his projects?" Meredith asked, giving the man a glare.

"Yeah, and he did a full defensive set up over my family's place," Pickingill replied and everyone winced. Well, that was one way to be driven completely and utterly into debt with Davis, they supposed. At least Fortune and Karin merely had some favoritism in the man's classes. Between what George said, what Meredith had sort of shared and what Levi had told them about, the three of them were much more in trouble in comparison.

"Well, fortunately for you, it seems that Phenex has some ideas we might all be able to use… and benefit from, hopefully," Fortune commented wryly. "Which I'm not sure is good for us, since that'd mean still being in debt, but at least it'd be us doing something."

"We can hope," Pickingill said and they remained silent afterwards, waiting for Levi to join them so they could talk with all of them together.

[}-o-{]

[Ravel Phenex]

She may or may not have been a little impulsive, she supposed.

Her family had needed a bit of an in with Davis though, and the deal Leviathan had struck with them in the magician's stead had been too good to pass up on. Not only would they get a more favorable standing in anything related to the Phoenix Spell, with someone closer to the whole thing and maybe able to sway the human's opinion a bit, but it was a known fact that Davis had a bit of a weak spot for children, evidenced by the Heiress of the West Youkai Faction and the Holy Priestess, among others. So, they'd jumped on the chance to improve a situation that really couldn't be worse without them doing something stupid.

And maybe, just maybe, Ravel had been happy about that.

It was no secret that she was a fan of Domino Mask as a character. She kind of had given that away very thoroughly during their first meeting. She wasn't a great fan of Leviathan's show until the appearance of the side character, but it was entertaining enough to pass the time with. There was a depressingly low amount of adequate ways for devils to spend their time, especially if one didn't enjoy Rating Games. After Domino Mask came into the picture? She hadn't missed a single chapter.

That wasn't quite enough for her to be fine being the man's assistant though, but she'd seen and learned enough of the man through… research to know that he wasn't that bad. Sure, it might not be her dream job or anything, but, as stated, House Phenex needed that. So, they'd take the chance to improve their situation regardless. It was just fortunate that Ravel was in a good position and had a positive enough outlook on it to be agreeable.

Somehow, the man in question was a lot better than his character in the series was though. Sure, Domino was confident and outspoken, but that could be obnoxious very quickly in real life. She'd seen a lot of those kinds of people.

The real Joshua Davis was almost the opposite, really. Withdrawn, unassuming, but still very much a force to be reckoned with. The more she saw of him, the more she was reassured that the position wasn't quite as bad as her father and brother had made it out to be.

So, what had been a somewhat forced but not terrible decision… was turning out to be quite good in Ravel's opinion. Her family might not agree, but she'd been working with Davis for a few days and she could confidently say that she was enjoying herself. Where she'd expected to run errands and do little else than keep track of a schedule, Ravel found herself instead having quite the power at the tip of her fingers.

Sure, she needed to run everything by Joshu- Davis, but he seemed to care very little and allow quite a lot so long as she stuck with his vague and rather lax rules. He seemed to just genuinely be… nice. He didn't pressure people. He didn't demand payments from people. He didn't seem to care for much of the debts he was owed either.

However, he seemed to allow Ravel quite the free reign over the latters. She just had to read his character right so that she wouldn't upset him by trying to organize favors and payments. Besides, it was actually enlightening to see how he dealt with people.

He did massive favors that thoroughly got people under his thumb. Then he all but refused to get paid for any of that, which got people more and more desperate to repay him. At most, he'd pull those strings later when he needed them and still pay for the services or whatever it was he asked. He even did so while completely overpaying, so that people somehow ended up in a worse position than before.

That way, none of the people Davis dealt with ever felt any resentment. It was difficult to be angry at someone when they were doing stuff for you for free and never really asking for anything back. If anything, it seemed like a very effective way to build goodwill with new people and Ravel was very eagerly taking notes of everything she saw.

It was very interesting and also… refreshing.

"Hey there, doing a good job so far, it seems," the man in question said, approaching her with a warm smile and seemingly just as warm cookies on a plate besides two cups of tea that he set on the table in front of her. Then he took one of the cups after taking a seat in front of her. "Hope it's not too much trouble. It was a bit much for me, but I don't know if that's because I'm just not built for that kind of stuff, or because there was a lot on my plate beside that, or maybe something else."

"I'm fine. Thank you, Mr. Davis," she replied respectfully. "And thank you for the refreshments too," she added, taking the cup offered to her. "It's been no trouble at all so far, I assure you."

It had actually all been kind of fun. She usually didn't get to do much with her family and even less so with her brother's peerage. Her mother and father dealt with the family matters and Yubelluna dealt with her brother's. She was actually looking forward to this job, especially after the peek she'd gotten on.

"I'm glad to hear that. And you can relax with me. You should have noticed that I don't care for formalities and such all that much," the man told her with an amused smile. "It makes me feel like there's something wrong when I see a kid be that serious."

"I'm not a kid, Mr. Davis. I'm your assistant," she said, glaring at the man, who in turn just laughed.

"And you are doing a great job. Doesn't mean you can't act like a kid though," he pointed out, shaking his head and running his fingers through his hair. "Well, I guess you are too grown up to like chocolate chip cooki-"

"I never said that," she interrupted, reaching for the tray that the man was about to pull away.

"Hm, that's what I thought."

Joshua Davis was… surprisingly deceptive, as it turned out.

Ravel would have to remember that.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How's it going?

Guys! Ravel is trying to take over the story! She took over another chapter, man. What the hell? And this entire chapter is more or less a single scene of House of Water class, which… Is a bit surprising.

Admittedly, I shouldn't be surprised anymore.

Why does this keep happening? Why? Just… I… Have I done something to insult the Writing Gods or something? Did I somehow piss off the characters in some way?

Anyway, I hope you liked Ravel- I mean, the chapter. Yeah, that.

As always, if you can't wait until next week for next chapter, there's up to three new chapters in my Pa tre on:

P a treon . com (slash) AdrianKing

Discord Link: discord .gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: What do you think Ravel is gonna do with the assortment of strings Joshua has at her- I mean, his disposal?

See you.