【Name: Faer Jaecar】
【Level 11】
『HP: 323/323』
『MP: 68/68』
『Str: 7』
『Agi: 7(11.9)』
『End: ７』
『Int: 8(110fps)』
『Mag: 4』
『Dex: 7』
『Luk: 7』
After that fight against that… the Reaper they fought this was the result of what he had gained.
His stats had been the most straightforward thing to happen to him last night.
The relaxing Contractor let out a sigh, it wasn't bad. At this point he was blatantly beyond superhuman, capable of moving at speeds that were more in line with comic book and low end manga characters. Hell, he saw and was able to react to things that most untrained humans would be hard pressed to catch.
However, if nothing else he knew that he was far from reaching any real pea- "Fae-Jae, are you brooding still?" -ks of power. "Yeah definitely still, brooding."
Then there was him apparently being a "Demon Summoner," he didn't summon Pixie, she just decided to start following him.
It kinda reminded him of this one thing he had been told about cats. They do that.
Flying into his face the petite woman looked at him with puffed up cheeks.
"Jae-Fae, you're so boring. Why don't you do something besides look at these bland books and stare off into space?" The woman questioned as she tugged on his nose.
Right, then there was Pixie. The Demon who had stuck around and according to the system, was his first Party Mate, which in his humble opinion didn't explain much if anything to him. But it did confirm what the heiress said about him being a Demon Summoner to some extent, through some manner he didn't understand Pixie was attached to him.
And by some other unknown extent he could command her as well.
Even if Pixie hadn't been there for the Reaper fight, which was more on him than anything else since even if he didn't know he had that ability he still could have told her to come along. He didn't try. It was fine this time since he somehow made it through that fight without getting hurt and the soreness he had felt had faded after some sleep.
Pixie gave Faer a utility he's been needing for some time, magic, the one thing that Faer was sorely deficient on up until last night. Hell he still likely needed more going for him.
More coverage never hurt anyone though and he could use all the coverage he could get.
To expand on that earlier point about last night, amongst other things he had learned something called 【Spirit Gun】, a low damage "Almighty" magic attack, that would drain him dry of his MP in two uses. But it was probably better than his basic magic based gun attack by leagues given that. He would eventually need to go over to Akihiko's Warehouse in order to test it since it would be better to get a handle on it before he actually needed it in a live scenario.
"Stop brooding and answer me," The petite woman shouted as she stomped the air in front of his face and puffed up her cheeks in a pout.
"What? Sorry, I was a bit distracted."
"The hell you were, I totally saw you look at me before you were like "ugh, she's babbling again,"" Pixie says imitating Faer's voice about as well as a child could imitate a grown man's.
In the short few hours the small woman never really stopped running her mouth and while it wasn't as annoying as the kids that he attended school with, it was definitely enough for Faer to honestly wonder if she ever ran out of breath.
"Yeesh, there's no winning with you is there?" Of course, he didn't say that since he wasn't rude.
"Yes there is! I'm not that picky and needy, I just want to do something that isn't sitting around the house all day. Or training! I bet you're a real training nut too!" The small woman says accurately calling out his habits.
But one didn't exactly get a physique like his by not training efficiently. Though it definitely did make him wonder, would his old half remembered training methods even work on him now? We was roughly twice as good as what he was across the board now from when he was… in his first-
"Faerrrrrrr, come on, stop wandering around in your own head and start wandering outside! You won't find anything new in there, dummy!" By now the blue wearing small woman looked to be completely red in the face with the yelling that she was doing.
She really was upset with him like this…
"Fine, fine, what do you want to do Pixie? Where do you want this humble Contractor to take you?"
"Hmmm, hmm, hm. Ah I know! Let's go watch a movie! At that Theater place!"
A sigh forced its way out the Contractors, if this was what dealing with Demons was going to be like then he was definitely going to have his work cut out for him if he was going to have a full party of them.
"Is that so, how do you plan on going there? For as much as I stick out, I'm not exactly a floating Fairy that looks like it belongs in a story book."
"First off, rude. Secondly, I wouldn't be too worried about it. I can only be seen by people who have already interacted with the supernatural before."
How would that even work on this island? It's a complete toss up for who has interacted with the supernatural and who hasn't because of how Shadows and Demons work. "And if you're seen then what?"
It wasn't like civilians had the highest survival rate after an initial encounter. Not that he would let it escalate that far.
"Just let everyone around them think they're schizophrenic. They would probably already be Shadow bait and pretty fragile by now if they aren't made of sterner stuff." Pixie waves off as she floats over to the door, "Now let's go already."
…
Was this what it's like to have a needy pet?
Several old analog clocks ticked in synchronization with a near deafening noise as the lights of the darkened amphitheater slowly turned back up to their normal intensity. In front of each of the occupants of the room sat a monitor that had just finished the feedback that the UNDIT task force stationed in Japan had sent up for review.
On most days paper would suffice however, this wasn't most days.
"You're sure that's right," came the questioning tone of a man with a heavy baritone voice. He wore the typical attire that you would expect of a politician, suit and tie clean shave, blonde hair slicked back neatly. The picture of a professional, with the exception of his missing eye and the terrible burns that rendered the left half of his face irreparably damaged.
"I know what I saw, and you saw it too, that footage would take way too much time to doctor into what you saw if it was falsified. Besides you and I both know that those fools have almost no idea how the Demonicas work let alone enough to falsify any readings from them," this time a blonde woman whose russian accent wouldn't be anymore apparent if she was speaking the language.
Dr. Zelenin commented, a veteran of the Schwarzwelt Investigation Team, though she didn't engineer the suits having used one for so long the accomplished doctor would be well aware of what the machine could and could not do.
It likely wasn't much of an exaggeration to say that the Demonica was proving to be the greatest creation human hands had ever made time after time and just when they think they know everything that it could do something else proves otherwise.
Though the person inside the armor mattered this was not a scenario where that could be possible, all the soldiers who wore the armor were chosen because they were the best the world had to offer in terms of warfare. It simply was improbable that they could alter or edit the material so quickly.
"So then this is real then… I'm not sure if I should be fearful or excited," this time another representative spoke up, a redheaded woman of germanic descent spoke up, carefully jotting down notes on the situation.
"It's natural to fear the wrath of Gods but I believe what we are looking at isn't a God. At least not yet." Ironically the scientist says, but again if anyone is to say, she was uniquely qualified.
The sentiment however, was shared by those on the Senior UNDIT counsel.
As of 0015 JST or 1515 GMT the UNDIT forces stationed in Tatsumi Port Island had sent forward the preliminary reports of what was amounting to be a troubling deployment in the war against the Demons and what was colloquially known as the Dark Hour.
It was like most endeavors involving the supernatural, a meat grinder that if fought by conventional forces, would see casualties on par with some of the worst wars known to man despite most battles lasting an hour each day.
The situation was far worse than one could glean just from that. As the war against the inhuman and unnatural seemed to have more exceptions to the rules than actual rules.
This required a special handling of each case. More than what most countries had in GDP revenue, luckily the UN didn't really need to worry about something like a collapsing economy if they needed the resources to fight the foes that this brave new world had to face.
With that in mind the Senior Counsel was always looking for something to sharpen humanity's bleeding edge.
"This Minato Arisato, you're certain he's summoning Demons completely loyal to him." The same blond man from earlier spoke. If so this was something big, possibly as redefining as the existence of Demons in the first place.
The nature of Minato Arisato's powers asked several questions, the least of which being what the precise relationship between the two were. The knowledge base that UNDIT had on Persona was a series of presuppositions built upon the analysis of that one young man who was seeking treatment.
One the surface level between a shared innate magic system they might have seemed similar enough but the reasons for a Persona to come about had underlying factors that laid in the psychology of each wielder. Or so they had been led to believe.
If this video were taken as unmitigated truth, then there was something deeper going on here, something that might inextricably tie humanity to Demons in a way no one present was comfortable with.
The silence choked up the atmosphere as most of the people in the room had either personal encounters with demons or understood from a clinical perspective that this war for existence could easily shift if there was more to to this situation
Even Doctor Zelenin who had plenty of reason to have hang ups over humans being so close to that corruptive force recognized that when in the hands of the morally sound they were like any other tool to be used: only when necessary and on viable targets.
"Well, Sir, we're not really sure if they are Demons or just this "Persona" phenomenon in the shape of Demons. But it is clear that his power has some kind of unknown relationship with them." A presenter who for the most part had been a fly on the wall piped up.
"So what you're saying is that you have no concrete data." The blond man said with no small portion of agitation coloring his tone.
It was defensive for the most part, many people present in the room had been numbed to the rigors of combat and the clean up with it but uncovering something new about the supernatural always threatened to wipe away all the previous data gathered. All their assumptions and preparations were wiped away because they weren't aware of a relationship between what they thought they knew and something that was recently unknown.
"Er- um…"
"Counselman Creed, relax, we are all stressed about the situation. Yelling some poor researcher won't fix anything. For now let cooler heads win and let us keep tabs on this situation. After all he will surely be disappointed if this spirals into something that we could have kept a lid on." The German woman suggested placing her pen down as she finished her writing and looked to the rest of the council with a mildly stern look on her face.
"That said, it's not as if we don't have reason to believe that there isn't more to this situation. That Pixie, made an allusion to the Bible regarding our new topic of interest that alone should be enough to warrant a second look."
"Are we going to trust the words of a Pixie?"
"You mean one of the same Demons that are in Kashima's retinue? Yes. It's enough for me to say we ought to keep a vested interest on that Peninsula."
"And what of our… Contractor? Is he still alive or has he failed as well?"
"Preliminary reports are promising… if a bit limited."
"It's to be expected when you pool resources into something… untested."
A sigh escaped the normally upbeat boy as he pulled out the milk for his cereal.
Junpei Iori hasn't been feeling Junough lately. Between the crazy hours spent training and the fighting and studying this was getting weigh pretty heavily on the intrepid hero in the making.
Letting himself collapse into the chair at the table heavily the boy quickly took in a spoonful of the sugary food.
Not too far away sat his homework, trying to puzzle it out he found himself wondering if any of this was worth it.
Sure, he had powers now and he was doing some cool stuff that most people would only think could be possible in a Manga but…
He almost died last night.
Tearing his gaze away the boy shoveled more of his breakfast down.
…
If it hadn't been for that Witch lady casting Diarama when she did, that would've been his bacon. It wasn't like Junpei didn't know the risks either but everything was ramping up way faster than he expected and it hadn't even been a full month yet.
That Reaper had been something else for sure.
Kirijo-Senpai made sure everyone knew what was up when they were studying but the real experience was something else.
Inhumane.
Junpei had almost frozen up before he remembered that new technique he wanted to try. It worked too, which to be fair had been the reason he almost died last night.
Not that there hadn't been another half dozen times it almost happened when they were first starting.
A "Critical Failure" according to their Redheaded leader who had practically sprinted to them to try to get them out before things got too hot.
Which kinda fell apart before it could even start.
Thankfully the fodder was there in all their glory to soak up the majority of that monster's attention.
Oi, Junpei isn't that pretty fucked up to say about people who died trying to help? Sure, they would definitely look cooler in black and red, but they definitely didn't just become nameless red shirts when they arrived.
They would probably have poor mental health too. After all, the cool designs are always saved for enemy fodder, or rival factions that aren't really that tough in the end.
Yeah, no… it just wasn't the same. Being the cool and mysterious Junpei Iori just wasn't happening today.
Hell he was lucky to even see today. Could be worse he could like- no let's not try to see what happens when these two things are mixed.
Escapism depression and real life depression was surely a recipe for disaster.
From behind light footsteps approached, but unless they were coming for him, he was too tired to care.
"Junpei, are you doing alright? You don't look so good."
Oh, it's Yuka-tan, dressed and ready to enjoy her weekend.
Sasuga, he had her well trained if Yuka-tan could distinguish his mood from just a single glance.
"Yeah… you're not fooling me Junpei. What's wrong?" His friend asks as she pulls up a seat on the opposite side of the table.
Well… It's not like sitting in a bad situation has ever done anything good for him.
"Er, Well… I guess if I had to say it's like this… Yuka-tan, we're in our second year right?"
"Yeah..? Is this about your grades? I told you no-" the pastel pink girl begins to admonish.
Shaking his head, Junpei continues, "it's not that. I mean it is but- Yuka-tan we're in the second to last year of high school and since this year has started its been like a Featherman series."
"...I know what you mean." Ah it was just like Yuka-tan to be so relatable, it definitely showed as her face curled into an uneasy mask of anxiety. "It's like this doesn't even feel real. I mean everyone knows about the Tokyo Incident but… I've lived here my whole life, I didn't think I would see something like this here..."
"Tokyo was weird. Like you knew something was off but no one really knew how for the longest… despite everything going back to normal something just wasn't." Scratching at his head and almost displacing his ever present hat, Junpei wasn't sure what to do with his hands as he continued. "But to get at what I mean is that, well Yukari sometimes… no- I feel like I'm out of my league here ya know. Like I got blasted t' hell last night!" Junpei flailed before shrugging with his arms to the sky.
"I would'a been smithereens if it hadn't been for that witch lady..."
"I didn't realize you were feeling like that…" At the display weakness his childhood friend didn't seem to know how to respond. At least it wasn't disgust.
"Yeah, well… It's just hard to keep up. I feel like I'm barely keeping my head above the water here. But everyone else seems to be doing just fine." Junpei finishes, placing his forehead into his hands staring into his bowl of cereal.
The words had stopped up the archer, killing her response right as she was about to open her mouth. She should've figured that Junpei would've been having a tough time adapting to all of this since none of this was really like media aimed at kids.
This was real and that made everything scary… that and well Junpei was chuuni through and through, the goof.
Pushing her legs together as she got a little bit more comfortable, the wooden chair Yukari looked at the back door.
"Hmm, Junpei, do you see the back door?"
Craning his head to see it, the tired boy hums in affirmation. He wasn't sure what was special about it, it was just a door. "What about it?"
"That's not the same door that was here last month. Ya see, a few days after Minato-kun moved in, Shadows attacked. And things got really bad."
Taking a breath the brunette looked down at the table, "I almost got Minato and myself killed, stabbed through the door. If it hadn't been for his reflexes I would've been done for."
"You can't know that for sure-" Junpei begins to interject.
"No." The girl says firmly with steel in her tone. "No, I do know for sure Junpei. After that when we went to the roof to get to another escape we came across Sanada-Senpai fighting one of the big shadows we were worried about. Or maybe it was the same one. I don't know. Point is the moment we got up there I distracted Sanada-Senpai for a moment and because of that he nearly died," the brunette says, running out of breath.
"I'm the reason he nearly lost his arm. And the reason why Minato needed to summon that Persona the first time. If I hadn't messed up between Kirijo-senpai, Jaecar-Senpai and him, they could've easily handled the situation."
…
This was something that she had been sitting on for a while, Junpei realized.
"But ultimately, it was the best I could do. It was my first major life and death battle and I was useless. I accept that though. Junpei, last night, was easily the worst night you've had to deal with too. You'll get better, you're not drowning. And if you start I'll pull you to the surface."
"Sheesh, Yuka-tan, if you weren't the quintessential childhood friend heroine, I'd think you like me." The cap wearing boy sang in a smug tone, as he closed his eyes and crossed his arms.
"Uureech!" Yukari's hands shot to her face as she retched, turned slightly green.
Bam
"Hey! Don't gag, that's so rude!" Junpei yelled red in the face as he slammed his hands onto the table indignantly.
"Then don't be gross Junpei, you're like my brother," the girl retorts hotly as she manages to get control of her disgust.
"Obviously Yuka-tan, you have zero sex appeal for this Junpei Iori."
"Is that so? Then why did I hear you talk to Minato-kun about a certain challenge?"
"Urk!" She caught him red handed! "Y-You're so vain Yukari!"
"I am not!" the girl growls back, slamming her hands into the table causing his bowl to jiggle. She took the bait- er she missed the amazing deflection from Junpei!
"Uwah! Yukaten-Douji has returned! I gotta get out of here before her rampage starts!" The nasty eyed boy bolts, leaving his homework and cereal abandoned on the table as scampered away.
She wasn't originally going to do this since she was definitely getting too old for this but, "Yukaten-Douji! You little rude- get back here Junpei!"
Yukari was just glad he didn't act like this in school! She would have no choice but to ruin her reputation in order to maintain her dignity!
She would show him! Turning her name into a blinding curse like that, see if she ever helped him get out of a funk like that again!
Yes, she knew that didn't make sense. But friendships barely did, and hers with Stupid Junpei made even less.