Level-Up Dragon King! (Saji SI, Highschool DXD)
By: ENIYA
[NSFW] - Level-Up Dragon King! (Saji SI, Highschool DXD) by ENIYA
Status: ongoing
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-10-15
Words: 235289
Chapters: 53
Original source: https/forum./threads/9011
Exported with the assistance of
Level-Up Dragon King! (Saji SI, Highschool DXD)
Introduction
Level 1
Level 2
Level 3
Level 4
Level 5
Level 6
Level 7
Level 8
Level 9
Level 10
Level 11a
Level 11b
Level 12
Level 13
Level 14
Level 15M
Level 15T
Level 16
Level 17a
Level 17b
Level 17c
Level 18
Level 19
Level 20
Level 21
Level 22
Level 23
Level 24A
Level 24B
Level 24C
Level 25
Level 26
Level 27A
Interlude: Perseus, The Hero Faction, and a Night at the Opera
Interlude: Jeanne, The Church and Many New Opportunities
Interlude: Atago, Youkai Faction, and a new cabinet position
Level 27B
Level 28
Level 29
Level 30
Level 31A
Level 31B
Level 32
Interlude: Issei Hyoudou, Rising of the Red Lizard
Interlude: Asia Argento, A New Home (Part 1)
Interlude: Asia Argento, A New Home (Part 2)
Level 33
Level 34
Interlude: Azazel and Himuro Kaiza
Level 35
Level 36a
Level 36b
Level 36c
Level 1
Summary: Someone get's inserted to the side character Saji from birth, he gets creative and power games his way to survival. And keep his family from dying just like canon. Not that he knows they do but it's the thought that counts.
Level-Up Dragon King! (Saji SI, Highschool DXD)
One of my pet peeves when it comes to the light novels, especially the battle-harem kind, is how much of the world development and non-main character-related events are glossed through or simplified in a manner that raises many questions.
Some of those questions can be very worrying.
Let's say… there's this OP arc villain that the main character and his main harem can't defeat without lots of help, so they need to fulfill various requirements just to have a chance against the enemy of the week. They decide that they need to chip away at the antagonist's strength, there's a minor character established a few volumes ago with a weak ass power has that effect, but he sucks… so what happens? That poor bastard gets powered up by a procedure that has been established since the first volume to be freaking dangerous and life threatening! Not just to the recipient, but to the "donors" from where the new power-ups come from?
What is the main question here? Well… How did a faction filled with non-humans of dubious morality (to say the least) enhance a side character (to be a convenient and future plot device/ally) through a dangerous procedure involving extremely hard to get materials?
What does it sound like to me? It's as if some group became either desperate or science crazy and decided to buff up a human / human-like side character as if he was a Common Rarity character in some Gacha game with really strange materials that has terrifying implications when you take a moment to really think about it.
It worries me. It worries me a lot.
Well, of course it worries me! Considering that the Truck-sama decided to send me off to Highschool DXD, where that exact scenario has happened (and many other similar events) before, I have legitimate reasons for worrying my ass off about all of this!
To cut a long story short, I'm concerned about the story of Genshirou Saji. The resident counterpart comparison to the perverted main character Issei Hyoudou but with an added impregnation fetish.
If I recalled correctly, during the whole (lame version of) Loki debacle, Saji just had several different "Vritra Sacred Gears" stuffed into him by the Fallen Angels. Like, what the fuck? Hasn't it been established that Sacred Gears are attached to people's souls? What kind of fuckery is this?
How the actual fucking hell did they just randomly get Sacred Gears? Especially those specific high-powered ones that belong to the split soul of an Evil Dragon? Did they just go to some random possessor and say, "Oh hey there, you have the soul of a dead Dragon King in you, imma just gonna shank you and rip it out of you for research, teehee!"
Oh sure, there's the possibility of those Sacred Gear wielders being the mad-types that would go crazy just from activating their god-given artifact but what if they weren't? What if Saji only lucked out because he so happened to be the only Vritra Sacred Gear wielder that was part of the biblical faction alliance?
Considering that no other Vritra-user appeared in the light novels despite there being mention of even more of those types of Sacred Gears… I can only speculate on the possibilities… and it worries me.
Ah, why am I worried about the case of Saji Genshirou specifically? It's because I know the guy in my second life.
Well, of course I know him. He's me.
It took me a few years to figure out I was in Highschool DXD. To be fair, it only took so long to confirm my suspicions because I had to wait until I was old enough to ask legitimate questions on the geography of Japan. I mean, if some four-year-old kid asked about whether there was a town called "Kuou" or not, then that would be very weird.
A six year old child prodigy? Heh, it was a much more reasonable question to ask one's parents then.
I'd like to think that I played the role of a good son for most of my new life in this battle harem genre world.
When my new fraternal twin siblings Gosei and Kouho had been born when I turned ten years old, I had devoted a good amount of time that I could have spent on training with them and helping my mother when I could.
Thanks to all my help, my father considers me reliable enough to let me get away with a lot of things, and my mother spoils me a whole lot. I'm twelve years old now and I sure hope that my siblings won't feel left out by the different treatment that they're likely to get.
"… Genshirou, why did you skip school again?" My second mother Haru Saji, a sweet and caring woman, gently questioned me after finding her child hiding out in our home's storehouse instead of going to school.
For the third time this year.
And the twentieth time since I started Elementary school.
"Oh, you know, the usual. I had a bad feeling and I thought someone would break into the house to kill my lovely mother. So I decided to camp here to reverse gank your would-be assailant while getting some studying done at the same time." I smiled as I explained my reasoning for this particular incident as I hid the metal pipe I "salvaged" from somewhere behind me.
"Ufufu, my brave little boy is so sweet. You're still getting punished, however, so no Weekly Shonen Jump for you." She admonished me and took my Level 1 weapon away from me.
"Aww…" One day I shall be vindicated, and I truly am not looking forward to that day…
"You shouldn't be worrying so much."
"I can't help it."
Considering that the pasts of most of the Sitri peerage were unknown, with only two or three of them having shitty pasts and Ruruko Nimura having a completely normal life, I think it's a reasonable assumption that most of the reincarnated devils (among the good guy cast) there had good reason to ditch their current lives and become a devil.
Since this is a battle harem light novel, there's a high probability that every character has an atypical home life outside of the main character, with my status as a side character I was greatly worried about the life expectancy of my parents.
The fact that my (somehow) naturally blonde half-Japanese mother has been using the "Dead Anime Mom Hairstyle" from as far as I can remember is a huge cause for concern. I tried to convince her to try out other hair-styles, but alas, my efforts were in vain.
As "punishment", my mother cooked us (my dad when he finally got home from work) my favorite home Curry Katsu Rice, before sending me back to my room for the rest of the evening so that I can't watch TV.
I'm pretty sure she only chose that punishment because she knew that I wasn't interested with most of the stuff being shown this year.
Considering that I had the best grades at school, never gave her any trouble outside of a few "I had a bad feeling" events, and that she doted on me a lot, I dare say she never punished me for real or would ever think of doing so unless I killed a man and buried him in our garden.
I might need to do just that if the bad things happen on schedule. And by on schedule, I mean before I become old enough to attend Kuoh Academy.
"Hmm, what to do for tonight?" I look through my book and apparatus filled room for ideas on how to train my abilities tonight.
I unlocked my Sacred Gear, Absorption Line, three years ago when I was just a third-grader.
Genshirou Saji was just like Issei in the sense that he had only recently unlocked his Sacred Gear and became a reincarnated devil at just about the same time as Issei did. Which meant that he had little idea how to use his Sacred Gear and was thrust into many life and death battles where he had to learn on the fly. This meant that he quickly gained strength and tactical skill, but lacked the time to truly experiment and develop his abilities.
I, on the other hand, had a higher IQ and many more years to make up for his lack of spare time. The poor guy was bogged down by his duties to the student council and most of his training was regimented by his strict "master" (the word still gives me chills), with so little time for independent development it was no wonder that he needed some off-screen deadly powerup to stop being a one-trick pony.
After locking my room door, I summoned up the multi-headed mini-dragon device on both my arms and flexed.
Shooting out sixteen tape-like lines glowing bright blue, eight from each arm out of each of the eight heads in many directions, sinking into the additional sensations given by the divine artifact, I manually controlled each of them as if they were extensions of my own body.
From what I can remember, Saji only made it to four lines after he extended his capabilities to manifesting Absorption Line on both hands and both feet. It was much more useful for combat, but I decided to choose a different route with the amount of time available to me.
I chose four lines, sending them to two power sockets, one new battery and an old battery I used for the first generation Gameboy that my parents got me. The ones targeted at the power sockets twisted until they looked like a twisted piece of tissue paper, they stopped right at the entrance to the sockets before slowly entering the holes. The two lines I sent for the batteries quickly wrapped up the targets in a crude manner.
Next, I closed my eyes and focused on what the information coming from the lines, telling me the "power" or what it was prepared to tap into from the surface area that they were interacting with.
Taking a deep breath, I pulled the potential power from the sources at a slow rate, the Sacred Gear processing it in a way that I could understand at first. I was practicing multi-tasking in a way, as I was draining power from different sources at a controlled rate. Wouldn't want to cause another power outage.
I had my Sacred Gear convert the power to replenish my own, first my "mental power" to reduce the fatigue of my mind, then swapping it to my physical energy so that my body would feel energized, then to my life force. It barely affected the latter due to the very inefficient conversion rate.
Vegetables were a much better substitute. Sweet potatoes would be electrical energy for life force supplements any day.
I tend to pick up leftover food thrown away by restaurants when I have the opportunity, hoard it all and then absorb them all in a private location until the food compost turned into ashes. The stored energy could then be used later on to replenish my own reserves, most of the time I used them to help recover from intense training.
I'm basically a dragon that runs on potato power, just like Glados once did, and it works. Admittedly, I had the inspiration to try absorbing plant life power from Superman, after remembering what he did in "The Dark Knight Returns". Hence, it wasn't an original idea.
I withdrew the tendrils and opened my eyes, reaching for both my microscope and water bottle, then used my additional appendages to set the experiment table up.
Unsummoning most of the lines, I focused all my attention onto one line, poured a bit of water over it and slid it under the microscope.
Focus, Understanding, Surface Area and Experience.
These are the main pillars which govern how well I could absorb "power" or any form of energy and then using it for myself.
I hadn't gotten to using Absorption Line to boost my physical capabilities like Saji could, devils likely could imagine physical reinforcement much easier than normal humans could since they have magic in their bodies, however, I made up for the lack of direct combat applications with variety.
Focus. I closed my eyes and turned my senses to just the line and what was on it.
Understanding. Water molecules, Hydrogen and Oxygen, heat energy is key to the state of water. I have to look deeper.
Surface Area. Ignore the light and heat from the microscope, only absorb whatever is in the water.
Experience. Recall the sensation of heat energy, harmonize experience across multiple absorption materials, drain it all then…
… the energy flowed into me, I opened my eyes and saw the thin layer of ice upon my line.
Not enough, when there's nothing left then I have to take even more!
There's still more to take. Don't look at water as a whole, focus… deeper, smaller… find the inter-molecular bonds… it's…
"… Gah! I slipped again."
Drat. It felt like my awareness expanded to "see" something new, yet, I couldn't reach for it.
The level that I intend to reach is still so far away.
That's not even discounting the fact that my molecular-level techniques aren't even usable on the field yet.
It wasn't the case that I lacked the necessary energy, I was in peak condition this time and yet… I need more experience, more knowledge, more of everything.
A few months later and I had barely progressed in that particular field of study, even as was now enrolled in middle school.
Perhaps I need to focus on developing and mastering other abilities first before going back to that field? As I pondered that, I idly answered the teacher's attendance roll call for my first day at middle school.
"Saji Genshirou."
"Here, sensei."
…
"Kaizer Himuro Heydrich."
"Yo!"
I felt like choking on my own spit after hearing that. My eyes quickly opened wide and I discreetly turned my head to look at the boy with the most ridiculously non-Japanese and abnormal name.
Let's see, multi-colored hair, heterochromia, buff as fuck (how is he a middle school student), tanned… oh whatever, he's either a native of the supernatural world, an absolute chuuni or someone's OC donut steel.
Fuck.
I thought the absence of Naruto in Shonen Jump was a bad sign for an incoming NINO crossover, but this might just be worse!
I did my best to plan for canon, but I can't handle fanon! Oh shit, the power creep is going to be even worse, isn't it?
Okay… I can probably survive school just by not getting involved with this guy at all. Note to self, also, don't even think about getting a girlfriend because if he's an OC, he's gonna get some.
In order to assuage my worries, I decided to make a new motto just for the upcoming years.
"Keep calm and keep grinding."
Level 2
Level 2
Japan's waste management is strictly managed for the most part. It makes it both easier and harder for me to get things done. Why is that so?
For me, the best part of Japan's trash collection policies is how organized the trash can be and how it's all gathered together ripe for the pickings. This saves me a lot of time, as I won't have to simply pray and hope for some useful materials during any random searches.
On the downside, trash collection time varies, it can be anything from 8:00am to 10:00am. Most people get up very early or take it out the night before. This is inconvenient for me as it means that I need to play it safe to make sure I don't get caught and sneak out of my home around 2 to 5 am to be on the safe side.
Waste not, want not.
I couldn't let all the potential experiment materials and the free power provided by thrown away food go to waste. It's a shocking anomaly, but Japan already trashes millions of tons of perfectly edible food each year, and if food like that goes to waste while millions of children under the poverty line in this country don't have enough to eat, then I will damn well make sure I put all the waste to good use.
Of course, "good use" equals "my use", when it comes to discarded items.
I had long familiarized myself of the trash collection dates for my local community and the closest large supermarket. With that in mind, twice a week, I can easily refill my stores of energy and bury away my materials in a secret spot of mine.
Absorption Line can be very useful for landscaping once the lines are sharpened enough to penetrate through the earth, thanks to all my multi-tasking and remote control training, I can even use my multiple lines as a main form of attack… and like a shovel.
Wow, Sacred Gears are so useful!
"Okay, last haul before summer break. Let's do this."
A few of my lines wrapped around the sacks of trash while my newly placed Absorption Line shooters on my both sides of my hips shot out another a single line each, using its sticky properties to latch onto the sides of the alleyway.
Diverting my reserve stores of power to the other side of those shooters, I released them as kinetic energy to propel and fling myself into the sky with my trash, no… treasure, in tow.
The rest of my lines were levitating and rotating itself like a spherical shield around me with the specific goal of absorbing sound energy in order to reduce the travel noise I made.
"Sasageyo! Sasageyo!" I couldn't help myself as I repeated the technique to do some real 3-D maneuver gear action.
After calming down a bit, I quickly made my way to my secret spot near home and used my lines to swiftly move things about. I quickly placed most of the experiment material into my underground stash before covering it back up with the patch of ground.
As for the others, I hummed a tune as I absorbed the piles of food compost until they were utterly drained and reduced to ash, before moving on to absorbing the meat and vegetables that couldn't be sold in the same manner.
When I felt that I reached the limit of how much spare power I could store, I redistributed the actively absorbed power to all the many sources of "power" that my body held.
Anything from my body integrity (fixing fatigue and illnesses), to my physical energies (Life Force, that could be manifested as Touki with a bit more training), spiritual energies (like mana) and up to my life span in that order of priority.
I could barely impact my life span and the other more conceptual forces so I prioritized them the least until I could improve on all the other aspects of my power or reach some breakthrough.
Over the past few months of this first semester, I had gotten good at manipulating my life force for internal use, with a bit of external use that could be passable Touki after I train more.
Through constant recycling of my internal mana through Absorption Line, specifically through controlled feeding and replenishment of my reserves, I had grown my mana supply until it was a few times larger, although I still haven't found out how to use it yet.
I wasn't born a magical creature or a denizen of the supernatural world where magic or some natural racial energy is part of their being. So supernatural strength, speed, and senses at birth wasn't a thing for humans like myself.
At present, my only working source of superhuman strength and speed is through training (with Absorption Line recovery and enhancements increasing my gains tremendously). And while I am much stronger than an average run of the mill adult has any right to be, I'm still woefully below what's needed to even survive against a newly reincarnated single pawn devil.
Hopefully, by the time I reach canon in about 4 years' time, I would have grown strong enough to pull off some Hero Faction tier stuff.
… After about half an hour of burning off a bit more excess power through some self-injury fueled training, I took a small pile of cleaned "trash" back home, sneaking back into the window by using my line to pull myself right back to my bedroom.
Part of my new haul included an old video camera. Great, now then, time to see if I can selectively drain "data" or if I'll end up with "Video" powers like inFAMOUS.
Summer exams were over and summer vacation was about to begin.
So far, I managed to survive school without incident.
"That's the kid!" "Teach him a lesson!" "Yaaaaaah!!!"
I sighed in unending disappointment as I blocked and parried the attacks from my assailants in front of the school gate.
They were the latest delinquents from some high school who came here to attack me for several minutes until they tired out. This pattern has been repeated time and time again without a single hit being landed upon me, due to… well, I am rather good at self-defense.
Thankfully, my parents had never been called over these incidents since no one technically gets hurt.
It all started when I just had to be a decent guy and told some high school boys to back off from harassing some female students, then of course, in Japanese anime / light novel tradition they decided to get violent.
As someone that didn't intend to get a black mark or be particularly noticeable by kicking some ass, I simply blocked and parried most of their attacks without causing harm directly while repeatedly pleading with them to stop the senseless violence.
The situation was resolved when a policeman came by and took some statements, I got off scot-free since I hadn't caused any harm (it helped to have witnesses that backed me up), but unfortunately, things… escalated in true Japanese "misunderstandings" fashion.
"As expected of the boss!" "16 minutes and 37 seconds." "There's 14 of them this time so that's 54 seconds each until they gave up."
What a waste of time…. Wait, what the fuck, are they placing bets on how long it will take until the latest group stops attacking me?
Assholes.
Well, I guess that's to be expected. I didn't really have any friends in middle school.
Pretty much everyone thought I was a delinquent due to my blonde hair, or at least, they believed I had delinquent-like tendencies despite knowing that I was the smartest kid in school in addition to knowing the actual story of how this all started.
I'm really starting to think that this is due to whatever… field, is generated, by our resident speshul OC.
If he's not some Gary Stu or a regular dark edgy OC then he's at least a supernatural being whose constant information manipulation magic is somehow fucking up my reputation by screwing with everyone's logic processing capabilities!
Seriously? Fucking really?
The kid that looks like a high school bodybuilder on steroids has white and black "natural" hair colors parted right in the middle isn't a delinquent? Or at least a suspected trouble maker?
Blue eyes on the left, red eyes on the right, red tribal-like tattoos on his back (as revealed in swimming classes) somehow make the girls go crazy despite all the Otaku and Yakuza connections?!
What the actual fuck?
If he's putting on a "this is normal, I'm not a troublemaking delinquent" field around himself… then I suspect that the scrutiny or impressions that people should be having about him are being transferred to me due to some unknown criteria or cultural biases being taken into account by this "information field"… in a completely messed up and inconsistent manner.
My SAN meter is literally on free fall right now… has been at free fall since the start of the semester, and I've just discovered how big negative numbers can really go.
"Well, at least I can be happy about getting the top score in school."
One of the perks about being reincarnated is that my IQ level seemed to be boosted to an extent. It wasn't a straight-up IQ number added onto Saji's canon average IQ (based on comparisons to Issei and other LN MC's), but rather, just a slight boost to the point where I can be considered a prodigy.
Not a Super High School Level Genius. I wasn't going to make a doomsday device or anything.
Concepts and subjects that I once thought was too hard for me in my previous life simply became manageable for me so long as I put in some moderate effort. That's about it. I still have to put in a fuck ton of effort to "git gud" in anything.
… Of course, that's not the main reason why I'm getting the top score when the exam results come out after summer break.
No, the main reason is that this "Kaizer-sama" (as called by his female admirers) deliberately gets 75% in all his tests, in all subjects, without fail.
He's like the Classroom of the Elite's 50% man, but at 75%.
And absolutely no one gives him shit for it! Like, no one!
The teacher's don't even tell him to try harder and they love him. The girls all fawn over him while the rest of the male population seethes in impotent jealousy and admiration at the same time.
Absolutely unbelievable!
This is madness!
Thank god that I'm going to see my grandparents from my mother's side in the United Kingdom over the summer break.
If I have to stay in this country for another month without a reprieve I'm going to go insane.
You know what, just give me my Naruto-in-name-only, or Harry-in-name-only… it can't be as bad as… as this. Hell, just give me a Shirou. I would like a nice sword guy that would save my ass rather than all of this crap.
Breathe… keep calm… just a few more days…
Plane rides still suck as much ass today as it did in my previous life.
It could have been worse, however, if there were more babies and younglings on the plane. I count myself fortunate that my grandparents on my father's side were more than happy to take care of my two-year-old twin siblings.
Canterbury was a nice place to visit. My grandparents were surprised at me speaking in English as if it were my first language, my father who could only speak broken English came to rely on me as a translator, and my mother was pleasantly surprised and very proud of me.
We spent a nice long relaxing week in the quiet town. I also taught my new grandparents how to use Skype and various other technologies, I think I will be getting some calls from them at some point, they seem to be have appointed me as their new favorite grandchild.
Mostly because everyone else was a disappointment.
For our last few days in the UK, my parents and I went to stay in London to get some shopping and sightseeing done.
That was when the bad feelings started to come back to me in full force.
I kept a close eye on my parents and our surroundings, looking for anything suspicious, and found nothing.
And then I read the local newspapers and heard about some local serial killer killing people at night, all of the victims were middle-aged Asian males.
All of it took place in London, and every Friday without fail for the past two months, there would be someone that was knifed in the gut and dropped off a high-rise building to fall to their death.
It was utterly bizarre. And people simply accepted it.
What the fuck? Why aren't people more terrified? Are they all thinking that "it won't be me, it'll be someone else" every Friday night when they go out for a fucking drink?
"Here's 50 Pounds, go treat yourself to something Genshirou, you earned it. Your mother and I are going to have a dinner date at Duck & Waffle." My father pointed at Heron Tower, the tallest building in the City of London financial district.
I was screaming in my head.
Obviously, as always, they didn't fucking listen to me when I started talking about how their lives were in danger and that I had a bad feeling about this. They thought I was being a cute and concerned son.
Realizing that I wasn't getting anywhere and that I wasn't willing to hurt them to keep them safe, I smiled and played along until they left. After that, I quickly put on a hoodie I bought at a store earlier in our trip, and stalked them all the way to the restaurant on the 40th floor of the 46th floor high tower.
Unfortunately, I couldn't stay on the floor since there was no real place to hide from the public, so I was forced to head back to the ground floor by the scenic elevator that I took to come up from there.
Okay, they should be safe if they stay within public view, so that's fine…
Oh shit, what if they went to the bathroom?
I made some calculations based on the few observations I had on my father's toilet breaks whenever we ate at a restaurant and went back up the lift after circling the tower grounds for about two hours.
The bad feeling became a consistent buzzing noise in my head.
I could barely prevent myself from manifesting Absorption Line right there and then. I don't know why, but for some reason, I felt a call to go… somewhere.
And that somewhere so happened to coincide with my father excusing himself to go to the restaurant's bathroom, I followed closely behind.
As the door opened, we both paused to note the light malfunctioning briefly, flickering on and off. My father continued on even as I stared, in both confusion and horror as the shadows created by the light began to move in unnatural ways, the buzzing in my head became louder and I quickly brought out Absorption Line.
I didn't know what came over me, but I quickly shot myself forward, darted around my father and got in front of him… just in time for my shoulder to be caught by a shadow.
A shadow deeper and darker than I had ever seen before.
It felt as if a human hand had grabbed my shoulder, the sensation was brief but familiar, but I could recognize the energy even without one of my lines covering my body.
The aura was nearly the same as my own Sacred Gear's.
In that quarter of a second when I was grabbed and I recognized that energy, I had been pulled forward into the wall, enveloped by darkness and when I saw the light again, I was falling.
Free falling from well over 150 meters high off the ground.
"Haah! Huwah?! What the fuc-"
Something reached for me and it was only thanks to my reflexes that I managed to twist myself with transferred kinetic energy to catch the arm about to drive a knife into my gut.
"Haaaaahahahaaaaa!" The shadowy monster clad in black cackled as it attempted to stab me with another knife that whipped around it's side by a shadowy tendril.
My bright blue line severed the tendril before it could finish its move.
"Eeah?!" It shrieked!
"Two can play at that game." I growled and kicked the thing off me, shooting lines at the building to pull me back to it, the thing followed me even as I used the sticky lines to stand sideways on the tower walls.
I looked up at the creature staring down at me, it's figure still hidden by the black clothes. Upon closer inspection, I could see a human-like shaped head… although, I'm pretty sure there were flickering black flames that made up it's lower jaw.
"There can only… be one…" It rasped as it pointed a black sharp talon-like shadow construct at me, oh, that's it's hand. "It won't… be you…"
"Oh, I don't think so." I narrowed my eyes at it, directed more of my lines to the building before letting myself drop about a dozen meters, then I focused on the lines so that it would pull me up at high speeds.
Right at the peak of my launch, I propelled myself further with converted kinetic energy, shooting myself at high speeds up the building and at the creature.
Crashing into it only shocked it for a moment before it became a formless shadow, seemingly melding with the tiny shadows in between the tower floors before appearing at random spots, striking me as I ascended up the tower.
I defended myself to the best of my abilities, sometimes, the sharp shadow tendrils got through my defense and gave me some shallow cuts. In the end, however, the creature couldn't stop me from climbing my way up the tower to reach a place where I wouldn't be at risk of falling to imminent death.
At least now I only have a risk of falling off the tower, which is an improvement.
I quickly put the pieces of the puzzle together.
Sacred Gear users can go mad when their artifacts are awakened, the aura of this creature was similar to my own, it's abilities revolve around shadows… it's a Vritra Sacred Gear.
Vritra the Prison Dragon King, one of the most troublesome Evil Dragons due to his various abilities. Four abilities are not enough to be troublesome.
Absorption Line, Shadow Prison, Delete Field and Black Blaze Flare.
When Vritra was exterminated and then sealed into Sacred Gears, he had his soul split into many layers. Because of that, there are many Vritra-type Sacred Gear possessors. But if you were to group them, those four made up the main "types" that they could generally be grouped up as.
That's all, they were simply broad classifications. Every possessor had different and varied abilities. There were more than just four Vritra-type Sacred Gear possessors, his soul was chopped up like lettuce and I only had a part from one particular layer.
Vritra had many troublesome abilities that he developed from a handful of basic abilities that he enhanced and mastered to the point where they became deadly, not just in power, but in it's endless applications.
And now, just one possibility of how his power could develop was standing before me as my enemy.
I layered the roof of the tower with threads, a few lines split into countless and nearly invisible tiny threads, through this, I could spread my awareness and influence all across the area.
Even as the mad man reappeared from the shadows, I could feel him coming and react accordingly, countering his attacks much easier than before by virtue of sensing where he was at any given time.
My enemy was tiring.
His last-ditch attempt to fell me with a hundred shadow spikes from the ground failed as my lines acted like additional appendages, just like Doctor Octopus's robotic arms, and lifted me up in the air just in time to avoid the attack.
One of my lines acting as a long leg moved up upon my command, and then stabbed down at the exhausted enemy as if it were finishing off a wounded prey.
And then I began to absorb the rest of the maddened Sacred Gear user's power.
It was over.
Or was it?
I lowered myself back down to the roof and went up to the assailant, removing his face coverings only to see that half of his face can barely be considered flesh at all. In fact, it looked like part of his body was replaced by the shadowy substance made by the Sacred Gear… which made me wonder what the fuck happened to him…
Removing a few more of the coverings showed that all four limbs were in the same state. Did someone just high-grounded him and turned him into a Vader? Poor guy.
As I drained enough power from him to keep him incapacitated, I reached for his life force and found it to be woefully dim. I knew then and there that he was near death.
Could his Sacred Gear be… in some incomplete Balance Breaker mode to preserve his life, only to drain the rest of his life force in order to maintain this state? Why the killing? Did he have some small bit of Absorption Line powers in him that let him compensate for his shortened life span by draining it from others?
Why just middle-aged Asian men? Is he actually a psycho killer? Or is it because whoever did this to him looked a lot like these targets?
I was just speculating over too much that I couldn't possibly know.
I calmed myself to focus on the here and now.
Feeling compassion for him, I pulled a line to the spot above my heart and stuck it there. I pulled on my own life force and attempted to transfer it to him, only for the flow to suddenly reverse itself!
My life force rushed back from my Sacred Gear and back to my own body.
Stupid. Why did I think it was that easy?
I couldn't "understand" his life force enough to convert my own life force into something compatible enough. There just wasn't enough time for me to do the required adjustments.
I tried to pump back power to maintain his shadow limbs, but his life force began to decrease even with that, and so I decided that it was pointless and decided to cut my losses.
Resolving myself to be with him until he dies, I simply sat there with the man even as the shadowy appendages faded into nothing, leaving behind a limbless broken husk of a man.
He stirred, turning his head through the pain to look at me, for one last time.
In a show of surprising strength and clarity, he told me to "take it" and thanked me for stopping him.
It was… odd. I still felt completely helpless despite coming out of this alive. So hearing this is… I'm still numb to it all.
A small shadow tentacle reached from his body and attached itself to one of my Absorption Line heads.
"Please…"
Following my gut feeling, I agreed to his wishes and pulled.
There wasn't much to take, it was like I was trying to drink a near-empty cup of juice with a straw. A tiny sliver of liquid and some powdery like substance remained, but I couldn't reach it.
An image came to my mind. There was a chocolate drink and at the bottom of it was some undissolved chocolate powder mix, I never wanted that sort of thing to go to waste, and I would just pour a tiny bit of hot water…
I pushed some of my power into him, directed at the last embers of what was there in his own power, and then I pulled.
And I understood.
A derivative of Shadow Prison, another sliver of Vritra's soul, as he lingered on in the realm of the living I managed to reach deep into his own Sacred Gear and pull on it's core. The power I pushed into him became imprinted with the functions of his Sacred Gear and when I pulled it back into me, the small piece of Vritra's soul came along for the ride.
What I was doing is similar to what Yhwach did in Bleach but without the creepy soul pieces implanted in people.
His Sacred Gear was a bit of a grab-bag, at least, it became so after ending up in an incomplete balance breaker state that pulled on Vritra's memories of his other abilities in order to empower him with abilities that wasn't part of the Sacred Gear's original functions.
I held the man's… shoulder, as he began to weaken for the last time.
"Thank… you…"
There was nothing he needed to thank me for. Honestly, he should be raging at me for stopping him, he should have been shouting about having vengeance or…
… that's enough. I don't know enough, or anything at all, in order to just assume his past or what had happened to him.
I just had to be happy for him. I had to smile and believe that he died relieved of his pain.
"Shadow Rider." I sunk into the shadows, becoming an abyssal umbra that drained the light around myself. I fed upon it, rejuvenating my "body" even in this shadow form, then I moved down the building through the shadows.
My ability was far from the outright teleportation that the dying man had displayed at times, but it got the job done, and I evaded the eyes of the people as I reached somewhere near where my family stayed.
I dumped the bloodied and damaged hoodie unto the ground and transferred heat energy to it, setting it on fire so that I wouldn't leave DNA around that could be used for scrying or modern identification.
My parents returned home safe and sound. As far as they know, I had gotten a quick dinner and fell asleep on the sofa waiting for them to come back.
We returned to Japan two days later.
I still had trouble making sense of what had just happened. It was the first time I had actually deliberately hurt a man and… allowed someone to die. I knew that I would be doing so for, well, actual life-threatening self-defense situations at some point, but I still wasn't prepared to process the aftermath at all.
Would all of my life be like this? It would be worse… because there's no way all of my enemies are going to end up pitiful enough to mercy kill, or outright evil enough that I could say to myself that I did what I had to do.
Sacred Gear users wouldn't have peaceful boring lives, I'm pretty sure history and canon events were pretty clear on that.
So what was I to do about this? Could I just accept this?
Keeping myself alive at all costs isn't something I could just accept as a reason to continue as I am. There are plenty of stories and examples where people like that turn out for the worse.
If that is so? Then what is worth fighting for? What is important to me outside of my own life?
I stared at my calendar back at home, looking at how many more days of summer vacation that I had, and thought about how much more time I had until I became a high school student.
I have to find the answer to my question soon. I have the strangest feeling that fighting Vritra Sacred Gear users is somehow going to be a more common occurrence. And I do not want to end up hesitating in future fights.
I decided to set some time aside each day to reflect upon my life and actions, hopefully, I will be able to reach some answers at some point.
Now then, back to training. I have a whole new set of abilities to master.
Oh boy… here we go again.
Level 3
Level 3
My parents bought me a parrot.
Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not a pet type of guy.
I had very pragmatic reasons for making such a request.
It all started when I began reviewing the process of how I attained more of Vritra's powers. After a bit of reflection, I realized that the experience was similar to my data transfer attempts with the video camera.
Power acted as the medium in which information was imprinted upon.
That much should have been obvious to me when I started to discover incompatibilities between life forces, the bad conversion rates with different types of power and the tiniest distinctions between different sources which I draw power from despite similar energies being extracted from them.
This had opened up many doors that were once closed off to me.
One of the first things's I discovered is that I could now extract the information I desired by using my power with the intention of engraving information onto it, enveloping the target with it, and then having the power return back to me.
When I wrapped a new reference book with an aura of power through my lines, I used my experiences with the other Vritra user and the video camera in order to "read" the data on the physical book, before copying it all back into my mind for faster processing.
This didn't mean I could just instant-read any book like some HAX "Gamer" character.
It simply meant that I could absorb information and then process it remotely through Absorption Line just like how I process my sensations through my lines. The process and experience was supernatural, but my text processing speed still remains the same, even if it was slightly boosted by me Sacred Gear's conversion abilities. My storage for that type of "information power" was also still limited like all my other power sources.
Essentially, I had a small "E-Library" in my head where I could read books without having them in the palm of my hand. It wasn't something like Unlimited Book Works which recorded everything that I had seen for all eternity.
After processing the information by "reading" it and deleting the copy from my "E-library", my ability to recall the information I read is no different from the information I gain from reading the book for real.
It was a big breakthrough for me.
I can now copy hentai into my brain and then peruse it at my leisure! Ahahahahaha!
Okay, in all seriousness, it was a really useful information gathering tool and can be turned into an espionage tool later on.
After all, aren't memories considered "information" as well?
And if I can copy information from somewhere, isn't it the case that the opposite can be true as well?
What if I can force information into other things? Hacking into security feeds and replacing them would be well within the realms of possibility.
How about other people? Could I feed my enemy's bodies false signals with my invisibly small threads to cause them to make mistakes? Can I cause a heart attack by imitating certain signals and sending it through?
If Issei could forcefully transfer power to others in order to fuck them up (thanks Vali), then why can't I do the same? Why can't I do the same… in a subtle manner?
In any case, my parrot will be a nice little experiment for me. I want to see if I can transfer my "language power" to it, make it talk in English, Japanese and the little bit of French I know. I want to learn how to deal with different brains and bodies.
After all, most of my future enemies will not be human, and I will need to deal with them as if they have an entirely different body structure.
"Henceforth, you shall be known as… Sheev."
I wasn't going to give my parrot some super edgy name, so that would do.
Besides… I think it would be quite suitable.
"OUUUUAAAAAAAGGHHHHHH!" Sheev screeched loudly.
Knew it.
"What's that?" Kouho Saji pointed at my pet when I first introduced it to them a week later.
"That's my pet parrot." I told my little sister.
"Where does she sleep?" My little brother Gosei Saji asked.
"In the cage. And it's a "he." I informed him in a manner that showed some awkwardness in answering a child's questions.
It has taken me some time to adjust to siblings that can ask questions. Whilst I had a little sister back in my first life we were only two years apart and very close to each other, turns out that those experiences do not transfer over when dealing with siblings who are ten years younger than you.
Even so, I'd like to think that my patience when dealing with my family in my past life would be a great help. Right now, I dare say that my tolerance for toddlers is much greater than before!
"What's his name?" Gosei continued to ask for more details as all curious little kids do.
"His name is Sheev."
"Squak! I must be Frank, your majesty." Sheev squawked.
I had inserted some movie quotes into my parrot's brain recently, I'm glad that it worked out well enough without causing him any harm.
"No! He says it's Frank. Not Sheev." My little sister has been confused by a parrot.
Damn you Frank! I mean, uh, damn you Sheev!
After a few months, the whole family would learn about the Tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise from my parrot, in both English and Japanese.
On a side note, I think my father got the hint and got me a Darth Vader toy for Christmas.
Fuck yeah.
The rest of the year passed by in a flash. It was as productive and as peaceful as could be.
And by peaceful, I meant that I was still being challenged by increasingly larger gangs of humans, some of which seemed to be trained in martial arts and various CQC disciplines.
I had begun to appreciate the challenges as I was able to apply my increased intelligence to develop better combat abilities, situational awareness and pick up new fighting skills. There were little chances for me to learn how to fight for my life at my age, and I am deeply thankful for the occasional over escalation of violence that led to bladed weapons being used against me.
So long as they kept away from my family as they always had, I would continue to receive these attacks and do my best to learn from them.
On the more traditional productivity measures (from my point of view), I had greatly enhanced all my pre-existing capabilities to new heights, gaining access to new types of energy, being able to absorb power at greater speeds with much less focus than I needed to before, but that was just the start of it.
My efforts into controlling my life force had given me the ability to sense life around me, to a vague degree, and I can slightly enhance my capabilities by controlling the flow of my life force around my body. I'm getting closer to reaching Touki usage at this point.
I managed to master my new abilities to create those shadow constructs, barriers, and turn my body into a shadow-like being. The shadow teleportation and portal techniques could only be used at short ranges and took a lot of energy, so while they weren't spammable at fights yet, they were still useful engagement and disengagement skills.
Thanks to my light experiments on Sheev, some more dangerous tests on the local pests (e.g. rats, crows, etc…) and lots of hard work, I managed to learn how to meld my abilities from both Absorption Line and the Shadow Rider to form new skills.
Adding the shadow tendrils to the more offensive use of my lines has essentially doubled my attack rate, even if it is more draining to keep up. Creating weapons out of shadows is generally a cool ability, but by fusing those weapons with different types of energies, they become more than the sum of their parts.
When melded with the metaphysical properties of the shadow weapons, the various types of converted energies become conductive to magical energy, essentially allowing me to use my magical reserves to multiply the effect of an energy release by a greater degree.
Let's use a shitty RPG example. Scenario 1, my absorption lines can send X amount of heat energy to an object to burn it for 10 Damage. Scenario 2, my shadow weapons can have X amount of heat energy placed in them, and with an insignificant amount of mana, can burn something at 100 Damage.
I haven't found the optimum amount of mana to insert into a shadow weapon for various kinds of energy or power yet, as it would be too dangerous to do so until I have a proper training place or end up in some secluded spot for an epic battle to the death.
Then there's one more technique that's… a trump card of mine. It's something that I don't want to use because I'm not an unrepentant killer nor part of a supernatural race that can just shrug off killing like devils or fallen angels.
Sometimes I wonder if animal experimentation is going too far… well, better them than not having an instant kill technique that could save my family and I. Loads of animals die in order to feed my hunger every day anyway, so this isn't too different… other than the fact it's feeding my hunger for more power.
I had reflected upon that train of thought and resolved to be very mindful of thinking that way. If I take it too far, I would be slaughtering non-humans like animals at some point out of some poorly justified reason.
It was at the start of my second year that led me to think that my Sacred Gear has some sort of "plot" or "danger" sense attached to it. Or perhaps it's a side character privilege?
Granted, it's still inaccurate as fuck, but when it works I can't help but be grateful to it.
As per usual, I sensed that my family would be in danger and stalked them from the shadows, until it was time to get in the way and drag the fight somewhere else.
I took a page from the Shadow Rider Sacred Gear user and dragged the monster just far enough to be out of sight from any humans.
Thankfully, I had just harvested plenty of trash the morning before and had enough energy to spare.
"Okay, so what's your excuse?" If I remembered the tropes right, plenty of people in DXD would waste time talking about their motives and banter in mid-fight, which is something I had intended to take advantage of.
"You… ! How dare you interrupt my meal!!!?" The human-shaped monster was covered a shell that reminded me of a rhinoceros beetle, it snarled at me in obvious anger, and while it was ranting I had already spread out multitudes of absorption threads in this abandoned construction site.
Honestly, why did my parents had to have so many night dates, and walk through the most secluded and unsafe spots around? Are they trying to set up their own death scenario or something? As if they don't already have enough death flags on them.
Well, at least I have a good place to fight without hurting anyone.
I have to wrap this up quickly so that I can get home before my parents do, and hopefully, my little brother and sister won't get themselves in trouble during the hours I had been away stalking my parents.
If they did, my parents are going to be so freaking mad at me for ditching my siblings. But I can deal with that, after all, I'm saving their lives here.
"-and then I'll chew your bones in front of your parents and-" I had my threads on it now after slipping some through the gaps of its armor.
They don't have enough surface area to absorb a great amount of its power to justify focusing my attention on that endeavor, but reading the information off its body through my new techniques is more than feasible now that I've managed to get it to keep talking and not attack me.
"Look, can you listen for a second?" From my preliminary analysis, I can determine that there's a chaotic source of corruptive energy within the being's body, perhaps it's a stray devil?
"Kyahahaaah!"
"Wait, wait, wait, dude, wait, listen to me!"
I did my best to look disarming and non-confrontational, putting up my hands in front of me as if I was trying to tell an animal not to jump on me.
Whilst I was buying time so that I can get more information on its body structure for my last resort, I was also going to try to get this potentially mad monster to see reason.
"I can help you remove the chaotic taint causing your energy to go out of control. You don't have to go around eating people and continue your descent to madness. Use my knowledge and power, I beg you." Don't make me destroy you.
"Like I give a shit about that, human!!! All that matters is power." And of course, any chance of peaceful negotiations was shot down.
"Okay then… is this what you really, really want?" Right now, I didn't believe it would work, but I did want to squeeze out every second of non-combat time to get the data I needed.
It stopped for a second and then nodded.
"Yup."
And charged right at me with superhuman speed.
I was up against a devil, a stray one, which I am certain is far superior to me in all aspects other than tactical skill and variety of abilities.
Diverting parts of the data flow to read it's body's electrical signals, the near instant transfer of power allows me to read and process the imprinted information, my body reacts accordingly in order to launch myself away from the attack with a burst of speed.
So long as I have my threads on it, I can read how it will move and predict it's actions.
"Then I will do what I must."
I resolved myself to do just that while also attempting to make it speak.
"You will try! You will fail! And I will feast upon your flesh!!!"
As expected of a Highschool DXD enemy mentality, they just can't stop wasting time speaking.
My shadow tendrils and more obvious lines were ready for it this time. The normal shadow tendrils couldn't pierce it's armor, and the obvious power drain from my lines wrapping around it was met with the appropriate response, naturally, my enemy would always prioritize removing them from his body.
Just as planned.
Power draining in combat rarely works unless it's a plot gimmick to weaken the main character so that the other characters can shine or it's an enemy's main power that the main cast has to take into account.
Simply accounting for that fact allows me to use my supposed main gimmick as a distraction.
Eventually, it got so mad that it turned into a giant beetle monster, with tentacles… of course, why am I not surprised?
"I'll murder you and then I'll kill you!"
"That's redundant! It essentially achieves the same effect… !"
He was much more dangerous despite having its speed reduced, as he begun to launch demonic energy bullets and a few elemental spells at me.
I was avoiding its magical attacks to the best of my ability, and thankfully, my best was pretty damn good if I was only getting hit by the edges of each attack.
Time for a bigger distraction.
Well, now that it's a bigger and slower target… let's try this!
In the darkness of the night, setting up an attack like this becomes much easier, and in an instant, I had dozens of shadow blades surrounding my enemy.
Heat, Electrical, Kinetic, Light, Sound, and Gravitational energy.
In an instant, I drained half of my total mana reserves to fuel this attack.
In an instant, it's form had been bombarded by a chaotic mess of energies that left both its body and the surrounding area scarred and deformed.
"GUUUAAARAAA!!!"
Even so, it continued to try to kill me despite half of its shell being broken, and more than half of its limbs being blown into bits.
I would need an attack similar to the one I used before in order to make it vulnerable enough for me to kill directly. But I didn't have the energy for that.
Well, my trump card was ready, it seems that I had best use it before I'm unable to do so.
Using my shadows and lines to keep me airborne, I gained some distance and had all my threads focus on connecting its heart and my power.
A shadow construct of a deformed heart began to form in my arms.
The previous user of this power could use it to make working limbs. Of course, this meant that the same can be done for organs as well.
All I needed to do was synchronize my enemy's heart with this fake made of the data I collected of its organ structure…
" Heartbreak Effigy."
… and then crush it.
Instantly, it transferred the power used to crush the fake heart through the stray devil's body without resistance, sending it right to its counterpart.
Like in all those anime I had watched, the monster coughed out a mouthful of blood before screaming as it died.
The Zabaniya ripoff worked just as it did on all those animals. The stray devil was a living creature, animals were living creatures, so it was only natural that it could die after having it's heart crushed as well.
I dropped myself onto the ground and confirmed the death of my enemy.
Immediately, I drained everything I could drain from it's body, making sure to convert it into something that wasn't dangerous. After a minute, a single red chess piece laid in the pile of ashes.
I wasn't getting close to that thing, instead, I used my lines in order to quickly scan through it's structure.
… Truly, it was a masterwork of arcane technologies and spells. The first thing I did was drain it's power so that the tracking spells wouldn't continue to work. With my ability to alter data, I overwrote those portions of the Evil Piece so that even if I put in power into the construct, the tracking and defence spells wouldn't activate automatically.
Before I did so, however, I had already stored the structure of the spell circles into my brain's "E-library" so that I can break it down and replicate it. There was so much to learn from it.
But I had to go home to my parents now. I couldn't just bring the Evil Piece with me, that would be the height of idiocy, I'm sure that there were other ways to track these precious materials.
And so I needed to hide it somewhere else, preferably, at a location I wouldn't normally visit so
that if a devil or other supernatural being does find it, they won't be able to just camp there in order to wait for me to arrive. If it's somewhere out of the way and in the open, I would be able to sense and locate them with my developing life sensor… and then back the fuck off.
"You! Hand that over now. It's too dangerous to be left in your hands!"
Of course, that was when the decision on what to do with it had been made without my consent…
No thanks to one "Heydrich Himuro Kaizer".
The youth had white and black hair, his blue and red eyes shone with… what the fuck was I just doing narrating his shitty chuuni looks?!
"Kaizer-san, good evening to you. Do you happen to know what this is? I sure don't. I just found it when this monster-"
"-Enough with your lies!"
"Are you okay?"
"Stop trying to distract me and hand it over. You don't know what you're dealing with."
"Did you really have to blow up in like, your second real sentence to me since the start of the year?"
If it weren't for my leftover threads around the area, I wouldn't have picked up on his approach at all.
I jumped backward and narrowly avoided a pillar of fire erupting from the ground. If I didn't move then the tip of my nose and parts of my arm would have been burnt.
That was a warning shot.
What a prick.
My line had been severed and he now had the devil artifact in his hands.
"Hoh? You dodged that."
"And now you're sounding like an anime character. No one talks like that you know?"
"You should have stayed out of this."
"It would be really helpful if I knew what "this" is all about. Don't need to get so violent Kaizer-san."
"You don't need to. Just don't say a word about this and avoid trouble… Saji-san."
It feels like we can't even have a proper on-topic conversation.
A few seconds later, he went ahead and did a disappearing act by wrapping himself in icy wings. The ice melted and left nothing behind.
What a chuuni faggot… asshole, he never even apologized and took my loot!
… Wait, didn't he come just after I got rid of the tracking spells?
Son. Of. A. Bitch.
How dare he make me do free labor!
Keep calm Genshirou, let it go… I need to get back home.
Honestly, if he was really an OC, then the author would have conveniently just given him some evil piece that wasn't being actively tracked just because his character isn't the type to be cautious.
I opened a shadow portal to my room to quickly return home. I had enough energy for that after draining the corpse of everything I could. Thankfully, my siblings were still tired out and were fast asleep, so all I needed to do was clean up the place a bit before my parents got back home.
… Crap, I don't know what's this guy's angle at all? After ignoring me (and every other guy that doesn't fawn over him like a minion) for a year he suddenly acts like I'm some sort of villain with nefarious purposes and takes away my loot.
I'm not too salty about that. Stray devils are the common mobs of this world and I will surely run into more of them in the future. So there's no real loss other than the fact I have to delay some of my research.
The next morning, on my way to school, I noticed a few people on different roads posting some pictures of a loss child.
Hmm, how curious, they all had slight traces of magic upon them. With the monotonous manner in which they were going through the procedures, it's as if they were hypnotized.
I took a look at the posters.
[Himuro, we love you. Please come home. - Love, Mother… Kaiza Himuro…. Last seen wearing… ]
If I took away the more chuuni features and aged him down a bit, I think this kid looks a lot like… no way… could it be?
This kid went missing a bit more than a year ago too… and his parent's live in…
Kyoto.
I quickly looked up for information on this missing child and found that there was very little to no information about this case.
If I had to look at this from a… supernatural point of view, and assume that the prick is part of the supernatural world by birth… then it's possible that some Youkai parents child had gone missing, they tried magical and physical means to find him but failed, and after a year they finally decided to turn to the normal human populace for clues.
I looked at the calendar, the week long holiday period was coming up and I quickly made my decision.
"Mom, dad, can we go to Kyoto for Golden Week?"
Level 4
Level 4
I sympathize with Kryptonians.
The sentiment isn't born out of some ill-conceived notion regarding physical superiority or having one's planet being destroyed. The specific circumstances I had in mind came from the Man of Steel movie, specifically, the part where the invading aliens were simply unable to handle Earth's different environment at the very beginning.
Sensory overload.
Going from Tokyo to Kyoto is like moving from Krypton to Earth, although most of the differentiating factors leaned to the spiritual and supernatural side of things.
For all the historic temples that should provide a spiritual environment, the high population that should invite the supernatural that sought to prey on humans… Tokyo was spiritually dead in comparison to Kyoto.
From the time that I had a short trip to the UK last summer to the present start of my second year of middle school in April, my sensory abilities in metaphysical energies had grown in leaps and bounds.
Outside of the stray devil encounter and whatever weirdness that goes on in my school, I hadn't discovered any locations of great power and thus, my training was entirely focused on sensing my own energies inside my body and when I deliberately dispersed it.
Such energies were quickly spread thin and I had to place myself in a state of deep focus just to recycle those energies as efficiently as I could. In time, I had gotten good enough at it that I could idly retrieve residual and stray energies with just my threads. At present, even without activating my Sacred Gear, I had grown sensitive and attuned to these sorts of energies.
I should have really considered those factors before I got on the train along with my family to go the land full of sites heavy in spiritual power, to the point where they would inconvenience devils who have no direct weaknesses to them… yes, it seems that I still have a long way to go when considering tactical considerations.
I once thought a busy train station in Tokyo was noisy.
Kyoto station was like a disorganized combined performance of several Japanese traditional instruments at once with thousands of voices chanting incomprehensible mantras.
"Gen, are you okay? What's wrong!?" My mother, Haru, started to fuss over me when she caught me closing my eyes and rubbing my head behind her back. I only managed to make out her words through reading her lips, thank goodness I decided that was a useful skill to learn.
"Just a bit… of a headache. I'll be fine." I smiled despite the fact that I thought being left alone would help me deal with this problem faster.
"It's not fine to me! If it hurts then we should go to a clinic or hospital or go back home or-"
"Mom, you're panicking. It'll pass."
"But-"
Thankfully, my father Gotou Saji, was the voice of reason. In other words, both his misconceptions about me wanting to be "manly" and the truth about me not wanting to worry my mother played right into my hand.
"Darling, if Gen says he can handle it then we'll trust him for now." He places a hand on her shoulder as he tells her that, and then turns to me, "If it gets worse then you better tell us immediately. Okay?"
I nodded, "Yeah, will do dad."
"That's my boy. Do you want to rest up in the hotel first?"
"No way! Let's keep on schedule. Banzai!"
Perhaps it was a bad idea to be a little too easy to manage all those years ago. Thanks to that, my mother didn't really have as much experience when dealing with sick children.
Another bad idea on my part would be my overcautiousness in regards to my siblings at times… as I had been regularly checking their bodies with my abilities and reinforced their own life force with some rejuvenating techniques I discovered during my experiments with other life forms.
If I had simply let my mother learn how to deal with situations that should be under her purview then she would have been a bit calmer in these occasions.
Then again, she was the eldest among her other siblings and had to take care of them, so perhaps she's the type to have gotten used to taking care of others and this is simply the way she acted. My first mother was the type to believe she had to handle everything because it was her "responsibility" to do so, and in that regard, both my mothers were similar to each other.
It's likely that I never gave Haru Saji the chance to show her stuff because I inherited my first mother's attitude when it came to solving perceived problems, namely, it was the "do everything yourself even without being asked" type of attitude. Granted, I knew when to ask for help, but I always did try to rely on myself when I could.
I made a mental note in my brain's stored library to let my mother handle more things if she looks like she wants to do so. That will probably only happen by the time I become a high schooler and my siblings become more independent, as do all Japanese kids do thanks to the culture here.
Hmm, strange… just focusing on my mother and my family, in general, seemed to soothe the pain and reduce the noise generated by my trained supernatural senses.
… Ah, could that be it?
As the day went by, the disorientation had also affected my sight whenever we approached certain temples, making whatever that could be seen through my eyes appear as constructs of light as if I was looking through magical heat vision.
I could probably rework this to some aura vision later on.
The above-ground spiritual power was frustrating, yes… but the normally calm and sometimes turbulent flow of energy underground sometimes blinded me. I managed to get through those times by narrowing my focus to the dimmer auras of my parents and siblings within all that bright energy flooding my view, doing so helped me refocus on the present, and perform adequately enough so that my parents weren't too worried about my wellbeing.
I managed to adapt to the abundance of spiritual energies when it was time for dinner.
After a bit of reflection, I came to realize that I had been training excessively on opening and enhancing my senses to the point where I neglected on learning how to close myself off in that regard, this was mostly due to Tokyo's spiritually barren environment not requiring me to do so, but it was still a major oversight.
As I didn't feel ready to make contact tonight, I simply took the time to rest and work on our hotel room's defenses. During the time between my erasure of the tracking spells of the Evil Piece and that prick's act of banditry, I also managed to log in a few different types of spell circles into my head.
A few of which were containment and defense spell circles, some were devil based, some weren't. Naturally, I used the ones capable of being used by magicians to reinforce our hotel room. It wasn't like it was an unusual thing to do considering that other rooms were being reinforced with magic as well. They were likely supernatural creatures or magicians staying at the same place, that got me thinking and I came to the conclusion that they were most likely here in Kyoto on "business".
I kept myself awake at night to monitor the movements of various individuals with my life and spiritual senses. From what I can tell, most of them were unaffiliated and simply went about their own business. If they didn't manage to avoid crossing paths, they would simply walk past each other as if there was some unspoken agreement.
It was done in such a manner that I wondered if we accidentally checked in to the magical world equivalent of John Wick's Continental Hotel.
The next few days involved lots of tourism, both the cultural and the food sort of tourism. My parents had handled the cultural parts and talked a lot about their previous visits, while I had managed all the food places to try out.
I actually used some of the knowledge from my previous life to pick the right places.
Thank whatever force that placed me in this world that my favorite Ramen place about 15 mins away from Kyoto Station existed in this world!
The 30-minute wait on the outside of the store and 20-minute wait for the food was completely worth it. Both my parents and I had cleaned up our bowls in record time. And we had eaten that bowl of Ramen late at night, after having dinner three hours ago, which is evidence enough to how tasty it was.
In the midst of all our normal activities, I had also turned this trip into an intensive training camp for the senses that are affected by all the energy.
Right now, I can easily identify supernatural creatures a block away with high accuracy, and also have a rough gauge of their power.
I'm pretty sure that my power gauging ability is highly inaccurate because most people would either suppress their power to a lower level or hide it by keeping it contained within their body.
It's also possible that they are following my method of continuously directing the flow of power within themselves while keeping it contained to their body like I do for both constant control training and to create a "blank" shell around my body that hid my power.
Of course, considering that I'm self-trained, any supernatural creature that did bother looking would likely be able to see right through my attempts.
Other than that, I've also started "seeing" the way power flows in others, I'm guessing that I've made a bit of headway to some fundamentals skills to Senjutsu and…
Wait a fucking second.
What was the explanation for DXD Senjutsu again?
I don't have the wiki page on me because I'm in this world right now, but I'm pretty sure that I've been performing various Senjutsu related disciplines as part of my day-to-day activities. Wasn't there something about opening the user up to the world's evils and malice?
Huh… I might have been unknowingly dispersing it as unusable energy constantly or have been recycling it to fuel my abilities using Absorption Line's conversion abilities.
Gah! Stupid! I'm such a fool! How did I not see the potential for Absorption Line in making Senjutsu usable for a guy like me!?
My spotty memory of DXD's details and various powers is starting to become one of my greatest weakness. I suppose that's to be expected.
A reincarnated person can't be expected to remember every single detail of some fictional world without some cheat ability to do it for them.
Haaa… well, whatever. It doesn't change the fact that I'm a noob at it. At least I can still comfort myself with the thought that my basics are quite solid for someone that's self-trained.
Anyways… the time has come.
It's the night before my trip back to Tokyo and I had to make the visit now.
Turning into a shadow I slipped through the window and made my way into Kyoto, following the address on the missing person poster to a traditional looking Japanese estate. A quick check showed that the family name displayed matches that of the missing poster's description.
I reformed my body out of sight and walked up to the large magically enchanted wooden doors, looked to the side and rang the electronic doorbell beside it.
Fantastic. These guys aren't as technologically illiterate as I thought.
I'm feeling a bit nervous. I wonder what kind of Yokai's they are? If I'm lucky, they won't be terribly traditional or particularly racist, or else it'll take ages just to communicate our intentions. I'm much more suited to dealing with direct people, potential clients, and overly considerate family members.
A small horizontal hole opened up as what seemed to be a guard greeted me.
"State your business."
Oh my gosh, this is kinda cool. I've got to sound impressive or at least interesting enough so that they will take me seriously. I may be tall and muscular for a fourteen year-old, but this body of mine is still that of a kid by my standards.
"Good evening. I take it that the owners of this estate dearly misses one… Kaiza Himuro. As it happens, I have some information regarding his whereabouts that might interest his… mother?"
From my limited encounters with supernatural beings and what I knew about the series, I gained the distinct impression that the supernatural would prefer acting mysterious and speak around a subject for awhile. I'm not the type to speak in cryptic terms, so this is the best I can do while being direct and honest about what I intend to do.
The guard slid the wooden slot back into place loudly.
… Well shit. Did I mess up my introduction?
There seems to be a lot of sound suppression magic, as expected of a magic-using household, as such, I can't hear a single thing that is going on behind the doors.
Even so, I can feel a crowd of what seems to be mooks gathering in front of the door…
The doors opened to review a various armed Youkai's, most of which seemed to have dog ears, which means that they must be Inugamis or Heavenly Dogs or something related to them.
"In the name of the Kaiza clan head, you are to surrender yourself and follow us, boy!"
Hmm…? Oh! I know this plot point!
Due to my youthful appearance they had come to the conclusion that I was messing with them, and so they decided to send a squad of their lesser servants to test me!
"Are you threatening me, Head Guardsman?"
"Don't make this difficult on yourself."
"It's violence, then."
Spreading my shadow under them, I used it as a conduit to unleash sound energy in the form of a magic powered screech!
"ROUUUUAAAAAAAGGHHHHHH!"
In their split second of shock, I had already covered the distance between myself and my opponents.
Swiftly infusing my lines, shadow tendrils and body infused with life energy, I launched a surgical strike at the twenty of the front line guards. In an instant, I had aimed at the non-lethal spots where their power seemed to flow through and from.
From my point of view, they looked like small circles over an image that showed the circulation of energy across their body. I figured that was important but not life threatening and went ahead with the attack.
Those twenty guards collapsed like a puppet whose strings were cut.
"What?!" "I-impossible !" "He can't do that! B-blast him… or something."
In the time they took to exclaim loudly like a bunch of idiotic mooks I had partially transformed my feet into shadow form, allowing my to utilize the shadows of the estate's ground to move quickly as if I had transformed. With only a partial transformation, I would be able to attack without the delay of returning into a corperal form.
I swiftly struck at the whatever pressure points with life force infused strikes, bringing them to their knees or outright knocking them out. When they started to retaliate I brought forth the shadow swords, and made sure to use kinetic energy to make concussive blasts just weak enough to knock them out without causing too much damage.
The good part of being able to sense an opponent's current suppressed power level is that so long as I can catch them off guard, I can apply just the right amount of power to do non-lethal damage.
I was done with the entrance's guards in just over half a minute, I quickly entered through the front door and dispatched any combatants with speed just under the sound barrier (as I didn't want to damage the house too much). My ability to sense life forms played a key role in this and after two minutes of conservative fighting that prioritized speed and efficiency, I could sense that I was on the right track as there was a large room on the upper floors where the more powerful presences were awaiting me.
They were either the owners of this house or the actual elite guards that would act as my boss fight, aka, the final test to see if I was worthy of their attention.
I kicked open the door and dashed forward, and took the katana attack that awaited me head on.
"Die bastard!" A really muscular dog Yokai with black hair and an impressive beard had swung a sword right through me.
Right through my shadow clone.
In the moment where I had passed the door, I infused my form with light energy just as I transformed into my shadow state in order to lock my current image into place, sunk into my own shadow while leaving a construct in my place hidden by the shell of my image, and went under my opponent's shadow to appear behind him just when he thought he sliced me in half.
By the time he realized something wasn't right, I had already struck a key point behind his back and knocked him out. There was a slight delayed effect as he stood there, turned his head back in utter shock to see my behind him, and then collapsed onto the ground.
He must have been the sub-boss. Only sub-bosses get to be defeated swiftly in a manner that showed the new character's power.
"Father!" A cute black haired girl with similar really fluffy dog ears yelled from across the room, she stood right in front of the beautiful lady with matching features who I assume is either the boss or the person I'm supposed to impress, "You'll pay for what you've done!"
She was about my age, but I wasn't going to go easy on her, and I had already made my move by spreading my threads around the room when she was wasting time shouting.
A tug and a familiar feeling alerted me to a pillar of fire about to erupt in front of me and several others around me ready to burst out after a slight delay, an obvious tactic to force me to dodge right into another attack, one which I did not fall for as I warped right in front of her and shot my lines at her.
Okay, I lied, I was going easy on her.
I can't imagine hurting cute girls in front of another lady would look good on my resume.
All I did was capture her in my bright blue lines and drained her strength to resist as quickly as I could to a certain point. It helped that she used up quite a bit of power in her previous attack earlier. If she didn't, then I wouldn't be able to subdue her in such a peaceful manner.
The more mature lady closed her eyes, seemingly making her decision on something before looking at me with resolve in her eyes.
"Please let my daughter go."
"Certainly, milady."
I'm just going to assume she meant the younger girl since they look alike. I gently placed her on the ground and released her.
"It's me you want."
"Rightfully so."
"Who sent you?"
"I came here on my own volition."
She seemed genuinely surprised at this, I suppose they are more used to weak messengers and proxies being sent to them, and don't see much of charitable volunteers like myself.
"W-why?"
"I came to… clarify some details regarding your son."
"Then Himuro is… alive?"
She sounded rather hopeful which pained me to say it in this manner.
"From a… certain point of view."
I can't count being a speshul OC that's wanked to hell and back as being alive.
Well, to be fair, he could just be possessed by some ancient god fragment and became an asshole because of it.
"Is he hurt?"
"That's not for me to say."
I can't really confirm that. I mean, is he still alive in there? Or is he just being an absolute chuuni?
"I see… what are your terms?"
"First of all…" I reached into my shadow and took out a suitcase, thank goodness I managed to learn how to store mass in my shadow like a game inventory, "Please review these documents and confirm whether my classmate is your son or not. Do note that he has been significantly altered by unknown forces."
"… Huh?" The lady tilted her head, looking cute in her confusion.
"The test is over right? So it's only right we get down to business. Ah, you should really call in your real elite guards back in to take care of the weaker ones, I couldn't sense them around the estate at all so I'm guessing they will be teleported in."
"T-test!? You thought that… that all this was a test!?"
"I mean, why else would you… I get the feeling that we are currently having a huge misunderstanding."
"That is an… understatement, to be sure."
"And not a welcome one." I continued quickly to finish the modified prequel quote, but it seemed that she didn't get the joke.
I quickly clarified that I hadn't killed anyone at all, and that I would know since I'm tracking everyone's life force and deliberately went for the knock-out blow (I didn't say it was my first try on live people, I've only tested it on animals at best).
She introduced herself as Sakura Kaiza, apparently, she was the boss here.
It turns out that the guy I struck in the back was her husband, Raiga Kaiza (it kinda rhymes), so yeah… she's kind of crying tears of relief right now.
Damn… I feel like a bad guy now.
Now that I felt that things were sorted out, I shot my lines out at the woman's daughter, Atago Kaiza, and recharged her physical strength with some of my stored energies that I absorbed earlier.
Let's just say that she's pretty pissed off…
"Now that we've all gathered on this lovely night…" I began after spending several minutes of awkward silence sipping my hot green tea (which I checked for poison using my threads) at their living room table.
The father and daughter pair were glaring at me with killing intent while the more reasonable lady of the house was being much more composed.
"… I'll start my tale from the beginning then. Last year, on the same date your son disappeared, a boy with striking features that bares some resemblance to him was enrolled into my middle school, in my class, with a very similar sounding name. I know that it was a last minute enrollment because I acquired a copy of his documentations from the staff's office. Take a look."
I opened my suitcase and laid down the official documentation with picture attached. I also had some other photos taken during Physical education and Swimming classes, plus some photos of him in "casual" (chuuni as fuck) wear during his "dates" which I acquired by hacking many of the female school student's phones.
"N-no… it can't be… but…" Raiga definitely looked as if he was convinced despite his verbal denials.
"W-what happened to my little brother!?" Atago seemed horrified at his new appearance, "He's become a bigger delinquent than this idiot here!"
"Hey! That's stereotyping! I have you know that I rank top in the school for all subjects!" I shot back, and she rolled her eyes in response. Such unbelief!
"It's him. I know it is." Sakura said with much conviction in her voice.
"But his sexual escapades…" "Strange ice affinity…" "A mother knows her son anywhere, anytime."
That seemed to put an end to the argument.
"I'll elaborate more on his situation in a bit. But first, I would like to know what happened on your end."
They explained that it was just like any other morning, they were having breakfast together when suddenly, Himuro Kaiza just disappeared into thin air right in front of them. They couldn't track him with any of the spells that were placed on family members for their own safety, they used their connections to help look for him but he wasn't anywhere in Kyoto and across Japan.
After a few months of fruitless searching, Atago gave her parents the idea to modernize and try using technological means to find him. Even so, they weren't able to get relevant information for months, until I came along that is.
I elaborated on my first year (while omitting on my training and battles) of school and how I largely kept away from him due to the strange feeling I got from him. I emphasized his effect on women especially, along with a bit of details how he banged a good amount of the school population's mothers and sisters, and a bit on how it affected men. I briefly went through my own supposed delinquency period and why I think he's the cause of it before moving on to my first actual encounter with him.
Needless to say, they quickly claimed that he was entirely out of character.
"My son is a gentle boy! There's no way he can play around with so many women when he can't even properly confess to his childhood friend." I get the feeling that his father actually meant "spineless".
"There's no way my little brother is that strong. His fire affinity isn't as strong as mine and he can't use ice magic at all." His older sister probably wanted to say "useless".
"He never took to the books very well. His tutors had never gave him a score above 40." His mother was much more diplomatic, but she pretty much called him an idiot!
"… I think I got the picture. So then, what are our conclusions?" I took out a piece of paper and wrote down my thoughts on it.
Secretly hiding his true abilities since he was born then gave into his chuuni tendencies by running away from home, changing his name, appearance and demeanor.
Kidnapped and replaced by some evil doppelganger.
Chosen by some "god-like" being to be a puppet or play a role for an unknown purpose, likely possessed by an antagonistic personality and given unnatural powers. (I wouldn't use terms like OC, wankfest and author as they wouldn't understand it in context)
All three of them ruled out the hiding his true abilities backstory that is way too common in fanfiction. The second one was crossed out after we determined that there was no purpose to replacing him at the exact same time, and even if there was one, they didn't think their rivals (who have reasons to kidnap him) would be able to pull that off.
In the end, they were led to the conclusion that I wanted them to have.
"Great. So we can all agree that he needs to be exorcized and freed of whatever is controlling him." I smiled and clapped my hands to get everyone's attention.
"That is so. However, I must ask, what do you desire out of providing us with information and your assistance?" Sakura Kaiza asked.
"A few things actually. All of them are true. Firstly, I want to protect my mother from getting raped and mind fucked by whatever power he has over women." Raiga nodded in approval, "Secondly, I get some peace of mind knowing that he isn't just going to designate me as a villain and destroy me for no reason. And lastly, and this is the reason why I came here in the first place, or I would have just dealt with it myself even without knowing the full story…"
I took out the missing poster photo where I had a single line highlighted in yellow.
"… I couldn't just take uninformed action against someone without confirming whether or not he did have a mother who loved him to the point where she never gave up on looking for him after so long."
My phone alarm rang, I had to get back to the hotel to meet with my parents soon.
"Ah, I have to go now. Now, be rest assured that I have no intentions to kill him, I haven't killed anyone in cold blood and I never intend to change that fact. I rather save lives rather than end them. If you wish to co-operate on the matter and speak further on this, here's my phone number so you can contact me."
I quickly left through a shadow portal to somewhere near the hotel before turning into a shadow and making my way back in the same way I exited. Just in time to "sleep" and "wake up" along with everyone else.
A day after we arrived back at Tokyo, I got a call from Raiga to meet him at a park.
He had several badly injured mooks along with him.
I slapped my forehead.
"You just had to confront him directly, didn't you?"
"I couldn't just leave my son like that! H-he was like, he was a completely different person. He toyed with us and then "showed us mercy" after threatening us. It's sick! You weren't there! You would have heard him actually justifying raping anyone related to us because we "forfeited" their safety by attacking him! I-I can't believe it!"
The older male looked both disgusted and pained at the memory.
What the fuck. Is that bastard running on bashing logic and the protagonist morality license?
"… Please tell me you left both your wife and daughter back at Kyoto where they are safe and sound."
"Of course I did. After hearing what he did to… well, every female in sight, I had to!"
"Good. You are strong and wise. Anyways, please lay down your men in a line on the ground, I'll heal them."
"You can do that? No, wait, of course. You're a Senjutsu master."
"I'm not a master, I just have strong basics. Also, next time you want to confront a potential enemy, at least collect information on them. If you had called me earlier I would have given you my observation notes on him."
"… Fuck!"
I had replenished my energy the night before so I could easily fix up the worst of their injuries.
For the entire week, I spent most of my time after school preparing for our best case scenario plan based off my observations, and also the worst-case scenario, where we would have to defeat him and imprison him to cure him at a later date.
As I would be spending most of my time after school hours away, I had to make sure my parents were informed.
So I told my parents the truth, from a certain point of view, and said that I was helping a classmate's father reconnect with his son after they had a dispute.
"Okay, first of all, do you know any teleportation spells?"
"We have the family magic circle and a generic one, like this."
"Hmm, okay, can you draw another one here to receive the contents of this one? What's the energy requirement like? How is it affected by distance? Does it go through barriers? How does it work, does it swap space or transfers something through another dimension as part of the journey?"
He wasn't able to answer all the questions, but we did test some of them, and I managed to get a sample of the "power" used to warp space or slip into another realm for a brief moment.
That opened up a lot of new ways to do things.
I made most of the plan to deal with the Heydrich prick, with Raiga and his men providing the manpower and resources to help set things up.
"Have your men prepare these materials and hide them close enough but not in the way of our battle, outside of the barrier that we will place around this building, which we will lure him into." I circled the abandoned building on the outskirts that we will be taking over, "And over here in this far away deserted forest area, I need your men to cover the entire place with a large conjured cloth that allows no light through, then place a barrier around the covered area. That… is our contingency." I circled another area and took the nods from Raiga as total agreement.
"Now, which one of you is taking me to Fukushima?"
I had to travel across Japan through some teleportation circles to get more materials for my battle. As the Kaiza clan can't afford to burn through more favors at this moment, it'll only be their clansmen and myself fighting this battle.
Well, mostly me. Most of the mooks were in awe of my "strength" (sneaky tactics) and skill so they promptly decided to give me the honor of fighting the other kid that trashed them.
Haa… the things I do to protect my family and save others.
Once most of the material preparations were complete, we had to do some tedious work in getting the bait, his onaholes "girlfriends" to the battleground at a specific time. To do this, I used their unnatural obsession and "love" with Heydrich to my advantage, imitating his voice by using direct data transfer to an electronic medium.
Of course, I tested it on a minor thing that wouldn't alert the target at all, and it worked like a charm.
Logistics was an issue so Raiga's man would have to work overtime to prepare everyone. Raiga himself would be supporting the barrier at the place where I intend to fight him if the plan didn't work.
Our plan would take place on Saturday night.
"You know, I thought you were a stupid kid in way over your head, but you turned out to be loyal, brave and a whole lot of fun."
"Kaiza-san… please don't say more death flag raising lines. My parents have already filled up my quota for the month."
"Hahaha! Relax kid! Just let me finish… I learned a lot of things from you, and it isn't just from your creativeness or your strokes of mad genius, but you taught me a thing or two about compassion."
"All I did was not kill anyone."
"You will find that mercy is in short supply in this world."
"Sometimes mercy can be cruel, and sometimes, the right kind of death can be kind."
"… I think I understand. You know, I get the feeling that you're speaking from experience."
Thinking back to my own death and the dying Vritra possessor made me say something that I wouldn't normally say… a beginner's mistake.
Even so, I didn't feel that bad about opening up to Raiga, he was a really direct and reliable guy. When we got over our previous confrontation, getting along became easy and natural for us.
It's strange… to think that all this plotting and running around with a guy at least triple my physical age can turn out into a bonding experience… did I just make a friend?
"Haha, if we fail, there's a good chance we'll die and leave behind a loving family."
"Death flag~"
"Shut it! Now it's your turn to listen."
"Okay, okay. I'm listening."
"… If we fail to get my son back… if I die and you live then I want you to make a promise to me, man-to-man."
I resisted the urge to highlight the huge death flag.
"What is it?"
"Take your family, run away somewhere safe, then take my family and run away together. If that bastard lives in my son's body then there's no telling what he will do. Just… take care of them for me, will you? My wife always looks like she's alright but on the inside she's hurting a lot. And my daughter is, well, please beat the crap out of any guy that looks at her funny."
"Yeah… I can do that. I swear that I will take care of everyone if you don't make it out of this."
"Thank you."
"And now it's my turn. If I die-"
"Death flag! Ha, gotcha!"
"Yeah yeah… If I die, tell my parents that I got hit by a truck and got Isekai'ed into another world. And that I'm doing my best to live a good and happy life over there. Then take them away and take care of them."
I really could get Isekai'ed again, but in reality, I just wanted them to know the truth.
If they put the pieces together with what I've been talking about when describing Isekai stories in our random chats, my "genius" and other factors then… I'm sure they'll figure it out.
"… Look, they aren't going to take me seriously if I lie to their faces like that."
"Hah! Oh, if you only knew the half of it…"
We took the long way to the combat area by foot.
I stopped Raiga from going any further at some point.
"What?"
"He's here."
15 minutes early… for once in his fucking life, can Heydrich just be fashionably late when it's important to me?!
"WHAT!? He's early, shit, we've got to-"
"-Stick with the plan. I'll improvise and keep him busy. He's still inspecting the interior and our preparations on the outside hasn't been tampered with so there's a chance it hasn't been discovered. Inform the men of the situation, erect a barrier when I enter the place, do not let it down until the bait has arrived."
"… I see. It's been an honor."
"Yeah. Wish me luck?"
"I'll be praying to the gods for all the blessings applicable."
"Actually, don't do that, if I get out of this alive I'd rather remain anonymous."
"Suit yourself… Gen."
He called me by the nickname that my future friends (from the canon timeline) and my parents call me for the first time as I departed for my apparently fated fight.
I adjusted my modified black jacket with many pockets containing additional material for my fight, nervously readjusting it a few times as I approached the place… and then once more at the entrance, before I pushed open the door to the stereotypical abandoned warehouse.
"Kept you waiting, huh?"
I smiled to hide my fear. I have no idea how strong he is or what kind of abilities he had outside of a few guesses. Even so, I prepared myself for the possible multiple "stages" as best as I could.
The barrier had been activated. Now I just had to buy time.
"Oh? So you've come Saji-san… this place reeks of your dragon stench, I figured that it would be you. It's always been you hasn't it!" The horribly mismatched of colors pointed at me accusingly.
"I really have no clue what you're on about." I answered honestly.
He laughed out loud, "Play dumb all you want. Your plot to drain the life of every living person in this town is obvious for all to see." Heydrich looked at me with a death glare as if I was the evil one.
I rolled my eyes, "Bitch please. Draining the life of others like a mass murderer? Only you would dream of having such an evil person to fight and kill to feel better about yourself."
"You know nothing. If you only knew who I am then-"
And there goes the OC wank. Honestly, the backstory was so inconsistent with what I've confirmed with Raiga through our casual chats that I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes, if only because my aim was to stall for time.
It took him three minutes to get it over with.
"-But it's not too late, I will give you this one chance. Join me and pledge yourself to me and I will show you the right way to live-"
"Pft!"
I just couldn't stand it anymore.
"So that's your answer?"
"Of course not. Let me word this carefully. My answer is… FUCK. YOU."
I quickly shadow-stepped (note to self, come up with a cool Flash Step equivalent name for it in the future) backwards just in time to dodge the ridiculously gaudy red and blue… white and black blade that keeps on changing color like a rainbow, aimed at my neck.
"You've gotten stronger, quickly too… I was right to decide to end you now." Despite his words he seemed to sound utterly confident in himself.
"I'm flattered, really." I lied.
"Hah! Now that I think about it, it would be bullying if I decided to kill you with my own hands. Come, my Phoenixes!"
Oh joy, he has OP summons.
There was an admittedly impressive yet stupidly wasteful display of orange flames and… ice? As a red and… blue phoenix was summoned…
I feel like there's something so wrong with this that I can't help but be utterly disappointed at the end of it.
He was introducing the names of his summons but I didn't pay attention to the details as I knew it was superflous and he probably ripped them off a video game or book.
"-my legendary flare phoenix-" Flare is unnecessary, most people would know a phoenix is a legendary bird of flames and rebirth, "and legendary ice phoenix."
"What?!"
"Surprised?"
"Shut the fuck up. There's no such fucking thing as an ice phoenix."
"Oh, I don't think so."
"You do not get to prequel quote me. Only my parrot has the right to do so. Fuck you, you don't exist!" I pointed at the ice phoenix that lacked a lot of detail or fierceness in it's eyes. "But since you're here, henceforth, I'll be calling you Alohan Phoenix."
Only in the Aloha region can you slap a prefix and completely change the element of a pokemon after a palette swap.
And then the beasts opened their mouth to fire laser beams that burnt and froze everything in its path. I dashed around the battlefield, keeping myself to the ground and saved my aerial maneuvers until the last second where I leapt unto the actual Phoenix replica (that sounds weird in my head) and began to drain it's heat energy rapidly.
The Alohan Phoenix started to weaken at the same time, it seems that they had shared health bars.
"By the way, it's weakening flames isn't because you are succeeding, it's because my Phoenixes continuously rebirths itself constantly so right now it's dying and-"
"Shut the fuck up! Do you know how many redundancies are in that sentence? Hire a goddamn Grammar Nazi for yourself!"
I swear, his greatest weapon isn't his "power", but the utter insanity that his sheer existence provides to this world.
As the bird died and turned itself into an egg, I used it's defenseless form to my advantage and attempted the information override techniques I developed with my pet parrot Sheev.
The "phoenixes" were reborn from their egg, and immediately, the one on fire attacked the Alohan version,
"NANI!?"
"The brains of your summons are as empty as yours. It was easy to take control of them."
I lied. All I did was swap our names in the "Master" section of their brains.
I wasn't in control at all. If it went for another reset then I would have to do so again and highly doubt Heydrich would just stand there again.
"Tch. So you have a few tricks up your sleeve." He snapped his fingers and dematerialized the summons.
Thank god he fell for it!
"It would seem that I can afford to fight you at 30% of my power. Let me show you the ultimate martial art style of-"
In that instant, I released my full speed and punched him right in the face-
"Whaaaaat?!"
-sending him flying straight into the warehouse's reinforced walls.
I had no idea how he managed to say those words in slow motion.
I don't even want to know.
All that matters is that I managed to interrupt some bullshit Hokuto Shinken tier martial art by attacking first. If I allowed him to get it off then I would have been screwed.
I didn't let up the attack and launched a few weak shadow blades to lure him into a false sense of security.
The enraged Heydrich batted away the constructs with a wave of his re-manifested blade.
"You are no swordsman! You think throwing swords around means you can use them-"
"-Nope!"
A row of blades formed in front of me, each carrying some of the energies that I had gotten used to using, and were shot forward with minimal magical energy.
Heydrich swung his ridiculous sword and cleaved right through the attack, triggering a small explosion that didn't damage him at all, as I had expected, and thus hadn't committed any real power to the attack.
"Okay then… I will kill you with half my power."
His fist was suddenly buried in my gut and I coughed out a mouthful of blood like a Xianxia character. This time, I got the "punched into a wall" treatment.
"And a bit of my high-speed techniques."
I flipped him off and examined the damage. Oh, there goes my spine.
AHHHH! It fucking hurts! Holy shit, it's just as bad as actually getting stabbed, and that hurts like FUUUUCK!
I sent my pain and emotions into my shadows, quickly drawing on my lifespan to heal my wounds.
Life Force is good for stable healing, however, the only way I can rapidly heal fatal and crippling wounds is by converting power from my physical longevity or lifespan, to cause a "healing power" overflow.
I had just spent a year's worth of my physical longevity to fix myself.
But that was fine. I managed to convert the stray devil's longevity from it's corpse into around 50 years worth of life span for myself, so I have a few full heals to use in this battle…
"Good, I almost thought that you would have died too easily."
"You know, your personality is completely inconsistent."
"Silence mongrel!"
"And now you're just ripping off other characters."
This time I used every movement based ability and technique I had to make up for his speed, eventually even overwhelming him a few times, which pissed him off and made him power up to 75% in order to match my skill with raw speed.
Outside of the physical showdown where I crashed my glass-like blades into his magical rainbow sword to little effect, he had also launched a barrage of colorful magic, summoned temporary constructs in an attempt to kill me, caused huge pillars of ice and flames to erupt from the ground and almost struck me down with several bolts of lightning summoned from god knows where.
"Why won't you die!? How can you dodge my light speed attack!"
"Never believe what they say on the advertisements!"
I bet whoever is controlling him just doesn't know how fast light actually is.
With the way he was ramping up, I wouldn't be able to survive long enough to the appointed time. That meant that I had to keep talking and pull out my new tricks.
And so I did, I began to maximize the attacks from my energy infused weapons, used them creatively and pulled off different kinds of combinations to annoy him.
More often than not, I had managed to get a good hit and cause visible injuries.
Heydrich stomped on the ground, causing the entire ground floor to rupture with several earth spikes somehow shooting themselves at me, impaling me to the wall.
I had transformed myself to shadow form just in time to slip away, and almost met my end by one of his "purification" sword beams.
Shooting a small sound infused blast, I shattered the ground he stood on and charged at him while his footwork and stance were briefly in disarray.
Sending out a shadowy cloud to block his sight for a brief moment, I struck out from his blind spot and-
-He sliced my arm off from the shoulder.
I felt the stinging pain for a brief moment before I launched myself backwards with a grin.
The cloud of darkness was swept away.
And Heydrich found himself gripping a black fake arm, shocked as he realized he missed after predicting my attack, but not my trick.
The thing is about my shadow constructs… is that if I do it right-
A shadow blade infused with huge amounts of heat and magical energy stabbed into the shadow arm Heydrich was holding on to.
-even those fakes can have shadows.
And every shadow of mine is a weapon to me.
"Shadow Blade Cremation."
A massive pillar of black fire erupted from the ground in the shape of the blade, obliterating the target area and the victim.
Of course, just like in Bleach, the Ittou Kasou ripoff wasn't expected to really do in the villain.
"You… ha… hahaha… to think that you would force me to use my Elysium Eye that can only be activated once every week. My Elysium Eye can-"
He started ripping off Avalon's explanation, just badly… I'm not even surprised he has a Sharingan Avalon combo that is effectively a reusable Izanagi.
"Come to think of it, isn't your Sacred Gear supposed to be Absorption Line? You haven't been using much of it… oh, is it because you realized that you won't be able to handle my power?"
"…"
I just didn't know what to say to his nonsense anymore.
"Hoh, to think you can push me this far…" Did his mood just do a reset? Wait, I've got to stop being surprised, "I am still far from my true power, and that is why I cannot afford to die here. Now prepare to die!"
In an instant, the entire warehouse was covered in golden blades, all pointed at me… oh great, now he's ripping off Gilgamesh.
And then more and more magic circles began to appear behind it. I swear, some of the writing there is just reverse English… what is this? An Isekai world with a lazy animator?
… I couldn't just hide and dodge this attack. No barrier of mine would hold up against this much firepower from all directions.
"Goodbye SAJIIII!"
…
The brilliant golden blades and powerful torrents on magic fell upon me.
Not even the ground before me was spared.
"H-h-how…"
It was nice to get some real shock and fear from my enemy.
"There was no way a weakling like me can conjure up a barrier or defense strong enough to take that attack head on." I stated as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. Even now, against the big players, I was tremendously weak.
"HOW!?"
It was time to wrap it up.
"If I can't defend against an attack, then I'll just send it away."
I made a shadow portal around my entire body, sending the attack away to the huge shrouded area covered by Raiga's men. The secluded area should be large enough and far away from any innocent lives to take that kind of concentrated firepower. The huge shroud was required as my shadow portals over huge distances would require a large amount of shadows or some other aid to connect the two spaces.
"ARRRRHHHHH!" He screamed and then began to glow as he transformed into some "super mode".
"I'll crush YOUUUUU!"
"Yeah, no. Earlier, you asked about why I wasn't using Absorption Line, well, I've actually been using it passively and in many small ways, and to move around of course… but also, I've been focusing on absorbing all this energy."
I opened up my jacket to reveal its contents.
Repackaged decayed radioactive waste.
"Are… are you mad!? You're poisoning yourself!"
"Bitch please. Since when were you under the impression that I came here to die? Did you really think I can't protect myself and weaponize the power from radioactive decay?"
"You're mad!"
"Your author never told you how to defend yourself against radiation, now did he?"
Quickly converting a small portion of the stored energy into a huge burst of kinetic power, I managed to catch him off guard and planted a shadow hand pressed against his chest.
"Fallout Blast." With special thanks to Bethesda.
Just kidding.
The arm launched a powerful short-ranged blast that sent him crashing into the ground with severe magical burns.
I wasn't going to nuke us all. That would be dumb.
It was more of a radiation-infused magic blast that provided some magic defense penetration. If I wanted to, I could put in more power to turn it into a Nuclear Kamehameha, but that would be silly.
"You…. cannot… kill me…"
"I can, but I won't kill you."
The barrier fell, the time has come.
I sent my threads out to take back all the radiation energy released and finish up absorbing the rest of the radioactive waste decay.
It was thanks to having portable energy packs like this that I managed to fight so long at high power.
The doors opened and hundreds of girls ran into the crater where their "Kaizer-sama" had fallen, with some of Raiga's men using wind magic to make sure they wouldn't hurt themselves while doing so.
"You… fiend… how could you threaten girls and-"
"-Give it a rest. I'm doing you a favor. Raiga, it's LEMON TIME!"
"Wait what?"
The carts of lemons that had been gathered around the battlefield were quickly carted into the warehouse by our Raiga's clansmen.
"I'm sorry!" "This is for your own good!" "Enjoy it while it lasts!"
They poured the lemons down in front of Heydrich's eyes as he was being helped to by his "girlfriends'. Raiga's men also threw up many floating banners with words like "Warning: Lemon below", "Lemon started…", and similar phrases.
Without even pausing, he quickly groped and began to fuck the nearest girl.
An observation of mine that confirmed his status as an OC was a "peace offering" of a fruit basket that I gave to him. When he grabbed hold of a lemon, he had instantly left the room and came back after fucking a girl.
That was when I knew I could use the tropes to influence the author to stop… writing.
Raiga handed me some Dr. Pepper to drink and I briefly noted down that I should introduce him to Steins Gate when it comes out in this world.
After several hours of fucking later…
"REEEEEEEEEEEE!" Heydrich screeched in a completely… unnatural way, as some ghostly apparition left his body.
His body shrunk a little as he begun to take on the form of something more natural.
"Uh… what happened?"
"Himuro… is that really you?"
"Father, what am I… aaaaaaah, why are there so many naked girls?!!!!"
I chimed in at this point.
"We had to exorcise the evil spirit possessing you by copious amount of sex."
"Wait, this body had sex and I can't remember a single thing!? FUUUUUUUUCK!!!!"
"Shut the fuck up son and give your papa a hug!"
"I DON'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON!!!"
Ah, he got hugged… a lot… I think his back just broke.
"NOOOOOO! MY SOOOOON!"
"… I'll fix that I guess."
Raiga's men would handle the contraception issues and memory wiping to ensure that everything gets fixed.
With Raiga's help, I opened a shadow portal to their estate after he provided the magic that allowed me to form a link between the two spaces, and we all returned for a well deserved break.
"Honey, we're back! The kid here did it! Genshirou got our son back!"
Raiga was lugging their skinny child around and tossed him into Sakura's and Atago's arms.
Hey! Be gentle with him!
"Oooh! My baby boy!"
Oh crap, is she going to break his back too?
"Himuro! Don't leave your onee-sama again, okay????!"
S-scary! Is his older sister a brocon yandere? Yikes!
They thanked me profusely after saving their son, well… all's well that ends well.
I even got my loot back, yeah! Evil Piece Research, yeah!
Due to being in my creative space as I imagined the possibilities, I was caught off guard when the girl that was slightly older than me tackled me like a human rocket.
"Thank you! Thank you thank you for bringing my little brother back." Her dog ears are twitching, I want to touch them so badly… oh, and boobs too, but fluffy ears… but breasts…
No! The ears are confusing me! Keep focus!
"I just did what I felt was right. Family is… a treasure that must be protected. Well, I uh, got to go so I wish you all the best."
"Wait, you're leaving?!" Atago seemed to have some strange idea that I don't have anywhere else to be right now.
I've got to get home before I worry my parents.
"Uh, yeah."
"Then… give me your address. I don't believe my father is the type to ask all the right questions."
"Oh sure… I'll just write it down here. But don't rely on it because I think my family might be moving to another town in the future."
"Where?"
"I'm not sure yet…" It will be Kuoh, "But just to keep in touch, I'll give you my phone number and email address."
"How about LINE?"
I already downloaded LINE but I never opened it because I didn't have any friends to chat with.
Until now I suppose…
"You'll let me know your new address when you move… right?"
"Yeah."
"I can come visit you whenever right?"
"I'm a pretty boring guy that keeps himself busy training and studying so…"
"Hmm?"
"… Please arrange a time and place through chat or email."
"Okay~"
Well, at least I got a friend. I think I made friends with her father too, so yay, gender equality.
Level 5
Level 5
If one is to become a "master of all", then one must also master oneself, and not simply endlessly pursue power at the present on one's narrow path and limited point of view.
If I wish to become a complete and wise character, I must embrace… a larger part of myself.
My wish to achieve new levels of mastery in not only power, but also of my own self, had been something that I had always thought of beginning yet never finding the courage to do so.
Gaining power is easy, gaining maturity is not as easy.
Persona 4 had hammered that into my head already with all the spin-offs and adaptations.
I wouldn't think about facing myself just out of a desire of power due to diminishing returns in my training.
Of course I wouldn't!
After all, I was reaping exponential and increasing gains after my fight with Heydrich all those month ago! There was no signs of that stopping anytime soon!
Instead, such a wish was born out of my changing circumstances, if I had to describe it… it's as if I had accidentally stumbled past a roadblock that I haven't seriously acknowledged until I had already gone past it.
The trip to Kyoto helped me realized just how much of a connection that I had with my new family, that they could even drag me back from the blinding, deafening forces of nature and the many emotions lingering on this planet that gave it power.
By focusing on them I managed to enhance and control my supernatural senses to a new level, both out of concern for their happiness and due to their anchoring presence in my life.
The Kaiza family helped me break out of my isolationist policies. I had always avoided the supernatural so that I wouldn't get noticed, but in the end, I decided that what I had to do was more important than my current desires, hence breaking out of my comfort zone.
Even if there were selfish reasons (e.g. like getting info to dealing with him) for reaching out to them in the first place, I wasn't such an angsty protagonist that would deny the more selfless and compassionate reasons for doing so in the first place. From my hidden protests at what was happening to the people around me, the potential danger that he represented to everything I cared about, my own sympathy for how much pain his supposed family must be going through…
And in the end, the relationships I made from going through with that decision had made my world more bigger, brighter, happier among other things.
Raiga had expressed his thanks to my parents (with our agreed cover story of me helping to find, retrieve and "reason" with his missing son) personally (while hiding his ears) for "allowing" their son to help him, making them very happy and proud me for my actions. Atago and I regular chat with each other over messages and phone calls about our day-to-day lives, interests, the supernatural world and ways to grow stronger.
Funnily enough, the catalyst for all this was my personal arc villain.
Of course, I am speaking about the Tragedy of Heydrich the Wanked. It's not a story that Issei fans will tell you. It's a fanfic legend. Heydrich was an unoriginal fanfic OC, so speshul and so wanked, he could use his inconsistent backstory to influence the readers to create… reviews. He had such a saturation of the cliches that he could even keep the characters he cared about from… being well developed. The OC side is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be… badly written. He became so speshul… the only thing he was afraid of was, losing his "uniqueness", which eventually, of course he did. Unfortunately, he taught his enemy everything on what shouldn't be done, then he got stuck doing endless lemons no one cared about. Ironic. He could keep other characters from developing well, but not himself.
Banished and dead OC's are an improvement over living active ones, of course.
All jokes aside, the madness and evil caused by his presence had caused me to take extreme measures to set things right for not just myself, but for many others that were affected by him. It had also taught me some things about myself that I wanted to change… namely, the overly passive approach to dealing with evil right in front of me and how badly I ignored what I was feeling just for the illusion of "safety".
Too fearful I was of getting caught up with Heydrich's nonsense that I allowed myself to become apathetic to the plight of the people around me. If I had to address one of the key contributing factors to my decisions, it was my fight with the Vritra user that gave me a reason to focus on my own selfish development and the ability to ignore what I was feeling by shoving my negative thoughts into my shadow.
In the end, I didn't regret what I did as everything turned out alright. Even so, I acknowledged that I was uncomfortable with some parts of what had happened, and intend to address them.
Also, I was pretty sure that shoving the emotions I don't want into my shadow is a recipe for disaster, especially in a world where weird shit happens and my shadow itself has become a crucial part in my Sacred Gear's abilities.
"Oh my, do you mean like Dark Sakura?" Atago guessed correctly, having been introduced the the Fate series (thank goodness that existed here, I like Shirou too much to allow him to become a SINO in this world) recently by yours truly, we had played through all three routes together over several weekend visits to my home.
"Yup. It's only a matter of time before my shadow becomes sentient and kills people for sustenance in an attempt to become real, kill the original and take over my life. Or just end the world, because it's made out of my rage of injustices and fear of various things." I knew the DXD world enough to know it's entirely plausible.
We were currently in an empty forest cordoned off by Raiga's men after I decided to finally allow them to help me in my training. They had offered to help me relocate somewhere and get my parent's approval through hypnosis at first, but I rebuked them on two accounts, namely that I'm the best person to look after my family and I needed to be close to them to do so… and that manipulating minds so callously on people I care about will not be tolerated.
I may have ranted a lot about how much I hated that field despite its use. My hijacking of the thought processes for animals and summoned creatures were for purely tactical reasons, and even then, it's not on the level of mind control but rather that of sensory confusion. Heydrich's summons were mostly mindless automatons with badly written scripts where just swapping a single thing was enough to screw them up.
But the type of hypnosis that happens in this world is mind-bogglingly terrifying! With how little resistance most humans have to them, it would just take a bit of effort to wipe someone's existence out of another person's memory.
If someone was evil enough, they would be going full Tsukushima and replacing me in the memories of my family just to crush my spirit. I'm already working on counters and preventive measures to that… but the point still stands, hypnosis and the mind arts were evil.
I had almost jumped off the slippery slope at some point during my training when I just managed to stop myself from tampering with the minds of some criminal group that tried to attack me for no real discernable reasons with lethal intent.
"Oh my… that sounds like the birth of an evil god!" Atago exclaimed.
Atago was filling up my "Ara Ara" and "Ma Ma" quotas rather easily. While having it being overdone can be annoying in anime, I don't mind it so much in this world, most of it is due to Atago using it to express her emotions honestly in certain conversational topics rather than spamming it in her teasing moments.
"There are some that become real with that method?" I asked with genuine curiosity.
"Mm-hmm!" She nodded happily, even as I sighed at the obvious answer.
As she did so, she also shook off a brown leaf that fell on her head, indication of the upcoming Winter season.
"Why am I not surprised? Oh well, I learn something new everyday then."
"Rather than everyday… isn't Gen learning something every hour?"
Sensing a bit of sadness in her tone with her slightly downcast expression (betrayed by her ears drooping down a little), I reached out and placed a hand on her head, rubbing it gently and affectionately.
She had long given permission (and even requested / tempted me to do so) ever since I helped bring her brother back home.
I held off for about a month until I was sure it wasn't some ploy to get me too attached to her for political ends or for untenable ulterior motives, when I was certain our friendship was genuine I decided to stop holding off from denying her of the innocent physiological pleasures that her race blessed her with.
"It's fine, it's fine. I have to do it, and also, it's what I want to do as well."
She wasn't particularly happy when she found out that I've been training all my abilities when I should be sleeping for at least four days a week, even if she understood my reasons and acknowledge its effectiveness after considering my special circumstances.
I don't like it when she tries to make it sound like something pitiable, I had told her as such a month ago, and we eventually worked through it for the most part. Nowadays she just gets sad that I never let myself be as carefree as she thinks a human child should have been.
"Uuuu, Gen… you shouldn't do this out here." Where some of her clansmen can hear her with their enhanced hearing… she has no issues when I pet her in private.
"I'm absorbing the sound and light energy around us, no one can make out what I'm doing to you."
"S-stop it, you're distracting me. Bad Gen, bad!"
"I'm distracting you so that you don't die of sadness. It's better to start early as a prevention method."
"I think that you've been reading too much Star Wars fan stories…"
She pouted even as she snuggled up closer to me in this cool area. I wouldn't say we're… dating yet, but we were certainly at least good friends that trust each other with normally private matters. Actually, that's in best friend territory right there, now that I think about it.
"Ah, Gen, if you keep this up then I can't control myself anymore~"
"This isn't exactly the time for… hey, remember when I told you that the world conspires to stop potentially steamy events from happening?"
"What about that?"
"I can see the men waving at our locations to say they finished the preparations."
"Oh my my… how troublesome."
Despite the light tone she used, I knew that she was going to give them a piece of her mind for interrupting our moment.
She left for the edge of the barrier as I settled into the center of the secluded area.
The time has come.
Summoning all aspects of my Sacred Gear into existence, I laid my hand down and breathed, taking in the energy of the world into my body in the traditional manner.
I started from the present and moved back into the past.
I reached in deeper into my shadow and myself, drawing in the "emotions" that had ended up sticking in my shadow, and the corresponding ones that I often hid in my own heart.
The near suffocating density of the malice of the world reacted to what I was doing as I had activated Senjutsu as one of the methods to sort through all of this.
In a way, it was much like the Dark Side of the Force.
Thankfully, I knew of a couple of ways to deal with it.
The first trial was the simplest, if only because I was already recovering from my own fears of interacting with the supernatural, it was simple enough to let that fear fill me, accept it and let go.
Yet I knew that those were simply the surface of my own feelings on the matter.
I looked deeper, my shadow screeched, the trees around me were buffeted by the shockwaves for a brief moment before silence filled the area once again.
The fear of not being good enough, of failing to protect those I care about, of losing the ones I loved… gave way to frustration, some measure of self-hate and resentment for the world… but it was nothing new to me.
These are merely the symptoms of a broken world and a man trying his best.
It's not my fault, it's not anyone's fault, it simply is. I rebuked such thoughts founded upon such reasons as being illogical, then focused on the love my family held for me, the new friends I made and how much faith they had in me.
This trial was over. I forgave myself.
But now…
I shot one of my lines to a tree, dragging myself to it just in time to dodge the shadow spikes erupting from within my shadow, powered and influenced by the emotions of this world.
I was still in control over my body, my original Sacred Gear and some functions of my new one, as for the rest… well, it's a battle against myself right now, from a certain point of view.
Violence wouldn't solve anything. I meditated upon my emotions even as I dodged the attacks that were getting increasingly ferocious as I brought them to the surface.
Apathy towards the plight of others. Self hatred.
Deliberate ignorance over many situations. Frustration over hypocrisy.
Selfish delays and actions. Fear… I continued to sort through both the present events that I felt strongly about and the lingering resentment over not doing typical SI things and attempting to save others.
For some matters, I reconciled them with logic, acceptance and forgiveness.
But for everything that Heydrich representative, for what evil does to this world and it's inhabitants… all I felt was a burning hatred over myself, the acts and the perpetrators. I felt hate towards the circumstances that caused this to happen, hatred over whatever forces that governed this world, hate, anger, anguish-
-I stomped the shadow tendril coming from below me.
I crushed the overwhelming feelings with sheer anger and will.
I remembered and paraphrased Emperor Palpatine's words from the Book of Anger.
Anger and Will, joined together, are the greatest Power.
Learn to meditate Anger and Will with clarity and precision.
However, anger was a two-edged sword. The key was a fine intelligence standing watch over anger.
A proper balance among intelligence and anger would grant one the aggression that can kill with precision and murder one's enemies.
A dragon's greatest strength laid in their fearsome rage. My greatest fear laid in those I care about.
Even if rage grants me strength, I cannot let it rule over my actions, lest I endanger the very thing I swore to protect.
It angers me. It truly does.
To think that it's not simply the imperfections of this world, the evil intent of its inhabitants, the forces that conspire to inflict harm upon those I care for… that can destroy what is important to me.
The thought that my own actions, my triumphs and mistakes, that no matter what I do… all these things will not necessarily guarantee the safety of what I love.
It drives me to further anger.
Then I think of the danger that I represent to those I love.
And I wrapped that anger in ropes of will tightly.
I looked upon the assault upon my body with disgust.
I unleashed my anger in the form of a light attack.
The same pain inflicted upon my shadow is reflected upon me.
It screamed in pain. I laughed in triumph.
One. Last. Trial.
Standing in the desolated center of the area, I went back to the beginning, the root for many of my current hold-ups.
Images of the stray devil dying in the ensuing explosion flashed through my mind, false memories of it's dying expression shook me, but I did not stop.
The last words of the dying Sacred Gear user became twisted as it cursed me in whispers, I pushed past the lies and continued to the truth.
"Sometimes mercy can be cruel, and sometimes, the right kind of death can be kind. Do you still believe that?"
My own words were thrown back at me by the shadow taking my form.
The desolate area was no longer that of a damaged forest, but of the countryside, a long forgotten one to be sure… and not a welcome one.
Thunder crashed, the rain continued to fall and hit the car's metal.
I remember the stormy weather of that evening.
The loud horn of the truck, the blaring lights, the impact and…
"Tell me what you regard as your greatest strength, so you will know your what makes you feel helpless. Tell me of your greatest fear, so you will know what drives you to act. Tell me what you cherish most, so you will know what brings you deep sorrow. Tell me what you crave, so that you may acknowledge just how far you would go to take all you desire."
I looked at my cooling corpse by the road mangled along with the vehicle I drove.
Taking a deep breath, I asked, "In this life, or the other?"
The shadow me smiled, "Is there a difference?"
"… No, I don't suppose there was."
In the end, this life is merely the continuation of my previous one, simply with different circumstances.
"I always thought my perseverance was my strongest point, I could keep on toughing it out until things get better or change… now I can see that I had always been helpless to the circumstances around me."
"And…?"
"It makes me angry, at everything, at myself… but I will change, I will move past that point and I have already taken the first steps to do so."
The shadow struck at me, it lashed out, it tore at my face as it wailed, "Only because you came to this world where you have the illusion of power, the illusion that power can free you from such things!"
I let it happen until the strikes felt lighter, then I threw my shadow self off me.
"And if so, what of it? There is no difference between that life and the next. I dare say the lack of procrastination counts as a positive change, and you don't get to make me forget the good parts."
The darkness in this false world made of memories almost made me forget that there was light too. I had to focus on the good as well.
And with that, I gained the strength to repel the beast-like attacks of my other self.
"I fear to lose what I have… no, that's only one part of it. I'm scared of dying. I'm scared of dying alone like in that world. Being so far away from my family, not being able to tell my family that I loved them, that I wasn't as good as a person as they thought I was, and all the truths that I had hidden away. I fear that it will happen again. And I will do almost anything to prevent that from happening. Heh, how selfish… but that's fine. I'll make it work."
"What I cherish… oh, what a bothersome question. In the end, I love the people I can't help but love. And losing them will always leave a hole in my heart. One day, I may learn how to deal with that, that day isn't now, but it will come."
"And what I crave, when it comes down to it, when I think about all those lonely nights by myself, in the end I just wanted more love, affection and acceptance I guess. Well, the love part. To love and be loved, I don't think there's anything worth wanting more than that."
Power, wealth, influence… all is vanity if there's no love for me to give and receive. Happiness is fleeting, joy is lasting.
I feel much lighter now.
The world shifted back to normal, my shadow is where it should be and also… ah, so the divine artifacts have acknowledged my wish.
There was no black lizard themed device on my body, my shadow no longer reacted to anything outside of my own will.
I looked at a lone tree undamaged by the earlier fighting amongst a few dozen smashed trees.
Eat.
A darker shadow shot out of my own shadow, sinking itself into the ground below the tree. The tree blackened in an instant, dispersed into black particles and was consumed into nothing but power for me.
This power was much more substantial and encompassing for me. Yet, I feel that there is still a lot of inefficiencies with this method. I still needed more precision into molecules and atoms to progress further.
I stretched out my hand, both my familiar lines and shadows tendrils shot forth from an invisible aura coating my body, and the realization sunk in.
The acceptance of parts of myself had seemingly interacted with my wish to use my abilities so seamlessly even without manifesting the more clunky and noticeable Sacred Gear appearance.
In this state, my abilities had all merged with my body, and while they were different and somewhat harder to use than in my previous state, I could now use it constantly without anyone noticing.
I could even train during school hours by sending out my shadow across town to absorb energies from a great distance, the sensation sharing abilities in this state were much greater than before, so I could probably do some shared body tricks and exploits like this.
And also… I let the threads spreading from my body hover in the air, I waited and then found the familiar sensation.
So that is how emotions feel as a source of power… I'll take that.
I fed off the feelings of the world, of the encompassing hate and malice of this world, turning it into something useful and doing my part to make the world a better place by also releasing some of it back as positive emotional energy.
Heh, I'm an emotional vampire now. Wait, that doesn't sound very good.
Well then, looks like I have even more ways to train now.
I see Atago waving at me, the barrier had dropped, well then, time to tell her that everything is alright before going along with whims for the rest of the day.
It would be awhile before we get to see each other again due to her own duties.
The next time we'll meet up face-to-face should be at the ski trip up in Sapporo… okay, I just had a bad feeling about that one.
My plot senses are tingling.
Level 6
Level 6
"What's with this increased monster encounter rate?" I muttered to myself as I juggled the three most recent Evil Pieces in my hand.
I swear, Japan must be the dumping ground for stray devils. Why the fuck does the Shinto and the Youkai faction allow this? Is it because all the stray devils seem to have a general tendency to head towards Kuoh town due to its future plot relevance?
It's like the stray devils are setting themselves up as mob encounters for the Gremory group to grind on. Then again, if this was a bad fanfiction that decided to set up Sirzechs as some evil mastermind, then this is all part of his 1000 Year Keikaku for Rias's group to become stronger or have a false sense of confidence.
I highly doubt that's the case.
Regardless of whether my wild theories are true or not, their unrepentant mob monster mentality has left me greatly disturbed over the past two months. This was especially so after I incapacitated them and rummaged through their minds to find some way of bringing them back to sanity and the light.
It led me to some new discoveries. It was a mixed bag of sadness, pleasant surprises, and exciting topics.
It was the potential of the knowledge I gained that excited me the most, things like the devil language, devil magic, Underworld politics, general information that the light novels would leave out that helps with world building and the experiences of these stray devils that gave me plenty of ideas on how to continue my growth.
The pleasant surprises laid in the surprising professional behaviors of two of the three devil Kings for these mutated monsters. I would compare two of the stray devil's relationships to their Masters to that of an apprenticeship. An apprenticeship to mostly civil Sith Lords that is.
It was the degree to which the servants coveted the power of their masters and how it was an acknowledged facet of their working relationship that made the comparison rather apt.
At least, this was the case for those that became stray devils, it's possible that other devil servants either desired power in a more patient manner or simply had other requirements that their master fulfilled in order to maintain their allegiance.
The promise of societal advancement seemed to be one of the key pillars of trust from what I could see from these memories.
As for the sorrowful parts, in general, it simply pained me to put them to death simply for the threat they posed after I failed to fix them.
The longest I managed to return a Stray Devil back to some semblance of sanity was about 12 hours. Just enough time for them to regret what they've done, reflect upon it and beg me to kill them.
Devil energy is ridiculously volatile and destructive by nature it seems. No wonder healing is so difficult for them. It also comes as no surprise that it plays the main role in mutating devils into a monster of the week.
Two of them asked for death out of remorse, the last one just wanted to die out of some misplaced pride, as he killed his Master without devolving into a monster and was damn smug about it. The last was the only one of the three Stray Devils I fought that had a more painful relationship with his master, by the way.
I didn't know the proportion of reincarnated devils that had shitty masters, but the impression I got from the last stray was that his master is part of some "old boys network" where such treatment to their servants is pretty much the norm.
"Haa… note to self, never ever trade away your life for something temporary like power or a promise that cannot be fulfilled or guaranteed in a legal manner. Especially a "long life as a powerful being.", I mean, who buys into that thing?"
I guess it's easy for me to say such words when I can easily attain such a thing by draining the stray devils of their life span. Having become many times more proficient with handling both my life force and life span, and devil physiology after my first stray devil encounter, I managed to drain the longevity of these stray devils at a much more efficient rate.
Right now I have an extra 450 years worth, give or take 50 years, of extended life span for me to use.
Thus, it renders whatever argument that I have against people desperately seeking a longer life no matter the cost, as words that flowed out of the mouth of a, particularly privileged individual.
Well, whatever, I'm not the main character.
It's not like my chances of giving someone a Touma lecture and breaking them out of their illusions is any higher than a regular persons ability to do so.
Even so, it bothers me.
"Hey! Kid! Watch where you're going!" Ah, I almost bumped into a salaryman that looked like a high ranked manager, just after putting away my loot into my pocket when I felt people were nearby.
"Sorry sir. Are you alright?" I asked, sensing his life force was a bit out of balance.
"What? Do you think I'm made of glass or something?! You think you can look down at me just because you're young and-"
I graciously heard him out as I discreetly tried to "calm him down", slowly distracting him until enough threads were on his body for me to scan him, after finding the increased build-up of toxins in his brain that was likely from lack of sleep plus some other deficiencies, I used Senjutsu in conjunction with my energy storage to heal him.
His life span seemed to have also dropped a bit due to very poor health when he was younger, which kind of explained why he seemed angry at being "pitied", so I donated a couple of years to remedy that issue.
Having a form of immortality is a privilege that most people would hate me for. Even I'm a bit miffed of myself for discovering such an exploit so quickly. Thankfully, I found that putting such privileges to good use is a good way to spread happiness.
"I see, I understand Hanakai-san. I can see why you would think that way. By the way, do you feel alright now?"
"Did you listen to a word I just… huh? Huh… hey, hey! I actually feel pretty good! All my pain and headaches is gone! Yahoo!!!" He jumped up into the air, throwing his working bag up into the air which I quickly caught for him so that he wouldn't break anything important.
And now he's tap dancing like crazy with a stupid smile on his face.
Is he acting? Isn't this way too overdone? Oh crap, I may have accidentally healed a long lasting injury or impairment… time to salvage this.
"That's great. I've heard that letting your feelings out more often and dealing with stress helps a lot with your actual health but not to this extent! This is a miracle! You should go tell your family the good news! Like, now!"
"You're right! I have to tell everybody about the good news!" I passed his bag back to him as he quickly took off like a high school student chasing after the woman he loves that was recently NTR'ed away from him as he resolved himself to his fate of being a cuckold
… Well, at least I didn't give him my name. I had already discarded some of my fears of causing butterfly effects like in most other stories if it meant that I could help people in front of me, to a significant extent without compromising my family too much.
There was nothing to worry about. It's not like he's related to some minor character in the future, much less anyone of plot significance. So everything will be just fine.
I decided to look at the bright side of this little detour on my way home.
More training, yay! I made a person's day, yay!
There's always something special about seeing someone smile like that.
I've already performed discreet Senjutsu healing on others using my threads to work around the "physical contact" requirement for quite some time. I would have usually done this at a "distance", sending out my shadow across the city to spread my life senses, searching for people that needed healing and making some rounds at the hospital patients… all from the comfort of my boring school lessons. (Wahahaha! My school hours are now even more productive!)
My subspecies Sacred Gear is really great for training control in all my abilities. Be it my Senjutsu, Sacred Gear capabilities, awareness or multitasking abilities…
I was in a good mood as I reached home, the vaguely familiar additional presences served to brighten up my day even further.
"I'm home!"
"Nii-chan!" "Onii-chan!" My little siblings run out of the living room to greet me.
"Hey there Gosei! Hi Kouho! And how was your day?"
They started talking in their own youngling manner which took awhile to translate in my head.
"Hey grandpa Marvin! Hello grandma Hinako!"
"How's my favorite grandson!" My grandfather was the first to grab me into a hug.
I would have thought that the Brit would have been more reserved, but it seems that he's become more lively since last year.
"I'm good, yourself? When did you arrive? I'm afraid that I was kept out of the loop."
Turns out that it was a bit of a surprise visit planned by my parents.
"Oh my, what a lovely parrot you have… Hello, what's your name?" My grandmother is speaking to my parrot, Sheev… oh no.
"Squawk! I am the Senate!"
Sheev, just why? No, wait, that was my fault.
"Your name is "The Senate"?"
"I love democracy."
Right then, I regretted giving Sheev the silly idea of "freedom of speech".
My parrot perpetuated a misunderstanding that wouldn't be cleared up until dinner was over.
Speaking of dinner, my grandparents were very surprised to see my father speaking English well. I took credit for that, as it was my idea to "tutor" him in English as part of our weekend family time.
And the night after that, (or whenever they were not "busy" in bed) I would send my threads into my parent's bedroom and slowly feed him some copied language skills so that he could become a fast learner.
It was a safe procedure for the most part. I had already tested copying over language skills with both my parrot and the stray devils while I kept them in captivity for a short while, (they could speak all languages but couldn't read all of them, glad I thought of testing that out before I mercy killed them) and it was perfectly safe.
Anyways, we would be going to visit my grandparents from my father's side and introduce my grandparents from my mother's side to them as part of my school's Winter Break schedule. In addition to that, we would also leave Gosei and Kouho there so that one set of grandparents could take care of my siblings while we went for our ski trip.
My mother was concerned that they wouldn't enjoy going up to the ski resort in Sapporo, and so arranged our trip in such a manner. Her parents would be going up there with us to enjoy some skiing and see more of Japan before they fly back home.
Well, it won't be long before I see them again. My parents also made some plans to visit the UK again after a short stay in Italy when Spring Break arrives!
I will be looking forward to it.
The first half of our holiday around Japan (family visit) turned out to be a nice and lively affair for us all.
I even had the opportunity to heal up and donate some spare lifespan to both sets of grandparents. I hope to let them live long enough until they get to hold their great-grandchildren within their hands.
I wasn't able to do that for my first grandparents back then… but I will give these ones that small yet special share of happiness!
There weren't many opportunities to sneak out so I wasn't able to train as hard as normal, nor perform some research into my new pawn, knight and bishop Evil Piece loot, so, unfortunately, I couldn't research some new spells from them.
That said, the addition of the devil language and some magic knowledge, did allow me to review the information I had from the Rook piece. Back then I only managed to learn some reinforcement and fortifying magic which I used as home defenses, but now that I had some new knowledge, I managed to pick up a temporary body reinforcement spell that seems to be a small part of the Rook Piece's active durability and strength enhancements.
"They aren't going to mutate or anything right?" - Atagoneesan~
"I think you played too much Resident Evil games. Don't worry, it was all converted to human longevity before it fully entered my body, so it's all good!" - ActuallyVritra
"Oh my, I will take your word for it then. The creations of that god truly are amazing things." - Atagoneesan~
"Only if they are used properly." - ActuallyVritra
That was how the chat between Atago and I looked like on LINE before we met each other again at the ski resort.
The journey to the meeting spot was normal enough, although there was a strangely familiar sensation at the edge of my senses, pinging on it for just a moment… when I focused my senses on that power, I sensed nothing, as if it was never there in the first place.
Could this be my high inaccurate "plot senses" at work? Is it the work of an enemy that can hide itself so well it may as well be a phantom?
We met with the Kaiza family for lunch before we were to head up the lift to the ski resort and courses. Himuro seemed to have gotten fit without making himself overly buffed like Heydrich did, thank goodness… I'm glad he isn't aspiring to be the chuuni guy just because the guy was powerful, but still took his fitness seriously enough.
Raiga stood behind Atago while looking comically sad as he tried to get some sympathy from his daughter, no doubt due to some idiocy of his own making when we first saw him at the meeting place.
I glanced at Sakura who cheerfully ran up to greet us before quickly looking around her for Atago, finding my best friend childishly pouting with her face turned away from her father, her arms crossed together to communicate her displeasure.
I brushed a few threads across Atago's ears fluffy ears that were hidden from sight by magic, tickling her and catching her attention. Her mood visibly brightened the instant she saw me, moving at speeds that she really shouldn't be moving in front of a public audience, she quickly scooped me up in a tight hug.
B-big! Her breasts got big! I mean, she got big in general. Did she go through a growth spurt when I wasn't looking? Is it a Youkai thing? Perhaps it's kind of like how Fallen Angels power up by getting more wings… she could have reached a new threshold of power which translated into a growth spurt.
I'd like to think that I can take a bit of credit for this, considering that I had helped to improving her training efficiency and had acted as a sparring partner on occasion.
"Geeeen~ I missed you!"
"Y-yeah, me too!"
The above average bishoujo had evolved into a busty bishoujo that overtook me in height! Just by a little bit… curse these Japanese genes that give me a shorter average height to work with!
Spoiler
[img: https/i./LPuaSWD.png]
Anyways, it's not like I couldn't push her off, I just didn't want to even if it was getting a little tight. I think I can understand Issei a little more now.
With how no one seems to think her speed was particularly unusual, I'm just going to chalk it up to anime comical transitions being one of the tropes that are an exception to this world's logical rules. That, or it's an active feature, and I'm slightly more inclined to believe that tropes that make characters cute or beautiful do apply to this battle harem story.
"Gen, my goodness, you've grown!" Her words were that of honest joy, although the glint in her eyes showed a hint of something… else.
"So have you." Unfortunately, being almost thrice her age after taking into account my life in another world, did not prepare me for dealing with supernaturally beautiful women.
Back then she still looked like a middle-schooler, a well developed one… but still a kid in my eyes, despite my body reacting without the consent of my aged mind. Now she looked liked a hot college student model, which is basically completely legal no matter how old I am, add in a bit of supernatural hotness and there goes my composure.
Her mother didn't count since she was happily married and the circumstances of our first meeting meant that I was too busy focusing on the mission rather than anything else.
I felt the onlookers stare and snickered at my panicked response.
"I mean, uh, more beautiful and… fuck, the prequels are infecting me."
"Hehehe, you've done that yourself."
"And so I have."
Lunch was rather lively, my family was getting friendly with Atago's family quite a bit. I didn't need to be genre aware to notice that they were quite clearly trying to get us both into a relationship.
As nice as that would be, the beautiful girl was still young and I wouldn't want to jump straight into a relationship while there were still secrets that we kept from each other.
We enjoyed spending time together just fine, even so, there were certain topics that we avoided talking about when we could.
"Is it me, or is that an unused storage house on the way down the mountain?" I asked, pointing at the building, as I took in the view from the lift up to the resort.
"It does look like it. Oh! I know, it's like one of those cottages that people hide in whenever an unexpected snow storm comes around~ The two people would be a young boy and girl, they would be unable to leave the place until the storm dies down and to survive they need to share body warmth with each other!" Atago has definitely been watching more anime lately!
"I was thinking the same thing…" I agreed, looking about the mountain in search of the menace hidden from me, for some reason, my senses are a bit off today.
"Hmm~ the weather has been really erratic around these mountains lately. It might just happen you know…" My sense of unease intensified as I felt that she was particularly serious about the weather conditions, to the point where she was suggesting that something strange was going on.
Or perhaps they are only "off" around this area?
Something's odd.
Making sure that my parents were definitely preoccupied with their conversation, I whispered at a volume just loud enough that Atago's enhanced hearing could pick up (her family too, but it's best that they can hear me to get on the same page).
"I felt something, someone, around the mountain for just a moment before it became completely invisible to my senses. After that, my senses began to have a couple of blind spots here and there… is there something going on here?"
Atago shot me a worried look before glancing back at her father, who returned the same concerned look before quickly returning to his conversation with my parents, acting as if there was nothing wrong for the moment.
Whispering at the same volume as I did, Atago turned her head towards me, "There is. We expected some trouble around here but… if there's something that can hide from you, then this might be a bigger problem than we thought. I'll tell you later."
We eventually reached the top and got changed for our sports activities.
I saw some of Raiga's men undercover as ordinary visitors, seemingly fortifying the resort and discreetly followed my family around for their protection.
"I thought this would be just a holiday for us to have fun, but then father just had to bring up work." Atago complained for a bit before seriously addressing the question, "Our clan was called up to investigate some missing snow children."
Atago rarely brought up their clan duties and work for some reason, so it fell to Raiga to keep me updated when it came to their clan affairs.
The Kaiza clan and a few other families were descendants of the first Heavenly Dog who eventually moved to Japan and became part of the unified (to a point) Youkai faction. Thanks to their particularly strong tracking abilities and magical power, they are essentially the go-to group for magical policemen.
Aside from getting jobs specialised in finding criminals, tracking missing persons, and participating in various missions that require their expertise on occasion… Raiga was part of a council that led a large law enforcement agency that protected the peace of the moonlit world within Japan.
This council position was held by the heads of prominent clans that represented the interests of certain races of Youkai. Sakura had held the position for well over a hundred years before deciding to share the position with her husband in recent years, mostly so that she could take care of her children herself after figuring Raiga had way too much quality time with them and that it was her turn now.
The members of this agency not only acted as policemen, but also as negotiators, some of which were sent on diplomatic missions.
With how many clansmen were here, it didn't take me long to put the pieces of the puzzle together.
"I didn't think some missing baby Youkai would require all of this. There's something bigger at play, isn't there?" I glanced at the large gathering of clansmen here. I knew that the Kaiza family would have placed a few men in order to protect my family and Himuro (who needed it) due to our prior arrangements. "Thanks for not cancelling all of this, by the way… my family was looking forward to it."
Atago smiled, accurately surmising that I figured out this was a last minute affair. "You should thank my father, or rather, you can send your complaints to him for not telling us anything until now. Haa… and I was looking forward for a really fun alone time with Gen!"
"Yeah, me too." I nodded in agreement, deciding not to address her insinuations now as I wanted to focus on work, "What's the plan?"
"Mother and father will be handling the main search for the undetectable being you identified while also focusing on the main mission. The rest of the clan will be looking for a few missing persons…" In other words, the corpses of some who may have died from dangerous "weather conditions", "I will… be negotiating trade deals."
"… Is it a trade blockade?"
"No, nothing like that. We are to find the Face Powder Hag clan and negotiate better prices for their cosmetics." Oh right, they were supposed to be "goddesses of cosmetics" or servants of some long forgotten goddess of cosmetics. "Um, that is, if you would be willing."
"Of course I'm coming along. I can hardly leave you alone and play around here instead. Besides… you may need a friend that has some skill in… aggressive negotiations."
"Oh my, let's hope that the negotiations will be short then."
After our chat, we spent some time acting as if everything were normal and skied with our family, having tons of fun learning how to ski well without falling or losing control.
Under the pretense of going for the advanced course, we went off the main path to our mission of the day. Himuro and the few clansmen protecting my family would be able to distract my family from our activities, the former would probably continue to be a target for my mother to fuss about while the latter would act as helpful tourists making conversations with the rest of my family.
Sakura, Raiga and the rest of the Kaiza clan were off performing their respective missions as well. Normally I would be worried about their… competency, but considering that Sakura was apparently stronger than most of the clan combined (although she stated that I would have been able to incapacitate her with moderate difficulty due to compatibility issues), they should do just fine.
Atago led me to a magically hidden village in the snow where many "Snow Youkai" lived.
I was hoping to meet a beautiful Yuki Onna, a snow woman, and I got my wish.
From a certain point of view.
"Hokyooooooooooooooooooooooou!" A… gaggle… of white gorillas wearing female sailor uniforms with cute accessories were drumming their chests as if they were about to beat the shit out of me.
… Who am I to judge?
The supernatural world is weird.
I'm just going to pretend that the beautiful kimono-clad snow woman of anime had actually existed and were in hiding somewhere. Or I could just comfort myself with the fact that the multiverse is real and somewhere out there, a main protagonist is getting it on with their Yuki Onna waifu.
Damn it Tsukune, Mizore is best girl! If I find my way to his dimension one day then I'm going to punch him… well, the him in some shitty badfic, I tend to respect canon a lot more than… the weird ones.
The rest of the supernatural beings here were definitely different from their cultural depictions.
The powerful Old Man of the Snow, were actually powerful, but not due to their control over ice and winter. Nope, they looked like as if their faces were photoshopped unto some overly muscular body, like that of "Qui-Gon Gym".
The Yuki Warashi, snowbabies, were like shadow monsters with a snow coat made out of straw. Gegege no Kitaro lied to me.
The Yukinba and Yukifuriba, "normal" bloodthirsty Snow Hags, looked like the pale versions of Amazon warriors. I would have said they were hot, but considering their body temperature, that would only be true from a certain point of view. The point of view where everything above absolute zero still had thermal energy, that is.
Icicle Women looked like textbook Yanderes out shopping for their next murder weapon.
And the Face Powder Hag clan that we met with turned out to look completely normal beautiful women! Well, with heavy makeup on.
Atago was right. The negotiations were short.
She had skillfully sorted out some misunderstandings that arose due to some confusing new consumer tax laws enacted from Kyoto.
"You're good at this diplomacy thing. Will you be taking up your parent's job in the future?"
"… Mm, I suppose so."
"… You don't sound particularly enthusiastic. I take it that's not what you want to do."
"I guess… well, I don't know. I don't really know what I want to do just yet except… nevermind."
"Is this why you don't talk much about your clan?"
"Oh my, so you noticed?"
"Hard not to when you keep distracting me with magical theory and Youjutsu lessons all of a sudden whenever I bring it up."
Not that I didn't appreciate it. Atago was skilled in both magic used by magicians and the Youkai exclusive Youjutsu.
I had some skill in that discipline as well, having managed to cast some Youjutsu spells thanks to getting the right energy composition with Absorption Line, then converting my own mana into the energy needed to cast such spells. I managed to do the same with two devil magic circles by converting my mana into demonic energy, although I'm not particularly proficient at it yet.
"Well, you certainly had no complaints."
"I did, as much as I liked them, I would have rather heard more about you."
"I see… I'm sorry."
"There's nothing to be sorry about. You're under no obligation to tell me anything you don't want to."
On the way out of the village, I brought up the main mission that Raiga and Sakura were dealing with, wanting more information about it due to the bad feeling that I've been getting.
"Your gut feeling tends to be wrong more often than not. But… these things only happen when your instincts go off like that. So you're certain then?"
"Yeah, I get the feeling that we'll encounter our phantom like menace some time soon."
"And with what's been going on… yes, he could be involved."
We spoke with the Snow Mothers whose Snow Children went missing. The race of Snow MILFs said that their children slowly began to leave their homes over a few days, until most of them went missing, after that, the erratic weather (via sudden snow storms) began to claim a few lives around the mountains.
I wondered why there wasn't any warnings issued about this, before realizing that it was likely due to some differences between how the supernatural and the "normal" world dealt with these matters unintentionally causing some inefficiencies…
"Just for reference, how do your kids look like?"
They gave me a photo.
What the hell? They all look like punks!? Actually Snow Delinquents! Are those female Snow Children imitating Gyaru culture?
What's with this village!!!!
"Well… uh… I guess that even Snow Children would have to grow up at some point."
I mean, the race has got to propagate somehow, right?
A heavy snowstorm suddenly began as we left the village.
"… Crap, my range have shrunk, my senses are… blurry, through this unnatural snowstorms."
It was tiny, but I felt it… not only did this unnatural weather mess with my supernatural senses, but my various abilities had also weakened.
This must be the work of an enemy ability!
I quickly told Atago my concerns, she acknowledged our low visibility and reached into an enchanted purse to take out some items.
"Ta-da! Enchanted Heat Vision goggles!"
"Whoa!"
"I thought this might happen and came prepared! Thanks to our efforts to modernize our tracking capabilities, our clan had turned to modern technology and sought to integrate them into our methods."
"Like my mother you seem to have everything you need in your handbag! Are you sure you're not aiming to become Doraemon?"
"Mr. "I have a pocket dimension in my shadow" is the real first Doraemon, so that makes me Dorami!"
Trying on the goggles, I was pleased to say that it worked like magic.
Now that we could see each other (heat signature) clearly, we began to make our way back to the lodge while keeping vigilant of the potential culprit.
The Snow Children (delinquents) aren't likely to be the responsibly party behind the unnatural effects of the snow storms. Even if they played a role in it, I don't think it was an informed or willing one.
"You know, our clan's reputation took a big hit when Himuro went missing…"
"I can see why." I answered cautiously, not knowing why she was bringing it up now of all times.
"The family that could always find the criminals responsible for so many crimes can't find their own family member, much less a child of the main family. Then they went around begging from help from all sorts of people… I hated hearing about it, how they talked bad about my family behind our backs just because we of all people, asked for help. For a time I even blamed my little brother for causing so much trouble, even though I knew it was wrong to think that way considering the way he disappeared from our lives."
"Mmm… I thought you didn't care too much about the clan responsibilities and roles?"
"Haha, I may not desire to take on such a role as a future career, even so, I'm proud of what my family do."
"I see, it makes sense that you would feel that way then."
"Yes… eventually, I decided to do something about it and researched a lot about modern technology, how we could use it to find Himuro. Thanks to that, we even managed to do what we are good at… well, even better than before. We have you to thank too, you know."
"If it's about Himuro-"
"-We won't stop appreciating you for it. But that's not what I'm talking about. Even when we could have been doing a lot of other things, you always did get me to watch shows like 24 that showed how technology can be used for the purpose of security and searching. You taught me quite a lot of things, and it's thanks to your ideas that we managed to finish this product too."
Huh… I'm glad I'm not the only one that's innovating a lot. Well, to be more accurate, I'm glad that someone I cared about found a way to make use of my creative musings and random ideas.
"I didn't do much."
"If you say so~"
"Hmm?"
"What?"
I stopped as I saw just a hint of red appearing through the lens of these goggles, when I looked closer, I could see something unnatural there… right, these enchanted goggles could also detect magic heavy areas.
And right in front of me, there was a void of energy surrounding that speck of red.
Focusing energy into my sight, I took off the goggles and looked through the heavy falling snow.
It was a person wearing heavy winter clothing, with how dark it is and the strange "empty" sensation that my threads are picking up near the person, it's safe to say that the person is the key to all this.
Unfortunately, that fellow noticed us first. Blasted nerfed abilities!
Is that being's ability some… power dampener?
This is really bad, I've got to end this fast!
If he's some sort of gimmicky villain of the week, I should be able to pull a fast one on him.
"You… you monsters… !" A male voice screamed through the storm.
Oh great, a racist.
"Atago, inform your parents."
"I'm on it. But the connection here is… it's as if it's being continuously cut off!"
Crap.
"I will have my revenge! I'll kill you all!"
Oh great, he's also a raging revenge-obsessed villain.
Well, if I take him down quickly enough, I can use a modified Stray Devil sanity recovery method in order to have a civil conversation with him.
Blasting myself forward at such speeds that I burnt the air around me, I launched a powerful jab right into his center of mass with disruptive Ki, intending to incapacitate him.
I overestimated myself.
My blow sent him flying across the snowy forest without him even having a chance to resist.
If it were a supernatural creature, they he would have simply fallen from the blow.
Due to not being able to sense much at all through this power dampening snow storm, I wasn't able to properly estimate his power and approximate his race… but…
I was pretty sure he was human.
Oh no. What have I done? What if I killed him?
I should have controlled my strength more or gathered more information! Fuck, fuck, fuck, what a blunder! Wait, if I rush after him then there's still a chance for me to save him… worst comes to worst, I might be able to activate my stored Evil Pieces with converted energy.
Shouting to Atago that I would go on ahead, I leapt after him, and found his crumpled body after following the path of many destroyed trees.
He's at least durable enough to not have went "splat" from that blow, which is good… wait, no… if he could take all this without dying then-
-That's when I felt something terribly wrong.
My right knuckle was cold.
It shouldn't have been cold. I had been redistributing heat energy across my body to keep myself warm ever since I went up the mountain.
It was as if the part of my fist I used had… my sub-species Sacred Gear that had been covering my body ever since that day… it couldn't reach it.
Or rather, it couldn't activate around the back of my hand.
His ability didn't weaken my power. It outright cancelled it.
As if he just… deleted it.
No.
"You… I won't let you get in my way…"
I made another mistake by not immediately incapacitating him.
Crap.
I rushed forward towards him, and realized I fucked up by subconsciously holding back against my fellow human, moving too slow to stop him from injecting himself with a syringe.
Shit.
I was too slow.
Sending a burst of kinetic energy out from my side, I narrowly dodged the black "thing" that shot out from his body-
-No!
It was a gigantic deformed black hand that radiated a strange yet familiar aura that almost crushed me.
It struck a glancing blow.
I couldn't feel parts of the left side of my body.
"[Deleting Right]!"
More accurately, the derived ability of the "Deletion Field" type Vritra Sacred Gear, had erased the supernatural power of everything it had hit.
And that nullifying power was spreading.
I focused my life force into containing the area, halting the progression of the cursed aura across my body at the cost of greater stamina loss.
I may have been faster and stronger than him, but the surprise attack had left me off balance and I couldn't launch a counterattack.
Even the environmental attacks that I launched at him were negated because the bastard could somehow delete "Gravity" and "Inertia", causing the boulders and trees I tossed at him to float up with the mere wave of the giant hand behind him.
Upon closer inspection, it wasn't just the hand that was the problem.
Even the shadow of his normal right hand carried the same cursed power, to the point where he got creative and "deleted" space in front of him, instantly teleporting in front of me a few times!
I managed to evade all the blows from an attack like that due to my training in melee combat against all the delinquents and thugs over the years, however, and thanks to that, I managed to continue fighting.
I couldn't find an opening to put him down non-lethally now that my abilities have been cut to this point.
It dawned on me that I was actually losing. Even if I managed to kill him, I would have lost.
"Die race traitor!"
Okay, note to self, punch the racist idiots that are involved with him. I swear I've heard that line in before in some fanfics with all sorts of racist bastard-
Ah… did he just cause an avalanche? Oh shit, he's riding it, he has the high ground!
And with such an advantage in altitude, my options in avoiding his shadow just became much more slimmer.
He left me with only one option that I could quickly enact.
I ran down the mountain.
My opponent seemed to have complicated some matters for himself and couldn't catch up with me for some reason, my best guess was that it may have been due to the drawback of whatever he injected himself with earlier.
Yet, I was tiring, I couldn't keep this up for much longer.
"Geeeeen!"
"Atagooo?!"
My best friend had launched herself with a pillar of flame, grabbed me by the arm, then blasted off to some building on the way down. As we fell inside the building, she quickly got up and slammed her hand onto the floor, creating an array of magic circles in an instant before closing the door.
I heard and felt the avalanche crashing into the small building we hid in.
Yet, we were left unharmed within.
"W-we made it."
"Y-yeah… Thanks… for the save… god, home fortifications spells are great! Convenient Cottages are the best"
We were likely in the building we saw on the way up to the mountain earlier.
"Oh my, Gen! What happened to you?"
Oh, right… fuck, I had to deal with the effects of my first loss.
Level 7
Level 7
One of the worst movies I had the misfortune to watch when I was an impressionable young kid that couldn't help but be fascinated by anything on the TV screen was Superman IV: Quest for Peace.
It's a wonder that I can even remember that horrible movie at all.
Actually, rather than "wonder", I dare say that it's a bit ironic that one of the most non-sensical and badly made scenes I have ever watched was the first thing I compared my situation to.
To think that the scene where one of the worst made villains depowered Superman with a radioactive scratch actually became relatable to me! How laughable!
As the adrenaline faded and the pain across my body became more pronounced, my thoughts were all over the place and I couldn't help but see my situation as something I would have read in a bad story that passed around random nerfs like no tomorrow.
Thinking about all this reminded me of Heydrich.
"Ironic. I could save others from bad story elements, but not myself." I found myself imitating that pleased evil grin from the movie despite the numbing cold creeping up to the rest of my body.
Guess I might have practiced delivering the "Tragedy" too often in the privacy of my room.
Atago frowned as she moved her hands up and down my body, within each of her hands was a spell word made out of black energy that looked like some bastardized mix of Japanese characters and the Elder Futhark, she was hovering those symbols just above my body as if looking for something.
No doubt trying to figure out the nature of the Sacred Gear's effects as it continued to weaken me, thankfully, I managed to narrow it down for her with all my observations.
"I know you love the prequel trilogy to death, but when meme'ing becomes your go-to coping mechanism…" She began only to begin frowning, displaying her disapproval of my slight satisfaction of inserting one of my favorite memes into my ever-eventful life, " I think it's time that we have a serious discussion about it."
"If it bothered you then it would have been perfectly a-okay to bring it up anytime, well, any more convenient time when we have some guy with a revenge boner disturbing the peace."
Preferably, a time when I'm not dealing with parts of my body being unable to call upon or interact with most forms of supernatural power I know, yeah… that would be a good time to talk about any bad habits that do not have life-and-death tier importance.
"Disturbing the peace… you make it sound like you've been in a schoolyard scuffle."
"It is a very broad and general way to say "the shit has hit the fan", so yes, perhaps I failed to attach the correct amount of severity to the word… and I have been in one too many of those scuffles."
The sheer amount of mooks coming to battle me, no thanks to Heydrich, made up the bulk of it.
Focusing on generating body heat on certain segments of my torso and limbs, I managed to warm the parts of my body that I couldn't access directly with transferred heat energy. Whatever power he used on me could only block the supernatural aspects of power, not the perfectly natural transfers of energy.
His ability to negate some of the natural laws seem to require much more selective focus, as the removal of gravity and space attested to.
"And…. done! Oh my!"
"What's wrong?"
"Well, it certainly isn't as bad as it looks. From what I can tell, your "Sage Mode" is already causing the curse to deteriorate… but at the rate it's going, I think you will run out of energy before it's all gone."
Atago explained that the ability was, unsurprisingly, similar to mine as the effect will last so long as there is an unbroken connection to it. However, with the way his powers work, most of the connection relied on the "shadows" or "lack of light" used by the cloudy weather or his own body.
"And so since we're in a very convenient cottage-like place on a ski resort's mountain… we aren't under his "shadow" per say."
She nodded, agreeing with my assessment.
"If you were to focus all your energies on just healing yourself then it might work out… but…"
"I don't have enough energy stored and also, my shadow inventory isn't functioning at the moment." The guy's shadow struck my own, unfortunately, leaving some functions of my Sacred Gear half-functional.
No access to my nuclear waste equals no easy energy recharge.
"Quite so."
Her ears drooped at the bad news she had to agree with, I smiled and patted her head.
"It'll be alright. These things happen. I'm sorry that I messed up big time though."
She shook her head quickly, shaking my hand off it, "I know. Oh, and you're not forgiven since there's nothing to forgive."
"Heh, you're too kind. Don't spoil me like that. I make a mistake then it should be addressed, don't make excuses for me just as Obi-Wan did for Anakin."
Love had blinded Obi-Wan to the faults of his brother, it was only natural that Anakin slowly fell until he was basically half-Sith just before he disarmed and ended Dooku.
I don't want that kind of devotion in my friends and family.
"You really can't go a day without a Star Wars reference, can you?"
"I try."
I could have gotten frustrated, I could have berated myself for my mistake of going easy on him, or my carelessness, or many more things… but I knew that I would have gotten myself in trouble for all of that at some point.
It was only a matter of time before I ended up making a mistake that a supernatural creature would make against a human.
The (very common) mistake of underestimating them or having such a low opinion of them that they don't take them seriously.
Quite frankly, this whole predicament of ours could be much worse.
Atago hadn't gotten hurt at all so that's a major plus in my book. Thank goodness for that.
No one else had gotten killed or hurt due to our fight as I had been carefully monitoring and controlling the flow of battle despite my disadvantages. Yay.
My situation was more than salvageable and I could still get back to fighting shape by the time my opponent recovers from whatever stopped him from coming after me. Huzzah…
She smiled at me with fondness that warms my heart, metaphorically speaking, of course, it was still freaking cold here. "You should lie down and focus your energies on healing then."
Atago gathered some junk lying around and set it on fire, casting another spell to keep it contained in a small area. I laid down next to the fire, preparing myself for what I had to do.
My state would have been more severe if I hadn't already isolated the infected areas. There was a darkish purple glow over the areas struck by the effect of his so called "Deleting Right", I had to dedicate all my attention and energies to tackling those areas.
There was a problem of how I was to do it, however, as I was in my "Sage Mode" state as I tend to keep myself in ever since I discovered my exploit in developing my Senjutsu abilities.
I had to deactivate it so that I could redirecting all my Ki flow into healing instead of the enhanced state that I kept up at all times.
When was the last time that I allowed myself to be this vulnerable after discovering a way to keep it on perpetually (outside of circumstances like this)? Nearly never.
I felt my head being lifted up by a pair of soft hands before it gently laid me back down on a nice warm pillow.
"What's wrong?" In front of my eyes, I could see Atago looking down at me in concern, the bottom of her face would have been blocked by her own larger breasts had she not leaned forward as far as she did.
As I stared at her and wanted to ask about what she was doing, I decided to just answer her question instead as I didn't want to get sidetracked (even if it felt really really good), "I'm not sure. I guess it just occurred to me that I would be dropping a lot of… stuff, just to focus on healing."
And that included the long ranged life sensor, the ability to sense and manipulate life force around me, the slight empathic senses that I've been training and a general body enhancement that I've been using all the time.
I thought about it once more for a moment, then I let it all go.
"Kuh! Haa…" I gasped and began to breathe quickly, my breathing disrupted as I had to regain my equilibrium.
My body felt heavy in an instant, then the overwhelming fatigue that I've been aware of intellectually, but never keenly felt due to my abilities followed after it.
"A-ahh…"
"Gen!? What's wrong!?"
The details that I had always seen through my eyes faded from view, the world looked so much duller, I felt as if I was like a painter gone blind.
I can remember how the world should have "looked" like, but I can't see it, all I can remember is a memory.
My hearing, sense of touch, ability to smell and even the taste of the dusty air of this small place made me acutely aware of how diminished I was.
"Ah, haa…? Hah?" For a moment, I was semi-delirious, as if trying to reconcile this strange world with the one that I was so familiar with.
It was then that I wondered if it should have been the other way around? Did I get so used to having power so freely available that I had forgotten what it was like to be normal? Did I forget what it was like to be so utterly weak… and helpless?
"I'm o-okay…" As I said those words, I turned my focus inwards, examining my progress and found myself frightened by the size of the work needed to be done when compared to the power I had available.
At this rate, I would run out of energy before I succeed.
"Are you sure?"
"No, I'm not okay. This won't work. Any guesses on what would happen if I fail?"
"I… I think it will be weakened enough that even if it spreads across your body… you will eventually overcome it. Oh, and with what you thought me of Senjutus, I should be able to continue your healing process from where you left off."
"T-thanks. That will do, I guess."
"Although I won't be able to do as good as a job you would do…."
… That bad feeling started to swell up in me again, if I knew all these "de-power" scenes well enough, I would end up weakened to the point where I can't put up a fight, forcing her to defend me until I recover just at the last moment before she gets killed.
"It will take too long to recover. I have a bad feeling about that." I told Atago as much, she frowned as she made her assessment.
While she had made great strides in power lately due to both our joint training and her personal training, she still wasn't at a level where she could beat me and was a bad match against our opponent.
"I'm, heh, glad that you're taking my gut feeling seriously."
"I think we're in the sort of predicament where your guesses are more likely to be correct."
That was true. My plot senses and the guesses I make tend to be more accurate after an "event" starts, rather than predicting when and what kind of "event" occurs.
"Guess so… ha, I knew I would be in such a position one day, yet I can't help but feel…"
"Feel what?"
"I can't help but feel… helpless, frightened even. Or rather, the reminder that I can still be brought low and feel this weak is… really scary. I don't like it. I don't want to feel like this ever again if I can help it."
A small part of me protested the admission of vulnerability, that still small voice tells me that it's the worst thing I could have done in the presence of a supernatural creature that could take advantage of my weakness, to twist my mind with their evil mind-manipulating magic.
But then I look up to see her face in this small room with not much light outside the fire, despite the diminished ocular abilities of my unenhanced eyes, I could still make out her genuine reaction as being anything but dangerous.
She was my friend. No ifs and buts about it, hell, she was actually a friend.
"… Gen… I… I feel the same."
Now it was my turn to be confused. That nasty voice in my head yells at me, saying that she's lying, she's trying to get some pity or to manipulate me, that a powerful supernatural being like herself "can't" feel helpless just like me because she was born with power.
"I may not know what it feels like, exactly feels like to you, but I… I hate not being able to do anything about a situation I want to change. It's scary when you can't do anything about it. It may not be the same, but in effect, isn't the inability to do anything with what power you have still the same as being weak and powerless?"
"Yeah, yes, it is." I agreed with her.
"Would it surprise you to know that you made me feel that way?"
If this was a serialized manga, the chapter would have ended there in order to create suspense and draw out the worst kinds of scenarios from the reader's minds.
But this wasn't a manga.
"No, it wouldn't. And again, I'm sorry that everything became so messed up that night."
I did, after all, mistakenly ended up giving off the impression that I was about to kill her family, leaving her helpless on the ground as she could do nothing but watch me complete my business. How embarrassing.
"Oh my, I already said that you are forgiven for that. Silly Gen. While I do remember that, there are… other times in my past that I felt that way, it isn't just in life-threatening scenarios like this, but also in the little things in life, sometimes I feel that way for my future as well…"
"Then let me help you so that you won't have to deal with that."
"I will gratefully accept your offer then, not that you have to do anything different, just spending time with you the way we already do is enough for me."
"I see, I guess that makes sense."
Not a whole lot, but I think I get the picture. Just being a good friend and someone to help her gain greater power is enough for now, such a thing seems to be more important to her than I initially thought.
"… Hmm? Gen?"
"Yes?"
"I know how we can get you healed quicker. We just need to get you more Ki or life force."
"The whole building is covered with thick snow and he could be out there anywhere. Even if we did find a life form, my Absorption Line isn't working well right now."
"Oh my, I'm a life form you know."
"Uh… I think that was obvious."
"Even without Absorption Line or your ability to use Senjutsu, there are ways to transfer Ki even with my current level of ability."
For some reason, my mind flashbacked to Fate/Stay Night's H-scene music.
Atago leaned down, placing her face right in front of my own, and said-
"Let's try the bedroom method, okay Gen?"
"Goddamnit… again, used like trash… lies! Deception!" The man curses as he limped through the snowy mountain, leaning back against a tree for support once he reached it.
"Touka… a little longer… give me strength."
This is Koji Sato, once a kind older brother, now a rage-filled man carrying out his self-appointed mission. In his most private thoughts, he believes that is all he has the right to be now.
He used to be so much more. A bright and wonderful son to a pair of loving parents, on the way to getting a scholarship from performing so well at his high school, he had a younger sister many years younger than himself that he loved more than anything in the world.
Koji's friends once joked that his girlfriend had dumped him because he was more in love with his sister than anyone else. That was true, from a certain point of view.
There were no incestuous feelings involved, especially since there was a 10 year age gap between them, but there was no denying that Koji adored his sister Touka more than anyone else.
"What's wrong Touka?" "Uuu… I broke onii-chan's DVD… I'm sorry." "It's fine, it's okay. You weren't hurt were you?"
His sister was a little clumsy, but that was alright, it was only natural. Koji had always been the forgiving sort anyways.
At least until tragedy struck.
His parents had died in a "skiing" accident.
Got caught in some freak snowstorm, the authorities said.
He swore to himself that he wouldn't let Touka cry anymore, of course, that wasn't a promise he could keep. Their relatives came to take care of them afterward, but both families weren't willing to take both of them together and separated them despite his pleas.
Koji did his best to study and work part-time, making money so that he can visit and buy presents for his sister, who lived in a different part of Japan now.
At first, he believed that things would be alright.
He should have known better.
It was during one of his planned visits on the weekend, he was dropped off at his uncle's house, and walked into the house stained with blood.
"Oh, that's quite an aura you have there, so you're the one with the Dragon Sacred Gear. What a blunder, I wasted a piece on this girl that I thought had a Sacred Gear, so I had to retrieve it after I figured I made a mistake-"
That day, he learned that the devil was real and that there were too many of them .
His so-called Sacred Gear activated and he managed to knife the monster right in the throat with a kitchen knife his auntie used in a vain attempt at self-defense.
Ludicrous. Absurd. Outrageous. Unfair. Cursed.
There was nothing "Sacred" about it!
Even so, a tool was a tool, so long as he could use it to avenge Touka then he would use it however he pleased.
He thought about how to kill the ones responsible for Touka's death for so long, and rehearsed it, gaining more and more abilities as he did so.
Scouring Japan for any sign of the supernatural, he stumbled across a drunk man that revealed to him the existence of evil spirit eradication specialists who have protected the country from the shadows.
Doumon, Kushihashi, Shinra, Himejima, and lastly Nakiri.
The Five Principal Clans.
He approached them with the intention of selling his services, just for more information, for help, for justice and his vengeance!
They all lied to him. They betrayed his trust and used him. Whether it was a fringe group, some fakes or the main branches or not, he didn't care, it didn't change the fact that they broke their promises to him.
He shed blood for them and in the end, instead of doing their "duty", they washed their hands off him and said that "It was an accident. Pursuing it will do more harm than good", after talking with the damn monsters.That was the case for his parent's death at the hands of fucking snow demons!
Then later, they wouldn't even help him get to the Underworld in order to kill the fucking devils who killed his sister! To think that there really was a world with more of them… they were like animals, they should be slaughtered like animals! And these so-called "defenders" of the country, of humanity, were sitting there like it wasn't their problem!
Then he met them.
"Your Balance Breaker is very impressive, you must be very proud." "Shut your mouth! I don't give a damn! If you get in my way then you'll die too!" "Certainly not. In fact, how about we offer you some… help?"
Oh sure, they tested him first, put him in a room with a couple of bats. Naturally, he killed them all, finding himself a bit disappointed that they didn't look as smug as that bastard did.
"Here, this is where it all began. Your parents… perished, on this mountain at Sapporo. It was all due to these monsters that can't and don't care about controlling their own powers… wouldn't it be nice if they destroyed their own families? I'm sure your abilities can do something like that. Here, this will help."
The vials granted him the power to sustain his abilities much longer than he normally could, that was good… he was so close to avenging his parents, then after that… he would go back to avenging Touko. It was only natural that he paid them back for making Touko cried, how dare they kill their parents!
So with his power, the "deleted" the "free will" of some wannabe gangster monsters, unfortunately, inciting them to attack their own family was much harder to achieve. He was about to give up on giving them the "ironic" death they all deserve when his timetable had been moved up by more intervening monsters.
Then he met that race traitor. He didn't even need to speak with him. Just looking at him made him sick, it was like looking in a mirror to the past, only… so very wrong.
He didn't know why the boy felt so familiar, but he didn't care… not anymore.
Atago Kaiza had always found expectations to be a more selfish type of "hope".
Then again, perhaps "faith" would be a better word to compare it to, after all, faith without hope is possible, hope without faith is not possible.
And for many moments in her life, she didn't dare hope for anything despite desperately feeling the need to have faith, faith in that everything would be alright.
She would not lead a peaceful life.
She had to comes to terms with that at a very young age when politics reared its ugly head.
It was madness. The world was mad and unreasonable. How could anyone think that it was alright to kill and kidnap others just to have leverage over another person, a rival faction, or outright greed?
That was how she felt and thought at the ripe age of 6 years old. Naturally, her point of view came about from being the victim of such crimes.
While the situation was resolved without further bloodshed, she ended up hating the East Faction for a time before the hate ended up diluted to a strong dislike of politicians on all sides, unfortunately, such an attitude wouldn't be suited to a daughter of the main house so she put on a smile and acted as if things were alright.
She loved her parents, she was proud of what they were doing, and of what they achieved, their clan history and so much more. But she couldn't help but despise the current environment and how the governments worked. Whether it was their world or the mundane human world, politics hasn't changed at all.
Worst of all, she was expected to be a part of it, take a seat at the many seats that their clan had occupied as rightful heir at some point.
Just like how she dealt with the "eligible" males she had the displeasure of meeting with, she simply smiled and ignored their gazes, pretending that things were alright before finding a way out of whatever uncomfortable situation she had been placed in.
No matter how much she disliked it, she couldn't say no to her parents, as she loved them and she did understand the purpose, and meaning, behind their duties. That said, it didn't mean she wanted to play her part in it. If she could contribute or make them proud in some other way then she would have loved to do so, if only she knew how…
Then her dearest and helpless little brother disappeared in front of her family's eyes.
She began to wonder if there was something wrong with her when she began to plot the downfall of everyone that had ever slighted her family in the past.
Days turned into weeks, weeks into months, and her family began to lose hope of ever finding Himuro ever again.
And then he knocked on the door. Their brief hope turned into anger, their anger turned into fear, then their fear gave way to hope once again. It was a rather messy night all things considered.
In the nights after the accidental break-in, Atago had found herself rubbing the parts where she had been restrained on that night, fearful of that feeling of powerlessness that the human reminded her of.
And then Genshirou brought her brother back, suddenly, such memories began to trouble her less and less.
At first, it started off as a bit of gratitude, mixed in with her race's involuntary instincts for "identifying' good mates, and a bit of pity of his obvious lack of knowledge and friends.
By their first meet-up, she found herself wholly invested in learning more about him.
Soon enough, they had become best friends.
He was really strange. In a good way.
There were many things she could say about him, yet, the part that she loved the most about him was his lack of expectations.
Namely, he didn't expect anything about of Atago Kaiza, but only saw her as Atago.
He never had wanted anything from her at all.
She is an astonishingly accomplished Youjutsu user, who had already shocked many of her teachers with how quickly she learned such skills, and as for her familial duties, she was among the list of preferred diplomats when engaging with the Five Principal Clans who help intercede between Yokai and human matters, one of the youngest ever…
But she never liked or cared for any of that beyond its purpose of bringing happiness to her parents.
She can always play at those roles, she can pretend for a very long time, after all.
Yet it's a very tiresome thing to do, and it was the times she spent with Genshirou that she came to realize, just how draining it all is.
Her friend was refreshingly direct and honest, despite keeping secrets from his parents, when it's just them he's like an open book. In the midst of all the small talk, memes, passionate discussions of "munchkining this power gamer's paradise", it was clear that he was a young man that knew what he wanted.
And what he wanted demanded absolutely nothing from her.
All he ever wanted was to share a life with the people he loved and cared about.
All his pursuits of power were to safeguard that life and their happiness.
Despite all that, he had never deliberately hurt or killed anyone with selfish intentions in the pursuit of his goals, that is, unless one counts self-defense and assuring the safety of his loved ones as selfish.
From what she had seen and heard (he is rather bad at lying and she's the opposite, naturally this translated to an ability to discern the truth on her end), he was dangerously compassionate by her world's standards, going so far as doing something foolish as trying to help stray devils and staying with enemies that he couldn't save until they died.
He had plenty of flaws, however, just to name a few, he was prideful (of his own efforts, albeit not at his power), and paranoid, and couldn't read the mood at times… but she found them endearing as it made her adore him even more.
His extraordinary compassion for life, his accepting heart and passionate devotion to those he cared about more than balanced his flaws in her eyes and heart.
Atago's favorite thing about him was that he would never demand anything of her that she wouldn't be willing to give. She simply knew it in her heart that he wasn't the type to do so. It was a struggle in itself to get him to start asking for help from her, and when he did so, he did it with close to zero expectations.
With him, there was no need to worry about him wanting something out of her, he simply wouldn't take advantage of her because it's not what's in his nature to do. The things a person in her position can afford to give him matters little, he could probably think of a few things that might help his goals, but it's no great loss for him to continue life without it.
When she's with him, she can be just "Atago" and not who everyone expects her to be.
She knew him to be a man who knew exactly what he wanted and was honest enough to simply ask for it (asking for help was a different matter, but he was getting there. He was a man strong enough to admit his deepest feelings before her without fear and without shame.
Even now, as they were secluded in this tiny convenient cottage, he had done just that.
Just as he confided in her, she confided in him as well.
From someone that kept his guard up 24/7, his display of trust by trusting her words, leaving himself helpless in her arms and admitting all of that had made his trust in her all the more obvious.
Naturally, she trusted him just as much. Trusted him enough in order to suggest the carnal method of Ki transfer.
If it was him, she would have been happy to give her virginity to him, even if it was in a situation like this and not the romantic scenario that she hoped to set-up one day. She believed it would help him, that if his fears would be proven true, then it would be necessary to do so.
"… You're serious?"
For a moment, she almost thought he would laugh out loud in a rude manner just to fulfill a meme, but he didn't.
"Yes. I am."
"You should only do so with a man you love, you know?"
"I agree. Don't you feel lucky?"
"… Yes."
With surprising strength, he jolted out of her lap and turned around to kiss her.
Their lips met, they were in each other's arms, and they held each other for a moment that felt infinitely long to them. Then all-too-briefly, that kiss that seemed to last an eternity finally ended.
"I love you."
It wasn't clear who said it first, but it didn't matter whose mouth it flowed from. All that mattered was that those words were repeated twice, and only said once from each mouth.
He shouldn't have been wasting his stamina in this critical period, but she found herself unwilling to stop him from what he wanted to do.
She had offered to help him, and so she did, undressing as he hurriedly pulled down his pants. Initially, she wanted to stop him from taking his shirt off so that he could conserve some heat, but he reasoned that they may as well share their body heat anyways.
Atago had intended for him to rest while she did all the work, but she had forgotten that Genshirou was amazing at multi-tasking, even as he concentrated on his own body, he hadn't forgotten the practical purpose of the act, neither did he neglect her in both body and heart.
It was fortuitous that he developed such skill because she really couldn't concentrate on giving him her Ki with the sensations coursing through her body.
Even at his weakest, he managed to surprise her with his strength. She had initially believed that certain positions would be uncomfortable for her, as some of them relinquished more control than she believed acceptable, but was quickly proven wrong by his passionate lovemaking.
She didn't know how much time had passed, only that it was long enough for them to have a short rest, and for their enemy to blow apart to the protective roof over their heads.
Genshirou stood with his back to her as he faced the hate-filled man, he turned to look at her once and then smiled brightly. As if thinking, "ah, I got it!" like he made a new discovery.
Whatever he found out wasn't important at the moment, at least to Atago.
His smile told her a simple message.
The enemy in front of them was dead already.
What would happen in between would simply be boring filler details they could talk about over dinner next week.
She found herself loving that smile of his even more.
Level 8
Level 8
The warmth of her loving embrace lingered upon my body just long enough for it to serve its purpose.
I was the only being in between a creature of rage and a person I loved dearly.
That sobering realization made everything just that simple.
In the span of a single heartbeat I had discarded all of my other concerns and simply decided to defeat this monster.
The big picture that this battle was a part of vanished from my mind. My desire to do right by the world, including my enemy, had been temporarily discarded as irrelevant content.
My enemy's mastery of his sole ability is useless.
His emotions, history, determination, appearance, and everything that he prided himself upon… all the things that made him human, that was living proof that like me, he was part of this world brimming with interconnected life… was unimportant.
My mind is clear, there is only one thing I have to do.
I must decide.
And so I did.
I decided that he would never be able to harm anyone ever again.
That decision becomes reality immediately after.
There were no dramatic exclamations on how fast I was at that moment. Neither was there any reaction from my enemy that would be commonplace in a shonen manga.
This wasn't the matrix, there was no slow motion in this place.
For just a second, I unleashed my anger in it's entirety and punched right through him.
Distance and elevation were meaningless.
It was simple, yet complex.
My decision to win without concerning myself about the welfare of my enemy was the simple part. The complex part was the attack itself.
That attack used up almost all of my remaining spare energy outside of my untouched longevity pool. I pulled out all the stops with what little I had, essentially combining at least 50 different skills into one strike.
Fortification spells on my fist, Strength reinforcement, Sage Mode Reinforcement, my refined and supernaturally efficient martial arts, Ki infused strike, Chaotic Ki Release, Life Flow Severance, Life Flow Binding, Ki Point Implosion, Body Heat Absorption, Heat Strike Combustion, Lightning Touch, Bioelectricity Absorption, Vibro-blast, High-Frequency Strike, Kinetic Acceleration, Kinetic Energy Absorption, three different mana manipulation attacks, two soul contamination methodologies, four knife-sized draconic energy weapon constructs that would destroy his insides in unpredictable ways, simulated demonic magic spell circles, instantly simulated Youjutsu carving spell, two gravity distorting spells, one spatial tearing ability, nuclear-enhanced power, magically weaponized electromagnetic wavelengths, numerous channeled emotional power as an attack, dozens of composite magical energy powered nano-shadow weapons….
My life's work.
The entirety of my efforts to develop and use as many abilities as I can in order to bridge the seemingly impassable gap of power all those years ago had been unleashed all at once.
The apex of multi-tasking ability usage.
I blinked.
I did that. I thought to myself.
The body I ran my fist through was still breaking down in at least twelve different ways from the point of contact. His Sacred Gear's effects faded along with the rest of his rapidly failing life force, the lingering remnants of my power latching onto his crumbling body, grasping at information and power for the briefest of moments before whatever it stuck to had crumbled away into dust.
The head was still intact.
My other lines quickly wrapped itself around his head, using the energy of our surroundings and the salvaged material to fuel the preservation and extraction process.
"A-ah… eh?! It's over?!" Atago exclaimed in a way that reminded me of typical Japanese high school girls, well, the Japanese people in general… reaction sounds attached to specific words are pretty uniform in this part of the world.
Her surprise is warranted considering that the fight was over in a second.
Falling back to usual routine due to my focus on the current endeavor, I answered her plainly, "It was only natural. He was entirely focused on the capabilities of his Sacred Gear while disregarding other avenues of power. I was simply better at applying my capabilities overall while taking advantage of his power's weakness."
The information I gathered from his body showed that it was already a living corpse, from a point of view, considering that the strange drug enhancing and sustaining his pre-existing Balance Breaking was already eating away at his longevity and body integrity to the point where he would have died in a day or two if he continued taking the rest of them.
If he stopped taking it earlier, he would have keeled over in a few hours.
Better earlier than later, considering that I can't predict how many would suffer before he fell if I had somehow spent my energies on escaping, rather than eliminating the threat.
Could I have saved him? Well… time to find out so that I can put my regrets to rest.
"It seemed pretty overpowered to me earlier."
"I guess it was. But if you pay attention, well, if you were on the receiving end like me, then you would notice a lot more. Firstly, the negating power is a lot weaker as an automatic defense, which is why it took so long and didn't spread much when I struck at him. Then there's the fact that it can't negate physical force even if it was caused by supernatural means without massive concentration and-"
"-Gen, this is all well and good, but um, what are you doing with his crumbling head?"
"Oh yeah…. Right, I guess it's time to tell you the full story with what I've been up to with the stray devils I encountered."
I didn't want to risk any information leaks during our time away from each other when we only spoke via phone. This time, I tell Atago about how I could get information and copy memories of my enemies, while also making the major limitations on my ability to actually manipulate minds very clear.
Thankfully, my sincere rants against mind-manipulation magic in the past had played a big role in assuring her that I would never abuse this ability among friends.
I had gathered snippets from his past and a lot of detail from his most recent endeavors, while I was doing so, I decided to also absorb the "power of hate" in selected parts of his memory and soul, while strengthening the "power of love" in the memories that count.
At the very least, I wanted Koji Sato to die like the loving brother and family member he was, rather than a monster of pure rage that could have made it as a Sith Lord.
This was the process that I've been performing on Stray Devils in order to help them pass on peacefully.
The initial intent was to find a way to permanently help them regain sanity, but the chaotic demonic energy from the stray devils would slowly overcome my assistance as if I was a sickness attacking their body, leading to their eventual degradation back to the insane stray devil they were before.
Atago hummed happily, "As expected, Genshirou cares a lot, even for those that people gave up on." I blushed a little, back in my previous life, in retrospect, I probably acted like a Tsundere when people insisted I did something kind or did something well.
I'd like to think that my tendency to think of my actions as inadequate in comparison to others isn't a problem and that even if it was, it is being worked on… but it's time like these when I was about to brush off her words that made me wonder…
"N-neeh, eh….?" Biting back the words of denial about to come out of my mouth, I quickly shook my head to her amusement and changed the topic, "Perhaps, a little. I mean, I just think that people look at it from the point of view where stray devils are irredeemable monsters, and while that is true to a point, I just don't think that all hope is lost and that we shouldn't find a solution to it. It's kind of like global issues, the problems of the world, if we think there's no solution then we aren't even going to try and uh… I'm just rambling aren't I?"
"Yeeeep!" She reached forward and hugged me from behind as I worked.
Oh yeah… so good… no! Focus! Bad brain!
I pulled up the memory from his fading mind as I took in all I could from his Sacred Gear.
A memory of a man hidden beneath a magician-like cloak, mist coiling around him, as he handed over the vials containing… what was likely, an early version of what would one day become the Balance Breaker enhancing drug "Chaos Break".
Fucking Georg, fucking Hero Faction with their shenanigans… I knew that they must have had a lot of backing, and a lot of time to get all that R done… but to think they have been active already, and have taken an interest in causing chaos through third party agents, well, it's worrying.
Wait… crap! Information is Cao Cao's most important power! There's no way he would pass up the chance to gather information and the results of all these "experiments".
They would have certainly wanted to retrieve the corpse and observe the results of the chaos caused by their "subjects".
A part of me told me that I was worrying for nothing, that since the "bad feeling" had passed, there was nothing to worry about.
But I fucking know this light novel trope.
The bad guy has been defeated, the hero thinks "thank goodness, it's over!" and then they go off to relax while having a nice short epilogue or cliffhanger.
Thing is, this is Highschool DXD.
Cliffhangers involving the bad guys or important figures watching and commenting on the events that had just occured is the absolute norm!
I turn around and kissed Atago on the lips again, "Mmph~", her cute moans made a good distraction… for our potential voyeurs.
My threads were already scouring the area, I specifically looked for both mana and spatial energy, knowing that at the minimum, they would employ magic spells to observe events.
But at their maximum attention? Georg would be hiding in some pocket dimension "nearby" or using Dimension Lost to connect space in some weird ass way to perform surveillance.
I grabbed hold of Atago, the both of us were indulging, there was no denying that. I was simply multi-tasking, and since I was damn good at it, I could keep up my work while enjoying this "we survived" make-out session.
When the initial readout turned out as "nothing", I had almost retracted my threads, but then I remembered that the most commonly used realm as a plot device was called the "Dimensional Gap" and was essentially an endless void.
In addition to that, from my experience, there's no such thing as "nothing" as there's always something to extract with my Sacred Gear, even if I don't have the power or skill to do so yet.
So I reached for the faraway spots around us where I felt "nothing" at all, then latched onto it, almost gasping as the first hits of "void energy" began to refill my reserves rapidly!
Searching deeper, I found that the void energy came from an invisible spatial distortion anchored by a tiny white device no larger than an earphone, emitting a cool water vapour filled with both magical and spatial energies.
When my threads touched it, I found that my senses was now linked to a library of information, surveillance information.
It was a surveillance spell, it felt like a mix of some security magic circles and directly manipulating information from my computer, and through it, I managed to find out that this area had been under surveillance for days.
There's no way I could just destroy the whole thing.
On the bright side, the feedback that I was getting indicated that it was a record and store type of spell, and this meant that I had… options.
If I was the overpowered protagonist from another story, I would have did something like destroy all the recording methods after making it certain to the observers that I knew that they were watching.
Events could go two ways. The story could wank the protagonist by making the Hero Faction all impressed and all about the SI OC's power, or more realistically, it becomes a "Dark! Strong! Rated M to be sure" story where the Hero Faction idiotically tries to recruit or "deal with them" permanently.
Actually, I honestly can't reminder how something like this would happen in fanfics, it's been so many years since I read a DXD fanfic that I wouldn't be able to remember the tropes with 100% accuracy.
Either way, I'm not that kind of protagonist! There's no way I'm going to act cocky or become "determined" by way of "bravely" challenging everyone.
And so I focused my attention on the captured information on my family, the Kaiza main family, Atago and myself. I got creative and fused the faces with that of random visitors, messing with their abilities to recognize us. Then I messed with the voice information…
I pulled out from our latest long and deep kiss, making sure to lick up our mixed saliva before the cold weather reduces it's temperature and makes it feel weird.
Conjuring up a cloak of shadows to act as a shared blanket as a defense from the cold, I whispered to Atago at a volume so low, that no one other than she would hear me at this moment.
"We're being watched, act normal as if we don't know what's going on, don't say any names. I'll explain later." Seeing that I was dead serious, she nodded understandingly and followed me lead as we did our best to shield our faces while also acting as if we were just keeping warm together.
We eventually made it back to the lodge, I discarded the black cloak once we arrived after finding that there weren't any surveillance points within. Most of them were long distance ones scattered around the mountain and the forest, it seems that they had little interest in the ski resort part of the mountain.
"Gen! Atago-chan! You're baaaaack!"
My mother was the first to greet us, hugging us tight as if she lost us… wait, we did go missing…
"M-mom, what's wrong?"
"What do you mean what's wrong!?"
Raiga and Sakura came back soon after and helped smooth things over, saying that they went looking for us both when the freak snowstorm had hit the resort, Himuro backed them up by saying that they told him they went out to look for us beforehand.
"Saji-san, really, Gen and I are fine. We managed to hide out in the cottage we saw on the way up." Atago explained diplomatically.
"What were you two even doing near there? If I remember correctly, there weren't any courses open near that part of the mountain."
Atago looked at me with hope in her eyes that I had an excuse ready.
I didn't, but I still had to try.
"Uh, I lost control, crashed into a forest, broke my skis, got lost, Atago followed me and when she found me I uh… lost the will to ski?"
My best friend groaned audibly in a most unladylike manner.
Well, at least I didn't say that I "lost the will to live", or that would have gotten my mother to fuss over me in a completely different manner.
Once we were all fed up with the snow, we made our way back down to Sapporo and went our separate ways, but not before I quickly debriefed Sakura and Raiga on what happened before promising to turn up at their house to explain in detail later.
Thankfully, I've gotten so used to Atago and her shadow that I could just teleport to her whenever I wanted.
I thought it was pretty convenient and reassuring, until Atago replayed the audio on one of her listening devices on her person, showing that what I said sounded pretty creepy from a certain point of view.
"A-anyways, the main point is that there's likely a magician out there that could be part of a group, that is… targeting the supernatural specifically. I'm afraid that I don't concrete proof but you should be careful about potential terrorist or independent attacks like these."
The casualties were… quite low, mostly due to early intervention and a quick resolution to matters. The snow children were found earlier on, seemingly broken free of a trance after I eliminated Koji Sato, and ended the influence of his Sacred Gear.
As per our arrangements, my name would be left out of any official reports, as I really don't want the attention until I gain enough power or it's very beneficial for me to be well known.
"Of course, of course. Thank you for filling us in… now then, we need to talk about another important matter." Sakura Kaiza began, taking out a scroll from beneath her sleeves… did she carry that around the whole day?
"Ooh ooh! Let me guess!" I wanted to try my luck.
"Oh my, Gen looks so excited!" Atago seemed to find my excitement infectious.
"It's… it's… an ancient scroll leading to a lost sacred landmark of some sort!"
Raiga made an X with his fingers, "Bzzt! Wrong!"
Sakura laughed, "Oh no, nothing as trivial as that." How can an overglorified fetch quest to unlock a special dungeon be trivial?!
She unfurled it, revealing a whole bunch of familiar names… oh, is that Atago's?
Sakura held out a brush to me.
"Please take responsibility and join our family."
"How did we jump to that stage!? I want my lawyer!"
"Mother! W-whaaa-what are you doing?!"
We decided to postpone this discussion for later.
The end of my second year of middle school arrived rather quickly after the eventful winter break.
Atago and I had begun a… sort-of long distance relationship, but not really, as thanks to magic, the both of us could just visit each other whenever it was convenient to do so.
I had retrieved a few Evil Pieces left behind by the devil that killed Koji's family, buried underground with most of its energies drained thanks to his Sacred Gear along with the devil's ashes. There was only a couple of pawns and a single Queen, as that was all he brought with him, apparently.
At least I got a sample of each now! Yay!
I hadn't been able to make as much progress as I wanted to in decoding the Evil Pieces since I had many more research and training paths to walk on.
Experimenting with "void energy" had helped me enhanced my constant anti-precog (hopefully, not that I would know whether it works or not) space-time curving defensive ability, I think, as it costs a lot less spatial energy and the nearly unnoticeable bent of the space-time around me should have at least disrupted my place in a modeled predicted timeline.
Who am I kidding, I have no clue what the fuck am I doing.
Onto things I do have more than a simple idea of, I was able to integrate [Deleting Darkness] into my abilities fairly easily over the past handful of months. This was also helpful for my training as I could negate the fallout of my more volatile experiments and make barriers where my energy won't leak out from, and this meant more intense training!
With regards to my integrated concealment technique, the Kaiza family had confirmed that it was even harder to detect me now. Turns out that I register as a perfectly normal and "powerless" human to the supernatural with my method.
I went ahead to teach their guards and the family how to do something along those lines in Senjutsu, most could only lower their perceived power level, however, which is still useful in their own right despite the many weaknesses of the technique. Well, I shouldn't be surprised, the technique does require strong and constant control, which isn't something they are all trained for.
Sakura and Atago made good progress in that technique in comparison to everyone else.
I managed to finally "get" Touki, and once I had it… I quickly learned how to suppress it to just my skin for maximum efficiency.
Turns out that a person's life force leaks out more when Touki is active, the visible aura of power isn't just a visual indicator of Touki but the actual emission of life force, which is just like the Blazer's mana aura from Chivalry of a Failed Knight.
I vaguely remembered that mana leaks out due to the "flame" like aura of the Blazers, as per their naming theme, and that reducing the burning up on mana meant greater control and greater duration of mana reserves.
I applied the same principle here, drawing my life force in while also projecting my life force outwardly to the bare minimum until I could keep Touki on constantly under my power concealing method.
My version of Touki had some differences from normal Senjutsu users and non-Senjutsu users, however, that I was just beginning to explore. Preliminary research has shown that my durability is lower due to my base human stats and the fact that I don't project a thick aura of Touki unless I need a powerful attack.
On the other hand, I made up for it all with massively increased attack power, speed, super senses and overall enhancements to my other abilities, all of this with reduced energy upkeep that is still falling at a significant rate for now. Essentially proving my training methodology to be super efficient for now.
"Good morning, is everyone read-iiiiaaaah! Why aren't you all packed!?"
"Good morning sweetie! Sorry, we tricked you." "Yeah, sorry. You're going to Italy without us."
What happened to my concerned parents?
Someone rang the doorbell.
I opened up and came face to face with my girlfriend holding a luggage bag.
"Gen! Good morning!"
What a bright smile! Ah, the sun, it's burning my eyes!
"G-good morning to you too. Wait, what is going on here?"
"I-it's my first time…"
"What?"
Don't tell me I'm stuck in some alternate timeline where I hadn't taken her virginity!
"My first time riding on a plane!"
Oh right, Youkai don't travel to other countries that often, that makes more sense than a plotline that would do well as a standalone anime movie.
"… I think I get the picture. Atago, will my parents…"
"My parents sorted out the guard detail." Well, I'm glad that she remembered about their unending number of death flags.
"I am 100% at ease now." I say as I thought that they were going to get kidnapped the day before I returned to Japan.
She playfully slapped my shoulder at my blatant lies before dragging me into the limo in front of my house.
"So will your parents be-"
"-Nope! It's going to be just you and me~"
I looked at my comprehensive booklet of places that I wanted to take my family too, along with several timetables that were tailored to different scenarios, and then dropped it in my shadow inventory.
"Well then, I think I have to restructure our plans a bit… perhaps we should go out a little less. We can afford to sleep in too, after all, I don't think we want to leave the hotel… too early every day, will we? My dear?"
"Hehe, what a dirty mind you have~ what do you think we will end up doing cooped up in the hotel?"
Level 9
Level 9
"… And that's done." I muttered as I completed the emotional energy absorption and other tasks that I sought out to do on this long plane ride.
More people in one place means more EXP for my brain/soul data processing powers! It would have taken a full line just to go through someone's head a few months ago, through some practice I managed to bring it down to a couple of threads while operating on a handful of people, and through intense multi-tasking as I entertained Atago on the plane ride, I managed to refine it to an absurd degree by sustaining the process via feeding on their negative emotions held deep in their memories and souls.
It's a win-win situation for all of us. They get less pain over their past and I get to practice reading people's memories and feelings.
I withdrew my threads from the many shadow relays, empowered shadow-shards that I can create with my ability to extend my range and use my other abilities remotely, redirecting them towards the integrity of the plane.
"Mmn?"
Atago's head shifted a bit on my shoulder, she hadn't woke up from her nap (how she falls asleep on will I can't understand…), and simply stirred a little at my words.
I smiled at the adorable sight, despite my mental faculties being used to facilitate hundreds of different interactions through my power, this body of mine was more than capable of acting in the "here and now".
And it was right here that I couldn't keep myself from feeling comfort and joy over this seemingly insignificant display of intimacy. These precious moments filled with love and joy is what I should be fighting for, and knowing what awaited for the world in the future, I knew that having memories of times like these will be my greatest strength now and forevermore.
Carefully controlling my body position and sending her soothing energies with Senjutsu, I took hold of her right hand with my left, before bringing my right hand across my body to pet her head.
"You're like a puppy sometimes, you know that? Atago…" A really energetic one when it comes to new things, and you tire yourself out so quickly too…
I said those words softly and found myself a bit surprised at the fond tone I used, having isolated myself for so many years in order to train hard and smart in secret, there were very few people I could interact with in a natural manner without deception, especially in a loving manner.
Atago had been so excited to get on the plane and enjoyed the view from out here. As she began to realize how boring in-flight entertainment can be if there's nothing that piqued her interest, I shared the sensations I got from my shadow keeping watch from underneath the plane, giving her a real bird's eye view over the world we flew over.
Well… even she would get bored at that after a long time, especially since she didn't get much sleep last night. We did wake up very early to prepare for our flight and naturally, she became tired and decided to sleep on the plane after two hours of hand-held console gaming between the two of us.
"A few more hours to go, my dear."
As she slept by my side, I continued to hone my abilities with this valuable opportunity. I was stuck on a plane with well over a hundred people that can't very well leave, and I wouldn't look suspicious for being here since I'm a passenger like they are, which means I basically have access to lots of human test subjects.
Now then, let's grind some Empathy sense EXP…
"E-eh? What do you mean we can't have Pizza for dinner?"
"I'm not saying we can't, I'm simply saying that the particular dish is not representative of all authentic Italian cuisine. Don't be fooled by the lies of foreign media, Italy isn't only about pasta and pizza."
"We're still having it!"
"Of course."
Atago isn't normally so willful when it came to deciding on where to eat or what to eat, then again, the situation is different from what it was in Japan. Back then, her opinions on food were… well, she left it to me to choose a place since she had no qualms with most meals unless the food was actually bad.
She was mainly interested in lunches and dinners as a chance to spend time with me, getting good food was a plus for her.
While I agreed with her view, I'd say that I prioritize good food first. This was a habit that originated from my family in my previous life. We got into a lot of arguments on where to eat, what to eat, and also showed their unhappiness quite obviously when the food isn't what we expected… things like that were stressful for someone who always played the good son like myself, and over time, I came to associate good food with a pleasant dinner environment, which leads to a pleasant time with the people you love.
We checked into our hotel in Rome after arriving in the afternoon, the eight hour time difference between Japan and Italy was something Atago would have to get used to, I didn't have that issue as I could just go without sleep near indefinitely and knock myself out when needed.
It was now dinnertime and we followed my list of "places to eat" that I compiled after lots of online research, with lots of notes on what they specialize in so that I can cater to Atago's desires for any particular type of dish.
The distance between places was no issue as I could just carry us around the country many times the speed of sound without causing destruction thanks to my abilities, while also keeping us both shielded in such a way that we are effectively invisible to others, both in the physical and supernatural sense.
I'd rather not overdo it, however, as I fear what would happen if I got used to the perks of having supernatural abilities in a mostly normal society.
Our first dinner will, unfortunately, be very expensive. I had always griped about price back in my first life as well despite eating expensive meals whenever my family had guests at my house. I'm a bit too serious when it comes to working out value over cost ratios when it came to food.
Although… now that I think about it, I am someone who "eats" expired and trashed food for power. I wasn't sure if I had ascended to some new heights or had only just realized how far I had "fallen".
"So, what are we going to order?" Atago looked overwhelmed as she read through the menu, "I don't understand the names, it's good that they wrote the ingredients in English at the bottom, but I don't know what to pick."
"You wanted the full Italian dining experience, right? Regardless of the cost?" I double-checked with her, getting a grin and a flash of several cards in her hand.
"Father said that he would cover the costs."
Right… the supernatural tended to be filthy rich in comparison to normal humans, even the less materialistic Youkai (when compared with devils) were wealthier than their socio-economic human counterparts, somehow.
It's times like these that the fact that I have a rich ojou-sama type as my girlfriend starts to sink into my skull, just a little bit more. Not that it will stop me from working out the numbers for everything I eat and drink in my head…
"We'll have to start with an Antipasto platter, then a pasta before the main course, and finally we will end on a dessert." I explained to her before telling the waiter my order, not bothering to consult Atago on this as she prefers it when I take charge of the specifics.
"There's so many, where do I start?" Her eyes looked like they were shining as she stared at the assortment of crostini, fried polenta, pecorino cheese board with sweet jellies, and other appetizers.
"Wherever you want, my dear."
"Is there a wrong way to eat this?"
"So long as you enjoy it you can't be wrong… well, you can be sub-optimal, but that's not the point."
Even as we had a nice dinner, I was doing my usual thing and began spreading my shadow relays across the cities, extending my range while also reducing the risk of anyone tracking my actions back to me, as I had extensive SOP's when it came to concealing my activities.
I liked this city. It was filled with… something. The people were a mix between the usual humans back in Japan, but there was a greater proportion of people with a kind of "light" in them, the power of faith, I surmised.
I wasn't surprised at that. I could sense the many "blessed" sentients over at Vatican City since we began landing in Italy, my range and power reserves had increased vastly over these past few months to the point where long-range sensing with my Senjutsu was as easy as breathing.
"Say ah!" "Ah!"
Typical couple exchanges happened over the course of the dinner.
W had also taken a lot of pictures of the food and of us to send back to our family, and had a nice time getting to know each other more. Atago had seen fit to talk about recent Youkai politics that had annoyed her to no end. I was a bit disappointed when she confirmed that they didn't have democratically elected leaders to form a "Senate", nor did they have any plans to do so, but that was just prequel memer in me talking.
We retired to our hotel room for the night after the dinner, Atago was too sleepy to go walk around too much, and so she wanted to end the day well… naturally, it ended with sex.
I did my best to resist the urge to explore the place. It wouldn't be fair of me to leave Atago's side without giving her some warning on what I wanted to do. That can wait, I'll let this night be that of a real holiday's night.
… I hadn't been free from worrying about my parents for a long time, I could still reach and watch over them with a simple shadow warp, but the physical distance was… strange. It was strange for me to be so far apart from them.
And worryingly, such a thing bred no small amount of excitement from me. Perhaps a part of me craved a bit of "freedom" from my worries?
Our next day was spent on touring about in Rome and across Italy (hooray for super speed and being undetectable). I was more than happy to be the expert tourist (having been to many countries in my previous life made some things easy) for Atago, just seeing her wow'ed by some of the sights made me happy.
Of course, like me, she would get bored of the tourist stuff after a while of "seeing the same thing".
She brought up something interesting, however, as were relaxing somewhere.
"At first I found it rather strange that there isn't a magical street where we can purchase magical items, then I remember that this is Church controlled lands."
"Ah, no Diagon Alley for us I guess."
"If you're willing to cross the borders we could pop by over to France's magical street."
Well, with my speed, even if I don't travel in a straight line I could probably get there in about 15-20 minutes by foot.
"Is that legal?"
"No, and I will not make it legal."
She knew me too well.
Anyways, I had a feeling that she was suggesting this for my sake as well considering that both our research into western magic was… stalled, a bit, due to the high price for that kind of knowledge in our region of the world.
"Ah, I've actually heard that it wasn't so much a street, but a shopping mall for magical items."
"I didn't come here for retail shopping."
And besides, there's a high chance that it will be populated with countless surveillance, divination and less savory spells, which I may not be able to deal with now.
I've got to step up my Youjutsu training at the very least if I need to be more well rounded.
"Hmm, then what shall we do… I know! You've been quite interested in those exorcists light swords right?"
"They are an affront to any Star Wars fan."
It was outrageous. How could they have a glowing blade of light but not add massive amounts of heat to the blade so that it can make the most glorious sound in all of sci-fi history?
"Then you would like to do better than… them?"
"Are you trying to get us both in trouble?"
"It's fine. I have a visa."
"I don't know, the church in this world strikes me as the "monster, go die!" kind of folk."
"I have you with me so I'll be just fine. Anyways, the church aims to kill supernatural creatures that are either obviously evil or haven't aligned themselves to the church up to a neutral level. Japan had never really accepted Christianity, likewise, us Youkai aren't allied with them although we aren't enemies either. There are official documents that let us go to other faction's territories that should keep me legally safe."
"I'm still not taking a risk with you."
"Hmm, how about just the border then?"
And so we went to the border and I got to get some light energy samples from the many exorcists hiding in plain sight.
But for me? They may as well not be hiding at all.
I could sense how well they've been trained, the "holy light" affinity in them and the blessed nature of their main weapons.
It didn't take long for me to synthesize my own kind of holy light energy within my body, although I'm sure that it's a pale imitation to the light of Fallen Angels and the Angels up there, whose deadly devil vaporizing "holy light" spears can only be compared to few other Holy Swords.
Rather, it's closer to say that it was the Holy Swords that are imitations of the Angel's Holy Light.
"I've got what I need and left some ears behind." With my shadow relays set around the city perimeter, I could listen into the goings-on within the city and the "secret" underground training facilities right beneath it. Even if I can't process it all at once, I can use the "recording" function I derived from the mountain observer's spells and review them later.
"Hmm, then let's go take a break somewhere. Hey, we haven't visited that cathedral yet." Atago dragged me along somewhere that looked like there was a service (or did they call it "mass" here?) being held.
I looked around and found that the concentration of exorcists just loitering about were higher than normal, hmm?
Why do my eyes keep being drawn towards that direction?
"Atago, can you follow me for a second? My gut feeling is telling me that there's something I need to see."
"Oh my, if you think this is one of the times when you're correct-"
"-I always work on the assumption I might be right as it tends to help me prepare for the worst. I don't really like being right when it means trouble."
"I know."
We walked around the cathedral and caught sight of a blonde nun saying goodbye to a thankful family. I felt a strange urge to protect her, and also to take her home right now.
"Ah, I think she's a dragon tamer."
"You don't mean the type that will punch you to submission right?"
"I see that you have started playing Grand Order. Gooood… but no, I get the feeling that she would never want to hurt someone deliberately."
"Gen…?"
"She might have an affinity for dragons."
Even as I was speaking with Atago, a slight probe of the mind had already confirmed the girl's identity to me.
Focusing on my more developed emotion sensing capabilities, I decided to check for a couple of signs that could help me determine if her history is relative "canon" or "OOC". I felt an overwhelming sense of compassion for others, a bit of worry over various things, and a deep longing for something to end a deep long crushing sense of loneliness.
Well then, I'm not sure what I can do for her considering that Diodora likely has help from within the church's structure, so I decided to do what I could for her now.
"Hello, good evening miss!" I walked up to the nun and caught her attention by speaking in her native language.
Thank goodness I thought to learn multiple languages so that I can meme with them too.
"Oh! Hello there!" She turned and quickly gave me one of the purest smiles I had ever seen.
"General Kenobi!"
"Huh? Excuse me?"
"Sorry, reflex. Ignore that part. It's nice to meet you, and I was just wondering if… if I could pray for you."
I may have stopped practicing after getting Isekai'ed into another world where gods can die, even so, it seems that I could still find some use for the teachings, especially when it came to getting an opportunity to interact with this world's faithful.
My words seemed to have shocked her, focusing a bit on her emotions, I was surprised to feel a great amount of joy from her. Shouldn't this be something she's used to? Or maybe she is used to it and it brings her a lot of comfort?
"Y-yes, that would be fine."
"Thank you. I just feel like the Lord has placed a word for you in my heart and um, I hope it doesn't sound strange for you considering that I'm Protestant and all-"
"-N-not at all. Regardless of differences between some teachings we all still serve the same God."
Her earnest trust made me feel bad for lying, but after feeling what she felt, I wanted to help her in a way that I felt I could.
"I'm glad. My name's Genshirou Saji, by the way." Just planting the seeds for the future, at the very least, she will have a friend in Japan if canon gets derailed due to unknown plot forces like Heydrich.
"It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Asia Argento."
Atago watched from a safe distance, about a bench away from where we were sat at.
Even though I hadn't prayed for a long time, the familiar sentence structure and key concerns flowed out of my mouth easily.
So I closed my eyes and began to pray, thanked God for a number of things, then spoke some facts that pertained to her upbringing and the "gift of healing" that God had given her without mentioning any names, and how the Lord knew her heart (Meta Knowledge Senjutsu Empathy = Auto-pass, yay!) was always in the right place.
"-I pray that the Lord God will put kind people into your lives, that they will be friends that you will be able to share your joy and laughter with. The Lord knows the desire of your heart-"
I could feel her surprise at hearing things that few had known about like her desire to have friends, and she was touched at what I prayed for her, although I admittedly ripped off parts of best Onii-chan's speech to Miyu when praying for Asia to have her own share of happiness (while finding friends and whatnot).
"… There… I see that there will be a time when you will feel lost when you will do what you feel is right only to have others judge your actions as a mistake… I pray that the Lord will strengthen you, that you may persevere… and that you will find someone, one day, to tell you that you're right…"
I messed up the last bit where I gave her a bit of encouragement that may or may not help her get through her canon situation with a little less pain, but she still accepted it happily as I closed with an "amen".
I was so tempted to go "and not just the "Amen", but the "Awomen" and the "Achildren" too!" But I restrained myself admirably.
When I finally opened my eyes, I was surprised to see her… crying, a lot, like… how did she manage to keep quiet while holding back all those tears?
I didn't know what to do! Huh? Before I knew it, my hand reached up to pet her head!
Apparently, due to having practiced the comforting movement on Atago frequently, such action had become rather habitual.
"There, there… it's okay to cry…" I think?
She clung onto me a bit, and I was really worried on whether Atago was going to kill me or not, but it turns out that she was barely restraining herself from comforting Asia too.
I guess she didn't want to suddenly intrude and make the situation more complicated.
After remembering herself, Asia went all "Hawawawa!" in her usual cute manner (damn, how does she make it work in this reality?) before thanking me for praying over her. I had the sinking suspicions that she has been the type of girl to always give but not receive prayers.
But she should have all those letters filled with heartfelt gratitude and prayers right?
I guess it just doesn't happen often enough in person.
"O-oh no! It's getting late, I need to be back in the Vatican soon."
"I see, I won't keep you waiting. I'm here as a tourist for awhile longer, say, do you have a phone number?"
"U-um, sorry…"
"There's nothing to apologize for. Uh, here, I'll just give you this number that you can call whenever if you want to keep in touch or discuss theology with me. It's a Japanese number though so it's going to be expensive if you don't use an instant messaging app-"
Asia's brain looked like it was overheating. In the end, I just got her to memorize my number, I actually cheated by subtlely adding it into her brain with my abilities.
I also placed a part of my shadow in hers so that I can make some progress with familiarizing myself with her shadow. It would be nice if I could teleport to her whenever she was in danger.
"… Gen… using your abilities to pick up girls is good and all-"
"-I wasn't!"
"Are you sure? It looked like you were grabbing her flags rather well."
"I'm sorry, I just wanted to help her!"
"I know, that's what I love about you."
Thankfully, Asia was the innocent type and thus had not sparked any sense of competition from Atago. Just as well considering that I'd like to think of the blonde nun as a defenseless little sibling, just like Kouho and Gosei.
We went back to the hotel room later, and as she took her shower, I went over some of the recordings I got from the Vatican.
It was interesting to hear all sorts of things, but the thing that caught my eye was about some vampire hunt in Romania on the upcoming full moon, a few days later…
Apparently, they are having a hunt then as a protective measure for the citizens.
Turns out that the vampire method of getting their own servants is as simple as biting a victim on the night of a full moon. After that, they become vampires under their absolute control, and if they weren't turned, they would still be under absolute control as slaves trapped in their own minds.
The exorcists were only going there to stop them from replenishing their numbers, grabbing new servants or just having a snack.
But who would free the slaves?
There was no matching answer from any of the recordings.
I can't just standby and let that happen. This is… I haven't been so livid in a long time.
I took all my anger and placed it in my emotional energy storage, I needed to use it to fuel my abilities, I needed to keep calm.
This is still vacation with Atago and I wouldn't do anything rash without discussing it with her.
Well, I'll discuss it with her tomorrow.
Tonight's session was a lot longer than before, and like lasting, I slept in bed with her.
Curiously enough, I found myself in some sort of dreamscape.
I knew it was a dream because I could shape the world to my desires rather easily.
"Hello? Hello, anyone?" A familiar voice called up from the distance.
Okay, what kind of weird-ass fantasy am I having? Then again, nuns have always been my fetish. Damn, I feel dirty from just having any similarities with Diodora…
"Wow! The buildings are so tall! Is this what they call skyscrapers? I never had a dream like this before!"
What kind of dream construct talks about having their own dreams? Isn't this a bit too elaborate and meta for my dreams?
"Oh! Genshirou! You're here too! Hello there!"
"General Kenobi. Wait what?"
Oh crap. What the fuck. This is one of those shared dream sequences cliches.
Oh shit, what am I going to do?!
Level 10
AN: Splitting the story to two different updates, here's the setup. The 11th update will contain multiple POV's.
Level 10
My capabilities were still available to me in its entirety in this dream world, I noted, as I had quickly processed the myriad buildings of different shapes and sizes on this strange metal plate in which a good portion of buildings stood on.
Stretching my senses, I could feel that we were on the highest plate of some Aincrad-like floating citadel made out of skyscrapers and other facilities, and above me, a vast sky where it's few clouds were pierced by a single tower that seemed to spiral on without end.
I wonder what Zangetsu will say about this inner world?
"It's so good to see you! See someone, I mean… I don't know what I would have done, oh… oh dear, what have I done? D-did I bring you here? How could I have been so selfish-"
Asia began to panic in her rambling, I quickly put a stop to it before she falsely attributed blame unto herself.
"Asia, relax. I think you're overreacting by thinking whatever… this-" I gesture to this world, "-Is, is somehow your fault. I suspect that there may be greater forces at play."
"R-really?" Looking at her worried smile, I sighed and smiled gently as I patted her adorable little head.
"Yes. I do."
"Uuu…"
She looked like she was on the verge of crying. What had happened in this world?
"If you want to cry then go right ahead, I'll be right here for you. If you don't want to, it's your decision and choice to make."
"I-I'll be fine."
Asia shook her head and patted her cheeks with her tiny palms before gathering her resolve.
"Better?"
"Y-yes!"
Uwah, so earnest! I should just take her home with me and put her together with my other siblings. Wait, no, that's kidnapping. Liberation is okay, but I can't remove someone from a place where they currently feel like they belong…
"Great. So, tell me what happened from your point of view?"
"Um, I've been walking around since I got here and um… at first, I woke up in a small chapel alone, and when I walked out all I could see was a river and a field of flower lit up by fireflies, uh… they were very bright fireflies. I looked for someone, anyone, all around the place but when I decided to go to the other side of the river I ended up in this place. I've been walking around here for hours ever since."
Hmm, so she woke up in her own dreamscape or a different segment of my dream world, then ended up here… wait, how many hours?
"How many hours ago?"
"I don't know."
"Okay, different approach, when did you fall asleep?"
"I went to bed at about 9, but I think I only fell asleep an hour later because I was so happy…"
"Happy?"
"N-nevermind."
Oh yes, it's sometimes hard to sleep if you're feeling too much of something.
"Hmm, I went to bed at around 1 am, so the timeline fits a bit. It's likely that this is a dreamworld and I somehow joined you when I fell asleep. I've seen this kind of things in fantasy stories."
"You mean the kind of stories with witchcraft?"
"Is that what the church calls it nowadays? Nevermind. The point is that I get the feeling that something or someone has connected our minds together, the purpose… is elusive."
It's likely interaction with our Sacred Gears and other variables.
The thing is, Sacred Gears are like the Shield Hero's omniglot "legendary" weapons. They literally eat whatever comes into contact with them so long as the user explicitly desires to integrate something into them, although, this is likely very dangerous as you're stuffing random stuff into your soul.
Kiba stuffed the Hocruxes of his dead friends into himself, Issei put in Vali's shiny dragon balls into Ddraig, canon Genshirou Saji stuffed in the other pieces of Vritra into himself… I came up with a shadow inventory, but that had more to do with the innate properties of my Sacred Gear than actively trying to add in a new function to it.
My shadow is essentially a part of my Sacred Gear, normally, that kind of thing gets shaved off or damaged against any sort of enemies including other Sacred Gear users without anything happening to it. Unless you're Euclid, in which case, you're trying to make a knock-off Boosted Gear.
However, when I put a piece of my shadow into Asia, she (or Twilight Healing's non-existent consciousness/auto mode) must have subconsciously accepted me into her, as a result from our positive interaction earlier that day.
Thus, Asia had somehow absorbed a fragment of the "connection" part of my Sacred Gear, then used the minuscule amount of my will embedded into the shadow relay to create a link to my mind, and now we're here in this shared Sacred Gear soul space that doubles up as our dream world.
Of course, as accurate and as fitting as it sounds for something from DXD, I couldn't just explain that to Asia even if I don't want to stretch the truth in maximum "from a certain point of view" mode during the previous evening.
Having a relationship founded on… truths told from a different perspective, is not the kind of relationship I want with someone that gives off a little sister vibe.
And so I didn't say any of the above and simply acted as my usual decisive self.
"We seem to be running in real time. And if I came into this world by falling asleep then I should think there's a good chance that the opposite is true."
"What do you mean Genshirou?"
"Elementary, my dear Asia. It means that in a few more hours you will soon open your eyes to the waking world. Tell me, when do you usually wake up?"
"7 am in the morning for my daily devotion."
"It's settled then. We'll just have to keep each other company until then. If this is a dream world, then I wonder how much influence we have in this world."
"Uwa?"
Asia looked completely out of her depth in comparison to my composed self.
I launched an uppercut into the sky while controlling the aftermath on the ground level so Asia wouldn't be harmed, unleashing a huge shockwave and clearing the sky of clouds through physical force.
"Oh wow, I can do superhero stuff in this dreamworld! Awesome!" I pretended that this was a totally imaginary thing.
"Waaaah! Amazing!"
"Well, it's a dream, after all, I mean, what are the chances that someone in real life could do something like this?"
"Ehehe…?"
Asia may be a sheltered nun, but the church seemed to have at least impressed upon their members, the sheer devastation their natural enemies can cause at their mightiest.
As for myself, it's a lot easier to hide my power by just handwaving it all as "dreamworld" logic.
"Should we get a bird's eye view of the place so we can find somewhere to go? Who knows? Maybe we'll find a way back to the place you started at?"
"Um, that sounds like a good idea. D-does that mean we have to climb that tower?"
"Nah, only me."
I went in from behind her and swooped her up in my arms.
"Hawawa!"
"Gotcha! Don't worry, I won't be letting you go."
"W-wait, what are you doing to do-oaaah!"
I carried her in my arms and leaped right at the tower with a seemingly endless height, I reached there at speeds that would have killed humans many times over, and landed on the side of the tower with my passenger safe and sound, barely comprehended what had just happened.
"Wow that was fast! Hey cool, gravity has no meaning here, I guess I can just run up this tower then." I narrated some borderline eye-rolling commentary in order to make it seem like this is an entirely new experience for me.
Without giving Asia a chance to tell me to stop, I ran up a couple of huge steps until I came to a stop at a tower ledge, that kind of reminded me of my time climbing the Eos Tower in Maplestory.
I set us down there, Asia's eyes were going swirly at the confusing events.
"Asia, are you okay?"
She nodded after while, turns out that she was pretty okay with it.
"T-that was fun."
"It was, was it? Do you want to give a go at carrying me?"
"E-eh? N-no, I don't think I can."
"If you don't think you can then you never will. But let's set that aside from the moment… take a look, Asia. It's a nice sight, don't you think?"
"Hmm, haa….haa! We're so high up! Wow! The city down there looks so pretty!"
"It does, doesn't it? And those buildings you thought were high are actually pretty short from up here. Don't you think?"
"Yes! I agree."
And I had a good feeling that it represented just how far I've come yet there is still an endless amount of potential avenues to power left to explore and develop, despite the significant progress I made. And even that amount of progress is still small in the grand scheme of things.
As if sensing my darkened mood, clouds began to form, dimming the light of this world ever so slightly.
I shook my head, no sense on dwelling on such things.
Finding no way to get Asia back to her starting point at this moment, I turned our attention to seek entertainment.
"Asia, have you ever watched a movie before?"
"What's a movie?"
"Hooboy, this is going to be a long story. Well, I'll make this easy for you, it's something you can watch along but preferably, with family and friends."
"Friends?!"
"Uhuh. And we, are going to watch one. If I'm right and that this world is connected to my mind then… ah, there."
As if on request, a familiar galactic opera house began to light up in the distance, as if signaling for us to go there.
I held out my hands and Asia leaped into them, knowing what I wanted and trusted me to do what must be done.
I hope I didn't turn Asia into an adrenaline drunkie by introducing her to this kind of skydiving.
We entered the "Opera House" which was actually a huge empty cinema room with only two other viewers, a handsome young man, and a much older male gentleman, that nodded at us after performing an evil head turn, acknowledging our presence.
I told Asia not to say anything to him, and to be careful of guys trying to meet up with girls like her without good reason.
I started off with a basic plan in mind and began playing A New Hope.
The remarkable accuracy and the updated graphics were a pleasant surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one.
A few hours later…
"Gen, Gen! Tell me it's not true! Vader can't be Luke's father, right? He's lying right! How can a father cut off h-his son's hand!? Please say it isn't so!"
"There there… all will be revealed in the next movie. But it seems that we won't have time for that."
"W-what do you mean? G-Gen… I feel… sleepy…"
"Farewell, fair maiden. May you find your worth in the waking world."
As if the host had just left the server, the world around me froze and I felt as if I was being booted out of this world, into a state of semi-lucid dreaming.
I woke up feeling strangely rested, more rested than what my typical dreamless nights that is.
Before I could contemplate more on my connection with Asia or my plans for the near future, I felt a familiar warm and wet sensation enveloping my morning wood.
"Good morning… nmm, darling…" Atago wasn't a morning person, by far, but ever since we've arrived here she's been diligently sucking me off in bed.
Letting the thoughts of the future drift away, I focused more on her ministrations while reciprocating by caressing her sensitive ears with my hands, of course, I didn't stop there. I couldn't bear to be inefficient, after all, and so I put my shadow got to work.
"O-oh my!" She exclaimed with mock surprise as the dark tentacles bound her limbs to her back, and wrapped themselves around her body in a manner that wouldn't be out of place from a doujin, the ends of the tendrils didn't remain idle, and contributed greatly to her pleasure as they teased her pussy and breasts. "Oh no, Genshirou has caught me~ What will I ever do?"
"You will do the only thing you can do. Clean me up with your mouth now." Not that she hadn't been working on it just now.
I was about to call her a bitch in heat, but that phrase would only be accurate during certain period of the year, and outside of it, she'll only happily accept those words during particular emotional states. While sensing emotions had taken a great deal of focus before, it was always a lot more easier for me to read Atago, and I could tell that she would only take the degradation well when she's more aroused.
Her cute ears perked up as she heard my command, adjusting herself to work with the restraints, she began to use her mouth on my dick with more enthusiasm from before.
I squirmed a little as she did that unfair trick of kissing the tip, all while looking up at me with those gentle eyes filled with amusement, before putting it into her whole mouth.
My restraint must have been weaker due to last night's unexpected events as I ended up shooting the first load into her without much preamble.
"Ah~ So hot and thick! Oh, look how much there is… ah… wait, why did you stop?" She looked disappointed as my tentacles stopped her from cumming right at the last moment.
"I felt like setting this morning's goal as… get Atago to cum from performing a titjob." Right after saying my piece, I released her from her restraints and moved to the side of the bed. In response, she quickly crawled off the bed and got on her knees, aligning her body to properly service me.
"Ehehe! Look, my tits just ate your dick whole!" Her loving gaze matched well with her enthusiastic tone, and after a bit of trickery from my end, I ensured that our targets were met and that Atago had gained a level in deriving pleasure from using her large breasts.
After a shower (in which we attempted to keep our hands off each other), we settled back in the bedroom and flipped through some random tv channels for a bit.
"Hey, did you think about what you want to do today?" Atago asked, and without giving me the chance to respond, she quickly told me what she wanted to do, "I was thinking about some more sex. Would you like to try something risky, perhaps, take me for a walk near the exorcists?"
Is she trying to get us all killed?
"Please no. If you want to do that then let's do it back in Japan. I would also like to minimize my chances of getting arrested then deported, then banned from coming to this country again."
"Aww, you should take a bit more risks you know?"
I know she isn't scheduled to go into heat again until a few months from now, but sometimes I can't tell the difference between her lust-filled state and her normal state. Well… I guess I'll get there eventually.
"With what I'm thinking of doing, I'd like to think that I'm already taking enough risk to fulfill my quota for the year."
"So early into the year? Hmm, oh! Could it be… that you plan on kidnapping a sweet innocent blonde nun and turn her into your plaything in front of your loving wife-to-be?"
Ignoring the last bit, I quickly denied her accusations, "What, no! That's like… a devil hobby or something."
"I wouldn't have mind you taking a few more breeders."
"You wouldn't? No, wait, stop distracting me with these images so early into the morning."
Also, did she have to use that specific word? When I think of Breeder I think of that doujin titled "sister breeder", and I most definitely will never have that kind of intentions for my blood-related little sister. Also, the type of "sister" mentioned doesn't match the occupation of the girl Atago's referring to anyways.
Seeing that it was best to head off any misunderstandings and to be completely fair to her, I told Atago of what happened in my dreams along with my plans for the day. With the exorcists flying over to Romania right now, I could pretty much head them off at the airport then stalk them while getting the location of the vampire homelands from their heads, and then go and liberate whatever unwilling "citizens" of the vampire town.
"Of course, I won't be doing this without your permission, after all, this is our vacation together and I could always find time in the future to rectify these injustices. I will be careful as well, and won't take the Church's thoughts on it as the truth, using my abilities to investigate-"
"-Oh Gen, I know you'll be perfectly responsible with what you feel is the right thing to do. Let me help!"
"Atago, I am taking into account your political position-" She rolled her eyes, rude, she may not like the thought of it but I don't want to cause trouble for her family after they've been good to me, "-and with the humanitarian efforts that my plan entails, I don't think I can afford to bring in your family into this."
"Haa, I can see what you mean. Strong vampires, pure-blood or turned, can be force multipliers and valuable addition to any factions due to their ability to absorb power from blood, although this is offset by how little they can be trusted and controlled with such access to power and potential to take control of others."
"Yeah, I wouldn't let any emotionally compromised vampire that may or may not hold a grudge or something else anywhere near your family. Anyways, I will deal with them later. Humans are easier to handle, I was thinking of getting the plans from the exorcists then time my assault, so that when I "liberate" the enthralled humans with a combination of my shadow storage and teleportation, I can simply pop them up right in front of the group so that they can heal them. Apparently, fixing enthrallment is easy enough, the long term damage not so much… but if I can get some results from stray devils I'd like to think it'll work for these guys too."
I bounced some ideas with Atago on how to time things, and we decided to leave the hotel immediately so that we can get to Romania by noon, since night and day are pretty much reverse for vampire time, I would be able to scout around the territories more in the day.
Atago would find a remote place and isolate it with a barrier, which would act a temporary hub for her and as the target spot for the turned vampires to be teleported to, of course, Atago would be safely behind the group by about… several layers of magically fortified walls and barriers, just to be on the safe side.
Thankfully, such things wouldn't be uncommon in Romania, as there is a sizable magician population there with their own shielded territories, as she had heard from some foreign magicians visiting Japan a couple of months ago.
The first stage of the plan went off without a hitch.
That said, the details I picked out of the exorcists minds were worrying, for a number of factors.
They seem to be the type of people that would commit so-called "necessary evils" for the "greater good", which is already a big red flag in itself.
More worrying to me is the fact that they were nominally "led" by one of the Vatican's holy swordsman, Jeanne, as in, the Hero Faction child hostage taking Jeanne. Looking at her from afar, my first impression is that she was conflicted about something, and was feeling uncomfortable with her group for some reason.
If I had been closer to them and had more time I would have dived deeper into the minds of her subordinates (in name) to find out why. But I didn't have the time to do so.
I decided that I would try to approach her as a tourist later on if possible, I had to make haste in my scouting of the vampire territories.
The territory of the Vampires is located in the depths of a particular mountain away from a human's village, how that village is still standing I have no idea, considering that humans are essentially food, livestock and sex slaves for them.
After a few minutes of high-speed traveling, I managed to find the place.
… Is it me, or does the security here really suck?
I know that the church only had a rough idea on where the vampire territory was, but uh… the nice castle town is kind of noticeable. And I can even see modern looking buildings as well. (Guess the devils aren't the only ones actively ripping off human civilization, I mean, if the Youkai's can develop alongside humans then this makes sense…)
Then again, I do have several things that the vampires do not usually prepare for, as their regular enemy would be the church and their vampire hunters. I doubt that the vampire hunters would have a spatial distorting spell constantly active, a power negation aura, and Senjutsu abilities on their side.
It's not that the church had done a bad job at trying to find the place. Rather, the credit belongs to the vampires that somehow managed to elude the church's resources for so long… guess they overspecialized in anti-faith measures but forgot to defend against other methods.
I easily slipped through the tower meant for noticing the intrusion of enemies from the outside. Literally, no one noticed, and through my enhanced senses, I could tell that the magical barriers and other systems hadn't registered a change at all.
Uwah…
I spent about an hour at the base of the castle town sensing the emotions and going through the memories of the townsfolk. It's… interesting. Life seems to be rather normal for the most part, other than the fact that most vampires may be working in an underground city during the day or just sleeping most of the time, and that the turned vampires are pretty normal folk just like reincarnated devils.
Outside of some unpleasant memories regarding the turning process and how some of them were used by their masters until they were tired of them. Like the Underworld, a good amount of the population is actually made of descendants of human-turned vampires.
Even so, there are plenty of pure-bloods pretty much acting as the bosses over most of the vampires, and based on their memories, I can tell that most pure-bloods consider any other vampire that isn't pure-blood, as substandard beings.
What a surprise.
I tagged a few hundred servants, mostly human (who acted as regular blood producers and the usual unpleasant occupations) and a couple of turned vampires that I felt would do well in regular society if their bonds with their masters were broken, and slowly drained the power keeping them enslaved to their masters until only a small connection was left behind.
Letting it snap would have likely alerted the vampire masters to something going wrong, so I stopped the process at that point and relied on their mostly inactive state during this time of the day in order to carry out the rest of my plans.
I managed to luck out when I managed to follow one of the Tepes dhampir servants, who was running some last minute errands in the town, up the gondola ride into the Tepes castle town. The gondola ride is essentially the "official" way up, as it bypasses the many layers of barriers to the castle.
Even so, with the samples of magic I took using my shadow tendrils, it seems that I can slip through it easily enough.
… The residents in this part of the town are filled with pure-bloods, although, initial analysis shows that they were mostly decent and had little servants, the attitude was as a result of a different type of arrogance where they would rather do things themselves rather than leave servants or enthralled humans to do it for them.
Eventually, as I slowly made my way to the Tepes castle, a huge source of life and spiritual energy lighted up at the edge of my senses.
I connected the dots near instantly.
Security was pretty crap all the way in the castle. Please get these soldiers a proper shift change! Why are so many of them asleep in medieval armor?!
Eventually, I slipped under the door leading to where the mass of energy was, reforming myself above the half-closed coffin of a dhampir after clearing the place of any surveillance and monitoring measures.
"--ah, no, I don't think that's… ? -- oooh, maybe-- stop that, I don't want to hear --"
Rather than seeing a vessel that contained great power, all I saw was a girl with sandy blonde hair and red eyes turning around in her cramped little coffin, half speaking the regional language to herself while speaking some unidentifiable language to the souls of the dead.
She looked like she was already half-crazy, at the very least.
I wasn't sure whether the bruises and torn parts of her shabby dress was due to her own erratic state or caused by her so-called "brother" during his experiments, but I damn well hoped it was the former.
Calming myself, I looked into her emotions and found that it was a complete mess. It's like, she was feeling three different sets of emotions strongly, all at once, as if they were in response to different scenarios… like she wasn't exactly here in the present at all.
It is something I expect of someone seeing the past, present, and future all at once, but in Valerie Tepes's case, I think that this is likely due to both the Grail contamination and the fact that her sub-species splits her soul into three pieces.
"It'll be okay." I brush my hand over her head, stopping there for a moment, then focused my life force into her. "It won't hurt anymore."
If I can purify the body with Senjutsu, that uses both the living and spiritual forces of the world, then with a bit of creativity and some negation power (even if it's of a lower tier than the forces of this Sacred Gear), I should be able to purify her soul a bit.
Thankfully, I had some excess soul energy that can be used as a general replenishment force, after I drained off the more contaminated parts muddied with strange "information and soul power".
She calmed down after that, and I sighed in relief, a smile gracing my face after the small accomplishment.
Still, this doesn't solve the root problem at all.
"You all should stop bothering her." I used Absorption Line to form a connection between me and her, specifically, her Sacred Gear and soul, "If you want to bother someone, try me on for size."
With a combination of Sage Mode senses and Absorption line's adapted soul energy processing capabilities, I was able to "sense" and "differentiate" the multitude of souls surrounding her, and those that were being called forth from the grail or had sought the grail from faraway places.
Having had a bit of experience in filtering out negative energy, I used my emotional energy stores and reconverted the power I got from the spirits that tried to overwhelm me, slowly beating back the tide by pacifying the more harmless spirits.
As for the more aggressive spirits? That was what the anger was there for.
In my mind's eye, I saw myself brutalizing them with my many abilities, of course, this battle was far removed from the mortal realm and took place in a manner that wouldn't cause physical harm. That said, I took some hits to my spiritual form, and that was reflected unto my body.
Minor injuries as far as I am concerned, as I still had over a century of stored life to use, and I had only gotten more efficient at using it over the past year thanks to my healing practice in Tokyo.
"Ha… mmmnn…" She seemed to be sleeping soundly now.
"That's good. Sleep tight alright. You deserve it." As I was about to remove my hand from the older girl's head, I felt a strong grip over my wrist, I turned my head around quickly in my shock of getting caught off guard.
"Don't… leave…" Instead of an opponent, all I got was a pair of bright red eyes looking up to me in a pleading manner.
Not according to plan.
I can't say that I thought it would have gone smoothly, but it's safe to say that I didn't expect to be held up in this part of the operation.
Level 11a
Level 11a
"I know what we're doing is technically sentient trafficking but… isn't he doing this too properly?" She muttered, not at all stopping to use non-discriminatory Star Wars terminology when describing non-human trafficking.
It would have been more racist to have only made the distinctions between humans and non-humans, youkai and non-youkai anyways…
Atago couldn't help but make that remark as she looked upon the finished reinforced inches thick air-tight "transport" area, cordoned off into several sections through metal gates enchanted with warding magic… all made within an hour of high-speed (supernatural) construction work and junk salvaging.
On one hand, she thought it was really cool that her talented boyfriend would be really handy in household matters. On the other hand, it looked as though he had unfortunately sacrificed comfort for utility when it came to this operation, which will most certainly result in terrible ratings by the users!
Should his surveillance and projections prove correct then they would have about a hundred or so refugees herded into this cramped place like… well, actual refugees.
Then again, it was her suggestions that made it like this in the first place.
It occurred to her that if she were to do this as a career she could possibly make it into a criminal broker's Blacklist. Oh dear, what if she was actually good at this? No, no, that wouldn't work. That sort of thing only exists in TV series.
To get her mind off the fact that she might have been becoming the very thing her family sought to destroy, *cough* arrest *cough, she decided to do some durability tests on the lightless "transport" cube of reinforced materials.
"Ooooowwww! Ouch ouchie!"
Needless to say, she immediately regretted her decision to kick the thing.
Atago looked around quickly, making sure that nobody was in the secured warehouse where the underground "transport" cube was located and sighed in relief.
"Thank goodness no one was here to see that."
When the time has come, the turned vampires should all be transported into the large makeshift underground waiting area, through the darkness attuned to Genshirou's abilities. The humans would be going to a different area, if only to minimize the risks and tensions that may arise due to the sudden change in circumstances.
Atago took out her game console, flipped it open and booted it up, only to turn it off a minute later when she realized she wasn't in the mood for it.
It really didn't sit right with her to just let Genshirou do what he wanted without support. He had said that her tagging along to stay near him would keep her safer, and thus counted as helping, as fewer worries equated more things he could do in his book.
She had nodded along and agreed at the start, seeing reason in his arguments on why it wasn't worth it to get deeply involved in his own personal endeavors and simply helped him in developing his ideas.
But it didn't feel right to leave it at that.
He had to deal with so much work by himself because he wouldn't leave people in trouble to a cursed, fate yet couldn't bear to cause her problems both at a grander scale and a more personal level, as he knew her distaste for being involved in such matters.
At times, just thinking about the everyday life that her lover craves and protects, yet throws himself at attaining more power just to keep a peace that he may never fully enjoy, makes her want to cry.
She could lie to herself and say that simply being there for him would be enough. And that would be true, but only from a certain point of view.
It doesn't change the fact that she could be doing more without causing him to worry at all, and it was her personal distaste for the field in which she was talented in that held her back from doing so.
Is that all it was to it? She wondered for a bit when the answer came to her suddenly.
No, it wasn't.
Before she even realized it, she had unknowingly entrusted the responsibility for her own happiness to her loved ones, specifically the younger boy performing his own heroic rescue by himself. She hadn't done it all the time and she had very well decided she wanted to be responsible for a great deal of his own happiness, but she could be doing more, just like he was doing so all the time.
Did he like risking his life, hurting himself, exhausting his mind, body, soul and entire being for the sake of the ones he loved? Ultimately the answer was "yes", but there were a lot of times where he would have to say "no" as well.
She thought that the lengths he went through were unhealthy, but the same could be said about her own bare minimal actions at times.
"Screw this, I'm done. Oh, how unladylike."
Regretting her choice of language for a moment, she shook her head and quickly decided to make the call before she gave herself a reason to stop again.
Writing the magical name of the household she wanted to contact onto a communications talisman, she set it on a wall and waited for a response after filling it with the required magical energy.
"Hwaah, good night… or is it morning?" An image of a silver-haired little girl appeared, the small figure was wearing modern pajamas and was seated on her fluffy bed.
"I believe it's night time in Japan, Auntie Sophie." Atago answered, getting a puzzled look from the girl that was far older than she looked, until the girl showed her understanding by tapping the bottom of her fist to the palm of her other hand.
"Oh! That's right! Your mother told me that Atago-chan decided to travel to Europe with your boyfriend~" Sophie's normal subdued tone quickly was turned up to "lively" levels by her standards for a brief moment.
"Ufufu, that's true. Although, it seems our holiday has been cut short a bit…"
"Hmm? What's wrong? Oh wait, I never get called when there's nothing wrong."
Atago quickly placated the sulking family friend.
"That's not true at all!"
"Holiday greetings and family invitations don't count! Don't be so cold to your Auntie Sophie! Don't you know you're perpetuating fantasy stereotypes by giving into the cats vs dogs thing that the outside world still thinks is going on? I mean, we put on a show for tourism sakes but…"
"Okay okay, I get it, I'll call more often."
Rather than calling her an Aunt, she's more like a lonely bratty cousin sometimes… but Atago did respect her and does consider her reliable when it comes to work-related matters.
"Yay! Now, with that out of the way, what seems to be the problem? Don't tell me that your boyfriend suddenly saw some pretty foreigner and decided he wanted her instead of you."
"I won't tell you because nothing like that is happening at all. Now please listen and don't say anything for just 15 seconds."
"Okie dokey."
"Right… hypothetically, say, if a dozen or so turned vampires with no place to go were to suddenly pop up in Japan, Youkai territory, for example, what would you think of it?"
Narrowing her red eyes at Atago for a brief moment, she took a while to think of her answer before speaking, "I would think that it would be a terrible tragedy if they had to fend for themselves, I also shudder to think of the consequences if they were to use their abilities to take advantage of the generosity of our beloved country's people, whether out of necessity or not."
In other words, the head of the Vampire Cat clan didn't like the idea of letting their technical cousins start out from zero, nor would she want them to be left to themselves without supervision.
They may have been a tiny clan, but in terms of both personal and economic power, the clan of vampire nekomata hybrids could be considered very influential among the West Faction Youkai clans.
Her clan's close friend and ally normally would stay out of the public spotlight… outside of those handful of times there were movies made about vampire cats, and so wouldn't do something as noticeable as what Atago was going to suggest, but she had to try…
"Alright then. So, let's say, if by any chance that the Kaiza clan so happens to run into some vampires lost at sea during a coastline patrol, and brought them into Kyoto for processing…"
"Are there cute vampire girls included? I've heard the turned ones aren't quite so racist. Ah, it would be good if a love story revolving around a rich young man meeting a poor destitute young woman stuck in a refugee camp were to be made into a nice drama series~"
"I'll just take that as a yes, only because you're hoping for romance to blossom and for the bloodline to be strengthened back to the right equilibrium…"
Keeping the right genetic balance was of significant importance to them as they lucked out over some synergistic powersets. The clan was descended off a couple of vampire nobles that forsook their ways because of their love for cat girls (essentially), the vampire cat clan's description is rather indicative of their hybrid status after all.
Sophie Araki had been the head of the clan for around a hundred years after her father's untimely death by choking on a lot of mochi all alone during a particular night.
Her husband had ended up dying a decade ago due to sickness, she doesn't really talk about it at all, and has likely been coping by devoting a good portion of her time into manga and otaku goods.
If Atago remembered correctly, her gateway into anime and manga had started after her son started writing a manga about manly men duking it out, ironically, vampires were one of the main antagonists at the beginning.
"Good girl! Keep me updated and have fun with your little hero. Say… do you think he likes legal lolis?"
Resisting the urge to growl, she quickly sought out the most expedient way to end the chat.
"Pssshhh, oh no, the line is breaking up."
"It's held open by magic-"
"-Oh no, I'm losing you."
Atago blasted the talisman with a small wave of fire.
She didn't like it when others tease her, well, unless it's Genshirou.
"Nooo! Stay focused! Okay, who's next? Oh… oh no, now I have to talk to mother and father."
Taking out another specialized talisman, this time with their clan specific names and symbols, she once again began the long-distance magic spell.
"My lovely daughter has called! How is everything? Is that little rascal treating you well?"
Normally her father would have sounded overprotective when mentioning other males that she associated with, but after their experiences together, Genshirou and her father seemed to have become good friends. Good enough friends to the point where he was legitimately using a light-hearted tone with that last question.
"Mm-hmm! I'm quite alright. We've taken a… two-day trip to Romania, you did say that we didn't need to stay in Italy and could have a mini EU tour after all."
"Ah, Romania. Land of the gypsies and bats."
"Father. That's racist."
"But what else is the place famous for?"
"This is why you're not allowed to participate in anything involving foreign affairs."
He pouted at the remainder of the clan's matriarch putting him in the kennel after a particular gaffe. So far, no one in the clan was going to let him live it down.
"Is mother there?"
"Hello there!"
"Mother, please no. I get that enough from Genshirou."
That line was also a mood killer when he tried to sound suave by saying "Hello There" as she walked out of the shower. He stopped doing that after she told him off quite strongly on using Prequel quotes whenever they were having sex.
Admittedly, she would have made an exception if he called her "good" whenever she got on her knees. There was something about the creepy tone he mimicked that sent the good kind of shivers up her spine… she couldn't quite put a finger on it yet.
"It's treason then."
"Father, stop it. You're doing it wrong."
Sometimes she also wondered when she became the resident Star Wars expert for the family… it's all Obi Wan's Genshirou's fault!
"Anyways, enough derailing. To cut a long story short, would it be possible for us to have an unscheduled coastal patrol back at the place we went to last summer? At around…" Atago looked at her phone to compare the time zones, 9 pm tomorrow night Japan time?" That would be tomorrow afternoon on their end.
Her parents both looked at each other once before turning to her with a grave expression.
"Dear… have you fallen into a bad crowd?"
"I know you've been watching all those American TV crime dramas but our police force does not condone smuggling of contraband. Now, I know that it's easy to find drugs in Europe-"
"Oh come on!"
"Ufufu, we're just joking."
"Uh, yes, that."
"Father! How could you!?"
"I'm sorry! It's just that my colleague came back from Amsterdam and-"
"Dear, quiet. I'm sure our daughter would like to elaborate a little more, doesn't she?"
"I have… reason to believe that some vampire refugees from Romania might find themselves washed ashore, at that particular spot, during that particular time."
"…" "…"
"… Genshirou is being heroic again."
"Oh!" "Makes sense."
They quickly got their story straight and went ahead to plant some items that were "left behind" at their summer home by "accident", which will be just one of the many reasons listed on why their clansmen would be at that area all of a sudden.
"Hey, uh, dearest daughter of mine-"
"-What do you want father?"
That was his half-guilty half-embarrassed tone, she was well familiar with the tone that he took whenever he admitted something to her mother. Atago would rather not let the discussions get derailed too much just because her mother went to get a drink and her father wanted to ask something of her in secret.
"This is just something I'm curious about but I can't really ask Genshirou about since he's not the type to brag and all…"
"Oh my, are you going to get to the point anytime soon?"
"How long does he last in bed?"
"Longer than you, at least."
The soundproofing in her parents bedroom was near non-existent. She had been scarred for life all those years ago and relished her foolish father's resigned expression.
All in all, the discussion went pretty well.
Huh, it wasn't that daunting at all! Atago thought to herself.
Making her way to the makeshift living room slash office, she laid on the sofa for awhile hoping to get a quick nap.
"You seem all tired out."
"Gen? You're done already?"
"Not quite."
She found him standing to the side of the sofa, looming over her a little before he reached down to ruffle her hair and rub her ears.
"You've been busy."
"Mmhmm!"
She smiled and nodded as she happily responded to getting her head patted and ears rubbed.
"What have you been up to?"
"Sorting out all the logistics, you know, when you bring them all back to Japan."
"You didn't have to."
"But I wanted to."
His face went through various expressions in short order, finally settling on a different smile from the usual. It was a bit familiar to her, still… ah, that was it! She figured it out.
She saw that smile from him after finding out she was okay back at the ski resort. The closest she could call it was a smile of relief.
"I see, you keep surprising me sometimes… thank you. Your support means a lot to me."
Atago knew he wasn't the type of person that would take people for granted, that is why those words of gratitude didn't ring hollow like so many of the "thanks" she had received from those she had done favors for back in the past. She liked that feeling a lot.
And it felt so right. While she still wasn't quite sure on what path she would walk on in the future, right now, she knew for certain that this felt "correct".
"I consider it my future duty to be there for you at all times."
"I knew you were serious about this, but I may have been in denial about just how serious until now…"
She didn't ask of anything more from him. He wasn't obliged to respond to that right now.
And besides, just letting him know was enough for her.
"That's enough for me."
"I'm such a lucky man, you know that right?"
"I don't know… who was it that complained about their E-Rank Luck and parental death flags?"
They laughed and continued to talk about fun things for awhile before they got to business.
"Everything will proceed as planned with some minor changes. I will go make contact in both identities with the female Exorcist leader Jeanne and influence them to head towards the town a contingent of vampires would be raiding later as planned. As for how I got that information, I found a collaborator which I will be evacuating, the only difference is that this individual will not be part of the refugees but will live with me instead."
That piqued her interest quite a bit.
"I know you have a good reason for it. So what's going on?"
"Uh… if I told you, you would be obligated to tell the authorities about it for safety's sake."
Which means, that whoever this person is… the individual contains recognizable powers that she would have to report to her parents, who will then report it to the authorities. Anyone that catches that kind of attention would likely never live a peaceful life under almost any circumstances.
That is unless, they are hidden well enough to the point where they're power can't be discovered, and the individual with the power to do so was standing right in front of her.
"All right, then. Keep your secrets."
Crossover memes work just as well for her at times like these.
He chuckled and thanked her for being understanding and trusting of him.
It was only natural. If he felt so strongly about protecting someone then it must be a really serious case, and if that is so, then the less she knew about the specifics of whatever power this individual held would equate to them being better off in the long run.
"Thank you. Haa, well, I'll just be heading over to that room for now. I need to fix up this vessel before making some weapons with what I've learnt."
"Vessel?"
"Oh, right. With the tibbits I picked up from that individual… I managed to get my connected Shadow Clone technique working. I'm actually still sneaking around in the castle while operating this second body simultaneously."
"I think you're taking multi-tasking to a brand new level. Are you sure you're human? Oh wait, congratulations! You did it!"
"I did it, yay! But yes, I'm pretty sure I'm human."
He spoke a bit about how the "void energy" he was able to recreate months ago was close enough to the origin of many types of energy, and that it would be the key to creating his new weapons.
Taking out some stolen exorcist light swords from the Vatican (shadow inventory = max Steal levels, apparently) and some evil pieces, she watched in fascination as his power purged the color of the complex artifacts, levitating in the air as the crystals from Agreas was dyed in a new color as his power flowed into it.
The metal frame of the light sword was taken apart, reforged with various energies and magic, into a cylindrical shape where the crystals were sealed into place.
A focus for powerful energy, those crystals were, and it seemed that he intended to use it in a way completely different from how most would use such rare crystals.
Blades of purple and red light sprung forth into existence.
While she could not feel the power of the blade, she could see the familiar signs of all sorts of energies being used in addition to his new "holy light" energy being concentrated to levels that wouldn't be out of place among the heavenly host.
"I want one."
"I'll make you one when we're back in Japan."
As far as Atago knew, the plan went smoothly and the refugees were all very well behaved thanks to whatever performance and assurances Genshirou managed to deliver to them.
The humans had managed to find shelter with the church after a lot of difficulties and… aggressive negotiations, apparently.
"Ah right. So, Valerie, meet Atago. Atago, meet Valerie."
Ah… a female… somehow she knew it would come to this.
The line between dreams, reality and everything in between was blurry.
For most of her time after… some time ago, she couldn't even be sure which side she was on at any given point in time.
As for how she felt about it? She couldn't say for certain. What was it like to feel anyways?
On a good day, she could reach out for that feeling somewhere in her memory, her face could shift appropriately to match the emotion in that memory. But that was all it was, an imitation of a memory. Slowly, but surely, she found it hard to care about a lot of things.
Rationally, it made her life a lot simpler. Not caring, apathy, serenity… the detachment from her emotions and the sensations of her body made it easier on her.
Of course, none of that really made a difference for the ever-present discomfort of having all sorts of nonsensical concepts and information being pushed into her being, slowly but surely, she sensed that she was becoming… less of herself, whatever that was supposed to mean.
Or perhaps that was no meaning to it at all?
Why would there be such a thing as "meaning"? How about "purpose"?
Whatever purpose she supposedly had was most definitely a lie no matter what her next-of-kin had said about her own, she hadn't believed a word of it no matter how sweet he sounded as he used her.
Did that matter at all?
Haunted by apparitions of people that once lived (or perhaps they were simply people, she couldn't tell the difference anymore) whispering all sorts of things they wanted done or simply wanted to say, used for her power to bend the principles of life to the user's will, kept here in this so-called home far away from a larger world, not knowing what was happening to her dear friend… it filled her with great bitterness and anger.
Wait… what was that? She wondered to herself.
It was strange for her to feel that way or anything at all. It was even stranger, in her opinion, that she even recognized that feeling.
"Everything will be okay now." "I'm here for you." "Don't give up." "Don't you remember? You made such beautiful memories." "You'll be alright, I believe in you, so believe in yourself too okay?"
Someone pulled her out of the sea, or was that her own mind? She gasped for air that did not exist in this world, air wasn't needed in a dream anyway, so she felt alright after a few seconds of getting her bearings.
She listened to the voice, the encouraging kind voice that spoke of hope and love.
Following it, she could sense the people around her leaving, going somewhere else with a sense of contentment that she had rarely ever felt in her life.
She saw his face, his body, and his being… he was an odd one.
The angry ghosts came. They would not be reasoned with.
Without the other confusing voices, she could feel the full overwhelming emotions that the lingering spirits brought to bear through her Sacred Gear as a bridge between the worlds and herself.
As if hundreds of voices suddenly lashed out in anger, and were suddenly silenced.
She felt something wonderful had happened.
Valerie wondered what that was… her mind showed her what she wanted to see, she ruminated on the control over her own desires that she had lacked until now, for a moment, before she saw what had happened in the realm between the mind and spirit.
The kind and gentle man cloaked himself in darkness, then unleashed his wrath, turning into a monster of shadow and blood, tearing apart the apparitions that so haunted her so quickly that she hadn't been able to process it in "real time" and needed to see it slowed down within a realm outside of the physical one.
Her mind felt a burst of clarity, memories of a more innocent time began to fill her head, she remembered… stories, fairy tales, of knights and heroes… that saved princesses. And while she was hardly treated as one, she did have an education befitting of her station, and right now, as far as she knew… she had been saved.
Then suddenly, she felt a shift, as if the knight was moving to leave. Without her. That cannot stand! Desperation and fear fueled her actions as she shot up from her coffin bed to grasp his hand.
She felt the warmth of his skin, a sensation that was rare in this castle where the bodies of others were as cold as their selfish hearts.
"Don't… Leave…" Please… she tried to plead, but the last word wouldn't leave her mouth.
"Your throat is parched." He spoke to her in her native language and took out a bottle from somewhere, a warm sensation filled her mouth and throat.
It was strange that she had begun to feel once again. Her emotions had been torn from her and dulled due to her nominal brother's use of her Sephiroth Graal in his experiments on his own kind.
She hadn't known warm water would taste and feel so good.
"Better?" His voice gentle, filled with concerned, with a tinge of haste in his tone.
Valerie could tell that he was rushing to do something else. Even so, she wanted to be selfish by not letting him go now, upon reflection, she was deathly afraid he would leave and never return.
"Y-yes."
"Take your time. You must have been through a lot. It took quite a bit of my reserves to resolve the symptoms so that's a pretty good indication that you weren't doing so well."
She would take his word for it.
Nodding to show she understood, she gathered her thoughts and spoke, not really knowing what to say or ask because there was just so much she wanted to do!
"W-who are you?"
He paused, as if deciding on what to say, she felt his spirit settle to a "calm" state with her power, "My name is Genshirou Saji, I'm a middle school student from a country called Japan. I'm here to liberate particularly miserable human slaves and turned vampires when I stumbled upon you and decided to help you too."
It's true. All of it.
She knew it was.
How did she know all of that? When had she ever been so control of her own ability to use the sacred artifact's various abilities in this way?
She breathed, looked inwards, and was surprised to see her whole soul intact.
Valerie Tepes doubted her half-brother Marius would have even considered returning any of the three Holy Grails to her, even for a day… then again, it made more sense for him to put back his "tools" in their proper "container" like a common usable item.
As the realization on just how depraved and heartless her half-brother was finally set into her heart properly, she felt a pulsing red hot sensation swelling from within her.
"The hate is swelling in you. Keep it controlled for now, you may have your justice later on." He promised her and she complied.
"Oh… forgive me… and also… forgive my rudeness, for not thanking you, for everything, earlier."
"I understand. It's no trouble at all. I'm just glad that you're alright now. Although, whatever your Sacred Gear does, it's side effects will still remain for now. The symptoms have been treated, but unless you plan to stick right next to me where I can siphon whatever weird info that gets into your head for the rest of your life, or until I find a proper cure, I wouldn't say you're completely treated yet."
As he rambled on, she couldn't help but inwardly giggle at the kind man's antics.
She preferred his company a thousand times more than that of her kin or their slavishly loyal servants.
"You… intend to… help me?" She was getting better at speaking again, but it was a slow process. She hadn't been able to process things to this extent for quite some time.
"I can hardly leave you to some horrible fate, now can I?" He smiled as if he had just said the most obvious thing in the world.
Modest too, she noted.
Suddenly, she felt a new sensation that was… different, scary even.
A growl echoed within the room.
"Are you hungry?"
She hadn't felt so embarrassed since… since… she couldn't remember. Is it strange that she even enjoyed being able to feel minor humiliation like that?
He took out a container filled with nice smelling food, apparently, he was a chef too. He fed her, it was good, better than most of the meals she had eaten, if only because she could feel the love and care he placed into his work.
"Was that not enough?"
"Um… unfortunately not, and I'm… not entirely sure why."
"Ah, right. Dhampir. That means you need some blood."
Before she could even say anything, he had quickly sliced a cut along the palm of his hands using a shadowy blade!
"Drink." He commanded and she obeyed.
She was overwhelmed in an instant. It was unlike any human blood that she had ever tasted before. It had an aftertaste that reminded her of the blood of some minor dragon that was once served to her, but this was on a level that… couldn't be described.
Valerie had never felt so powerful, so filled up, she didn't think that blood could make her feel as so alive. His blood was powerful, flavourful, as if it contained the tastiness of several full course meals from different cuisines, somehow fused into one red concoction to be served as one dish. It didn't make any sense at all to her, but she didn't care, because her body felt so good that she couldn't help but give into the power and pleasure.
"Woah there, uh… you okay?"
"Ah… ahn… I'm… feeling hot…"
"I get the feeling that this is familiar but… no wait, that only applies to some mammals."
He seemed to be thinking of someone else, which made her regain her senses out of some misplaced jealousy, long enough to realize she had to sneak off to get a change of clothes soon.
"I-is that so? I don't know whatever you might be referring to. Oh yes, I forgot to introduce myself. I am Valerie Tepes, you may call me Valerie if you wish."
She quickly changed the topic in a lively manner that she would have reserved for only her closest friend.
"It's a pleasure to meet you Valerie."
"Um, so… what do I have to do next?"
Apparently, more waiting.
He had to organize some things involving the accursed exorcists of the church so that they could take care of the liberated humans.
She believed that he would be back as promised, but that didn't mean that she liked waiting a few hours for the promised time.
In the meantime, she changed her clothes and made a mental list on all the things that she could take along with her.
With what he said about an alternate space to store both items and people, Valerie wondered… why not bring along the inheritance that she was rightly owed with a bit of compensation fees?
Why not? What has the family ever done for them?
Well, she would still give some credit to her father for keeping Marius and the others from going too far, and in his own way, she could tell that he did care about her mother despite all that had happened when she looked through her own memories.
Her knight in dark armor, Genshirou Saji, appeared once again as promised, sporting black clothing and a metal mask of some design.
He seemed to be using some ability to alter his voice to sound more menacing.
"The operation has begun. Let us make a move."
"Yes. Oh, um, could we stop by to take a few treasures with us?"
She told him where she wanted to go.
"… I don't see why not. You do realize we will most likely run into your brother and father."
She did specify the throne room after all.
"I'm aware of that. Forgive me for my lack of consideration, if its too much trouble then please forget about it."
"Not at all. I assure you that your safety will be my top priority. They will not lay a finger on you."
It felt wonderful to hear such words.
How long has it been since she had heard such sincere and caring words again?
He took her into his arms and sped off to the places where they needed to be.
His "clones" were apparently handling the rest of the liberation while he remained in this castle, it made her feel special, as he was treating her as a "VIP".
She barely processed the words of her detestable brothers and her resigned father when they made it to the throne room.
Valerie must have missed it. They asked for his name and Genshirou answered "Darth" something, she couldn't hear the last part, but everyone in the room laughed mockingly in response.
Well, they weren't laughing any longer.
With a very unique ignition sound, a purple blade of light sprung forth from a cylindrical object in his hands, then suddenly, Genshirou released an otherworldly screech as he spun into action and took on all the vampires within the room.
It wasn't even a battle.
The only one that put up a decent fight was her father. The roof had been annihilated after he stopped an upwards slash from Genshirou's blade of light, for half a second, only for the attack to go through anyways and blast the castle roof into dust through sheer force.
In the seconds after that, her father had already suffered various non-lethal wounds that would put him out of commission for quite some time.
"Don't worry. I left a small bit of energy that would be released into you later. You will be healed enough to defend your territory, but not earlier than tonight."
Valerie hadn't wanted the Carmilla faction to take advantage of the chaos, after all.
As for the rest of the vampires. The disparity of power was like that of a machine gun equipped fighter plane against some farm animals.
They were like animals before him and he slaughtered them like animals.
She cheered from the sidelines. It was a sight to behold!
Their vaunted abilities meant little to him when he had more than enough power and speed to overcome their racial abilities and to put the final nail in the coffin, he used his abilities to nullify the vampire's powers, leaving them more vulnerable to a more… inelegant beating.
"As promised, he is yours to deal with." He tossed the sniveling worm, her cowardly brother with delusions of grandeur, right at her feet after an utterly brutal and painful torture beatdown.
"V-valerie! S-sister! Please, stop him! Mercy!"
"Not even bothering to ask for forgiveness?"
"For what?"
Genshirou placed his palm to his metal mask, "Is anyone really that stupid? This is Akame ga Kill tier…"
He must have been talking about how utterly unrepentant he is.
Valerie swung her arm, the power from the blood still coursing through her body, his body hit the grown with a satisfying crack.
"G-gah! P-please… ! Sister please!!"
Genshirou walked to her and handed her his weapon, it could only be used by him, but through establishing a connection with their shadows, he could loan her this power. Of course, such communications took place through a mental bond made by proximity and Sacred Gear interactions earlier, they wouldn't have explained all that in front of her half-brother.
"Do with him as you wish."
He left Marius's fate to her.
Could she kill him?
The purple blade ignited in her arms. The weight was near non-existent, but there was some resistance as she swung it around… the shadow power attached to her hand guided her hand and prevented any accidents.
She placed the tip of the blade right at his neck.
Could she kill out of anger?
Thinking about it for a moment, she realized that she didn't want to do so. If only because it is people like Marius that treated lives like disposable tools, as the vampires experimented on could attest to, that they were all in this mess in the first place.
Valerie simply didn't feel like staining her hands with his disgusting lifeblood. She would rather just let this go and forget about him rather than let her hatred for him define any significant part of her life.
"You were never my brother, Marius. I despised you."
Then she sliced off his limbs and kicked his torso across the room.
He boasted about being a high-class vampire, it would only be natural of him to survive that level of wounds with only this amount of holy light energy coursing through them.
Huh… this weapon's holy light element wasn't affecting her at all… it seems like Genshirou had it designed well.
"Well then, shall we go, princess?"
"We certainly have overstayed our welcome."
She waved the half-dead members of her family goodbye and leaped into her hero's arms to a new beginning.
It was time to put this all behind her. Well, most of it. It would still be nice to find an old friend of hers.
Level 11b
Level 11b
She could make out the usual chatter of her comrades even as she stirred from her nap.
Sleeping in moving vehicles was a skill that she had to cultivate in order in her travels.
"Is there any pattern to the attacks or not?"
"What part of, "we have all this historical data but there are gaps due to people DYING and the vampires changing their patterns" do you not understand?!"
"I wish I brought my camping gear, then we could go, I dunno, traveling through the mountains and find the vampire castles."
"Do they still use castles? I thought that it was a cartoon movie thing."
"I love killing vampires so much. Ah, I can't wait to kill those blood suckers!"
"You love killing any heretical creature, and normal heretics too."
"Is there such a thing as a normal heretic?"
"Oh, Jeanne, you're awake."
Oh sure, now they notice? She held back from saying her thoughts out loud, they would just roll her eyes and blame it on her non-existent post-plane crankiness. Liars.
Jeanne had already noticed a number of them, even the ones engrossed in their conversation, had easily noticed she was awake already. Being constantly aware of one's surroundings was a necessary skill for Exorcists.
Combating supernatural threats with powers far beyond the reach of the average human necessitated not just personal strength and skill, but also caution, experience, and discipline. Those that lacked any of those three would find themselves underground pretty quickly.
As she learned all too well over the years.
Warriors had gathered around her as she set forth on the never-ending mission ordained to her by the church to hunt down evil creatures and be an inspiration to the children aspiring to serve God further. This is her fifth team thus far, which goes to show just how well she's doing in keeping her comrades alive… at this point, the flag that which she should have bore from carrying the spirit of a saint had somehow been twisted.
All the dangerous monsters she had fought over the years, all the deaths that had come about from both her choices and the circumstances around her had all but made it so that no one would join her on her quest.
No one but the most caustic, bloodthirsty and insane exorcists that should have been kicked out of the church already. Even the most reasonable and polite among them simply hide those desires well, lying about them, bottling them up until they set their sights upon a creature where they can unleash their passions onto, slaughtering them like animals.
The worst part is that she can understand their reasons and that acting as if she agreed with them to keep their trust was making her begin to… like the things that they like.
"Yup! I'm ready to show those bats my 110%! I've got some ideas that I would like to try out."
"Exploding swords!?"
"Uh, yeah! That too!"
"You're the best!!! Please give us some too!"
God is her strength, god is her strength… she had been chanting that every time she was introduced to a new level commitment to wanton violence by her comrades, it should disturb her that she's not been praying as much as she should have been to resist their influence.
But then again, it stopped feeling so terrible a year ago, nowadays she wondered if just going along with it would lead her to the peace and joy promised by performing her duty. Is this all of her lord's plan?
Leading by example, to have the virtues that defined the maid of Orleans, Kindness, Humility, Honesty, Purity, Faith… she could still have that while enjoying the slaughter of evil monsters right?
They arrived in Romania's capital, Bucharest, and were to spend some time relaxing and gathering supplies while the clerics, who specialized in invoking God's power through prayers, would get ready to scry for the vampires when night falls.
Her fellow warriors had told her that they would handle to supplies and transport arrangements so that she could wind down a little more.
And now she was all alone in a big city. Nothing unusual in itself…
"Hmm, I know! I've got to visit the churches here!"
She heard that it wasn't possible to walk for 5 minutes without running into a church in Bucharest, if she was smart about it, perhaps she could visit over twenty churches by the hour!
It was a bit of an ambitious goal but why the heck not? She thought to herself, nodding enthusiastically before setting off on her journey.
The rank and file members of the church that weren't exorcists or the head priests of a particular church were not aware of the supernatural dangers that the human world faces from evil creatures of the night and the devils down below.
Normally, she wouldn't have concerned herself with people outside her missions… but for some reason, she felt like she should change up the pattern a little.
"Miss Jeanne! You have to help! I told her not to do anything rash, to stay away from that man but…"
And of course, it seems that her Lord God had others plans for her. Perhaps this is the way her life should be? Killing the monsters and defending the mundane world without really ever being a part of it?
With the way her life has been heading to, she couldn't help but wonder if this was her ultimate purpose ever since she had been picked up when she was just a 5-year-old girl?
Focusing her thoughts on the here and now, she decided to head towards the Old Town of Bucharest where the resident holy maiden should have been going to rendeavous with some heretic magician.
Getting seduced by some handsome magician is worrying but not inherently dangerous, learning magic from them on the other hand was punishable. Worse still… it wouldn't be the first time some magician turns out to be a devil in disguise, Jeanne had run into that sort before.
If Jeanne could find this girl, get her to swear off magic (that she may or may not have learned) and never to meet this person again then all is well. Assuming that no evil was done, then the worst that will be done by the church would be excommunication.
The only problem was…
"How am I supposed to get there?"
She had rushed off before asking for further instructions. Her English wasn't exactly passable, and even if she could speak it to ask for assistance, she wouldn't have done so. She's French after all, it's only natural to hate speaking English.
The only other languages she had learned was Italian and bits of Latin. And that wasn't going to help her get around Romania.
"You alright? You look like a lost tourist." She heard someone speaking that language in the most irritating (British) accent in front of her.
"Not at all." She replied the blonde man with Asian features standing in front of her with a map in his hands… in French of course, that's the only way to reply those blasted Englishmen, mixed race or not.
"And I thought it was only guys that are too prideful to ask for directions." He remarked in a light-hearted manner using her native language. Her eyes widened in response to his surprising fluency in French.
"Aw, sorry! I was busy thinking about something, my bad, my bad!" Jeanne laughed a bit hoping he forgave the bad response of hers.
Damn it! She cursed in her mind.
Kindness, Humility, Honesty, Purity, Faith.
She recited in her mind, trying to set herself straight.
"It's fine. Anyways, do you need help getting somewhere?" He held up the map for her, she told him that she was looking to get to the Old Town. " Oh, that place. I was thinking about heading there myself. Want me to lead the way?"
"Yes! That would be great!" The Lord provides indeed!
She wanted to rush ahead but figured that her current attire had the advantage of being… ordinary, thus, if it's a magician she's dealing with, their familiars wouldn't identify any pursuers if there was no one out-of-place rushing about near the location.
And so she followed his somewhat quick pace of walking (could he be a Londoner?) as he talked about all sorts of things.
"Did you ever hear about how the Old Town became to be?"
"No."
"I thought not. It's not a story you would hear from another country. It's a local tale. In the past, Bucharest didn't really have one central place where people would go out or meet with their friends. So a couple of years ago the City Council decided that the city needed such a place. They designated a couple of streets for this area, laid cobblestones and forbid most traffic, and so now Bucharest has an Old Town. The locals have begun to joke that it must be the newest Old Town in the world… Ironic…"
He seemed to have a lot of fun talking about it, in fact, he began to talk about how other towns all across the world are getting similar treatments, albeit more commercialized and tourist-focused like a town called "Ipoh" in an Asian country called "Malaysia" that drew in tourists from the other states within the country.
The look on his face showed thinly veiled distaste when describing that particular example.
"You've been there before?"
"A few times."
"Recently?"
"Possibly."
He had some strange self-satisfied smirk as he answered her. What a weirdo!
"What do you mean by that?"
"I went there when I was really little and it had a type of charm to it… then the hotels and the old buildings got knocked down. I was a bit disappointed even though I know that modernization can be for the better…"
Before she knew it she found herself talking about her own impressions of other countries she had visited, although she had to preface that she wasn't there for a holiday and it was more like… her parent's business trips.
She didn't have parents ever since she was given away to the church from a young age, so that was a little lie… Jeanne felt bad about it and said that she was currently traveling with a rock and roll boy band when he asked about her present trip. It was closer to the truth, after all.
Of course, that led to him asking about her role in the band, in which she replied with "vocalist" since it was the closest thing to her previous worship role as a choirgirl.
"We're here, you said that you were… meeting with a friend?"
"Yeah uh, kind of! I mean, how do I say this, I'm worried for her since she's meeting this boy that's the suspicious sort and she ran off somewhere so now I have to find her."
"I see… is that so? Perhaps you should start your search… from there." He pointed somewhere that seemed to be less busy.
"Why there?"
"Just a feeling. I mean, I heard that there are also lots of bars there."
Well, it doesn't hurt to start from there. Jeanne thought that she had to start from somewhere at least.
Now that she had arrived, she began to berate herself in her head for getting too caught up in the moment by… actually enjoying talking with someone that wasn't part of the mission. She blinked, actually looking at the man closely, and saw that he was a lot younger than she presumed despite being rather tall and well-built.
There were a lot of things she saw but didn't notice, little things that she dismissed due to subconciously sorting out the mundane folk in her mind as "non-important", and therefore not worth keeping careful track of.
The only thing she had to ever really care about were the "VIP's", "allies" and "enemies". Oh, and God too. He totally has a separate category in her head, or so she tells herself.
"Yeah… that's a good idea…"
"Guess this is where we part. Hey, give me a call if you ever drop by Tokyo, I'll show you around again! Here." Did he hand her a… business card?
Jeanne felt a bit of shame at that, as she realized she hadn't bothered to ask him for his name. Was she becoming apathetic to the "normal" people that inhabited the world she was protecting?
Genshirou Saji… a name, his phone number and… LINE ID? ActuallyVritra?
"I, uh, am a bit of a mythology buff. Don't look too deep into it. Just download the app and add me if you want. As for why I have such a thing, I wanted to take up some part-time jobs and got ahead of myself by printing these out ahead of time."
Suspicious! Then again, she didn't sense anything off about him. Well, at the very least, she should check if he was some evil creature.
"Can you hold this for me?" Jeanne held out her gold rosary.
"Okay?" Genshirou looked perplexed but held it all the same.
"God bless you, amen!"
"Uh… May the Lord bless the work of your hands-"
Okay. Holy symbol, name and prayer checklist completed.
"Thanks! Sorry for doing this all of a sudden. Have a good Mister Saji."
"Okay. You too. And don't call me that, that's what people call my father. Genshirou is fine."
"I will do that then, oh, I forgot! I'm Jeanne, it's a pleasure to meet you.
"Likewise. Uh, just for reference since I know one or two Jeanne's, what's your last name? I'll look you up on social media."
She didn't have an account on any such social media platforms, even so… she did want to answer him. The problem was that she hadn't used her last name since she was a child and found it hard to remember what it was.
Also, when people called her Jeanne it both the name of the girl and the Saint whose spirit she carried. To everyone else, there was little difference, and so she never really thought about it until now.
"… Lefebvre." She ended up using a name derived from the old french word for "craftsman", which is fitting considering she inherited Jeanne d'Arc's Blade Blacksmith.
It was the first thing that came to mind! Ahhhhh!!! She screamed in her head.
"Then, until next time, take care Jeanne."
"You too! If I ever visit Japan then you better show me a good time!"
She ran off in search of the girl soon after, keeping at normal human speeds when there were people watching, but shot off at random bursts of speed whenever she felt she could get behind people's blind spots.
Jeanne noticed some movements of… shadows, shifting about. A Vampire? Here? Perhaps a vampire was the culprit and was taking sick amusement in seducing an innocent maiden! Well, perhaps her hunt was beginning sooner than expected.
"Y-you're here… just like he said you would come!" A distraught young woman dressed in the normal nun's clothing came running at her, with tears in her eyes. Jeanne quickly caught her and searched for the closest threat.
"What do you mean? Who said I was coming here?" Could this be a trap? She wondered.
"B-bobby. H-he helped me, showed me I was tricked. Got that… that liar to admit what he really was! A devil! How could I be so stupid…"
"S-slow down. There, there. It's going to be fine! Now, let's get you out of here and start from the beginning. Wait, is he still-"
The woman shook her head, "No. He teleported away after realizing that I was… that I heard everything when Mister Bobby tricked a confession out of him."
All Jeanne got was that this was apparently some stray exorcist clothed in black, wore a metal mask and used a purple light sword that made strange noises. That sounded alarm bells in her head.
Most light swords weren't colored that way. Only Fallen Angels would have holy light in that color, but whoever this person was who emitted enough light energy to scare off an apparently wealthy (and most likely high class) devil… couldn't be a Fallen Angel as they are a prideful sort who would unveil their wings to show how much power they had.
"O-oh! You're back! Y-yay…"
"Excuse me?"
"I mean, thank goodness you're safe!"
"…"
"AHHHHHHHH!"
Jeanne broke the priest's legs. He was clearly unhappy and surprised by the young woman's return. That was just blatantly suspicious.
"Okay. You are coming with me to the Vatican along with this sleazebag here after my vampire hunt later. Follow me." Serious Jeanne mode activated! She was secretly pleased with herself for pulling off a stern tone.
"O-okay…"
Jeanne dragged the clearly secretly corrupt priest to the meetup place with the rest of her team… who were mostly not present at all, the clerics were all accounted for however.
"Tie this bastard up and gag him. We're starting an investigation about… hey, where is everyone else?"
"They left."
"What?"
"They left for the hunt. We found the vampires traveling along a path that would most likely lead to a specific town 20 minutes ago so they all hopped onto the van and left after making a plan."
"WHAT?! W-why!? Why did they leave me behind? We're early! Also, why wasn't I involved with the planning at all?"
"Look, Jeanne, with your track record I think that you don't need to worry about all of that. That's what we're here for. Also, they thought that you killed everything too fast and wanted first dibs."
T-that's… the most idiotic thing I've ever heard!
She was slamming her head into the wall. Looking down on her because of her age and… misfortune was somewhat expected. But this was sheer idiocy! Or perhaps they just thought she wasn't needed for some reason… oh wait, they only joined her to kill things.
In her heart, she became determined to make a complaint to her superiors and tell them off about this "volunteer-only" requirement for her assigned holy crusade against evil creatures.
She was not going to tolerate any of this anymore! Do they think she's some kind of mascot?! She's the strongest among them for starters and had plenty of experience! Such were the thoughts that ran through her mind at this time.
If I am going to have comrades that traveled here and there with me, they should be at least as friendly and helpful as the tourist I met earlier!
"You… you all, are the sorriest excuse for comrades ever. Even my first team was better and they were mediocre students at the Exorcist academy for Go-goodness sakes! Why didn't you stop them from leaving?! No, wait, I don't want to hear it!"
She took a wad of cash from their supply, called a cab, and told them to drive straight towards the town she needed to go to.
She could sense the fight occurring at the edge of the town as she neared it, left the money in the cab, jumped out of the vehicle and ran towards the fight.
The warriors were already defeated. They weren't dead, so thank God for that, but there were a lot of severed limbs lying about.
But not by the hands of the vampires. The corpses of those monsters were there.
Yet there were still living ones cowering along with… humans? What's going on?
A humming sound traveling through the air drew her attention to the culprit.
The purple blade of light traveled in a circular arc, elegantly severing the legs and arm of one the most annoying members of her team in one swoop with barely any visible effort from the assailants' part.
"AHHHHH! IT BURNS!!!"
"And that's the pain that would have been felt by your victims, had you actually stab them with your pitiful light swords." She could picture the sneer and disdain behind the metal mask as the masked man spoke of the standard Exorcist.
She should be angry at the fact that her comrades were in such sorry, but non-critical, states. But all she could feel for them was some annoyance and a bit of glee for getting into trouble out of their recklessness. Serves them right.
Jeanne wondered if that thought made her a bad person. Even so, she put that aside to focus on the potential enemy before her. He shouldn't be a bad person, after all, with the woman's description and testimony, this should be the same person that helped her.
"Hey, you! Big, Black and Edgy!" Jeanne shouted to catch his attention.
The man paused… and deliberately turned his back to her!
"Uh… okay?" Maybe, just maybe, he might not have like that description, "Wait a second… you're Bobby aren't you?"
"I see, so you've heard. The girl, is she safe?"
She thought for a second about denying him the answer since it was an internal affair, but since he was involved in it, she figured that it wouldn't harm anyone.
"Yes, she is. We have to verify the truth of that matter, but if what she has said is true, then you have my thanks."
He sighed in relief, "We were on the verge of greatness, we were this close…"
"What?" That made no sense.
"It's a reference. Go watch Rogue One, it counts as a prequel."
Now he was just being strange. The deep and intimidating voice of his combined with the strangeness of his words simply made the whole situation surreal.
"Okay! I had no idea what you've just said so let's get this started! Surrender now and I won't hurt you too much!"
She still had to deal with him for hurting her group of idiots and… possibly protecting human-eating creatures.
"I don't see why that is necessary. Are we not on the same side?"
"You're a stray exorcist."
"From your point of view, perhaps. But I was not talking about it from that angle."
"Then from what angle?"
"We both want to aid the innocent, do we not? If you truly are the person who has inherited the soul of Jeanne D'Arc then shouldn't you aid the people?"
"… Explain."
It was the people that were behind him that did the explanations.
Jeanne was shocked. The people were rescued and teleported out of the vampire heartlands after being mindless slaves to their vampire lords? All the human slaves were brought out here where the encounter between the exorcists and the vampires began, apparently by Bobby for convenience's sake so that the church could take them in and help them, but were attacked by her team for "commiserating" with vampires?
Then this "Darth Bobby" went and subjugated everyone else instead of just the vampires.
"First of all, all of you idiots groaning on the ground, you deserved that and you're all fired. Secondly… uh, you, Bobby," That name made her want to laugh, "That's all well and good, so if you're on the same side and all, why are there still vampires here?"
"They are turned vampires who have family among the slaves. After doing some checks, they still wish to be together and so I reunited them after hearing their plight." W here and how did he pick the correct vampires from? Did he also save the turned ones?
There were so many questions that she wanted to ask, but she had to resolve the current situation first.
"The church will not accept them."
"Even though they are victims just as much as the human ones are?"
"They're vampires!"
"That hardly matters. If it makes you feel any better, only the high level vampires require regular humans as sustenance, the low-level ones can feed off donated blood and even then, they can last for weeks on just a single blood bag."
"I don't believe you."
Jeanne realized just how lacking their information is on vampire diet and society, as it never mattered to her before, yet couldn't budge on this.
Allowing this would just result in pointless "mercy kills" if they ever got near the Vatican.
"They can't come with us."
"Then I'll just have to resettle them somewhere else then."
A shadowy "thing" swallowed up a few tiny groups of people among the rescued. Was that his power? She quickly began thinking of non-vampires who might have abilities that could pull that of and other Sacred Gear's that could achieve that effect.
Nothing other than a few normal shadow based Sacred Gear's came to mind.
She could take him.
Or so she thought.
"You can't just let them roam free either. They're dangerous!"
"They hardly will want to go around becoming like their evil masters."
"It's only a matter of time."
"I disagree."
"Then you're coming with me! Sorry, but Mister Bobby's going to need to speak with my bosses!" She said as such to the benefit of the rescued humans who were glowering at her for following church policy.
"Take this!" A sword to enhance her speed, and another sword that would absorb light energy (made for practicing against other Exorcists) that should counter his blade of light.
She could make holy swords with many effects thanks to her inherited Blade Blacksmith.
In a few steps, she reached Bobby and swung her swords intended to "disarm" him.
A flash of purple light streaked across her vision.
Both swords were sliced in half.
Instinctively, she jumped back and shot forth hundreds of normal holy swords in a form of a wave to damage him, but most importantly, get some distance to reassess just what happened.
He swung his blade and the sheer force of his actions shattered the blades shot at him as if it were a wrecking ball being flung through a house made of glass.
The trees just behind her had also been sliced from the shockwave of the attack.
If she had made a misstep… if he did not deliberately missed her, then the force of the attack would have taken her arm.
Looking at the molten metal at the places where her sword was broken, she realized that it was less of a sword made of blessed light, but more of a sword made of pure heat.
She could work with that.
"Not bad! But let's see how you deal with this! Mister Edgy!"
"Don't call me that."
Creating two blades that could absorb heat and use it to increase the durability of the blade, she tried attacking him, making him block her attack with his blade.
"Hmm?"
"Not so easy when your sword can't get through huh?"
"Hardly."
He moved one hand behind his back and took on a stance that reminded her of fencing.
She pressed the attack, yet, he deflected each blow with precise movements and grace.
Jeanne knew he was holding back as if he hadn't wanted to hurt her like the rest of her comrades, even so, she couldn't feel thankful as it was a hit to her pride.
He was even controlling the fight to the point where he led them away from the civilians.
She was grateful for that at the very least.
Now she could try some of her bigger tricks!
Jeanne was summarily disappointed in herself when her exploding sword trick failed.
"Perhaps you should try shooting it instead of attacking me with it. Why are you trying to blow yourself up?
"I-it wasn't stable. I was only half-done okay!?"
"… Forget it. You obviously have not reached anywhere close to your full potential yet. Take care of them."
Then he swung his blade casually and broke her blades.
Apparently he was holding back on the heat as well, before she could contemplate that thought further-
"Wait!"
-he was gone. Just like that.
In the end, she had barely did anything. She didn't save anyone like he did, she was hardly at the level she needed to be in order to be… a hero, like Jeanne d'Arc, like so many of the stronger Exorcists.
… Well, she'll just have to work on it then. Cheering herself up, she went on to sort out the more tedious business.
Namely, collecting the people, her team members and their lost limbs.
She had to make several round trips with the van because there were just so many people she needed to bring along!
It would be days later that her ordeal was finally over and she had finished making all the paper reports.
The higher-ups weren't particularly happy, despite having laughed like crazy, with how little information she got from this "Darth Bobby the Unwise". They were even less happy about the report she made regarding the devil targeting the woman she found.
Something was very odd. She had a bad feeling about this…
There was nothing she could do about it, however, so she went ahead and prepared for her next assignment.
Her new team would take some time to be restructured, and while she could have done something that would likely be more productive, she couldn't help but take the opportunity laid before her.
Turns out that there are miracles happening in Tokyo. The lame can walk, the blind can see, that sort of thing. Hospitals had been stumped by all these miracles over the past few months, and it was only now that the church had got wind of it and wanted to send someone to investigate.
When she heard about it, she instantly volunteered. With everything that has happened, she couldn't help but feel that it was like divine providence. Now then…
"How do I work this stupid smartphone? If it's so hard to use why is it called a "Smart" phone?! Argh!"
First, she had to figure out how to put in someone's phone number and then download this "LINE" thing.
Asia Argento had never felt more invigorated for years!
She had a friend! They did friend things! Watching movies are things that friends do with each other!
Oh, she wondered if it will be the same tonight as well?
It was a shame she couldn't share her joy with everyone. She couldn't talk about it.
Even if she believed that it was God's answer to her prayers, she had a "bad feeling" about talking to anyone about it, and after thinking about it, the entire situation was unusual enough and the clergy would think that she was possessed!
And more importantly… they could actually try to exorcize whatever is causing those dreams away from her.
She didn't want that to happen. It was selfish of her to want it, even if she justified it in her mind by telling herself that it was the Lord that provided this gift to her.
The only physical evidence of this gift God had granted her was the third ring on her right hand's ring finger whenever she called upon Twilight Healing's power. It was a gem-encrusted ring whose jewel was a dark-black color that seemed darker than the night itself.
Asia would normally associate such a color with the darkness of her own room when the lights go off, with the notion of her being alone, yet whenever she looked at the third ring's jewel, she sometimes heard things… sounds, as if they came from a faraway place.
Nothing happened on the first day other than entering that dream world again.
Asia didn't see Genshirou until it was many, many hours later. She chided him for his bad sleeping habits, and got a big apology from him.
He took her to see Return of the Jedi. And it was wonderful!
Except for the cannibal teddybears. They were pure evil!
Darth Vader turning back to the light was her favorite part, it reminded her of God's grace and of how love can save others!
"I would like to introduce you to the Prequel trilogy, but I would need to plan out how I want to do it."
"Is it hard to understand?"
"Kind of. It would be better if we also watched the Clone Wars series before the third movie Revenge of the Sith… that would take a long time, and since our sleep cycles are in real time, when I go back to Japan we may only get to have a few hours together if I time things right."
"N-no way…"
"Cheer-up Asia. I'll find a way."
"O-okay! Oh! I memorized where my dream world starts! Can you um… bring me there? I want you to see my place too!"
"I would love to."
It was like inviting a friend over to her home, how exciting!
When she awoke, she thanked the Lord for the fact that she felt completely rested despite being "awake" from a certain point of view in that world, and went about her day as per usual.
Weirdly enough, the sounds began to become clearer, she could hear voices today.
She decided to bring it up with Genshirou once they meet up in their dream again. She hoped that this would continue on, forever.
It was during her shower before bed that she began to hear the strange sounds again.
The shower area was communal and shared with the other nuns. Asia showered quite late, and so was often alone in the place, but on this night, she heard someone singing something.
She followed the voice and the shower sounds.
It was a male voice! What was going on? Should she run and get help?
Despite thinking all of that, for some reason, she felt safe and allowed that feeling to guide her actions.
"Did you ever hear~ The Tragedy of Darth~ Plagueis~ The Wise~" What kind of song is that? She wondered, and turned around to the source of the voice-
-and saw Genshirou floating a few feet off the ground, completely naked, as he was showering while singing to himself.
"Hii-hiiiiiieeeeeyaah!"
"H-huh? W-what?!"
Then all of a sudden, he was gone.
Her face was bright red as she tried to shake off the sight of her very muscular friend in the shower.
W-what was going on with her?
Is she becoming a dirty girl?
"Okay. Just checking… did you see me in a place where I wasn't supposed to be?"
That was the first thing Genshirou asked when they met up once more.
"Hawawaa!?"
"I'm going to take that as a yes."
Level 12
Level 12
If I run into this amount of trouble every time I go overseas then I have got to stop taking holidays.
That didn't mean I would take on a dead-end life-draining job like the salarymen or settle for being paid peanuts as a freelancer for companies, of course. Screw Japan for their non-existent work-life balance (most of the jobs at least…) and notions of fair wages.
I had much better opportunities with my current skillset.
Only the worst kinds of protagonists in harem light novels would go on to become a salaryman at the epilogue. It's a shitty trope. How can an "average main character", who will end up overcoming a fuck ton of enemies and challenges by necessity, end up in a shitty job?!
To be relatable to the readers?! What kind of lame excuse is that?!
It just means that the protagonist is running away from putting their skills and determination to better use!
Naturally, even if I'm not the main character, I will be avoiding that shitty trope and use my skills to my benefit as I have always been doing.
With both my mundane and supernatural skills, making high-quality products at a fast pace would be a cinch, passive income is the best kind of income (so long as it's sufficient).
Yes, self-employment in both the literature and technology space sounds just right for me. I can be like Kamachi.exe and churn out novels with my own artwork as if I was a factory while hoping to make some good hits. I could even devote my time to programming a game by myself using my powers, add a Gacha system and keep on producing them until I suck the disposable income out of the world's population. The possibilities were endless for me as a self-employed person.
Best of all… I technically can't take holidays if I work at my own pace. It doesn't count if I'm not working on a day allocated by the government, company or institution… nope, it doesn't count as a holiday at all.
And since it doesn't count, that means I won't end up facing off against all sorts of supernatural opponents every time I want to take a break!
That sounds like a fantastic idea!
Not.
I'm not that naive.
Apparently, my fate as a hapless side character demands that my life becomes interesting whenever I do something outside of my "boring" slice of life and grinding montage.
That's not to say that I wouldn't still go ahead with being self-employed. I just don't believe that going that route will save me from a, particularly eventful life.
At any rate, even if nothing happens, my own nature will convict me to act and create complications anyways.
I ended up laying my sights on Asia, interacted with her, then suddenly we have a Reylo-like Force Bond with a bonus dreamscape hosted on Asia's Sacred Gear Server.
My own inquisitiveness brought a whole slew of injustices to the forefront of my mind, before I knew it, I had ended up in Romania liberating slaves from the blood-suckers while accidentally running into the plot device of the later volumes, Valerie Tepes.
It took a whole lot less time to sort them out thanks to Atago's help in organizing things back in Japan.
Aside from that, when I tried getting into contact with Jeanne, I ended up overhearing Diodora's gloating and intervening with the young woman's attempted rendezvous in order to save her from his clutches. It's a shame the piece of trash's teleportation circle had finished up just as I was about to help his body meet the floor.
Chatting with Jeanne was a pleasant experience, I was happy to know that she didn't start off as an out-of-touch callous killer. Getting to test out my abilities while properly delivering the refugees safely to the church through the heritor of the Saint was more complicated than expected, but the job was done.
What a busy "holiday"!
Even so, I can't say that I am dissatisfied. If I had to do it all again, I wouldn't change a thing.
"Oh! I can't say I'm surprised that some conventions on family and marriages remain the same across the world, so I just have to sign here to marry myself off? Ufufu~" Valerie. Wat r u doin? Valerie. Staph!
"It is only natural. He saved your life, and you wanted to give yours to him."
"STOP! STOPPU! Why the hell are you jumping into marriage?! And you! Where the hell did you my family's stamp?! Why are you teaching her all the wrong things!?"
Except preventing Atago from corrupting the out-of-touch Valerie with the cultural norms of the supernatural world instead of the mundane ones, specifically when it came to the topic of marriage.
My morals regarding monogamy may have become more flexible since becoming aware of the battle harem genre in which this world abides to, even so, going straight for the harem route without dating and compatibility testing is just insane. That's why if there was one thing I would have changed, I would have handled Valerie's orientation into the outside world instead of passing her off to a fellow female.
Atago hummed and gave me an "innocent" look, "Oh my! Were you perhaps unhappy about my meme use?"
"Of course not. That was a brilliant placement. The only thing missing was a severed head on the ground. No, wait, we're not talking about the Dewit scene!"
It's too early in the morning for this. I just got back from the dream world where I talked a lot about Star Wars with Asia after watching Return of the Jedi with her.
Then suddenly I got blindsided by this! Even I can feel flabbergasted at surreal events like this… can't these girls be a bit more considerate in the timing? At least let me Tsukkomi in the late afternoon instead of the start of the day.
"From my point of view monogamy is evil!"
"And now you're not even trying."
"Aww, okay. I just thought that you would be happier about this."
"At least give it more than a week! This isn't some shitty Isekai light novel where someone gets hitched in like a day!"
Come to think of it, Atago's been teasing me about Asia recently and has made a couple of jokes regarding my tendencies being that of a harem protagonist at times… I guess I shouldn't be that surprised that she's encouraging this.
"And stamp!" Valerie inked the family stamp and pressed it onto the marriage registration form that Atago had taken from Kyoto's supernatural world's equivalent of a civil office.
"That is not going to be processed anytime soon. And you, Valerie, I don't think you're thinking this through."
"Ufufu! What are you talking about? You have a Dragon-type Sacred Gear so that makes you a dragon. I'm a princess, and you took me from my castle, and everyone knows that when a dragon kidnaps a princess they have to marry them." Oh no, double onee-san laughs.
"First of all, that's racial profiling. Just because I have a Dragon-type Sacred Gear doesn't mean I'm a dragon. Next point, it was a rescue, not a kidnapping. Lastly, don't you mean that the dragon forces the princess to marry them? I certainly am not, and will not, force you to do anything you don't wish to."
Valerie waves her hand, "Oh no. It's always the dragon that gets forced to marry the princess." Is she trying to dismiss my last point or is this an attempt to mind trick me?
Atago nodded along, "That's right. You may not know this, but it's a common children's story for us princesses." Does she really expect me to believe that?
"How unfortunate that you are attempting to deceive me. I know for a fact that stories regarding heroes and dragons often have them in the same cultural roles as they do in human stories." A brief recollection on Ravel's backstory reminded me of that.
It's a lot easier to remember "minor" things that make up the personality of the main harem than it is the "major" things that define a side / minor character within the novel. At least, that's my experience thus far.
"Even so, a hero to his princess must take responsibility."
Not understanding Valerie's remark, I asked her to explain further.
"It's because of you that… I can't live without you anymore."
My mouth mimics "Surprised Obi-Wan" as I tried to recall what I could have done to elicit such a reaction.
"Gen, I mentioned it earlier, the lady I was speaking to before I talked with my parents is an honorary aunt of mine. She's a vampire cat, yes, they exist like in the movies but well, cuter. Point is, for some vampires, once they taste top quality blood their dietary requirements will go up several levels to the point where they may not subsist on weaker blood. This is a very rare case, normally, even high ranking vampires that drink the blood of a dragon type creature can still feed on humans consistently. The thing is… your blood is abnormal, even if you aren't actually a dragon at present."
"This sounds very contrived and convenient despite making some amount of sense."
"Of course it does. I made it up. Even so, some of it is true, from a certain point of view. Thing is, she can't be satisfied with any other blood except for yours now since your blood apparently makes normal high-rank dragon blood taste boring."
"… Valerie, is this true?"
To my horror, she had begun to describe her feelings on the matter in such a way that I wanted to cover my face and hide in shame.
"From the moment you came into my life, there hasn't been an hour gone by when I haven't thought of you. And now that I'm with you again, I feel content, safe and happier than I have ever been. The closer I get to you, the warmer I feel. The thought of not being with you makes my stomach turn over. My mouth goes dry. I feel dizzy. I can't breathe. I'm haunted by the blood that you should never have given me. My heart is beating, hoping that the sound of your voice will never leave me. You are in my very soul, comforting me and fighting off the darkness that threatens to consume me. What can I do? I will do anything you ask…"
I wish I could just wish my feelings on this away now because I want to bury my face into the ground.
How can she say all of this without being embarrassed?
I can spout prequel memes all day long but not even I can survive Anakin-tier flirting. Come to think of it, wasn't she essentially a slave? Please tell me that I'm not the SadPadme now.
I get the feeling that I must have left a small piece of my soul (recoverable) when I fixed all the soul contamination in her because I can think of no other reason for why she can paraphrase the prequels to this extent without my memory.
At the corner of my eye, even Atago is embarrassed, and she has currently stolen all the pillows on the bed, burying her entire head in them.
"I-I t-thank you for your heartfelt words. H-how about we just think about… us… for a bit longer?"
"Oh, certainly. It would be foolish to just get married immediately. Let's discuss this after you introduce me to your parents." Valerie suddenly began to sound reasonable again.
… What is even… I don't… you know what? Why not? Let's just see how it goes.
We only had a few more days in Europe before my Spring Break ended. Valerie, Atago and I traveled around different countries after we made sure the paper and electronic trail was concise to explain my brief trip to Romania.
Her aunty Sophie had already sent a passport for Valerie to use, Japanese citizenship with visas included, which wasn't that surprising considering how much bureaucracy skipping that the supernatural world does on a daily basis within the human world.
My time with Asia continued as we dreamed together. I managed to synthesize some scenes from the Darth Plagueis book and combined it with the Phantom Menace movie within the dream world, giving her a more complete experience to the pre-empire galaxy.
I think I may have corrupted her slightly in that she now understands the lengths in which someone would go to in order to achieve power. And I hadn't even gotten to showing the "Jedi Trap" aka the true purpose behind the Clone Wars in its entirety yet.
We didn't spend time in just our dreams. Valerie and Atago had been understanding of my circumstances and accommodated the seemingly random visual and audio connections between Asia and I.
At first, we could only see and talk to each other, which was often a happy occasion especially when we found some privacy in order to speak about our day and a lot of other things. It was only when we were all boarding the plane that the connection felt strong enough to the point where we were compelled to attempt touching each other.
"Hehehe…"
"Hmm, did you think of something funny?"
"Not really. I just thought it feels funny… every time we touch I feel this tingly feeling."
Asia playfully placed the palm of her hand on my own again, I focused on the sensation, realizing it felt similar to a discharge of current.
"Static electricity. It reminds me of when I generate too much of it when walking along a carpet and touched someone after the fact."
"Yes, that's it!"
"You learn something new every day."
"Yeah… um, do you think, when you fly off…"
"I've already been to so many countries in Europe so I'd like to think that distance doesn't matter between us." I reassure her, getting a smile and nod from Asia even if she seemed to be holding back some tears.
I was about to board the plane back to Japan after all.
"Y-yes, I know. Even right now, I can see you in my mind clearly, I can feel you… now I won't forget, even if we are far apart, it'll still feel like I'm with you." The young girl managed to convince herself after all.
"Yeah. We may be split apart but that's quite alright, I'm sure, that one day we'll end up finding our way to each other."
That is if canon still rolls around and Diodora still follows his list.
And even if it didn't, I would still find a way to see her without her finding out about my capabilities if possible, and if not?
Well, if she really needed me there, I will be there for her. Always.
Valerie's reaction was much like Atago's when she first rode on the plane. This time, however, I ended up with two girls using both my shoulders as a place to lean their head against.
The peaceful journey back home ended when I had a really "bad feeling" about something.
I took the both of them into my arms and rushed back to my home, the pieces of my shadow relays on standby mode reconnected to me, and I almost stilled in panic before I released my emotions into my shadow, turning it into power for my future use.
I sunk us all into the shadows and shot out of my mother's shadow, just in time to intercept and deflect the huge outstretched hand about to lay a hand on her.
A simple kick knocked the arm all the way back, sending the towering figure backward as it fell to it's back.
"Argh!"
"H-huh…?"
Across the empty park, we found ourselves in, I could sense all the injured guards Atago's family had assigned to protect my family barely conscious on the ground, all of my family (even my parrot Sheev who was kept in a cage) were currently situated behind us right now.
Well, considering that I'm not a fan of memory alteration, I guess I should focus on making a good impression now. No scary powers then, perhaps something familiar.
With my invisible threads, I pulled the injured clansmen back and immediately healed their most urgent injuries while gesturing with my hand after placing Valerie and Atago down.
"Honestly, I really can't leave you guys alone without having a threat to your life, can I?" I turned to them in order to flash them a smile.
"Gen…? I-is that… how did you…?" My mother had the closest view and apparently, had the level-headedness to comprehend what I just did.
"Amazing! Onii-chan is strong!"
"Beat him Onii-chan!"
In her arms, I could see both my siblings (one of which was carrying Sheev's cage) looking up at me in shock and wonder, and behind them, my father was looking at me with a relieved expression.
"Somehow, I always knew you would come. Just like back then in London."
He knew? But how did he-
"YOU BRAT! What the hell do you think you're doing barging in on my meal!?"
I suppose I will have to ask my father later.
… Eh? Who is this red giant brute?
"I asked the guards, apparently, he's a wanted Oni serial killer who just killed his entire family recently and has begun eating humans for fun." Atago informed me while looking at the monster with clear disgust in her eyes.
"He looks weaker than my self-proclaimed brother." Valerie remarked.
I don't think that says a lot considering that Marius, the kin-slayer Oni and I are all in the same category of "weak" in comparison to the beings with actual power in this universe.
"Is that so? You there, would you like to surrender?"
"I will eat your women in front of you."
What is with one-off over-the-top villains? Can they be bought from a convenience store for 100 yen or something?
"Are you threatening me, Master Oni?"
"What do you think!? Fuck, you're going to pay for what you did to my arm!"
And you're going to pay for using obscene language in earshot of my siblings.
Hmm… It's best that I leave a positive impression for my family by using a friendly and familiar type of power before I will have to explain everything.
My lightsaber shoots out from the shadow of my sleeves into my waiting hands.
A Jedi's weapon.
"It's violence, then."
As far as anyone could tell, the monster may as well have just stood there and let me stab him slowly.
It wouldn't have changed the outcome at all.
Level 13
Level 13
At the heart of my questionable decisions in obscuring the truth lies a disturbing lack of faith for this world's humanity. My brushes with death and the existences of tropes that make life in this universe so much more different from my first life had colored my expectations to expect the worst of others under certain circumstances.
Honesty was not an option for me back then as I believed that I wouldn't be accepted as I was by my parents and humanity as a whole due to certain qualities that the humans of this universe had that made them… so much lesser than the normal humans of my first life.
The origin for such beliefs laid in what I knew to be the foundation of this universe and it's conception as an idea turned profitable venture rather than the actual science of it all.
I couldn't rightfully fling accusations upon anyone after reflecting on the harem light novel genre as a whole given that it's my guilty pleasure too. Even so, it was this universe carrying elements of my most disliked part of the genre that drove me to keep secrets from my parents.
From my own experiences with the majority of "mediocre, at best" light novels, which is to say, anything that has bad execution, lack of creative ideas, demonstration of a lack of talent and effort, etc… I had come to noticed a peculiarity that caused me to fear the reactions of my parents.
Essentially, I couldn't help but come to see the particularly mediocre or worse harem light novels… as the bashing fics to the Isekai genre as a whole.
Protagonists with "original" personalities developed by the setting's lore or those with a mish-mash of "stock" personality traits that actually make for a compelling character thanks to proper story-telling are a rare breed.
On the other hand, one only needs to take a look at the other 90% of titles out there to know that most would only purchase them for the strange title or the cute girls on the cover, with little care to whatever personality or "viewpoints" that the stock protagonist has unless it's actually funny.
The worst ones would have the lack of engaging "personality" from the protagonist viewpoint character be made all the more apparent when literally any other character has more depth than them, even the generic waifus.
How can anyone actually like such a being as a "character"? Why would anyone even read about such an unlikeable and unrealistic "character"?
Well, there's an answer to that. The formula has been cracked. Rejoice, young authors!
You just have to make every other character so unbearably evil or stupid that you'll be able to derive a scrap of catharsis from the main character's triumph over them and getting the girl while they're at it.
Now, imagine this. A generally upright protagonist with some "flaws" that due to the narrative, are actually his greatest "strength" and the world pretty much runs along with it. He has many peculiarities regarding one of his most defining parts of his personality that makes readers either love him or hate him.
In-universe, however, if one considers all the other people of the same race that has the potential to be just as interesting as he does… naturally, it doesn't make that much sense to suddenly make him the center of the universe and black hole to the affections of almost all women that the readers take a liking to.
Unless of course, the vast of the faceless majority that makes up the human population is generalized as individuals that act out in fear of the unknown and those with power. As was the case with Asia when she kindly healed a little boy resulting in his mother taking him away quickly out of fear back in the first volume. And that was a very, very tame case.
Sometimes such a cliche had been overdone in some light novels to the point where you start to wonder if it really isn't a bash fic in disguise. It's done in a low-key manner in DXD as a way to excuse the status quo and whatever political situation within the Underworld for the more human-like population of devils.
In this particular context, it's a way to not only to place certain characters like Asia and Akeno in a miserable position but also for the protagonist to always have the higher moral ground for simply being an honest, kind and accepting person.
While I can't say that I'm honest all the time, I will admit that I do fit into some of the stock criteria in terms of action, even if my reasons are due to both meta and maturity reasons.
I digress, the point is, humans are pretty shitty in this world and having my parents reject me out of fear or some paranoia on par with Anakin's mental state nearing the end of the Clone Wars wouldn't be surprising at all.
The only reason why Issei got away with it was due to his status as the main character.
Having the love and acceptance of his parents when they found out about the truth was pretty much necessary for both plot and story development.
As a side character, I didn't have any of those plot advantages.
I was somewhat convinced that the world might conspire against me as an attempt to turn me evil or bitter to the point where I would do something I would regret.
I wouldn't be surprised if the world would try to push the "evil ex-boyfriend" plotline as a way to steal the people I love and give them over to some other character as if they were possessions.
Rejection from those that I love is but one of many stock tropes to excuse negative character development.
None of that happened today.
"Ooooh! My brave little boy has grown up so much! You're a Jedi like you've always wanted to be too!" My mother Haru had run up and hugged me right after I left the monster in pieces like a Separatist leader.
"M-mom! I'm glad that you're alright." And didn't just run away in fear.
"Hoooooly shiiiit! H-how! Why! Son! That was so coooool!" My father Gotou had completely forgotten the part where they all almost died. Figures. He wasn't a big Star Wars lore fan but whenever a lightsaber battle is on-screen, hoo boy, he changes into a completely different person.
"I am so touched by your concern…" I drawled at his over-enthusiastic reaction.
"Big brother! I wanna be your apprentice! Teach me how to spin like you." Gosei started to pester me, hey, where is he going?"
"Oi! Back! Back I say!" I swing my hand around at the side to keep him away from my lightsaber. "Dangerous laser weapon here! And no, you're not going to be my apprentice if you annoy me."
"That's not a no." Kouho pointed out, I can see that she's going to be the witty one of the twins sometime in the future.
"… You got me there. Anyways, hold on, let's stop for a second… are you all alright?"
Turns out that the guards did a pretty good job of detecting the threat, escorting them to a safe place (until the Oni caught up) and protecting them from it long enough for me to make my appearance.
I made sure to thank them all for their hard work and loyalty before promising them something special later down the line.
"Wait a second, before I start explaining things, dad, could you explain what you mean by knowing I would be coming just like in London?"
"Well, you did save me from the serial killer… I put the pieces together over the years."
"That's what I don't get… how did you know?"
"You didn't change the shoes that I bought for you."
Wait a second… oh, right… when I rushed past him and was swallowed in by the shadow portal, my main disguise was the unfamiliar hoodie that my grandparents got for me without them knowing.
I wasn't the type to ask for many things or want for new things (like clothes) outside of very specific Star Wars merchandise on holiday events. My father was the one that usually bought shoes for me so it wasn't surprising that he managed to recognize them when he's the type to carefully choose his gifts to others.
"After that, I thought about how you would always stay near us or even skip school to guard us whenever you had a "bad feeling". And before you had those feelings, you would often come to talk with us about it and… we didn't believe you. I think, somewhere down the line, we did start to believe there's a small change of it happening but… we didn't find any evidence of it happening again."
That was my father's evidence collection.
My mother on the other hand…
"Gen, you can't really fool me by putting pillows under your blanket. I'm your mother, do you think I won't check up on your room whenever I feel worried? Even at night?"
Ah.
I totally had that coming.
How unfortunate that I only got my human shadow constructs living and breathing after meeting Valerie. Well, perhaps this is for the best, they do seem accepting of all of this.
A strange thought came into my head. I'm likely misremembering this, but I may have read somewhere in a forum back on normal Earth that canon Saji's family knew he was a devil. Yet I also remember reading that his family was dead… why am I remembering it now? I highly doubt I'm remembering anything at all. It's likely just some false memories being made up in my head.
Even so, that left me wondering about what would have really happened, had I failed to save my parents. No doubt, the twins and I would have been living with our grandparents that could have died due to "natural reasons" once the plot decides to be unreasonable, and have them die of old age or sadness or something.
"Well… while I do have a lot to tell you, there's also a lot I shouldn't tell you, if only so that any other monsters or people that would consider me their enemy can't just hypnotize the answer out of you, learn my weaknesses then put us all into greater danger."
The twins were disappointed that I wasn't going to show them everything I could do while my parents were much more understanding of the matter.
At any rate, it was time to properly introduce everyone.
"I apologize for concealing my true nature from you all, but in accordance with Gen's decision to reveal the truth, I will be introducing myself to your family once again." Atago introduced herself after removing the glamour over her fluffy ears.
She later entertained the twins by letting them touch her ears a bit, although she found it slightly annoying since they didn't know how to do it right.
And now it was time to play translator.
"Everyone, this is-"
"- I am Valerie Tepes, it is an honor to meet the family of my hero."
She spoke Japanese.
Huh?
"Since when can you speak this language?"
"I have no idea."
I hadn't gotten to putting our language into her mind with my abilities yet as I did with my father when it came to his English language skills.
My mother and father quickly decided to take her in after we explained her circumstances.
Valerie had the foresight to have me make some looting tours back at the castle, so we had some jewelry, gold and other valuables that could be sold for money, which should ensure our financial status from hosting one more person wouldn't be at risk.
Even then, Valerie could just subsist on my blood, although my mother insisted that she eat normal food too since she's part human, and therefore, should learn to appreciate the cuisine of normal humans too.
I'm pretty sure that my family was behaving in a way that can be classified as "non-standard" at best considering how well they are taking this. The twins were kids, so they focused on the cool parts and settled with that.
My parents had their suspicions that I was more than they assumed years ago, yet hadn't confronted me about it because they saw I was still their son in every way that counts. And that they thought I was happy so everything was still alright.
They were different from my first set of parents. Thankfully, not the standard DXD adult kind of different, as if it was anyone else (outside of comedic minor characters), then I would have been on the edgy OC with shitty parents timeline.
A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one.
Spring break ended and things have started to settle down for my family.
Raiga and Sakura came over to our house for a more detailed debrief into the supernatural world one day while Atago and I helped her auntie Sophie settle the turned vampires (and human family members) into their new life. We had helped out since they were more familiar, comfortable and trusting the us two who helped them escape. Atago got some chuuni title that seemed to be the norm in the supernatural world while I got the "respectful" title of "Lord Bobby" from the group.
That said, I had to fight off various attempts by her thirsty aunt to drink my blood, as if Valerie's case was any indication, the special energy content of my fluids was something addictive to vampires.
I've been working on fixing Valerie's condition which could probably improve through training and researching the Holy Nail we got from the castle, but for now, I'll just put that off since Valerie should be able to recover from her ordeal first.
Well… she seemed to be dealing well in that regard. As she was a few years older than me, she could do a bunch of things within the financial sector that I could not. Valerie had kept a portion of the liquidated treasures upon my parent's insistence and then started using that money to buy and sell stocks.
I don't know why, but she's ludicrously good with numbers and money matters… I don't get it at all. She's picked up her computer skills from me easily enough then immediately went to try her hand at "making a living" from the safety of her bedroom.
Within a week, my parents made her the family's portfolio manager.
I had no intentions of taking advantage of her talents, especially at this point of time, but she insisted on investing what money I had, from my "share" of the loot and the apparent "bounty" placed on the Oni.
When I protested, she walked out of the room, took out the folded marriage registration forms from her bosom and placed it in front of my parents. My mother had some pretty "convincing" arguments on why I should let Valerie do this.
Before I knew it, I was eating late night Ramen with my father as we discussed the economic and cultural origins of why women handled all the finances in Japanese households. You know, father-son bonding time…
It took a while for the revelation to hit me, but I soon realized that my parents wanted more grandchildren than I expected. Personally, I blamed Raiga and Sakura for softening them up to the idea of multiple spouses so early. Not that I'm not appreciative of their efforts, I just thought that they wouldn't all be pushing this so soon.
Ironic. I could rush into training every scrap of ability I have, but not relationships.
It was hard to organize a time to meet with Asia these days. I had to keep up the appearance of a normal human too, so I couldn't just sleep at irregular hours to meet with Asia, even so, things did work out as Asia managed to gain some good control over the passage of time within the dream world. Nowadays, she could just "sleep" until I joined her (in the early morning for me, late night for her), automatically waking up from the bed in her dream world's cottage whenever I entered the dream world.
I was still my usual training junkie self, however, which my parents accepted even if they didn't necessarily liked it, and so neglected my sleep until it was nightfall in Italy. I only slept around 3 hours a day so that I could catch Asia just as she turns in for the night, before going about my day in the morning back in the real world.
Things were starting to settle down nicely… until of course, I totally forgot that I hadn't been as discreet as I would have liked about my philanthropic healing activities.
"And sent!" Jeanne cheered as she finally sent her message to her friend.
After about two weeks of training interspersed with helping the rescued victims of the vampires, Jeanne had finally gotten the approval to go over to Japan in order to research the outbreak of miracles happening in Tokyo.
She had received a holy artifact that replicated a miracle that would allow her to communicate in a different language, just for this mission, she had to return it later.
"Hmm, hmm~ It's dinner, then." Genshirou replied that they could meet up for dinner after he dropped his school stuff back at home.
Her intentions for coming to Japan weren't as pure as she would have liked. She wasn't doing this to do her duty, considering that most of her duties were purely extermination missions, she certainly wasn't being very dutiful by deliberately seeking an investigative mission.
Jeanne's motives could not be considered pure if a large part of why she was doing this was to not only meet her friend but to avoid killing for a little while.
She berated herself for such selfishness yet couldn't help but feel at peace with the decision. Feeling God's peace to fill her heart, she truly began to believe that this was the right choice and that God brought her here for a reason.
Jeanne spent her first day, after checking into the hotel in the afternoon, gathering the testimonies of those healed. She followed the reports the church had compiled of news articles talking about mysterious healings and went to speak with those people.
Most were happy to talk about how it changed their life, some simply thought of it as good luck, and very little of them believed it had something to do with divine intervention. Jeanne thought it was unfortunate but there was nothing she could and should do, about it.
There wasn't much useful information, however.
"Okay! Let's go, one more for the day!" And if she was quick enough then she would be able to make it to the restaurant they were to meet at right on time.
"Hello there!" She rang the doorbell of a certain household.
A rich looking man with a bright smile greeted her at the door, "Good evening young miss, how can I help you?"
"Are you Mister Hanakai? The one in this article?"
"Why yes, yes I am. Ah, I see, you want to hear more about the best day of my life outside of my daughter's birth!"
"… Yeah sure, let's go with that!"
The house felt a bit… off. There was magic in this house.
He was one of the most vocal proponents about a supposed miracle man she had met. One of his suspicions was a teenage boy of all things… for some reason, the features he listed sounded very familiar to her.
"Oh, I think my daughter is home. Ah, it's really nice to take a break and greet everyone at the door for a change!"
Jeanne got the impression that he's someone who really knew how to find joy in the little things in his life after getting healed miraculously.
"I'm back!"
"Momo-chaaaaan!"
"D-dad! Stop it! M-my friends are here…"
"Aww…"
As some beings entered the house, Jeanne's senses flared to the max as she recognized the foul sensation.
Devils, she thought.
She controlled her motions, she didn't want to alarm the friendly man, especially of the fact that his daughter's friends were devils.
But what if he knows and he's a collaborator? Jeanne wondered, and then shook her head, dismissing the idea of eliminating him.
He's done no wrong as far as she could tell. So long as she wasn't attacked by him then she would not raise her blade against him.
"Guess what? A schoolgirl from France dropped by because she heard about what happened and wanted to hear more! Isn't that amazing?"
"W-what? Dad, what are you talking about?"
"Jeanne-san! Please meet my daughter Momo!"
Behind the white-haired girl was a powerful devil with a short bob cut and violet eyes, the other being behind the devil was a weaker one with shoulder-length, reddish-brown hair and brown eyes.
Jeanne ignored the wariness, fear, and modicum of something akin to a promise of death coming from the devil who was likely the King of a peerage and simply greeted them all with a cheerful smile.
She didn't overstay her welcome, however, and quickly excused her self citing that she's running late for a meeting with a friend.
"And just where do you think you're going?"
"Oh, for dinner!"
The stern looking devil slipped away and followed after her in about a minute after she left.
"The church has historically ignored Japan for the most part."
"Is that so? I didn't know that. I never got the chance to read up on all the mission logs Miss Devil~ I was too busy traveling the world killing your extended family wait a minute… um, how many generations away are you from Lucifer again?"
"I will not let you do as you please here."
"The whole of Japan isn't devil territory, devil-chan! Oh hey, the honorifics are coming out again. Stupid weird relic."
Suddenly, the devil started to look particularly interested in the trinket Jeanne was carrying.
"Is that a relic made with a fragment of the Tower of Babel?"
"I think so. Look, if it works, it works."
The female devil started to mutter something about it being wasted on her rather loudly. Well, with those glasses, Jeanne supposed she shouldn't have been surprised that the devil is a bookworm type.
"A-ahem, anyways, what is your purpose for being here?"
"I would say none of your business… but I think it's pretty obvious."
"The elusive miracle healer, hmm, does the Church suspect that it's a holy type Sacred Gear?"
"Well, it's- wait a second… you aren't getting information out of me that easily, points for trying though! You almost got me."
The devil smirked a little, "Throwing around accusations already? My my…"
"Oh my, devil-chan, could it be that you're trying to provoke a fight from me?"
"Certainly not. I know better than to risk igniting a war. I will not hold back from retaliating, however, if you intend to harm the family of my peerage."
"Don't worry about that, I'm not going to kill them. It's not like they count as heretics anyway. Besides, if I had to kill every heretic I find, then… I'd like to think I could get to the 6 digits within a year."
"How reasonable…" The devil spoke with a flat tone, not finding her words amusing at all, "Hmm perhaps… would you be interested in exchanging information then?"
"I'm not giving up church secrets that easily."
"Don't jump to conclusions. I am speaking of your investigation into this miracle maker. I too, have come to Tokyo in order to… finish my business with the being responsible." The devil glanced back at the household she was just in.
Jeanne didn't know what was going on but it sounds like one of those devil pride matters that she should avoid.
Jeanne was surprised that she even considered it.
Blasted devils and their silver tongues, pretty lips, beautiful eyes and…
What the heck was she thinking? Damn devil! The harlot was obviously trying to confound her!
Before she could reply, she heard a familiar voice shouting something in her direction.
"Oh! Jeanne! What are you doing here?"
She looked to the right to see Genshirou calling out to her from the road's junction.
"Genshirou! It's you! What are you doing here?"
"I was just on the way to the restaurant. I didn't think I would see you on the way. Want to walk together?"
"Sure, let's go!"
Jeanne followed his lead and was going to start talking about her busy week until someone interrupted them.
"Wait a second, your answer, if you will." The devil behind them wanted a response so quickly?
Genshirou turned around to look at the devil, and looked back at Jeanne without stoping to stare at the pretty devil, "Friend of yours?"
Jeanne smiled, "Nope~"
"Okay then, shall we be off?"
"Yup! So, what are we going to be eating? I didn't understand the restaurant name at all."
Jeanne spared a second to glance back at the devil fuming at her rudeness, and perhaps a little bit of indignation for being ignored by the both of them?
It was surprisingly fun. Who needs to kill devils when you can just annoy them to death?
Level 14
AN: Next one will be in different POV's, should wrap up the arc by then.
Level 14
Life can get a lot more complicated for someone attempting to attain enough power to keep the ones they care about from dying. The world feels like a more volatile and chaotic place when I know that there are well over a hundred of individuals capable of wiping out the peaceful life I have at a whim.
I am, of course, taking measures to deal with the dangers.
After taking a page from those Worm fanfics, where the Panacea-Skitter combo created a comprehensive surveillance system, I had spread out many upgraded shadow relays in an attempt to better secure the capital city of Japan, and by extension, my family.
This took the form of shadow constructs of my skin capable of extending the range of my Sage Mode's senses being strategically placed in the shadows of buildings a certain distance apart from each other.
My shadow clones functioned by essentially constructing an artificial body and powering it with some soul energy specifically attuned to my own. I had taken the unfortunate man's ability to function on his Sacred Gear's constructed limbs and organs to a new level. The cost of sustaining all of this is rather high, unfortunately, but I am improving on it at a fast rate by keeping it up through continuous energy absorption (mostly negative emotional energy, community service is good) and working on minimizing its cost.
Thanks to this approach, I pretty much have the power levels, other supernatural energy levels and a whole slew of sensory information in Tokyo within my observation.
It's all still very overwhelming and I am unable to process more than five times my normal capability at a time, for now. Being able to push my limits in such a way has led to much greater gains in my information and energy management capabilities, pushing me closer to bringing peace, freedom, justice, and security to my new family.
And it was during this endeavor that I discovered that more supernatural beings were present in Tokyo, granted, most of them were of a great distance away from the places that I frequented. As they were outside the normal observation areas of my traveling paths it was only natural that I missed them.
That, or they arrived during my abscence… which increases the probability of it being part of the universe's attempts to set up more plot devices to kill my parents. With the way things have been thus far, that does seem rather likely from my point of view.
If I had been more rash then I would have quickly sought to resolve this "issue" with surveillance and violence if needed. But there was no need for me to do so as I have come to realize after closer observation and new understanding blossomed in my mind as I improved on my skills.
It was as I was accustoming myself to all this new information and dealing with the new family situation that I came to understand more of this city that I knew there was little direct danger to my family at this point in time. It was by understanding, meditating and reflecting on the information I was gathering that I had gained insight into what I was actually sensing.
There was no city more suited for me to realize this.
There is no Chaos, there is harmony.
The rush hour period at train stations where everyone can barely move yet still manage to pack themselves into trains without incident, the messy muddle of foot traffic that miraculously dissipates just as the crossing signal turns red right in front of Shibuya station… it looks like chaos, but it's not really chaos because everyone knows where they want to go, what is expected of them and how others are going to react to what they do.
First-time tourists will see it as chaos, but after a while, they will see it just as the locals do.
Chaos, yet harmony. There really is harmony and chaos at the same time. And at the same time as that, there isn't chaos, there's just harmony. The world seems to be a chaotic place, but it is not. Everything affects something, which affects something else, creating an intricate web of cause and effect.
Understanding is the key to all this. Harmony means understanding the structure of something. Without this understanding, everything is chaotic. But once understanding is gained, a person begins to see patterns and understand the whys and the hows.
Once that understanding has been attained, what once appeared to be chaotic is actually harmonious. The subject itself hasn't changed, just a being's understanding of it.
So long as I change myself, my ability to see and understand things, then changing the world around me will be a feasible endeavor.
The most immediate benefit of understanding the world and the beings around me with this perceptive is that I can remain balanced, when considering the potential actions of dangerous individuals living in my vicinity, just as I would be at peace in a combat situation against any opponent that isn't an invincible OP character for me (e.g. Crom Cruach, Indra, Ophis, etc…).
If I hadn't meditated on this, I surely would have either panicked and sought to deal with the problem as soon as possible… or convert my strong emotions into energy so that I wouldn't freak out at the possible danger.
With my track record of worrying about everything and everyone then rushing off to resolve a situation (case in point, dealing with my parent's safety and the vampire liberation), I dare say that I would have remained as reckless as Anakin had I not worked on this part of myself.
A surge of demonic energy at a sector close to where Jeanne, who just entered the Hanakai household, retrieved me from my introspection.
"Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen."
I knew the passive wards of demonic magic design would have elicitated such a response.
They should be on the way to the Hanakai household now, as I had predicted. While I didn't remember the connection at first, looking into the family's records had jogged my memory regarding the eldest daughter's position in the Sitri peerage.
Ever since Jeanne had indicated her arrival to Japan from the airport, I had kept a close eye on her and used my information copying abilities to read through the church reports at a distance as I was sitting in my classroom desk.
After that, it was simply a matter of sifting through the minds of all the names listed. I used the information already provided (names, home address and statements from various sources) as a reference to search the government's database for even more information, such as working addresses that I could use immediately and phone numbers that I could track through the signal for the same result.
Heading off Jeanne's investigation results allowed me to know what everyone else knows or thinks they know about my activities. Following her first few talks with people in order to get their testimonial made her pattern of seeking the families of those impacted very apparent.
It was through this that I discovered that the Hanakai family had demonic energy powered wards that would alert certain individuals should foreign energy be detected hours before Jeanne even reached the house as part of her mission.
A plan formed in my mind on how to misdirect both Jeanne and the devils off my person while leaving behind enough clues so that the eventual reveal (this is DXD, the mentor characters will likely figure me out at some point) becomes more palatable for them.
I considered the past history of the town, the supernatural residents of Tokyo, the amount of information I could find or fabricate, then executed a hastily crafted plan that had worked swimmingly thus far.
It was I who create the scenario in order for Sona Sitri to confront Jeanne privately, thus ensuring that they were aware of each other's intentions.
I used my shadow construct abilities and light energy layering technique to create a terrifying illusionary hound, whose growls frightened off anyone planning to travel along the road where Jeanne would be walking on after exiting the Hanakai household in order to meet up with me for dinner. Google maps was truly a helpful tool for the completion of that scenario.
Once that phase of the plan was completed, it was a simple matter for me to "coincidentally" run into Jeanne "on the way" to our dinner venue, all while ensuring that I was able to present myself as a normal human to the devil for the next stage of my plan.
"Haa! It's a little hot for my tongue but ah~ It tastes so good!"
It's troubling to me that I am, once again, finding myself understanding what goes through the mind of Diodora Astaroth as this dedicated servant of God makes such a lewd face in front of me.
"I told you it would taste heavenly, didn't I?"
I smiled, savoring her delight as she swallowed once more, making sure not to leave any residue behind in her mouth.
"Ahh! Come on, give me more." Jeanne begged impatiently, pouting in a way that reminded me of a puppy, or Atago's pout whenever I tease her.
"You're in Japan now, you've got to be more polite you know?"
"Kuh, please put the meat in my mouth."
"Gladly, milady."
She opened her mouth to receive the Matsuzaka beef that I picked up with my chopsticks. Honestly, she was hopeless with chopsticks, which meant that I would have to do all the work at this famous Yakiniku restaurant Rokkasen.
While most of the money is being used by Valerie for investment purposes, I still had a good amount of money that I could afford to use once in a while. This meal is exceedingly expensive for a dumpster diver like myself, but on this occasion, I wanted to elicit a certain reaction from not just Jeanne… but our eavesdroppers as well.
Opposite to our small covered booth in the restaurant, was another larger booth of fellow lovers of high-quality beef, or it would have been if the three devils hadn't stalked us and took over the nearby table just to see what Jeanne was up to.
I could hear a commotion filled with sounds like "kyaa", "aaaah" and some painful grunts as a result of one of them overreacting, kicking their legs up and hurting themselves.
As I thought, anime girls are weak to moderate levels of Lewdity (unless they're of certain archetypes).
Jeanne's obscene reactions to good tasting food had caused the stalker devils to react in typical anime overreaction style, giving me the excuse to engage them.
I quickly placed all the cooked meat onto Jeanne's plate so that it wouldn't be burnt before excusing myself for the moment.
"Hello there, I heard some screaming and was wondering if everything is alright?" I said as I parted the two pieces of cloth that served to cover the view of the opposite booth.
The girl with reddish-brown hair had her leg up on the chair as she rubbed her sore feet, almost flashing me her panties, while the other two had some awkward hand placement that made it look like they were frustrated about something.
Spoiler: Tomoe
[img: https/vignette.wikia./highschooldxd/images/4/47/Tomoe_Meguri_-_Profile_Pic_Infobox.png/revision/latest?cb=20150508062647]
I faked surprise, "Hey, aren't you that girl I saw on that street when I met with my friend?" I pointed at Sona Sitri, who flushed and quickly shook her head before slowly composing herself.
"I do not recall… perhaps you mistook me for someone else?"
"Oh, I don't think so."
"Genshirou. You need to turn the meat around and- hey, what are you doing here?!"
Jeanne quickly walked over the moment she heard me mentioning Sona with just those few words.
Her dangerous life as an exorcist has certainly ingrained alertness into her nature.
It made me recall the kind of life children with great power are destined to have in this world just to survive or keep the peace if duty is something they decide on following through.
In order for this body to not give away any reaction to those thoughts and feelings of mine, I quickly pushed the sadness I felt to a clone stationed far away that would act out accordingly.
"Okay… awkward. Since the two of you clearly know each other, I'm just going to handle the cooking now."
I made it look like I left them to my own devices as I handled the meat carefully, making sure to both savor the familiar taste while also using my abilities to eavesdrop through the hasty sound-proofing spell that the white-haired girl, Momo Hanakai, had placed down.
Jeanne was accusing them of stalking us, to which Sona denied and said that she was following Jeanne in order to see her leads to the "miracle healer", rather than deliberately eavesdropping on the private life that she shouldn't have.
I could feel Jeanne's anger at being reminded of her lack of connections outside of the church and her sworn duty, with the temporary connection formed by being in the general vicinity, I sent her a thought filled with positive emotions so that she won't suddenly lop off Sona's head and kick off the next Great War.
Not that I think she would do so, but it doesn't hurt to be on the safe side.
"Genshirou is my friend and he's a normal guy. The devil doesn't know what she's talking about."
Feeling her anger subside, I let the conversation proceed as planned, waiting patiently until Jeanne returned.
"Ah, sorry! Turns out that I met them earlier on a… uh, school trip, but I forgot to keep in contact with them."
"That's understandable. I used to be rather bad with matching names and faces so that happened to be more than I would like to admit."
"Really, that must be like, super annoying when someone says they know you but you totally forgot about them."
"I know the feeling."
We continued talking about everything from mundane topics, to some deeper topics as well, although that didn't last long as Jeanne changed topics quickly to avoid giving information on her real life away.
It was an enjoyable dinner. I could feel that Jeanne felt the same way, up until she remembered whatever was discussed with Sona's peerage earlier.
Having known that they were discussing about the lack of any clear lead into the "miracle healer" or any related urban legends, it was time for me to lead them along just like good old Palpy leading the Jedi to whatever he needed them to do or die at.
Well, my goals were not malicious at all, and I had plenty of win-win scenarios set out for us all after scouting out the other supernatural entities in Tokyo.
"What were you talking about with those girls you met some time ago? I didn't hear anything since you were all so quiet."
"Oh, uh, well, we were talking about an uh… urban legend, yes that's the word, around the city. Do you read the newspaper?"
"I do, on occasion."
"Have you read about all the "miracle healings" taking place in Tokyo?"
"I would be living under a rock if I hadn't heard about it."
Guess I'm changing my name to Patrick Star then. I totally didn't hear about it until recently.
"What do you think about it? Do you think it's the real deal?"
"I would certainly like to, considering what happened at my school…"
"Wait, what happened?"
"Hmm, it's a long story. Hey, those girls you met seem interested in these sort of things, why don't you ask them if they would like to hear what happened too?"
Jeanne made a face at that before deciding to just be pragmatic about it and get those girls to hear what I had to share outside the restaurant.
As she was doing so, I went ahead and paid for our meal, then waited outside for them.
We quickly introduced ourselves to each other, Sona introducing herself with the fake last name of "Shitori", the hyperactive brown-haired girl introduced herself as Tomoe Meguri while Momo Hanakai scrutinized me even as we went through the formalities.
"Ah, before we begin, just a quick question Genshirou." Jeanne quickly interjected.
"Sure. What's up?" I asked.
"Does the name Darth Bobby mean anything to you?"
I made sure to look affronted by the hideous name.
"What kind of Sith name is that?! Did someone use a random name generator or something?"
I did use one.
"What's a Sith?" "A Sith Lord!?"
Two reactions. Jeanne had no idea what a Sith Lord was while the energetic girl reacted loudly to the information given.
Wait, could it be…?
I turned my head to face her as I came to the startling realization that these devils might not be as uncivilized as I thought. She had also begun to look at me with a glint of anticipation.
"It's a Star Wars thing," Tomoe answered Jeanne in my stead before turning to Sona, "I'll tell you later."
I shook my head sadly, "So uncivilized."
"I know." She nodded in understanding. Truly, both of us are beacons of knowledge, blazing out across a black sea of ignorance.
Just for that, I will be tweaking my future plans so that she'll get more out of it.
I reassured Jeanne that I would tell her all about Star Wars later before beginning the story that would kick off an urban legend hunt controlled by all the "evidence" and information that I'll be getting them over these few days.
"Did you ever hear the Tragedy of Heydrich Himuro Kaizer the Man Slut?"
Level 15M
Level 15M
"Hey, don't you think we look like a bunch of delinquents? If we leaned against the school walls like this then, slouch a bit like this… Ha! We fit right in!" The ever exuberant young swordswoman announced excitedly as she leaned against the school walls, as they waited for the young man that provided both an… engaging tale, and some legitimately useful information that allowed them to find a lingering ghost last night, to exit his school grounds.
They were all technically skipping school to conduct their investigations and observation of the French Saint on a full-time basis. With the rest of the peerage running things back in Kuoh.
Their most informed and useful collaborator, however, was a completely normal human who still had to go to school, so they needed to wait for her for any more of the promising leads that he assured them he could get easily.
"Excuse me?" Sona Sitri, or Shitori as she was known on Japan's soil, exclaimed with a hint of anger, "Are you suggesting that I, we, look anything resembling this bunch of hooligans?" She gestured to the students and… other individuals, crowding around the school's entrance as if waiting for someone in particular.
Tomoe Meguri quickly, and fearfully, denied having insinuated such a thing.
Momo Hanakai watched all of this with the same amount of patience that she had reserved for her family. Although, to be more accurate, that level of patience was no longer required to deal with her home life and could now be re-allocated to her "new life" as a devil.
Normally such a display of "stern" authority, if directed to her, would have cowed her. If it was directed to her mother, then she would have to bite down on the anger and resentment that threatened to take control of her actions, lest she ended up like him.
But when it came to her new friends, she found that she could simply smile at the by-play, as there was no stress, anger, and other issues simmering under the surface. Everyone was simply being themselves in a positive and non-harmful manner. She liked this.
"Shitori-senpai, " Momo began, making use of the relevant honorifics for the girl just a year older than her, "Please don't provoke the gentlemen here with such undiplomatic descriptions." She advised.
Most of the delinquents, weapon wielders included, seemed not to mind at all.
But a handful of men were approaching them with both angry looks and lecherous gazes.
There was no real danger at all, but she would rather not cause a ruckus. Her new "King" was still getting used to the human world and was still adjusting to Japanese social norms.
"Oi! Girlie! You think you can run off your bitch mouth like that-" All three devils rolled their eyes, on the inside, at the hypocrisy of it all, "-you're going to want to "compensate" us if you don't want to get hurt."
Sona adjusted her glasses in that very anime-like way, "I agree. You may leave your bags and wallets down on the floor as you scurry off."
Clearly, her King intended to partake in a time-honored devil tradition of looting their would-be assailants. Apparently, it was a devil nobility thing, back in the past when banditry was more prevalent in the Underworld.
"Why you little-" The thug was being interrupted by at least three dozen other look-alikes, one of which, tapped his shoulder, "What!?"
"I'm sorry, sir." The young man with a shaved head did not look sorry at all as he held up the metal bat in his hands, "It's time for you to leave."
The thirty or so delinquents looked ready to beat the life out of the rude thug, who somehow had enough brain cells to process the message and turned away, "And so it is."
They left, Sona looked at the leading young man like she was about to ask a question, and was quickly answered without getting a chance to vocalize it.
"Saji-san has standards for his challengers. He'll let you off once, without pain, on any first offense. After that… well…" He trailed off as if remembering something, the school bell rang loudly before he continued, and the man quickly went back to his position at the entrance.
"Hey, what's going on?" The former Holy Sword user of the group asked, Momo and Sona both looked at each other, nodding as they silently agreed to keep observing the situation.
For some reason, the students of the school weren't coming out, in fact, they could see that the students were all watching the school's courtyard with great interest from their classroom windows.
"Ah, I made it just on time!" The surprisingly friendly yet casually murderous Jeanne suddenly appeared beside them. "Safe!"
Momo felt a deathly chill down her spine, a spike of fear, all of it her own.
She knew that the Church was essentially the enemies of devils, with a tentative "peace" in the form of a ceasefire so long as certain rules of conduct were upheld.
None of them sensed her coming. If she was serious about killing them at all, they would have just died then and there.
Her ever confident, if but slightly arrogant King, had said something along the lines of "we can take her". Tomoe of the Meguri clan, who was the only swordswoman in the group with actual monster slaying experience, had happily stated that Jeanne would have slaughtered them so easily it wouldn't even be funny.
Momo knew Tomoe to be an optimistic person. Yet the holy sword user could tell that the French holy sword user was on an entirely different level in an instant.
It's unfortunate that her King hadn't heeded that possibility until now.
"Hyaa!" Sona just flipped and fell to the ground, right after turning to the side and seeing Jeanne's rosary right in front of her face.
Momo placed a hand above her mouth to look shocked and worried, and more importantly, hide her snickering.
"What's wrong devil-chan? You're weird." The self-proclaimed Saint grinned innocently despite knowing full well what she actually did, "What's going on? Is Genshirou coming out? See anything Momo-chan? Ah, Asian Former Exorcist-chan, the trilogy was great. I marathoned through it last night at the hotel."
Momo didn't know whether she liked being referred to so closely by her new race's natural enemy. Tomoe had a complicated look at having such a nickname reminding her of the past while also sharing in the joy that she might have converted Jeanne to the Star Wars fan side, which Genshirou had apparently been born into, if the frequency of memes was any indication.
"Hello there!" They all heard a familiar voice calling out to them, well, all of them.
They could see the person they were waiting for walking up to the huge gathering of people with a gentle smile.
"General Saji. A bold one as always." The shaved head guy greeted him as if he was some sort of rival.
"You were the Chosen One!"
"Huh?"
"Uh. Nevermind. So… is it Challenge Thursday already? I haven't been keeping track."
"That's… why we're here."
"Good to know. Your move."
"Everyone charge! GET HIM!"
Then the delinquents and gang members charged at their new friend!
Momo was about to cast a mass sleep spell to save him, only for Tomoe to catch her wrist, shaking her head as she said, "I think they're just roleplaying the General Grievous scene. Look, everyone there has their phones and cameras out."
All the observers, both the students and a couple of people from all walks of life, who suddenly appeared near them by the entrance to record this occasion, seemed to be evidence of that.
A few seconds later and the bodies started to drop on the floor.
"That was quicker than normal!" "Shh!" "I'm betting 5 minutes this time around." The crowd were saying the strangest things.
Even more people came rushing in to the entrance, shoving Jeanne and the rest of them around a bit, just to watch the show.
It was like something out of a martial arts movie where a kung fu master would peacefully take out multiple assailants with impressive skills.
She could tell that he wasn't at the level of any supernatural fighter at all, he was simply strong, fast and skilled for his age. And apparently, very skilled, if the fact that he could continuously deflect well over 60 opponents (after the "reinforcements" arrived) after his hide without injuring them directly or receiving a straight hit was any indication.
A few minutes later, they were all watching as Genshirou helped the men up, smiling kindly and speaking with them in an encouraging manner.
"You girls are new here aren't you? Did you ever hear the Triumph of Genshirou Saji the Welcoming?" A… a journalist? There was an actual journalist here? To watch this? Wait, what the hell was she saying?! This sounds just like Genshirou's story yesterday about that rapist Heydrich, "I thought as much. What you see here is not a story the rest of Japan will tell you. He's a Tokyo Legend."
"Wait! Hold up! This wording sounds very familiar. Does this have anything to do with um… the Tragedy of… what's his name?" The saint who marathoned 6 movies last night and likely napped until Genshirou was out of school seemed to have recalled something.
"Darth Plagueis." Tomoe reminded the exorcist.
"Yes. It's a well-known fact that Saji-san over there is a big Star Wars fan." The female reporter made it sound completely normal! "It's only natural to have a little fun with researching his… interests." For some reason, this woman sounded like she had some other ulterior motive for this. Did they need to call the cops on her?
At any rate, Momo found herself surprised about all this as she had lived in Tokyo for most of her life without hearing about this at all! Then again, she hadn't been interested in many things outside her studies, her piano classes and some anime on the side. It was only natural that she tuned such matters out and thus was kept out of the loop on such "legends".
"Ah! Saji-san, will you be representing your school in the Kendo or Jiujutsu nationals after defeating the champions that had came to challenge you unofficially?"
Before they actually processed what the woman had said, she was already upon the young man like a vulture circling her potential meal… actually, that's just normal reporter behavior, isn't it?
"No. I have no interest in the fame or trouble that comes with it. My focus is always with my family and my studies, thank you, excuse me miss. Hey there girls! Sorry, I got held up a little."
Sona recovered first, "It is of no consequences. I did manage to catch sight of something… interesting."
The boy her age frowned at that, "Oh, okay." He turned to speak with Tomoe and Jeanne, and started a conversation about Jeanne's introduction to Star Wars.
"…" Sona Sitri seemed to have suffered yet another strike to her pride, apparently, the devil princess had never seen a negative reaction (outside of church forces) from someone who she blatantly expressed some level of interest in.
The young heiress likely believed that it was only natural that males would feel good about themselves with only a small gesture of interest like that.
"Are you alright?"
At the muted response, Momo placed a hand over her good friend's shoulder, reassuring her that it was "okay" just like all the times when Sona was upset over not "paying" up over the whole peerage recruitment agreement, and other minor things that Momo did not hold a grudge over.
Whether or not she believed her… father, who had been healed by this miracle man and professed Genshirou Saji (or some really close look-alike) as the person that healed him, or not… She was happy with the results either way.
Sure, she essentially became a devil for "nothing", after Sona's deal to treat her father's lifelong pains with a very expensive treatment in the underworld didn't pan out due to the miracle occurring right after her reincarnation… but there was nothing wrong about that to her considering that it all works out in the end.
Better than she had hoped for, actually.
Due to her father's beliefs on the matter, he had actually sought to change his previous behavior, modeling it after the boy that was "patient and always kind" to him despite the verbal abuse he had heaped on him.
Momo still didn't know how to feel about her much more happier and affectionate father who professed his love and pride for her every day, but it stopped feeling uncomfortable some time ago. She would always be grateful for the miracle that affected her household, both for the healing and the person that impacted her father in such a deep manner.
They soon left to follow the rest of the boy's leads.
By a great many strokes of "luck", or "misfortune" from Genshirou's point of view, he was always called away by either his family or best friend just a few minutes before they reached the location of the urban legends they were tracking.
This was fortunate for them as they didn't have to mind wipe him of any real evidence of the supernatural. It was also really lucky for them as Jeanne wouldn't cut them into pieces for even thinking about messing with his mind, partially out of feat that they could "turn him against me", in Jeanne's words.
Whenever he had left for home for Thursday and Friday nights, they were able to speak with one or two civil supernatural beings living in Tokyo, and together, they dealt with any troublesome monsters causing trouble within the city while gathering as many leads as they can about this Miracle Healer.
On Sunday evening, she managed to get a confirmation from Genshirou that he did in fact, meet her father on the day that he was healed. He seemed oblivious to whatever impact he had.
"What did I do to your father? Well, nothing but listen to him I guess… why are you asking about that?" He asked as he finished paying for some baking materials that he intended to use to bake a cake for his supposed "girlfriend" that Momo hadn't met at all. "Oh, yeah. We "met" because I bumped into him by accident. Does that count, Hanakai-san?"
"I wasn't talking about tha-" Just then, she felt a surge of family demonic energy from nearby. "Saji-san, please, go home now."
"What? But we're so close, I know I may have spend a little too much time buying stuff but-"
"-It's not that! I'm sorry, I just mean, please just go home for tonight. I'll… explain later."
Getting someone to safety without hypnosis or other magic spells (for fear of getting killed on a whim by the collaborating "Saint" that's looking for a reason to gut them) was hard, as Momo started to realize.
He blinked, then smiled kindly, "I don't get it, but I'll trust you on this. Whatever it is you're doing, stay safe alright? I don't want to see you hurt."
"Y-yes. I'll be… fine."
"Good night."
"See you later."
She ran off in the opposite direction later, just in time to find Jeanne, Sona and Tomoe engaged in a battle against a particularly strong stray devil.
Considering how humanoid and sane it looked, it was likely an A or S classed Stray devil criminal. It seemed to be fending off Jeanne's light swords by using some instantaneous plant growth abilities, fireproofed apparently, as Jeanne's flaming swords stuck in some thick branches indicated.
Sona's water magic was apparently not a good match-up against this foe, she was currently launching demonic energy bullets instead, which seemed to be doing minor damage to the defenses of the enemy.
"Oh come on! Not again!" Tomoe yelled as her katana broke. Ever since she became a devil she's been trying out all sorts of katanas to replace the Holy Swords she could no longer wield, so far, she favors a certain mass-produced brand from the Underworld, that happens to break rather easily.
Jeanne created a katana, "Miss Meguri, catch!" Then threw it at Tomoe.
Tomow dodged, "Are you trying to kill me or that devil over there?!" She screamed after the holy sword came flying at her, stabbing itself into the ground uncomfortably close to her foot.
"Is there a difference? Exorcist turned Devil-chan?" Jeanne was someone still able to fight while making conversation. Momo deduced that she still had plenty of strength to spare and was looking for an opening.
An opening she was about to provide with magic, were it not for the sudden interruption.
"Hello there."
An unsettling deep voice erupted from the shadows as the person who spoke those words stabbed right through the stray devil's back with a blade of purple light that seemed to cause the air itself to sizzle in heat.
"AHHHHHRRRGWH!" The stray was literally being burnt from the inside by the blade for a short moment before it was pulled out, then swung right across the stray's neck, removing its head.
"Darth Bobby! We meet once again! It's time for you to surrender." Jeanne definitely had a history with this… "Darth Bobby".
Tomoe had a look of utter disbelief and was staring at the blade of light, desiring the light sword it in a way a devil should not have done.
"Must we always start off with that conversation, my dear?" The man with the metal mask hiding his face asked in a tone that sounded bemused. "I am hardly your enemy."
"It's suspicious, don't you think? On how you happen to be all the way in Japan while I'm here… while Genshirou is here too?"
"Genshirou? Oh yes, that boy tagging along with your… investigations into him."
"You know? You know the healer?"
His insinuations have also caught Sona's attention.
"Oh yes, only my old master had such a knowledge of the light side of the Force to perform such deeds. As for why I'm here? He was practically inviting me by making it so obvious."
"Then you're here because of him? Why?"
"Now that would be telling."
"I will make you tell me."
Sona indicated to Momo that she should be ready to provide support when needed with a hand signal, "Miss Jeanne, I believe the purpose of our co-operation lies right in front of us. We'll take him together."
The exorcist smiled at her King, nodding.
The dark being turned to Jeanne, "Your swords, please. We don't want to make a mess of things in front of your friend."
Momo was sure everyone could feel their blood run cold at the sight of their new friend being strapped to a chair, bound by the wrist and ankles by some shadow-magic bindings.
He looked at them in great fear, "Get help, you're no match for him, he's a Sith Lord." Fear for them, that is.
"You won't get away with this Bobby!" Jeanne shouted. "My powers have doubled since the last time we met, Darth."
The "Sith Lord" laughed, seemingly very happy with the response, "Good. Twice the pride, double the fall."
She wasn't sure why, but she had the feeling that something was very off about all this… but Momo placed that thought aside, she had to save her friend and defeat this bastard.
Level 15T
Level 15T
The many late nights spent chasing the leads provided by her newest fellow Star Wars enthusiast and friend had left her a bit sleepy during the day, but more than alert enough in order to enjoy an adventure through Tokyo with everyone.
It was easy to enjoy herself.
Momo was recently reincarnated like herself and lived close to her temporary home in Tokyo after her family was exiled. The girl was patient and kind as she helped Tomoe get used to life in a big city, they also talked a lot about each other's families and got along well. Spending the day on a group adventure would naturally become fun if a great friend like that was with her.
It's a little known fact that whenever Sona wasn't strictly performing any duties then she would act much more boldly and girlier. Tomoe had been completely caught off-guard when Sona laughed out loud after hearing a bad joke about how she "had become what she swore to destroy" after being reincarnated at the behest of her parents. When her first impression of Sona was as a dutiful devil heiress, it was only natural for her to be shocked at the difference.
Apparently, she wasn't alone in that at all, as her fellow Star Wars enthusiast Genshirou Saji found himself completely surprised when her King laughed after hearing the antics of his parrot "Sheev".
"It wasn't funny when I was there. The number of misunderstandings generated was turning it into a bad 4-koma manga." He had grumbled about it over lunch, sulking as he drank his ice cold water.
"Only because it's owner couldn't help but force his poor parrot to listen to his memes every single day." Tomoe hadn't known why Sona looked so happy at reminding him about it, until she recalled that poking fun at the trouble his memes would get him seemed to be the easiest way to get him to react. Then again, Sona seemed rather tired of trying her usual methods to get attention, after being treated like a normal female acquaintance for most of the time, to the point where she was going for the low-hanging fruits.
"It wouldn't have been so bad had everyone else asked different questions." Genshirou deflected.
Tomoe hadn't let that attempt to shift the blame go at all.
"You have done that yourself." She punctuated for emphasis, before laughing at her own words.
The scene was emotional on the first watch, but after being introduced to the prequel memes subreddit properly by her new friend, she managed to find the fun out of using those lines just as he had.
He grinned and responded, "Don't lecture me Meguri-san. I see through the lies of the normies. I do not fear the meme side as you do."
"Then you are lost."
"Is it possible for you to go through one day without using a prequel meme?" Momo had asked Genshirou with a look of actual curiosity.
"I recite the Tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise every day, in different languages like French-"
"-Yeah! French dubs are the best!" Genshirou looked at Jeanne like she was the heretic.
"Excuse me? Did you actually miss out Ian McDiarmid's deliciously evil performance? It's part of what makes him the Satan of Star Wars, we have to rewatch this in English immediately."
"Noooo! I don't need to!"
It was nice to know that her race's life-long enemy wasn't an indiscriminate devil killer and closer to a girl her age with some childish bigotry against the English.
Tomoe had gotten along well with the exorcist due to some shared monster hunting background, although they quickly argued about what types of swords were the best (katanas for the win), overall, she could safely say she had a lot of fun talking with Jeanne over all sorts of things.
When they were finished with lunch, Genshirou took out a map of Tokyo's train stations and pointed to the stop where they would be getting off, "One of my classmates stays near this station and mentioned something about a creepy lady visiting a nearby cemetery every night since last week. The oddest thing about this is that there are an… unnatural amount of plants in that area now. I've seen the same thing being mentioned over some forums after searching the area name.."
"What does this have to do with this miracle healer?" Tomoe asked, not seeing how it was relevant.
"Oh! Plant growth might have something to do with giving life, and that's pretty close to healing right?" Jeanne seemed to have it figured it out. The church had more access to healing powers, in general, when compared to the devils or even the Japanese clans specializing in healing, so it's easier for the blonde to make those connections.
Genshirou had a worried look, "Let's hope that this will be the day then. Hopefully, it won't be a man-eating flower-manipulating Youkai like Yuuka Kazami."
Sona stopped walking for a moment, "How do you know about such Youkai?" Her tone betraying her shock.
"Touhou games." Momo answered in his stead, making her King flustered after jumping the gun.
"Senpai…" Tomoe's disappointment was immeasurable.
"It looks like Shitori-san needs remedial lessons through a trip to Comiket." Genshirou offered to bring her along for the summer one, "I will not enter that den of sin and iniquity!", Sona refused vehemently, to which Genshirou found entertaining for some reason.
"Ironic…" He smiled to himself like he knew something that they didn't, then everyone came to the mutual conclusion that he was just using another meme again, so they all ignored his response.
Other than interviewing the residents in the area, they had also spent the day walking about, trying any local specialties and generally had plenty of fun. To help pass the time, Genshirou had some apps on his phone to help facilitate some party games.
Oddly enough, Tomoe had noticed that it was the first time since she had been reincarnated as a devil, that she actually did "normal" stuff with an ordinary human. (Jeanne doesn't count, she's totally a monster for being stronger than Sona in terms of physical strength)
They had Udon for dinner, which turned out to be a less than quiet affair when Sona began scolding the owner for half-assing the meal, and required Genshirou to prevent them from getting kicked out. Jeanne's mouth was left hanging wide open at the sight of a devil heiress being so committed to the ideals of properly done Udon.
Since they had some more time before the lady would have appeared in the cemetery, they split up to get some last minute shopping done in the event that they may get hungry after staking the place out. Momo had left with Genshirou as he went to buy some baking ingredients to bake a cake for his best friend, hopefully, Momo would be able to find some excuse to make him go home before the stake-out began.
They all had a bad feeling about this whole thing.
That gut feeling of theirs turned out to be right when a powerful plant-controlling stray devil appeared.
Tomoe would never look at a wood splinter lightly ever again.
Alas, yet another of her favorite (same brand) katanas had been broken in a battle. If there was one thing that she disliked about being a devil (other than her family becoming temporarily unemployed), it was that quality demonic swords (or any melee weaponry) were harder to come by. And by "quality", she meant swords that could be passed down over generations without getting dented, and with the right kind of spiritual power infused into it. Unfortunately, most of those were holy swords, not demonic swords.
As for getting the right kind of quality demonic katana? The underworld doesn't really do that kind of orders unless it's the cheap kind of katanas.
She would have thought that someone would have reincarnated some famous Japanese blacksmith like Muramasa as a devil in the past, but no, devils weren't into katanas back then, so now there weren't any good katana makers in the Underworld.
Her rage over the crappy situation she found herself in was quickly washed away by a flurry of life-threatening attacks by the dangerous stray, Jeanne's crappy habit of attacking literally any devil in sight (why else would the heritor of Jeanne's spirit throw a holy sword at her devil ally?!), and a familiar ignition sound preceding the purple blade of light piercing through their enemy's back.
"Hello there." If it weren't for the altered voice, Tomoe would have thought that Genshirou was secretly a Jedi Master with Mace Windu's lightsaber and had come to help them, but that was only because he's been greeting them with Obi-Wan's famous quote every time they meet up.
Her friend was completely normal, so she dismissed those silly thoughts out of her mind and prepared to deal with the new situation.
"Darth Bobby! We meet once again! It's time for you to surrender."
Tomoe had never been disappointed by a Sith Lord's name reveal, until today, that is. On the bright side, the lightsaber that cooked the insides of the stray and sliced its head off as easily as it went through Jango's neck was really, really cool.
She barely paid any attention to what was happening until she saw her friend stuck to a stone chair being carried into the area by a mass of darkness underneath it.
Oh no.
Her friend was in danger. "Get help, you're no match for him, he's a Sith Lord." And the idiot was more worried about them rather than himself!
"You won't get away with this Bobby!" Jeanne shouted. "My powers have doubled since the last time we met, Darth."
"Good. Twice the pride, double the fall."
The exchange sounded like something straight out of Revenge of the Sith.
Tomoe hadn't waited for Sona's battle plans before turning towards Genshirou, intending to get him to a safe place. Her King would understand, after all, she couldn't exactly fight without a blade anyways.
"Saji! Hang in there!" She shouted and got into a sprinting position even as the sounds of a lightsaber going "swoosh" through the air began to resound across the battlefield.
"Oh, don't mind me. I'm not going anywhere." He was being remarkably sarcastic for a hostage. "Wait, what are you-"
"Here I come!" Tomoe used the full extent of her Knight piece's enhanced speed to dash in and grab-
-And was sent flying all the way to the other side of the cemetery.
"Huh?"
What? What was that? She hadn't even registered an attack.
Even her Knight piece enhanced perception hadn't been able to register what had just happened.
She used her wings in order to flip herself back upright in the air before gliding down, she wasn't good enough to use it in flight yet and so she stuck with her feet for the most part.
"No way…"
Trying to make sense of what had happened, she felt a light sensation across her chest as if she had tapped herself with her hand, and quickly put two and two together.
The magical shadow power that the lightsaber wielder (she refused to think of anyone with such a stupid name as an actual Sith Lord) used to move and restrain her friend was still there. If it could move something as large and heavy as that stone chair and a person on it, using it for offensive purposes isn't out of the question at all.
It wouldn't be the first "shadow" manipulating enemy she had faced. Having been born into an exorcist clan, killing monsters with a variety of abilities was an ordinary task.
However… most "shadow" abilities were much more "sharper" and deadlier in general. If he wanted her dead, there was nothing she could do about it.
It stung. She was already fast among the exorcists for her age, she was even faster as Sona's "Knight" piece, she had believed she had achieved greater speeds and yet… it wasn't enough, not even close.
The "fight", if it could even be called that, continued even as she was launched a great distance away. Her King and the exorcist alternating between calculative experimental attacks and conventional offense, seemingly working together well in order to repel their opponent.
It may have looked like fierce fighting for those caught up in it, or her friend Momo that had little actual combat experience, but for someone like Tomoe that had fought monsters as part of the family trade… it was quite obvious the Dark Sider was toying with them without the intention to kill.
As such, she felt no urgency to rejoin the battle.
Nor did she feel the need to rush in recklessly without a plan like before.
At any rate, to do so a second time would have been the height of foolishness, and she remembered the many lectures her father had given her for recklessness all too well.
And for the former, most of her dread and fear had faded away after she considered the fact that he had her dead to her rights, considering that she was completely unharmed after a would-be deadly attack.
If she ran on the assumption that he wasn't being the typical strong supernatural monster that was going easy on them in order to toy with their prey then… well, they may have overreacted a bit.
Actually, Tomoe was just going to blame Jeanne was this… okay, to be fair, her King was equally responsible for defaulting to conflict rather than further diplomacy.
Jogging towards them, she watched as the warrior deflected demonic energy bullets from Sona (which shouldn't be possible, so it must be some special property of the "real" lightsaber) with just as much ease, as he dodged the blade strikes from the swordswoman, who was easily the strongest in this allied group.
A large serpent accompanied by another eight serpents made out of water attacked the dark sider from the front, with hundreds of holy swords sprouting from the ground striking at his back, strangely enough, he didn't seem to be trying to dodge it.
"Get back!" Tomoe shouted, as she recognized the pattern from fighting monsters with superior strength, and threw herself back away from the masked man.
Just in time to avoid the omnidirectional Force Push that blew apart the incoming attacks.
"Gen!" She heard Momo shouting for their friend, a spike of worry and fear shot up her spine as she recalled that her friend might have been caught up in the attack-
-only to find her worries abated as a dark shield made out of the same "shadow" material had caught the storm of metal and water, protecting it's "captive".
"Relax. He's alright." She heard the voice reassure her, it sounded so close to her… as if he was standing right behind her.
Tomoe turned her head back and found herself staring at the mask.
"L-let him go." She definitely did not feel in control at all.
"I could do that. But technically, he wanted to be here in the first place."
"Eh?" Tomoe could only tilt her head slightly at the strange answer.
"That was hardly informed consent! What was I supposed to think?! I find a Darth Revan cosplayer with a really well-done lightsaber saying "we would be honored if you would join us", of course, I would follow along. I wouldn't have said "yeah sure" if I knew you were an actual Sith Lord. Especially, not if you used me as bait to kill my friends." Genshirou yelled back at the lightsaber wielder, further eliminating the tension.
"You were hardly "bait". I knew where your friends were and would go to. I am aware of where he will arrive to meet me. I simply believed that violence would hardly be considered as a first response when there was a powerless civilian in our midst." "Darth Bobby" retorted, barely paying attention to Sona and Jeanne picking themselves up from the floor after the Force Push.
"Then would you kindly release me and pay up for the baking ingredients you made me drop? Oh, and let us all go home already!"
"That's your priority!? Forget about the cake!" Momo yelled back at Genshirou from above, keeping a few spells locked on to the dark sider.
Tomoe quickly got out of the impact area, running towards Genshirou, this time stopping just at the area where she last remembered standing before she got swatted away.
The elemental magics were shot at the man to no effect as they impacted his body, as if they were completely neutralized upon contact.
It looks like he had already given up the illusion that their attacks could even hurt him.
"You, girl, I have allocated a minimum amount of power to take care of the boy. If you wish to "rescue" him from the threat that I supposedly represent, then learn to dodge well."
She soon found out that he had apparently made a game out of it. It was like learning the patterns to a boss fight from Dark Souls on knowing when to roll and how to tell what kind of attack would come.
After a few tries, some magic support from Momo and Genshirou's unhelpful encouragement (How it "Get!" considered a proper cheer at all?), she managed to stall long enough to notice that a small part of the shadow would "bubble" up when an attack was going to be launched from that section of the shadow.
Also, she learned that it would always be aimed at her center of mass, and so she was able to time and plan how she would dodge the shadow tendrils after knowing where the "attack" would originate from and from what angle.
It seemed to be an automatic defense with little pattern changing abilities considering that the Revan impersonator just left it like this while he continued to toy with Sona and Jeanne, who were now somehow coming up with special combined attacks.
Apparently, her holy swords various effects could be used in conjunction with Sona's Water magic, to an extent. While Tomoe was playing dodge the shadow tendril, the pair were trying out all sorts of steam, ice and mist tricks in order to get the man.
Finally, after a handful of minutes…
"Got… haa… you!" Tomoe reached the chair and wrenched off the weak restraints keeping Genshirou on it.
"I'm saved…"
"Sound a bit more grateful why don't ya?!"
"Sorry! I'm really thankful! Honest! But ah… it did get kind of dull seeing you dodge for five minutes."
"You try dodging."
"Shutting up now. I don't think I can handle being sent flying so far."
They shared a smile before it got slightly awkward when they weren't quite sure what to say.
"Good… I'm glad that you're alright." "You're unhurt, thank goodness he wasn't trying to hurt you."
They spoke at about the same time, speaking over one another until Momo came by and reminded them that there was still a fight going on.
Just when Tomoe was going to yell at the bastard for continuing to mess with them, someone else decided to intervene.
"That's quite enough my young apprentice. Really, toying with younglings? Look how far you've fallen." An older man whose face was hidden underneath a brown robe's hood, looking like a Jedi right out of Star Wars, chided the dark sider like a child.
The voice sounded really familiar too.
"Darth Bobby" growled menacingly, "Master Cannoli, so you've chosen to reveal yourself to me at last. Finally, we shall end this-"
"Hush now Bobby. You're being a drama queen. If you wanted to talk then you could have called, but no, of course, you wouldn't. I had to play your game by causing a big stir just like you had done until you decide to speak with me again."
This "Master Cannoli" had suddenly shut the supposed Sith Lord down.
"But-"
"No buts. We can talk over tea, somewhere else, without bothering other people."
"Fine…"
What the hell?
Genshirou looked just as shocked as they all were at such a display.
The person that they had all "fought" so hard (in their own ways) against was acting like a problem child of some secretive order? That was the question that came to the forefront of Tomoe's mind, she was under the belief that everyone else was likely of the same (similar) mind.
"And do clean up your mess." The robed man pointed straight at Genshirou.
"Eh, me?"
"Fine."
It was over before they could even do anything.
The masked man in black robes was already right in front of their friend, two fingers pressed against Genshirou's forehead, then suddenly, their friend fell down unconscious.
"He won't be remembering any of this."
"Hey!" "Get away from him!" Momo and Tomoe's attempt to stop him came too late as "Bobby" had already moved back to his "Master's" side.
It was a standard rule of the supernatural to erase such encounters from a normal human's mind. And while they didn't trust the pair, they would at least trust the fact that they wouldn't want any of this to be remembered by unrelated parties. They would still have to watch him carefully to see if he exhibits any strange trauma from this.
The pair outright ignored Jeanne and Sona as they suddenly departed in a burst of unmatched speed.
There was no hope of catching them at all.
Tomoe couldn't help but feel in awe of that level of speed.
All that was left to do was to put everything back in order. The cemetery was surprisingly undamaged, there seemed to have been a protective layer underneath, a shadow barrier (that quickly disappeared after they noticed it) that shielded the buried bodies from being disturbed. Even the soil damage from the stray devil's plant manipulation abilities had been blocked and diverted around the bodies laid to rest here.
They made up some excuse about how Genshirou passed out suddenly during the stake-out once they realize he didn't remember anything about leaving after doing some shopping. He believed it and didn't seem to have any lingering issues with the mind alteration done.
All of them said their goodbyes as Sona would have to return to Kuoh town while Jeanne would be heading back to Europe in a day or two to deliver her "school report" (report to the Vatican).
It was probably illegal to do so, but Tomoe and Jeanne exchanged contacts over LINE. So long as no secrets were being given away, it's not as if chatting like regular people over an app would be considered that terrible.
After things began to settle down again, Tomoe was up for a "New Life" challenge. It was about time that she began seriously training again. As someone born into a monster hunting clan, knowing when to dedicate oneself to reassessing and improving one's skill after a perilous encounter was a tradition!
Momo wasn't physically inclined due to her Bishop piece's magic power specialty, so even with recent events showing that speed was key, she didn't feel like there was much she could do to cover that up at this point and decided to work on stronger magical barriers.
She wasn't sure what her King would be up to after delivering her report, however. Sona had seemed quite shaken over the recent events.
… Oh. It just occurred to Tomoe just how weird everything that had just happened would sound like to the higher-ups.
Sometimes it was good to be the "muscle" of the group.
Pesky things like "responsibility" and "reporting" could be handled by the boss, in this case, Sona Sitri.
She wondered how Sona and Jeanne would handle explaining everything? Eh, they seem capable. They will probably be fine.
Tomoe decided to stop worrying about them and be happy over Genshirou's home-made chocolate muffins. How nice of him to send some over! Yeah, she wasn't sharing this with Momo, or her family, or anyone else.
Level 16
Level 16
Inter-clan negotiations were more often than not, merely annoying. Thankfully, Youkai politics was nothing like the Galactic Senate, where there is no civility, only politics.
Personal training was fulfilling at best, thanks to Genshirou helping her to see the joy and utility of having greater personal power, she felt that life became much more comfortable in many ways.
At worst, it was just frustratingly painful, especially since Genshirou managed to buy all the volumes of Ranma and proceeded to adopt the ridiculous training methods to their (and her clan's) personal use.
Speaking of pain, she wanted to be anywhere else but this place. Not because she was going to be physically tortured or anything like that. Far from it, the damage was more mental and directed at her sanity rather than anything else.
It was with great regret that she reluctantly accompanied her parents to her future husband's (temp) workplace. On normal days, she would only feel very disturbed at his choice of part-time work for favors and political gain. But this…? Actually having to accompany her parents here for "family planning" purposes?
She would rather just be paraded around naked by Genshirou instead. At the very least, she would be able to enjoy herself first before facing the consequences.
"Kill me. Kill me now." Her little brother Himuro, that happened to be Genshirou's age as well, was already banging his head at the receptionist desk as she shared her agony.
"I don't believe you can lose the will to live that easily. So please don't just die of sadness or something. Not at the clinic's entrance at least." The part-time receptionist, Valerie Tepes, continued to smile like a professional Guild Receptionist from some generic RPG-like Isekai story.
Well, that was the first thing that came to Atago's mind when trying to remember where that professional smile came from… the Goblin Slayer manga Valerie was holding helped to make that link for her.
"Brother, don't be rude to Valerie." Atago admonished him without much energy.
Valerie and Atago met eye-to-eye, the dhampir saw that she wasn't in the mood for talking and simply smiled sympathetically for what was to come.
"Hello Valerie, it's been a while, you look positively radiant today." Sakura, Atago's mother, greeted the dhampir happily.
"Thank you. I am a Daywalker after all." Valerie took it literally in a completely different direction.
Ignoring this, her mother pressed on with some small talk as they waited for their appointment, from what she could gather, Genshirou (or was it one of his clone's today? Not that it matters since he's basically living in all bodies at once…) had a lot of clients today.
"Tch, so that mutt Souchirou did come here after all… can't let him get one over me…" Her father muttered darkly beside his children after listening in to the conversation.
"Wait a second! T-this is all about that damn rivalry?!" Himuro shouted in clear frustration, remembering their father's competitive streak with a distant cousin..
"Hah?! What did you say?! How could you not understand the manly relationship between-"
"Father, Himuro, shut up." Atago silenced the two before they caused a further ruckus.
Just as she did so Rokurokubi couple had walked out of the main rooms, looking very satisfied with the services provided, sharing a loving smile with each other even as their limp long necks showed just how tired they were.
It was only natural that they would visit this place considering their rather low population and the good word spread about by her Auntie Sophie.
"Master Cannoli will see you now." Valerie enunciated, gesturing to a particular room. She had used the false name to make sure there was some consistency in the story when rumors of their services would spread to the factions aware of Genshirou's false personas.
This all started when her the vampire nekomata matriarch began talking about vampire reproductive functionality in front of both Valerie and Genshirou during an integration event with the rest of her clan. "Darth Bobby" was a welcome face, Valerie was also there to help answer questions about vampire physiology that their previous masters hadn't bothered to teach them…
It started off well until a couple wept that they wouldn't be able to give their aging parents (and in-laws) the grandchildren that they wanted to see thanks to the low fertility of vampires.
Of course, Genshirou wanted to help as much as he could. Atago had gotten involved as well, and before she knew it, her Auntie Sophie had begun coordinating the experiments with some volunteers to great success.
She should have expected that of all people, only Genshirou would have been able to use his powers to influence the reproductive organs to create… life.
"Master Kaiza. I take it that your journey here has been unimpeded." Genshirou's disguise under the Jedi robes faded away as they entered the room, swirling around in his comfy chair in order to greet them, "I must say that you are here sooner than expected."
"It looks like you're having tons of fun role-playing. Haha!" Raiga laughed, Genshirou only frowned in visible disappointment for not following up with a variant of Windu's lines.
"My dear husband heard a little song about how his dearest cousin came here asking for twins." Sakura quickly got to the heart of the matter.
"Your surveillance network has advanced that much?" Gen asked, getting a shake of her head.
"Unfortunately not." Her mother muttered under her breath as her father answered the question, "The bastard rubbed the magical pregnancy test results right in front of my face."
"Ultrasound isn't a viable industry in the supernatural world it seems…" Genshirou grinned a little.
"Can I leave?" Himuro asked, getting a loud "No!" from her father.
"As part of this family we must discuss this important matter. We need to one-up my relative, and to do that, we need at least two more additions to the family." Raiga continued.
"I was thinking of having fraternal twins like Kouho and Gosei." Sakura mentioned Genshirou's siblings.
"Eh, I was thinking we can have them like two years apart?"
"So three in total."
"The twins first or later?"
Genshirou tapped the table, "I must make sure that you are informed now… how do I say this, damn this is awkward… if you want twins in this round then you're going to have to ejaculate inside her at least twice during the procedure."
"NOOOO!" "WHHHHY!!!" She and her brother covered their ears and screamed, not wanting to hear this at all.
"You mean it can't be done in one shot?" Unfortunately, their hearing cannot be blocked by normal means, so they can still hear their mother's voice clearly.
"It is unfortunate, but influencing the womb to birth twins or triplets will require more… essence. In addition to that, having additional family members close by will help stabilize the formation due to sympathetic-"
"We have to watch them?!" "Onee-chan, talk your boyfriend out of this!" "Come on Gen! Please say it isn't so!"
"You only need to be in the same ritual room. I've got blindfolds and magic earplugs, while there is a full sensory deprivation spell that I can use, it is very uncomfortable to say the least." He stated clinically, later mentioning that he can't do anything about the smell and taste of the air either unless they wanted to just… not breathe.
"It won't take to long, please do it for us." "Listen to your mother."
"It's all your fault!" Both siblings complained to no effect.
"How about quintuplets?" Raiga asked Genshirou, to which he replied, "5 times at least, don't worry, I'll provide the… energy and uh… whatever."
"What is the additional cost?" Sakura inquired.
"Only that you name one of the girls Miku." Atago wasn't sure why, but her gut feeling told her it was a reference to a manga.
"Do the both of you need the pleasure and sex drive enhancements?" He asked one last final question.
"That would be lovely." "Why not?"
It was three hours of pain as their enhanced senses picked up the smell and movement of their parents fucking in the middle of a ritual circle. She thanked no god in particular for the small mercies of not being able to hear or see a thing.
Once the session was over, her parents were teleported back to the estate, leaving Himuro and herself behind at "Master Cannoli's Impregnation Clinic".
"If that otherworldly being that possessed me is responsible for us Youkai's low fertility rates then I'm going to call that fucker back just so I can beat him up myself." Her brother finally snapped and grew a spine, unfortunately, her parents weren't here to see it and Atago couldn't muster the energy to care.
"Look at the brightside… you're going to have five little sisters looking up to you and calling you 'onii-chan'." Atago tried to cheer her brother up as the responsible older sister she should be.
"Wait?! I'm going to be an 'onii-chan'!?"
Considering that Genshirou's methods in "creating life" were that precise, as a few volunteer couples of some Youkai races with very short gestation periods had attested to, Atago could say that much with absolute certainty.
"Well, yes, didn't you hear our parents finalizing their plans to have 5 girls and one boy later on?"
"I'm going to be an 'ONII-CHAN'! I have to tell everyone!"
"Eh? Ehhhhh?"
Her brother rushed out of the semen-stained ritual room, "Hey Valerie-san, I'm going to be an Onii-chan! Hi, it's me, fuck you Souta I'm going to be an Onii-chan!" He was actually calling his friends on his phone too!?
"Well… I can't say I expected that."
Atago turned to Genshirou, shooting him a dark look.
"You just had to make this a business, didn't you?"
"First of all, all of us agreed that researching this is going to help everyone. Secondly, you endorsed the idea for future political capital. And finally, don't forget that I had to watch every second of it. Not just for your parents, but for my parents and every future parent out there too."
Atago's anger quickly evaporated as she remembered those facts.
"Sorry."
"It's fine. Aaaanyhow, it's closing time for today. And since we're only open twice a week despite all my clone's capable of providing cheap labor… we get to spend a lot of time together over the weekend."
"Oooh! Yay! I know! Summer break is just around the corner for you, soooooo…"
"Soooooo?"
Valerie opened the door just in time to continue the conversation, "It's almost time to go to the beach. I haven't been to a beach before!" Genshirou had promised Valerie to take her all over Japan and the world to make up for lost time.
Atago herself wanted to experience life and what the world had to offer with the both of them, although, she gave priority to Valerie as the poor girl had been through a lot for most of her life.
"Oh, I just remembered. Once we get on the beach, we have to jump up into the sand while yelling "Umi Da!" It means "The Sea", just FYI." Genshirou added some mentions about how it's used in anime a lot, making sure that Valerie had the right context and got the correct meaning. She may have his knowledge of Japanese, but there are some gaps here and there due to the process being accidental and unintended.
"Ufufu, do you know what that means Genshirou~" Atago ran up to him and grabbed his arm, pressing it in between her cleavage. "You get to see me in a swimsuit."
He had the cutest grin on his face.
Valerie ran up and did the same with the other arm, "I don't have a swimsuit. Can you help me buy one?" The princess seemed to be in on the unspoken plan.
The three of them soon left to get some late night ramen. Genshirou had his favourite ramen shop that he frequented in the city, and so they went there together, sneaking into the line and replacing the clones that he had apparently sent ahead of time before he closed shop for the day.
The area around them was shielded by Gen's power, creating an illusion of them taking their time over the meal, while the sound within was being absorbed so that their conversation wouldn't be eavesdropped on.
This way, they could also let their guard down somewhat, and talk about whatever they wanted.
"Ah! It's tasty! I'll never get tired of trying new things. It still feels like a dream…" Valerie trailed off, "Somedays, I still have the odd thought of not wanting to wake up from this."
"Valerie, this is real. And even if it was a dream, or nightmare, or whatever. I'll be sure to be there with you, always." Genshirou was giving that earnest and kind smile of his that she loved, to Valerie.
Atago was happy for her, truly… she still had the urge to pout in order to get his attention though. It turns out that her control over her facial expressions lessens in their presence, Genshirou took hold of her hand even in this public space, reassuring her that he would be with her all the way.
"On a score of 1-10, how much did you like it Valerie?" Atago asked her soon-to-be sister wife as Genshirou went to settle the bill, there were some foreigners having some trouble at the counter due to not being able to speak Japanese, so he was helping out with that, and so it was taking normal than usual.
"That's not fair Atago. My hero's blood has set the bar impossibly high."
"You always say that."
"Only because it's true."
They started talking about the man they both loved, Valerie started to fill her in on some of the smaller "skills" that Genshirou had figured out in their day-to-day cohabitation, that he may have neglected to mention to Atago.
"The gardens are now brimming with life. Genshirou is trying to grow some corn with his powers, apparently, he's trying to give it self-defense mechanisms so, I quote, "No stupid rabbit is going to eat my corn plant ever again."
Atago couldn't remember hearing about the Saji household ever owning a rabbit. Perhaps he tried his hand growing corn in some secret garden only to have a rabbit eat it all like the little breeding and fucking monsters that they were?
Okay. Atago may have been a little biased against rabbits due to some slutty rabbit girl she met this one time…
"Oh, so he's also discovered how to modify plants? Can he make them shoot seeds like Plants vs Zombies?"
"What's that?"
"It's an app."
"An odd name for one…"
"Where did he get the idea from anyway?"
"I don't know. Let's ask him."
And so they did during the walk back to Atago's home.
"Where did I learn it? Remember that plant controlling stray devil that I backstabbed to help Jeanne, Sona, Tomoe and Momo with?"
"You managed to get her techniques so quickly?" Atago was impressed that he managed to get so much in such a short time.
"Not exactly. She was an experienced one and I had to start with her early memories. Luckily, I had the foresight to preserve the head and soul in a completely painless manner."
"… I'm sorry. I don't understand."
"Ah! So that's why I felt there was someone faintly alive in your shadow!" Valerie snapped her fingers excitedly, seemingly happy that she finally knew the answer to a question she tried to figure out for herself.
"Yup. Waste not, want not. I had a long time to really go through her research on how life can be manipulated. It's also how I figured out how to control and manipulate the egg fertilization process." Genshirou cheerfully explained how he was keeping the stray from "dying", technically, and that he would probably rebuild a new body to attach the head to at some point once he's done.
"You're doing it as some sort of payment?"
"Well, yeah. To be fair, if I knew the situation better, which I couldn't have known due to my presence being discovered thanks to her ability to sense me, I rectified that issue by the way…" He spoke about a rather tragic past of being tricked to serve loyally for a long time, before finding some horrible truth, and all, "and that is why once I figure out how to modify her memories, I should be able to let her have a new life somewhere."
He looked really excited and eager about it.
Atago gasped, "It'll be… if that works, it'll be the first stray devil that you manage to properly "save", right?"
"Yeah…" His smile confirmed just how much he was looking forward to it.
"I'll start with the papertrail." Atago volunteered.
"I'm sure we can liberate some funds somewhere…" Valerie was already thinking of looting some other stronghold for "funds".
"Haha, thank you! That will be a great help… Yeah, let's do our best then."
I had retracted every mean-spirited rant I uttered about the "Shadow Clones are the answer to everything" trope from my typical Naruto fanfiction complaints.
Not because I think that it doesn't ruin many stories (it does mess them up) when it's implemented with maximum wank levels ("Gamer" fics and other stories with complex clone shenanigans) or utter smugness ("Why didn't you use Shadow Clones to finish your paperwork?" - Said everyone fanon SI/OC/NINO ever) despite dumbing down everyone else.
Oh no, my reasons for that were much simpler.
I became a Shadow Clone abuser, of sorts, with my specific variant of it. I have become what I swore to destroy.
Granted, my version is more akin to a hivemind (where I multi-task across many bodies) rather than an independent extra player character than can earn EXP (like Naruto's clones). I must be frank, it's as OP in the utility department, unsurprising, to be sure, but I welcomed it all the same.
I certainly couldn't argue with the results of having a Grand Army of the Saji Household powered by repurposed harmful energies (the governments of the world will one day thank me for stealing their radioactive waste, man I love sneaking about as a shadow…).
The least productive part of my life, the hours I spent at school, could now be handled by a clone linked to me while I put my real body through intense physical and supernatural power training.
This is where the fun begins.
The clones were a product of my shadow construct powers and my soul/life manipulating abilities, hence, they were linked by my soul. The soul, which has a historical and empirical (in this world at least, thanks to all the magic knowledge I gathered) conceptual link to the mind, thus acts as the nexus to all mental components, including linked living constructs like my shadow clones.
From my early life, I had already begun training my mind in order to handle more information in one go, and in multiple instances, not knowing I was already enhancing my own soul before I had begun cycling soul energy through my body (which I eventually derived from studying my internal magic energy and it's linked to my mind).
With my limited understanding of these items, it was only natural that my progress, while tremendous from a certain point of view, can be considered sub-optimal.
Basically, my EXP multiplier wasn't the best, but the amount of grinding I had put in had compensated for that. That hasn't been the case since I saw Jeanne off at the airport more than a month ago, in which my discovery of this has essentially fixed my skill EXP gain to proper levels.
The more clones I have, the more energy that I can absorb and use across the Clone Network. This was one of the most effective, though crude, training methodology as it constantly stretches and rejuvenates my soul to a greater state. The stronger my soul becomes, the greater the effects on the physical limits of my body.
That's not to say that the method itself is without limits. It requires more energy to sustain and push myself further to the point where I simply can't take enough (without causing noticeable harm) power to fuel this process without end. My ability to regenerate power will lag behind if my total capacity has increased without the necessary control to truly make that new power mine, hence, I couldn't just rely my own generated and stockpiled energy to fuel my abilities either.
It's also a lot harder to train for greater control when I'm focusing on expanding my power.
Hence, I had essentially split my usual training montage sessions into two parts, "Power" and "Control" training, with sufficient amount of power and attention dedicated to protecting those I care about during either of those periods.
Training for power involves using a greater amount of clones with high energy expenditure, which requires a lot of resource "procurement" from foreign institutions, aka, the nuclear waste version of dumpster diving, then pushing myself to my limits on all fronts.
Acquiring greater control and new techniques act as my "rest" period from strenuous power training, it is when I keep my clones at an observation, utility, experience, and skill training capacity. Lightsaber clone sparring, skill training, family time, social activities, material gathering, spying, hobbies, studying, strategizing and experimentation all fall under this category.
Needless to say, if I told Atago, Valerie and the rest of my family the true extent of my near 24/7 training regime then they would say that I was on the path to having "no life" and I needed to slow down. But such judgments would be founded on emotional reactions rather than objective ones…
After all, how can I have "no life" when I can now experience "life" more through more clones?
Granted, 85% of clones were always engaged in tasks to gain more power, but 15% of my clones focused on family and social responsibilities are many times more numerous than a sole body… hence, I had more "life" than I ever had before!
It's just like increasing your Action Points in a strategy game, allowing your Hero units or whatever equivalent to performing more actions. It's not cheating or unnatural, it's simply the best way to get closer to that sweet, sweet 100% completion rate.
Not that I think life works that way, however, the attempt to achieve more efficiency (including that of interpersonal connections) itself is enough to make life satisfying, even if things do not always go my way or I run into a couple of roadblocks.
At any rate, I decided to start developing my special body cleansing spell.
The beach episode of my life story is coming up.
The swimsuits will be the opening act, normal beach activities and family time will make up the bulk of the trip… but the hidden beach sex is a must and one of the highlights that they can't afford to lose out on.
And in order to make it comfortable for everyone, I have to find a way to keep sand off our bodies continuously. The problem is that it's coar- oh, forget it.
Everyone knows why "I don't like sand".
Level 17a
AN: Splitting the next updates into a couple of parts…
Level 17a
It has been a habit of mine to constantly keep track of the locations and status of individuals important to me. As I am far from being omniscient within my domain, I had to make do with shuffling a bit more focus through all my relays at a rapid pace to gather data regularly.
Working on the assumption that an ambush is conceivable at any point in time due to shadowy figures acting behind the scenes or monsters just being their stupid evil selves is a good reason to form good "constant vigilance" habits.
Today was a quiet Sunday.
There were only a few dozen or so mundane crimes in Tokyo which my little shadow relays resolved through a variety of subtle means. The usual domestic crimes that could be resolved by draining and redistributing emotional energies were handled quietly whilst I had my clones put together enough material to solve such situations permanently. No supernatural beings were causing trouble, all in all, it was a nice safe day.
This made it a good Sunday. A good day for a date with my two girls or to spend time with my immediate family. Of course, I have shadow clones, so I can do both!
If I was a Persona series main character, then I must be playing on a hacked version of the game. Choices with high opportunity costs? What is that? Does it taste rancid? Ha! Hacks for the win!
Life is good… despite the looming terror of everything I love getting annihilated at the whim of the truly powerful beings… anyways, enough about that.
It was unfortunate that the "girls try on skimpy bikinis to get the dense harem lead's attention" trope wasn't applied to my life, but all the same, they were still going out to buy it privately in order to give me a pleasant surprise later.
I suppose the sexy clothing changing room trope wasn't in effect in this case as Atago and Valerie already knew they had my affections. In Valerie's case, I had only gotten up to playing with her breasts and fingering her before administrating her blood meal, still, it definitely counted as a show of sufficient mutual trust and interest in each other beyond that of friendship.
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that I ended up in a polygynous situation, this is DXD after all. It's still taking me more time than I would have liked to acclimatize myself to the circumstances. So far it's been going smoothly, considering that I simply doubled my efforts to make sure that both of them were getting the amount of attention reserved for any normal girl with a single partner. Hooray for Shadow Clones!
It's harder to balance my affections when I have the both of them together, not by much as they are mutually supportive of each other, yet just having one body to show devotion to both of them in the same place adds a lot more complexity to my efforts.
If they could hear me monologuing then they would have scolded me for "overthinking" things, which isn't true at all, I'm simply using my imagination to it's utmost.
Habitually using my imagination to prepare for conflict and warfare seemed to have carried over to my day-to-day life. No complaints there. It is, overall, a good habit.
The imagination is a weapon. Those who fail to use it, die first. - Goblin Pussy Slayer
Heh… it's a good thing that the manga still existed in this world (unlike Naruto, Bleach and other… DXD crossover material… I'm still on the lookout just in case), it's the closest thing to a R-18 doujin that I'll allow into my possession.
I have learned well from other high school boys. Never leave anything that can be defined as porn into one's bedroom, especially when in a battle harem verse. Goblin Slayer doesn't count despite how well drawn some scenes are, and I can just read doujins by scanning and storing them within my mind anyway.
It was during my typical Isekai'ed character's reflections that one of my predictions came to pass. Having sensed a familiar presence within the area an hour ago, and taking into account my own "luck" (that is likely influenced by a dragon's intangible fate-manipulating aura rather than the suppressible aura of power), I had foreseen that if I had simply followed Atago's lead in our shopping trip, my friend within the area would naturally run right into me.
"Heeeeey! Saji-kuuun!" The bubbly Knight of Sona's peerage came running up to me as I sat at the shopping street's bench.
"Whoa! Slow down there!" I spoke just as she came to a running stop right in front of me, somehow, as if they had sensed danger arriving, the crowd had subconsciously avoided the straight path from her to me. "Are you planning to try out for the track team or something?"
"Haha! It's kind of too late in the year for that. Besides, even if I could join the team, it wouldn't be fair… for the younger girls, yeah! They need their chance to shine too and I already had my turn." Tomoe Meguri quickly made up an excuse for not "cheating" with superior physical ability. "Anyways, what are you doing?"
"Sitting."
"I know that! Geez!"
"Waiting for some people to finish their shopping. Yourself?" She was wearing a tube top and shorts, traveling light, with a single shopping bag containing a swimsuit if my senses weren't mistaken. "Are you getting a swimsuit for the summer?"
"Ehehe, nah, it's the opposite really. I'm returning the one I bought recently." Tomoe patted the paper bag carrying the piece of clothing.
"Why is that?" I asked.
"Haa… summer remedial lessons. What's up with that? It's only the first term, and I've been studying really hard already, can't they give me a break?" She quickly skipped over the main reason and began chatting about how she felt about the whole thing. To cut a long story short, she bombed her first term's exams and some practice papers for Kuoh Academy.
"Ah." I interjected here and there with such "conversational" sound bites in order to assure her that I was listening.
Right. No summer break, no beach. I'm guessing that her parents or Sona is being strict with her after getting that kind of grades.
Eventually, she shrugged, saying, "Anyways, on the bright side, this just means I have more money to buy a bigger one next time. I mean, like, it makes no sense to buy something that would fit just right if you know you're going to outgrow it soon right?" She tried to hide her disappointment of not getting to play around with her new swimsuit over the summer.
Well, from what little I know of her future bust size…
"I'm so sorry." Is this the sadness that Obi-Wan felt when he had to kill Padme's husband? Nah, not even close, but she has my sympathies regardless.
"Hey, what did you just say?"
"Anyways, about your grades-" I quickly changed the topic with as much subtlety as Palpatine telling Anakin about a particular Sith legend.
"Urgh, I don't want to think about it."
"Surely, you want to avoid a repeat of this?"
"Mmmm…"
I shuffled to the left, making more space on my right side of the bench.
"Take a seat, young Meguri."
"Okie dokey."
She sat down quickly enough, only to tense for a moment, her eyes gravitating to the bench where we place our hands and… she quickly placed her hands on her lap, as if conscious about all of it.
Seeing as I had no real reason to be looking at her nice exposed legs, I hadn't looked at that part of her at all, and simply knew she had done all this through my supernatural spatial awareness.
"Oh, um, you mentioned that your friends call you Gen right?" She brought that up all of a sudden.
"Yup." I confirmed.
"Can I call you that too?"
"I have no issues with that."
"Then… you have to call me Tomoe-chan! There's no need to be so formal with me. You have racked up a lot of friendship points for all those desserts you sent me, hehe! Ah right, thanks Gen, for the Macarons yesterday. My parents liked them too."
I subscribe to the Harvest Moon, Rune Factory, and Stardew Valley tradition of regular talking and gift giving for the sake of relationship building. It was only natural.
Once we came to an agreement, I decided to broach the subject of her grades, "Walk me through why you feel you hadn't done as well as you would have liked." Giving her my usual patient look, she eventually relented and began talking about it.
"My parents needed a lot of help after they… got new jobs, I've been busy sorting things out with Sona-chan, her family has been a good help and…" She was clearly censoring some events related to her life as a devil and current training regime to be a more effective swordswoman. "The teachers at school hadn't really been understanding, and my classmates uh… no one took any good notes for me. I had been sick a lot until recently too so I didn't have many friends there and…" It was a bit long-winded, apparently not long enough, as I could feel Atago and Valerie moving to another store in order to find the swimsuit they wanted.
When she was done expressing the lack of faculty support, Sona's rather ineffective (in her case) tutoring, and a bit on her self-admitted difficulties in the academic space, she sighed and gave me an apologetic look for going on and on.
It wouldn't be the first time I had to listen to someone's woes. Hopefully, I would be able to help her with this. And while I do want to offer my help in a straightforward manner… When will I ever get another chance to say this?
"It is upsetting to me that the school doesn't seem to fully understand your circumstances. Don't you wonder why they aren't being very helpful?"
"I wish I knew. More and more I get the feeling that I'm being excluded by my classmates. I know they haven't been telling me the right answers or giving me useful tips when I asked for it."
I did spy on her during school hours before. The shroud of jealousy surrounds the female population. Tomoe had been popular as a First year student, her curse had finally begun to affect her health in her second year and she ended up missing a lot of the curriculum, by the time she entered the Third year well… girls can be real bitches at times.
"They don't like you Tomoe-chan. They see you as a threat to the social ladder they had created over the years. Don't listen to them if they make fun of you for not being smart enough or any such nonsense."
"How do you know-"
"School students can be assholes everywhere, bullies will always exist. I have dealt with a few in my time."
"Oh!"
Time to offer my help.
"Let me help you understand the subtleties of the curriculum."
She gave me an odd look, "How do you know so much of the curriculum I'm dealing with?"
"I taught myself everything on Japan's curriculum, even the nature of the grading system."
"You know how our papers are graded? Well, that would explain how Gen has 100% in every test."
"Tomoe-chan, if one is to understand our country's examination system, one must study all it's aspects, not just the hollow instructions of the teachers. If you wish to become a well-rounded and wise student, you must embrace an instruction beyond rote memorization."
I could feel that she was hooked, wanting to know what I was offering.
"Be careful of those trying to help you study without understanding the education system fully. Only through me can you achieve the grades greater than anyone your age has the right to have. Learn to study what is required and more, and you will be able to save your results from certain failure."
"What did you say?"
"Use my knowledge I beg you."
"… Is this the part where I whip our a lightsaber and call you a Sith Lord?" She grinned as she finally comprehended what I was saying, both on the true message and that of the format.
The last time I used that line was against a devil that rejected my help and tried to kill me, so all in all, I consider this a very good response.
"If you actually brought one then sure!"
"I was wondering why you were talking so strangely."
"I was waiting for when you would catch on. But in all seriousness, let me help you with your studies. I'll have you ace'ing the exams, both your finals and the Kuoh entrance exam, by the time you have to sit them."
And if it doesn't sink into her head, I'll just put whatever is needed into it.
"Well, since you're offering, then I'll pledge myself to your teachings."
"Goooood."
"Stop that. You sound creepy. Keep that up and I wouldn't be surprised if you talk about beating up children."
"Don't you mean killing younglings?"
"Have you filled your meme quota for the day yet?"
"I'll stop now."
"Good. Gen. Good."
"Okay, you got me there."
She left a bit later, and after another hour of waiting (where I productively trained my ability to influence the crowd's movement through vague mental suggestions), Atago and Valerie were finally done with their shopping, giggling all the way.
Knowing the genre, it seems that I would have to prepare for the usual tropes surrounding "pretty girls at a public beach in anime". I get the feeling that I'll need to hurt some fools, non-lethally, without being too much of an ass.
Level 17b
Level 17b
Turning the corner of an empty street with nary a thought given to the path I was taking.
I had no need for it.
The path to her changes every day yet my feet would always take me to her.
I stop when my legs experience the sensation of cool running water flowing around it.
Always on the move. Even the times allocated for self-reflection purposes carried the undercurrent of "achieving something", but right here, right now?
I took in the sounds, smell and sights of her world.
Truly, it was like an entirely different world. I could fly through the sky, dive into parts of the sea that no man has seen, yet it was only this place that I would feel compelled to just stop moving.
Standing atop the flowery hill, there she sat, basking in the evening twilight eternally etched into this world.
Even though I knew I would misplace this scene in my memories as I go through my ever-eventful life, yet as always, I simply had the urge to commit this instant of our meeting to memory.
At the sound of the water being disturbed, she turned around, the strong wind blowing some of those golden locks past her face. Yet like myself, she was feeling her own sense of Deja Vu and fondness for the sight, if the manner in which she kept those green eyes locked on me was any indication.
When I leave this place it becomes easy to get caught up with the things I want, need and should do, to the point where the beauty of life and the people living it may slip my mind.
Even with my lovers and family always there for me, there's always a tiny moment of weakness where I take them for granted in the refuge of my mind. The girl over there had confided similar experiences with me, that there were times she would feel, think or do things that weren't true to herself at her lowest moments.
We were not vulnerable to such weaknesses in this safe haven just for the two of us, in this place far removed from the variables of life, our thoughts, intents and actions were much more focused and clear.
A soft laugh made it's way to my ears, "Hehe, it's nibbling on you." Followed by words that confused me.
I looked down and found tiny fishes nibbling on my submerged foot, I never was one for Ichthyotherapy, and I was secretly ticklish so… thank goodness I still had my shoes and pants on.
This was the only place I would truly let my guard down, in a manner of speaking. If only because I had taken precautions to ensure that everyone would be safe in the waking world, including my own body.
Either way, my selective focus, and reduced awareness were apparent through a beginner's mistake like this.
"You added fish this time, Asia." The nun had added all manner of small critters into her own mindscape after I taught her how to take control of her mind a little more.
"I put them there a week ago. It's the first time you've seen them though… you really should step out of the water. What if you catch a cold?" Asia Argento appeared seriously worried for my wellbeing, even from this distance, a perk of this world allowed our voices to reach each other no matter the distance if we willed it. As such, her voice sounded as if she were speaking right in front of me.
"The common cold may be serious business in Japan but you know me, I'm too fit for that." I walked out of the river water, making my way to her.
She hummed a tune, before smiling brightly at me, "Your overconfidence is your weakness."
There was more truth in that than she knew, "And so it is."
"I believe that it is common courtesy to answer a quote with another."
"Ah, but I did milady! It simply came from the Prequel trilogy rather than the Original."
We easily slipped into a conversation without the need for ordinary greetings. There was no need for us to start with any small talk questions or the like. There would be a time and place for that later, but right now, both of us were simply having fun.
Asia tilted her head slightly, placing a finger to her chin, in a typical cute anime girl style that came native to her. "It doesn't ring a bell. I suppose it must be from Revenge of the Sith then. The last one…"
She had finished my extended Clone Wars series (including Ahsoka vs Maul and some other comic scenes) over a week ago. Since then, she wanted to take a break to prepare her heart for the final film, at least, that was the excuse she gave.
I hadn't addressed it then as I wanted to give her some space while I took the time to figure out the reason behind her hesitance. It took a while until I began to comprehend the mind of a teenage girl responsible for this rationale.
"Asia, we have spent some time together almost every day since we've met. I have taught you a lot about the world outside the church you grew up in, and you have taught me more than you have realized about the God I once loved wholeheartedly."
The slight shock on her face and sudden swelling of sadness within her confirmed my suspicions.
"G-Gen, wh-what are you saying? Why are you telling me this?"
I crouched down a little, trying to make sure that our eyes were leveled, making sure that my smile wouldn't leave my face.
"You have become a far greater friend to me than I could ever hope to be for anyone else. Asia, I want you to know that just because I would have finished showing what I wanted you to see, it doesn't mean that we will stop hanging out, talking or being friends with each other. I know you dread that our time together could end at any point, but I assure you, even if that were to happen we will always be friends."
Part of her fear was due to a mistake of mine for being a bit too excited about the ending everything on Revenge of the Sith that I neglected Asia's unsupported fears on our connection ending after it.
There was no evidence for our time together to come to an end at all, but due to her belief that our meeting was for a purpose, she had begun to worry if that purpose would have been fulfilled if she met some sort of condition… and my accidental omission of Star Wars Rebels, other technical "prequel" material, and obsession with my favorite movie of all time had fed her imagination.
Leading her to jump to some conclusions even though she internally acknowledged she had no real clue on "God's Will", which was what she believed enabled our connection in the first place.
"I-I was so… I just, I'm sorry for being selfish." And now she's under the impression that it's selfish to just want our time here to continue. I returned the hug after she latched onto me.
"There's nothing to apologize for. I feel the same way." Whilst my words could mean to say that I wanted our connection to remain firm, which was true as well, that wasn't the entire story.
I was also referring to our very similar fear of having what is important to us being taken away at the blink of an eye without us being able to do anything about it. For her, it was this special connection with me, and for myself, well… it's basically having everything I cherish being destroyed by the OP characters.
We stayed that way for a while, until Asia went through the usual abashed "hawawa" mode as if she was some Japanese anime girl, then composed herself. Taking my hand, she led me to the plains, where I could see the little home she had for herself and a replica of a Vatican-styled building far into the distance.
"Is this what you've been working on?"
"Ehehe, kind of. Well, I made that some time ago, but somewhere farther away then I moved it closer today."
"Gotta love spatial manipulation. If only we could do that in real life, it would be so convenient."
"Oh! Like those city builder games, you tell me about?"
"Uhuh. Just so you know, I have absolutely terrible designing skills for buildings. I like to see my numbers go up rather than making things look nice."
"But that's cruel to the people living there!"
"If the AI could tell the difference I would put in the effort to make it look nice! I'm the type of guy that picks the nice guy options in games."
"Mm-hmm, that sounds like you. Uuu, I think I'll end up taking the same options. Is there any games that can be completed without hurting anyone?"
"… Uhhhhh…" I quickly thought of Skyrim and Dark Souls "Pacifist" runs… then I decided against playing those together in the future, "Undertale. It's a game about flowers and friendship." From a certain point of view. "Would you like me to set that game up?" It'll take some time to memorize everything to reproduce it here, she knew that much.
"Yes! Thank you, thank you!" She skipped a bit, then slipped, dragging me down a soft grassy hill. We went from "Whoa" to a fit of giggles as we rolled in the grass together.
It's not like we could get hurt here so accidents from Asia's occasional clumsiness simply meant a pleasant surprise.
Of course, little innocent Asia got all embarrassed as we ended up face-to-face, with me right on top of her. I moved out of the way for quick separation, even if I didn't blush like a boy my age would in an anime.
"Oh um… t-take a look here!" She clasped her hands together then opened them quickly, releasing dozens of colorful butterflies! "I managed to um… convince the lead missionary to take me to a butterfly park, during one of our trips. Ah! I didn't know that butterflies could have so many colors until then."
"They're beautiful."
"They are. Although it's a bit scary when you look at insects up close, most of them are still cute, I think."
Asia shared a bit about how she's made good progress in her cooking skills ever since she volunteered to work at the cafeteria. Apparently, the higher-ups were rather against it, saying that she had better things to do but she stayed firm on it and managed to get a compromise.
I knew they just wanted her to be their heal slut and all, so to see her managing to try out different ways of serving others rather than just healing people with Twilight Healing made me smile in pride.
We watched my "enhanced" version of Revenge of the Sith later on, including scenes from the novelization to show how Anakin is torn in so many directions, how he's basically running on zero sleep most of the time, how not being granted the rank of Master was so significant, etc…
She enjoyed the entirety of the Battle of Coruscant until of course, the Dooku vs Obi Wan and Anakin fight. Needless to say, everything went downhill the moment Dooku's severed head hit the floor.
By now, her Clone Wars experience and the knowledge of their inevitable fate had made all the scenes rather tragic, and when Asia saw Anakin and Obi-Wan saying goodbye, she had already guessed correctly that it would be the last time they would see each other as friends.
She pinched my shoulder quite often throughout the movie, especially during the Palpatine scenes whenever she realizes I've been quoting the Sith Lord that she disliked greatly, comparing him with the devil especially after he told Anakin of the Tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise.
Needless to say, she was suitably horrified at Anakin's response to "Master Skywalker, there are too many of them, what are we going to do?" Asia was so emotionally drained by Order 66 and the ongoing tragedy that she only regained her energy when the hopeful parts of the ending came along.
Before we could discuss the movie, however, it was time for me to leave for my trip.
I awoke to an unfamiliar and horrifying ceiling.
It was the interior of our family car.
"Ah, you're awake." Upon closer inspection, my head was laying on Valerie's lap, which was really soft, smooth and comfy… nothing like sand. "Good morning, darling." She whispered with her native accent that sounded really nice in my head.
Top quality lap pillow service. I like this, I like this a lot.
What I didn't like was the fact that my clones had apparently assisted in putting my sleeping body into the car without my permission.
The memories from my clones began to flow into my head. Apparently, we were leaving for the beach earlier than expected, due to some last minute changes to a more luxurious hotel, courtest of Atago's parents who would be joining us.
My siblings were asleep with my mother taking care at the middle row while Valerie and I were seated in the back row.
"Good morning to you too Valerie. And um, thank you for this."
"Ufufu, so you like this sort of thing? Ah, the internet truly does provide."
"Please use the internet sensibly."
"Worrywart."
I wanted to lie down for a bit more but I needed to send new directives to the more limited clones that weren't synched up with me while I slept. From my other bodies, I quickly moved to the new destination in order to scout it out, having done so with the previous location but not this particular beach and hotel. I would spread out from the main location later in order to scan through the entire city, one can never be too sure…
Sitting up, I saw and heard a truck pass by on the other side of the road at high speeds, and quickly placed my head back down on Valerie's lap.
"Scary…" Truck-sama still haunts me to this day.
"What's wrong?" Valerie looked upon me with worry, and also, fear. Well, if there was something that could scare me, then it should scare her too, right?
I wasn't going to say "nothing" like some tough guy. That wasn't me. And I most certainly am not some Japanese anime character that would bottle it all up.
I whispered in a soft voice, "Would you believe me if I said that I was killed in a car accident involving a truck and got reincarnated in another world? Like, this world, with added trauma for certain vehicles?"
Valerie went "hmm", then nodded, "It would explain why your soul feels older than that of your parents."
"… Figures. Well, to keep things fair, I'll get Atago here and I will disclose everything to the both of you after dinner, okay?" I rather not just reveal the truth to just one person, especially another female.
I have consumed enough media to know that the female mind is a pathway to much drama that some consider to be…. unnatural. Perceived favoritism and trust related issues are a significant cause for drama, so it's best that I minimize things.
The dhampir showed visible happiness when she realized how much trust I was showing her.
Ah, through my other bodies, I was already at the site.
Oh dear.
I used my shadow that was linked to Atago's shadow in order to send her a private message.
"Please tell me that the Fallen Angel and the Sacred Gear wielding group of twenty kids, checked into a nearby resort is something that your family is aware of."
Level 17c
Level 17c
"And lastly, and I shouldn't need to repeat myself, do check for large expenditures in accommodation, especially when there isn't a fixed tenancy agreement." I finished my long lecture *cough* overview on operational security to those that gathered around in our hotel's penthouse. "Some supernatural folk, you guys excluded-" I catch Sakura, Raiga, Atago and two of the chief security guardsmen of their clan nodding in understanding, "-will throw around money like no tomorrow, especially when you're a mad scientist."
I flipped a whiteboard up using my abilities to project an image of a manic, dangerously handsome with messy long black-haired Fallen Angel in human disguise.
The image turned into a video showing teenagers of varying ages following him along like he was their most trusted and beloved teacher in the world. It's a live stream from what's happening in the other resort right now.
How they do not notice that he's obviously evil is something I scarcely understand, yet I do, seeing that it's easy for children to be groomed for immense trust by a race known for their silver tongue and deception.
Or am I confusing them for devils? Well, they are distantly related, so no surprise there. Am I becoming racist?
The other part of my audience that made up the mature side of my family, my parents, Valerie and Sheev… who had just become more intelligent after the dhampir princess decided to make him her magical familiar.
If he starts proclaiming his love for democracy within the family or promotes fascism to my siblings then I'm going to make parrot stew.
My little brother and sister are playing some card games with Himuro and a clone of mine. Atago's little brother is good with kids, or maybe he's been taking some internet tips to heart in order to be the best "onii-chan" ever.
Through my other body, I recommended him to watch Oath Under Snow or read the manga arc it was adapted from. Both of us were fellow Fate series fans. In comparison to our deep love for the franchises (I love both while Himuro only likes Fate), Atago was quite casual in enjoying different franchises like Fate and Star Wars, so I mostly kept that kind of fandom discussion between us.
"And that concludes my long rant on how to spot suspicious activity."
Everyone clapped politely.
"Taki, make sure you have these minutes blasted out to everyone." Raiga got some affirmatives from his subordinates.
What?
"That's my son! Using his paranoia to improve security services!" Gotou looked so damn proud to the point where I decided to let the minor insult slide. I am paranoid, after all, but justifiably so.
"Dear, are you sure you don't want to be a security consultant?" Haru asked, looking noticeably concerned for my future career. I think my mother is too used to "Japan equals wage slave" idea. Damn it, dad! Stay at home more.
"I will not be bound for the fate of the Proletariat." I prefer entrepreneurship, or self-employment, whatever way you want to spin it.
Sakura and Atago were scheming, I mean discussing, on how to monetize some presidential security tier services for some reason. Really? If they already had a valid business plan then they really shouldn't amend it after hearing a paranoid man's ramblings.
I was just slightly irritated over the fact that their whole security team didn't discover the fact that the hotel management next door was paid in gold for a long stay, many rooms, with a requirement for no room service to be provided.
It was obviously a sign for nefarious intentions, I don't blame the humans there since they're obviously hypnotized, but I would think that anyone securing a location would be more throughout, hence the fact that the Kaiza clan was taking responsibility by listening to my many complaints on how they could have done better.
My throat was getting a bit dry, I turned around in order to get some water, only for Valerie to be right there holding up a cold glass of water with a couple of ice cubes in it.
I gratefully took the glass and drank its contents. "Haaa…" I love drinking cold water so much, screw warm drinks, this is where it's at! "Thank you. Really. I appreciate it."
"She's just a simple girl trying to get you to pay more-" Valerie flicked Sheev, who was perched on her shoulder, off with a finger.
"Be silent."
"Uh… I know he's gotten more annoying, but he's still my pet too."
"I'm too weak… don't kill me…"
"Sorry."
We tuned out the magical parrot's obviously fake mutterings.
"Did you become a psychic when I wasn't looking?"
"Possibly."
She looked to be seriously considering her answer for a moment, "It's faint, but I could sense that you wanted to stop talking, and it felt that you were a little thirsty around the middle…"
"We'll talk about it later." I didn't want Atago and her family to hear the rest. Well, I didn't want anyone else to hear about it. The knowledge of her Sacred Gear wasn't safe with my family, and it wasn't politically safe for it to be in the hands of a clan responsible for the security of their faction. Atago pretty much told me to not tell her when I first mentioned it all those months ago.
Even though I said we would talk about it later, I was really just mentally communicating with Valerie through my information flow technique, which was easier achieved due to our prior soul connection making it obvious it wasn't so much as a mental intrusion, so much as it was a mental connection.
Keeping that in mind, it's possible that the shared skills weren't just a one-time thing, and that my skills and knowledge might be bleeding into her in a similar, but slower fashion, to how EMIYA's experiences were transferred over to Shirou.
From what she described, she might have been mixing in her Sacred Gear's passive "Soul Sight" and my "Empathy Senses". I had to broach the topic of training sooner than I expected.
"Okay, so, I'm going to get myself involved and hope it isn't just a misunderstanding." I announced, shrugging, "Considering the Fallen are the Sacred Gear experts, I'd rather not lie my ass off if he takes an interest in me and approaches me like some pedo. Also-" Pointing my thumb at Valerie, "I don't want any news about Valerie leaking out to them."
Spies from all factions are literally everywhere. Kyoto's supernatural faction is largely secluded, and most don't involve themselves with other factions, but they still do get visitors and involved in inter-faction related politics.
The Biblical faction on the other hand? All of them, Heaven included, have so many leaks that you need Truck-sama to work overtime in order to plug them all. If they're not spies for each other's factions, then they're spies for private individuals, extremist factions or the treasonous Khaos Brigade.
Valerie cannot be known until we're all more prepared. Preferably, it would be better if she could live her life normally, but that would take everything short of outright death.
I was also being rather selfish of wanting her with me, if only because I had grown very fond of her as well. Still trying to wrap my head around the fact that I do in fact have romantic love for more than one woman…
Most of the audience was displeased with my course of action, although for different reasons. I reassured my parents that we could still have our beach day as a family with a clone, that's basically me, in order to not disappoint the twins.
Atago's parents were much more accepting of it, part of the reason is likely due to their familiarity with my quirks, their desire to not get themselves involved in Fallen politics if they made a proactive move despite their concerns over the Sacred Gear wielders and lastly…
"Well, figures that you have to be heroic again. Personally, I don't see any death flags this round." Raiga grinned, remembering our old conversations.
"Even if I did, I'll likely find a way to resurrect myself after remaining "dead" for an entire light novel's worth of events." I joked. If Issei could pull if off without any planning whatsoever thanks to two cheating Dragon God's, then a bit of Palpatine and Voldemort-like preparations on my end could probably let me cheat death.
"Same rules as before?"
"… Yeah. Tell them about the Truck."
We did establish our "last wills" before fighting Heydrich after all, and we hadn't recanted it since then. While there were situational amendments, most of it still stayed the same in essence. We would take care of each other's family, and if I died, he would pass on the hint about me being a reincarnating in another world.
Although, without the mysterious death part now that my family knows of the supernatural, it would make it my circumstances so much more obvious in hindsight.
"I want in." Atago grabbed my arm before I left with Valerie, who had to stay close with me until the appointed time of my assault on a nearby facility that reeks "secret lab", "Someone has to sort out the logistics of twenty plus teenagers."
I could technically handle it with all my clones but… yeah, she would be better at that. I would either have to be on the honest spectrum or ham it up as whatever disguise I'm going as, somehow, I don't think that will end well.
This isn't clear cut like the vampire case. Some of these kids likely have legitimate loyalties to the Grigori other than their trusted "sensei" so I had to handle this more delicately.
Well, beyond the practical reasons for her participation, I could see that Atago was sticking to her commitment to being more involved in my life. Ever since our "holiday" to Europe, we've both been making an effort to improve each other's situations in the different lives we lived in.
If we were to be married, it is only natural for us to share each other's lives in a deeper manner.
And I was sure, that more than anything, it is for that reason she would be accompanying me for my stakeout and potential rescue mission.
I smile and joked around a bit, knowing that she wasn't going to change her mind, "It's going to be pretty boring. You sure you don't want to go to the beach with everyone else?"
"Fufu, I don't like the sand very much. But I wanna do all the fun beach things with you, like say… getting my body rubbed all over, with sunscreen." That sultry grin told me all about the things she wanted me to do during that "innocent" activity.
"Ah, the usual tropes, but make it R-18. Gotcha." We could always have fun tomorrow.
Right now, however, I had to follow my gut feeling with the hope that there was a slim chance of everything being an innocent misunderstanding.
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The really annoying security measures I had to navigate us through to get into the laboratory and the robots literally powered by a forsaken child, however, quickly proved my worst fears true.
Well then, thankfully, I already had a protocol for dealing with slavishly loyal children and obviously evil figures of authority that had gained their trust.
Now I just had to factor in how I was going to loot all of this… actually, I'm just going to do that later. Best not to get ahead of myself.
Step 1, get into the lab. Done.
Step 2, eliminate all threats. Quest accepted.
Level 18
AN: Long story short, I looked at the rough outlines I had, along with how many times I had to rewrite scenes in the first act out of five… then thought to myself "holy shit this is going to be fucking long" after estimating that it'll take anywhere between 4-6k words for me to be satisfied on the first act itself. So I decided to prioritize what I felt would need the most amount of focus and decided that it would be the personal relationships between the characters, rather than the backstory and actions of the players that will be involved for the following parts of this arc. I will be properly going through my outline to see what would be needed as I don't want to throw in stupid amount of detail to something that I won't focus on for almost all of the story again.
So yeah… here's the next part from Atago's POV, before the lab raid.
Level 18
His parents had laughed and reminisced fondly after hearing Gen's first "phase" of his plan, saying Gen was "going back to his roots", but honestly? There was nothing funny about it.
Stakeouts had always sounded cool in the movies, but that's only because all the parts where the police watch literally "nothing" happen aren't included. Even the "dynamic stakeouts" were just as bad, as they combined the never-ending boredom of the stationary stakeout and the false-excitement of following someone without letting them know you're there, creating the worst kind of stakeout.
Atago and Valerie had just learned that Genshirou's childhood has been filled with time periods that wouldn't be out of place among the most boring moments in all of humankind history.
Whilst it was definite proof of his dedication, patience and sheer will they wouldn't be able to add that to their list of reasons why they love him until after the day was over.
Simply put, they were almost regretting signing up for Genshirou's "main plan", instead of the one that involved placing them far our of danger.
"Oh. Mein. Gott. He even eats a potato chip like a fucking psycho." Genshirou shook his head with visible disapproval as he spied on the Fallen Angel from the top of the mountain they were hiding in.
Valerie was lying on the picnic mat bored out of her mind. Atago was in a similar mental state, leaning on the back of her boyfriend with her head slumped forward to observe the ground.
"Uhhhh…" Atago groaned, "Let me see that." She took out her own magical pair of binoculars, adjusting them to the spot Genshirou was focused on.
"That's it!?" What she saw filled her with utter disappointment. Yes, the target looked like a psycho, but there was nothing interesting in watching him snacking on his potato chips while the kids under him played on the beach.
Moving the focus slightly to the left, she could see one of the Genshirou clones in disguise, monitoring them and even speaking with one of the kids without any suspicious movements being made whatsoever.
Clearly, the supposed Sacred Gear expertise that was to be expected of a Fallen Angel, doesn't seem to mean anything when a clone body was involved. Atago was of the opinion that the target wouldn't even notice Gen's Sacred Gear even if he stood right in front of target, but of course, her lover would never believe that and would not take such a risk.
"Shh! Don't give our position away." He shushed her quietly.
"We are literally outside the town. On a mountain! How can we possibly give our location away?!" She stood up and gestured to the lack of intelligent life surrounding them to illustrate the point.
"You can't be too careful. We are approximately 10 km away, remember? That's practically nothing. I can cover that distance in 3 seconds tops at my current speed. Who knows how much faster these crazy multi-pair winged fallen angels can be? I'm already taking a huge risk by putting this measly distance between us and him."
Atago stood there with her mouth wide open for a good five seconds while Genshirou continued his long-range observations in addition to his close-ranged observations via clones and smaller "shadow relays".
After she realized he wasn't joking at all, she put her binoculars back into the bag, took a few steps to where Valerie was lying on the picnic mat and then laid down beside her.
"Only you could consider a distance like this as nothing…" She muttered with incredulity leaking into her tone despite her own knowledge countering such traitorous thoughts. Genshirou wouldn't lie about his capabilities to her, and with what she had seen thus far, it was completely possible for him to have overtaken many powerful beings within the speed category by a number of magnitudes without noticing it.
Atago always thought that he had some unrealistically high expectations for what constituted as powerful combatants after he introduced the "Ophis Serious Attack" as a benchmark to all his abilities. The amount of effort and progress he had made since the last times she saw him fought seriously, back in their estate and that mountain battle, had eluded her completely.
While they trained together, it was very apparent that he was holding back significantly, yet even then it never occurred to Atago that his definition of "balanced" training apparently meant a proportionate increase in speed relative to all his other capabilities, if not more so. She had no full measure of his actual capabilities since it was, as he said, "too deadly" to showcase properly.
"Pffffhaaaa!" Hearing a strange sound, Atago turned her head, and watched as Valerie attempted to blow a leaf that had fallen on her lips up into the air while keeping it that way.
"Oh! I know." Genshirou suddenly took out a balloon from his inventory. Atago didn't want to ask why he had one in there as he would give an answer that would likely irritate her at this moment. "Let's try to keep this up in the air with just our heads."
Even without turning his body, he was well aware of their current states and what they were up to, as his recent suggestion was too on point to prove anything else.
Atago felt a little guilty for thinking that he was a little selfish for letting them be bored like this, she should have known he was always thinking about them like this. And to begin with, it was their decision to commit to his method of doing things and his rules so they could have at least follow through it.
"You don't have to play too." She attempted to give him an out.
"Nope. Game starts now. Boop." He placed the balloon on his head and sent it flying.
"Ooh! I never played this game before." Valerie quickly stood up and positioned herself to bounce the balloon of her head. "I got it! It's up there."
Genshirou then, without taking his eyes off the fallen angel even at this distance, moved into position and bounced the balloon back up. The way he waddled in an exaggerated manner to reach it made her chuckle a little.
"Well, if you're okay with it, it's my turn!" As she began to play, Atago was reminded of the times where she played volleyball. Her prior experience made it a lot harder to play, however, as she had to resist the urge to use her hands to get the spherical object.
A few minutes later…
"I'm getting it- oh no! The wind!" Valerie laughed as she ran after it without a care in the world.
"Don't run." Atago quickly spoke a warning with a tone not unlike what she reserved for her younger brother when they were younger.
"Careful, don't trip!" Genshirou yelled out, tearing his eyes away from his observation target, then moved instantly, appearing right beside Valerie after she almost fell down upon tripping on a large branch, "Are you alright?"
The blonde girl nodded, the smile Valerie stayed on her face as if she wasn't surprised at all, "Quite so. Thank you." The dhampir allowed herself to be pulled back up, and pecked him on the cheek for his efforts.
The smile that appeared on his face was slightly more natural than his usual ones. Atago took it as a good sign that he was effectively adjusting his over-guarded reactions to a more relaxed one.
Genshirou had been visibly twitchy with his hands and feet during the days when he wasn't as "ultra-aware" of everything and was still unused to romantic affections. Compared with back then when they first started dating in winter, he has managed to cut his adjustment time by two to three times, which is good progress!
"I guess not having to worry about safety like this with you around is a worthwhile trade-off." Atago smiled at the pair, "You're going back to observing Potato Chip Sensei again, aren't you?" She made sure to put on her best pout.
While Atago may gripe over Genshirou's over cautiousness (having her "surprise" hugs from behind being made ineffective really sucks) at times, the payoff has always been worth it. That didn't mean that she wouldn't try to get him to relax when she could.
If he were really serious about it then she would let him do what he wants and accept it, he would do the same for her, it's the little concessions that allowed them both to show their love for each other.
"I've finished the necessary defences and have placed sufficient observation resources. Even if he were to directly attack us right now we'll likely be safe behind my instant shadow swap technique." Ah, she had to get the details on that later. She wouldn't do it now or he'll end up launching into a very long explanation in how he derived and created that ability.
"Oh my! And here I was, almost thinking that you couldn't bear to look away from your quarry." Atago joked.
"Not to worry. I enjoy keeping my eye on you ladies far too much to give that up." He grinned cheekily and winked back at her, setting her heart aflutter.
Valerie displayed visible happiness with a smile and girlish giggling, "My dear hero, you may gaze at my form to your heart's content."
"It is with great humility that I accept this privilege." His words were accompanied with an exaggerated bow.
The two of them enjoyed this dragon/hero to love-struck princess dynamic far too much.
"Hmm… so why is your current observation resources sufficient for… what's his name?" Atago found herself stuck on the Fallen Angel's name… which none of them really bothered to remember.
Genshirou took out the hotel guest list from his inventory that he printed out, "… I can't believe he's using his actual name. It's Tamariel, typical. I swear, at least a third of them must have a name that ends on "iel". One more letter off and I would have thought he developed the Elder Scrolls series."
That was a video game reference that she didn't get. All she heard about the series was from Gen, and as per usual, he was only propagating memes about it.
"Well?"
"I managed to re-allocate enough resources to get another clone up and running after I scouted a couple of pathways to the lab. That, and the defences I mentioned earlier."
So there was another clone nearby performing his previous self-appointed duties, Atago pondered upon that thought… then considered asking if he could get another clone up here since she was in the mood for a quick gangbang after the fun and games.
She held back on account of more pressing concerns, but he seemed to have noticed her intentions, as the smirk he always reserved for whenever her lust would flare up a little was plastered right on his smug face.
Focus! Atago reigned in her thoughts and decided to focus on the case.
Knowing him, he had likely swept the city and found the main entrance early on, only to have not been satisfied with that, and proceeded with scouting out for every emergency exit to prevent a "recurring villain" scenario. He had likely already prepared some anti-teleportation measures and had wanted to make sure any last-ditch escape through secret passageways would have been covered as well.
She gave her thoughts on the matter, getting a big "Yep!" from him along with a smile filled with approval that made her really happy.
"Are we going now?" She asked, getting a shake of the head as a response, her mood dropped a bit as she wondered if she had missed something and had given a stupid answer.
"No, not now. There's no point. From the dregs of energy I can sense, everyone down there is already dead. So we can just skip the "find the survivors and then be horrified at the revelation" phase." There was no surprise in his tone of voice even as his grim determination seemed to settle upon his face.
He took a deep calming breath and his smile was as big and honest as always. "It's best to wait for him to show us the way in. Well then, since the balloon is missing-"
"Noooo! Ballooney!" Valerie looked like she lost her favorite kite after remembering the lost balloon.
"I can't believe you gave it a name so quickly." Genshirou quickly transformed into a Tsukkomi.
"Gen, be nice, it was her first balloon." Atago internally winced a second after she finished her sentence after realizing just how pitiful that sounded.
"Uh, I have more in here… Oh, I also have Helium tanks, so we can have some floating ones too." The girl who had never held a floating balloon in her lifetime cheered happily as Genshirou speedily prepared a couple for her.
Atago was about to ask why he would have something as random as that in his inventory, and then she remembered his science experiments to use his abilities to decompose matter to create… energy. The science side of his training regimen has been a pathway to many abilities that many would consider to be… overpowered.
It took her a couple of seconds to process those few thoughts of hers.
"Nooooo! I don't want to hear it! No more tragedy of whoever the fuck is unwise!" She screamed in an attempt to banish the memes from her mind.
Genshirou had turned around and looked at her with a wide smile.
"Hahahaha! Good." The sadist in bed cackled at her then clapped once, no doubt re-enacting a famous scene from Star Wars. Even so, that last word of his was enough to make her body remember it's "training". He had been sneaking the word "good" in all manner of tones whenever he could whenever he fucked her brains out, the fact that it had such an effect on her filled her with disgust for enjoying being treated like a dog during those periods.
Sensing her reaction, he quickly continued and seized the initiative.
"Your disgust has made you aroused. Now fulfill your duty and take your place beneath me." She knew the tone he used well enough and before she could even respond to his words with her own, her body had reacted faster.
It took her a second to realize she was already on her knees.
Even though she swore to not let him have his way if he were to use memes within a time frame of one hour, the idea of letting him get away with it, or simply giving up on the matter and surrender to her own desires had won out over her dislike for this kind of talk.
She could take solace that she was the one that referenced it first, so it was her fault, and it was only right that she took her punishment for it.
Wait! How did this happen?! She's more controlled than this!
Atago had almost realized her nonsensical thought processes but by then she had already taken his dick into her mouth.
Apparently not.
Atago had been more thoroughly trained by her master than she thought, having little idea of the true extent of it all. She hadn't even batted an eye at the sight of Valerie pleasuring herself while watching them both, her thoughts on how far she must have fallen to have only felt more aroused at the fact she wasn't troubled by it only served to enhance her pleasure further.
Before long, she ended up in a state with all her holes filled with cum, to the point where Valerie jested about making an "instant loss 2-koma" image in "honor" of her.
She had lost track of time and had only stopped when her future husband told her to stop. As the haze of lust cleared away, it dawned on her that he had just prevented her from licking his cum off the ground, preserving what little dignity that she had left.
Out of breath and just recovering for her lack of control over herself, she spoke in a hushed tone with disbelief and perverse fulfilment in equal measure, "What have I done?"
He towered above her and smirked triumphantly, "You are fulfilling your destiny, Atago. Become my sex pet. Learn to experience the depraved pleasures of the flesh." That sounded wonderful in Atago's mind. It was only natural, she was already his bitch in more ways than one, getting a more advanced title for it was appealing to her.
"I will do whatever you ask…. Wa-wait a second! Mm-" Curiously, it wasn't the content of his demands that she was concerned about, rather, it was the fact that the whole scenario sounded far too familiar to her liking.
He didn't allow her to take back her words and sealed her lips with a kiss. Quite frankly, she didn't want to take them back either.
The dhampir voyeur even acted as a witness and made some handwritten documents for them to sign just to make it look "official", reading their mutual desire and predicting their needs. Atago made a note to get Valerie an extra special gift for her thoughtfulness and prompt action.
She supposed that it would only be proper to return the favor in the future… At any rate, the purpose of the "contract" was to act as a humiliating reminder to make their future couplings even more pleasurable. Already, she was losing herself in her perverted fantasies, she entertained the thought that she might have gone into heat early… then dismissed it quickly after checking her body.
"Oh dear, I seem to have forgotten to record it." Valerie grumbled about the lost opportunity even though she definitely had some incriminating images on her phone now.
"It's better that you don't no matter how much we may want it. Such videos have a tendency to find their way to the public in my type of career." They had that much in common with human politics, as her experiences have led her to believe such.
Hearing a strange slapping sound, Valerie and Atago turned around, finding themselves watching the surreal scene of Genshirou and a clone of his taking turns to slap each other's face.
"You idiot!" "Fuck you I'm with stupid." "I am you." "Not yet." "It's idiocy then." "Ahhhhh!"
"Haaa… can someone explain what is happening?" Atago raised her voice to get their attention.
The two of them looked back at her and spoke at the same time, "You're naked."
"Oh wow, I wonder who could be responsible for that?" What? He was begging for sarcasm when he tried to avoid the question.
"I think he's wondering why you haven't put your clothes back on." Valerie interjected.
Atago looked down, noting her nakedness, and shivered involuntarily at her shamelessness. "A-anyways-" She didn't bother to cover up in order to sound confident, although if she had to be honest with herself, she was enjoying this far too much, "What are you bashing yourself over?"
The two of them sighed and then there was only one of them left, the clone disappearing out of sight in an instant, "I, uh, had something important that I wanted to tell you and Valerie. I kind of forgot that I committed myself in my head to tell you tonight but well… it's the sort of thing that causes a truck-load of drama that needs a couple of chapters to resolve. So yeah, bad timing when we're going to be relying on each other later on."
If he was more blatant with his references to Shounen Jump then he may as well wear a black gakuran just to cosplay as a certain Good Loser.
"Oh yeaaah…" Valerie seemed to have remembered him mentioning it at some point.
Atago vaguely remembered that he wanted to talk to them about something important, then completely shifted the topic to the fallen angel immediately after. "Oh my, well, out with it."
"Okay, may as well… so you see, I actually lived in an alternate Earth, died via a car accident involving a truck, and got reincarnated into this world that I recognized as an ecchi battle harem light novel world after hearing my given name. For the sake of coming clean, I'm the side character that was always supposed to be chasing after the main character's shadow, Valerie is the MacGuffin for the bad guys trying to fuck the world up, the author couldn't be bothered to expand on the Shinto and Youkai faction since he chickened out of making them just as weird as he made the other factions so as far as I know, you weren't mentioned at all."
She should have been shocked at the unpretentious admission. There were many things she should have been feeling, thinking about, questioning and conforming but… somehow, she could tell that the truth of his past meant very little to him. And the fact was, that it meant very little to her just as well.
Outside of the non-painful, much more comedic version of trauma he had for trucks and his "gut-feeling" of certain tropes about to be enacted upon the material world… there was no real indication of him treating life and the people around him like a character that got reincarnated in a dating sim game, like all those villainess otome game reincarnations that are all the rage nowadays.
There was not a single person among his small circle of family and friends that he did not cherish in a real, genuine manner. His pursuits of power to keep everyone safe was but one of the many tangible evidence for that.
"… Huh. That makes a lot of sense. Well, I'm glad that I can just chalk up your absurd capabilities to someone that knows how to level grind." Atago decided to lighten up the mood so that Valerie's ruminations will not cause Genshirou undue worry, "If I had to be honest, I was kind of hoping that was the case, and well, I had my suspicions." He's been dropping hints like crazy considering what he had said to her father along with his actions, both intentional and unintentional, was any indication.
"H-how so?" He asked, surprised but not wary of her intentions, as he no doubt could feel that her heart was in no turmoil whatsoever.
She had been waiting for this. If she excluded the really obvious reincarnator traits that she had seen then…
"You put down English as your first language when we were filling up online forms to order your Star Wars merchandise." "That could mean anything." They were lying on a bed playing on a computer and ordering things online on it that time.
"You listed down an address all the way in some other country before going back to correct it to your home address." "Uhhh…" She initially rationalized as his hideout for training, then recalled he used English letters to type it all out and it was all the way in a different country within the SEA region.
"Your backup email address is basically an entirely different full name, with a 90's birth year at the end of it." "Stupid nostalgia." If there was any sort of backup email name he would have went with, it would have been Prequel meme inspired, not some random name he never mentioned in her presence.
"Specific comments about Tomoe and Momo being underdeveloped minor characters in "canon" under your breath…" "Oh yeah, you were coming around that corner on… I forgot that your hearing improves with the rest of your abilities." That was a big slip that she didn't think too much about.
It was at this point that Valerie spoke the question that had been plaguing her mind since he told them all of this.
"Elaborate on your thoughts as you came to Romania."
An open-ended one, but from what she had known from the couple of "self-insert" fanfics that Genshirou complained about for a couple of other series, and what he had apparently known about this world (he damn well knew how to not give a damn about so called power "limits")… it was an appropriate test.
Genshirou left nothing out, from how he heard about the activities of vampires from the Church and to his liberation of those within vampire territory.
"If you were to ask whether I specifically rescued you with the intention of securing your power or preventing untold damages by future villains, then the answer is no. I stopped properly reading the light novels and focused on summaries due to being busy at a certain point in my previous life, a couple of volumes before the part where the main character, his friends, including Gasper…"
"Wait! Gasper is fine?!"
Oh! That's Valerie's only friend before she met us! Atago remembered that during a conversation she had with the girl.
"He's a crossdressing shut-in that's afraid of people, a reincarnated devil in Rias Gremory's peerage who is made up of equally damaged people, why no one has gotten any therapy at all is anyone's guess… so yes, he's fine, largely… from certain points of view. Before you ask, he isn't in the human world yet as he'll only move to a sealed room in Kuoh Academy for his first year of high school. He's a year younger than me, so if you want to see him without drawing attention from the devils then you'll need to wait a bit."
The lack of professional mental help sounds like the typical Japanese way of dealing with problems. Atago could certainly see how that would have come about considering her own reading list in manga and light novels. It's like characters have a tragic backstory just for the sake of the story.
"Oh… okay. Thank you… continue, please." Valerie seemed genuinely relieved to hear all that despite the rather concerning implications.
"Where was I? Oh yeah, I'll just tell you about what happened in that timeline first so that you have some context. Long story short, you got way worse due to Marius's experiments, the vampires got backstabbed by the shittiest devil dad in all of current history, you had your Grail stolen by them, they used it to revive and modify armies of evil dragons, oh, and the Apocalypse Beast or whatever you call it sealed by the Biblical God somewhere in the Dimension Gap at the cost of his life. Which by the way, is so stupidly overpowered that they considered getting the strongest god to fight it for them, and still resulted in untold number of deaths among the supernatural world, unless said being was a devil because the author is fucking biased towards them. Valerie, you were basically confined to a sick bed with a fuck ton of machines for who knows how long, until they finally collected all your soul and stuffed it back inside you. And yes, the story continues, and now as far as I remember, the Underworld gods, gods of death, and other discontent gods are trying to assert their dominance without the Seiba "T-pose" by ruining everyone's lives. Oh, and the author went ahead and said that if he didn't know how to continue the story, he'll end it with the Hindu faction as the final bosses."
"Oh shit." Atago had involuntarily blurted out the first thing that came to mind.
Valerie was less educated on such matters, but even she knew how grave things could get.
"Yes! This is what I'm talking about. Until I can protect everyone from that level of bullshit, then I'm hardly strong enough. Anyways, continuing on…" He looked at Valerie straight in the eye, "Since you were pretty much a plot device in my head, I didn't even remember you until I felt your presence in the castle. And after that, the first thing I thought about was how to help you get better while getting you out along with everyone else. I only thought about the implications later on and resolved to keep you safe so that you can live as normal a life as possible, even if I didn't believe trouble won't find you no matter how hard I try."
Everything he said was pretty much in line with the reason why he decided to take care of Valerie personally, outside of the fact that Valerie had something to do with a reviving item that's classified… as… the Grail. Oh. Ooooh.
By the time Atago properly sorted out just how fucked up everything would turn out, she caught the sight of Valerie lunging at Genshirou, at his lips, hugging him tightly even as she released her emotions through lots of passionate kisses.
"As what you have said is true, you will always have my trust."
Ah right, it must be easy to confirm such things when you have "lol, I can see your soul" intention detecting cheats.
Atago didn't even feel like calling Valerie out for the memes considering that she had partook in it as well on this day.
"I have one more question." Atago raised a single finger up to illustrate her point.
"Ask away." Genshirou looked really happy that everything had turned out well. Considering that he had a hot young woman all over him after all that, she could understand why he would feel that way.
Taking into account everything he had said about the future, the grave implications, Genshirou's admiral efforts to live life the best he can for everyone's sake, their current happiness and many more things… there was only one more thing that Atago would like to know more than anything else at this present moment.
"I need to know how you looked like in your past life."
If he met certain requirements then he could transform his clone for specific types of roleplay.
"… Why?"
"Let me help narrow down what I'm looking for. Did you have dark skin? Were you over forty? Bald? Fat? Have a large bitch breaking dick and-"
His response to her desire for some "safe" (Still Genshirou) NTR related play was to push her down and spank her ass like the bad girl she was.
"Aaahn!"
"You slutty bitch in heat! I'll fuck your NTR guy delusions out of your mind until the only thing you can think about is the daily cum meals you'll be eating out of the bowl." He growled angrily with not a small amount of anticipation. Quite frankly, Atago was more eager than he was in turning those thoughts into reality.
His punishment and insults only made her feel hotter. Ah, such a well-trained pet she had become…
"Aaand… it's recording now." The blonde gave us the thumbs up.
It would be a very long enjoyable time before they ended up sneaking into the lab.
Level 19
Level 19
With a final swipe of my finger, the combination of "runic" (in the general sense) characters from a multitude of magical systems were completed, ensuring that the temporary black hood made out of my power would not reveal my identity.
My own studies into Youjutsu, various other magic tomes that Atago had purchased for both of our studies, and the extensive magical knowledge I had appropriated from the plant life controlling devil (named Himawari, unsurprisingly…) that sought to learn how to create life and the evil pieces, combined with my own developed understanding of the flow of magic, all played a part in enabling me to create new spells by mixing magical systems.
Most of my new spell repertoire is supportive and utility-based thus far, the all-purpose "conceal everything covered" spell that would conceal any of the energies that I am capable of using while disrupting a person's voice and image (wouldn't want any video cameras or memory reviewing spells to identify me or anyone close to me) is but one of the many spells that are ready for use in the field.
"Couldn't you just do the same with a ninja mask? If you did that then I could wear a "battle kimono" and look like a real Kunoichi." Atago had raised a relevant question, and as much as I would love to see her cosplaying as either Shigure Kosaka or a random "kunoichi" from an anime, it really can't be helped in this case.
"I would certainly like to, unfortunately, the enchantment works best when your head is covered," Atago pouted as she tugged down the sides of the hood that went along with the plain white robes I prepared for her, giving her the image of an adorable little puppy hiding underneath a pile of clothes.
"But it doesn't look good…" She whined.
"Tut tut. Atago shouldn't be so picky at times like these." Valerie seemed very comfortable with the Jedi-like robes that I modified for her. "Or are you just complaining about not wearing something "Japanese" enough?"
"I am not." She denied Valerie's claim. In my opinion, that was a half-lie.
Atago did have a preference for traditional cultural clothing. Uniforms (e.g. military-like cosplay and school uniforms) and swimsuits notwithstanding, she often prefers wearing a yukata over modern clothes most of the time. She's perfectly open to wearing whatever when it's time for sex, however.
Valerie, on the other hand, would wear anything from a full body motorcycle race suit to a fancy dress. She's often dangerously underdressed in the confines of her room. My poor little brother's mind has already been corrupted when he and his sister came barging to their favorite "onee-sans'" room when she only had minimal clothing on.
I don't think it'll show now, but knowing this world's genre, he's definitely going to develop some fetishes when puberty hits.
"What was the inspiration of using such robes?" Valerie asked me all of a sudden.
Atago rolled her eyes, "Star Wars fanboy, hello?"
I took out the Star Wars Complete Visual Dictionary and flipped to the page showing Dark Side Anakin as he walked up to the Temple for his favorite game mode Youngling Hunt.
Spoiler
[img: https/i./cMfrn0o.jpg]
"See, a raised hood increases your stealth level."
Atago slapped her cheeks and dragged her palms down with them in utter disbelief.
"… How long did you spend preparing to make this joke after you got inspired by a meme you saw on the internet?"
"I have a clone set aside to plan for events like this."
How else am I going to consistently cheer up my family with jokes? The less they think about what the rest of my clones are doing when I sit with them for dinner, the better I would feel…. can't have them worrying about minor details like how much I'm destroying and rebuilding my body on a daily basis.
We entered the laboratory, whose entrance was etched into a cliff facing the sea, after observing how the group of teenagers and Tamariel had done so.
I just warped us all through it.
My mastery of that ability used by [Shadow Rider]'s owner was such that the transition and visual indication of the shadow portal enveloping us was near instantaneous, with the added benefit of allowing my other abilities to hide the transition to the point where it was undetectable.
I held onto Atago and Valerie as they shook off the disorientating effect. My abilities no longer had any negative effects upon myself after I had trained them to a point and, or, developed workarounds and countermeasures for them.
"They've taken a teleportation circle shortcut. We can't hijack it without alerting them. We'll be taking the normal way, with all the booby traps there." I informed my partners about the plan I hatched based on what I've sensed.
"Oooh, that sounds fun." Atago looked so happy, wow, I'm starting to feel bad that I'm about to disappoint her.
"I can't say that I find the idea of dodging traps particularly enjoyable." Valerie didn't seem too happy about it, whew, at least one person will be happy about this.
"Yeah, well, I've already sent what I have sensed to my clones and we've already come up with the sure fire way to avoid everything. So we will be following that as a walkthrough, as in, you will be following my exact instructions or I will make you do so." I had to be firm on this.
"Aww…" "Whew."
After a lot of acrobatics, puzzle game worthy path taking and a damn riddle based hidden wall, we finally made it to the underground lab. Evidently, it was designed in such a way that the "visitors", aka test subjects, would not find the actual lab area.
… I could feel that they were in a large underground room, well, more like training arena. One of their numbers had been separated from the group and is with the psycho scientist right now.
Judging by their ebbing life force, I had to be quick about this.
Normally, this is the part where I'm supposed to fight my way through the utterly loyal students that want to protect their dear trustworthy teacher, who just told them that he's helping one of their number in an important matter and must not be disturbed and that his enemies want to stop him blah blah blah… of course, I didn't give a damn about fighting through mooks if it's not necessary.
"You girls do what you want. I'm going to end this now."
Without being detected, I sped through the room using my shadow form and rematerialized in the lab area past it, it only took me a second to recognize that this is the same area where the leftover life force (likely through lingering regret via a vengeful spirit of his victims, or something) remained.
"Kuhahaha! Yes, this is it! This is the ultimate mecha ahahaha!" The whackjob was cackling like the typical mad scientist.
What?
The question in my head was answered upon laying my eyes on the stupidly large Gundam derivative with a bubble like core in the middle, oh… why am I not surprised? There's a person in there. So much wow…
"Ha! Those fools… they said that I couldn't make it work, that I shouldn't make it work. Those impotent so-called "scientists" rely on humans to get Sacred Gear data… no more! Why bother with humans, those weak fleshy meat bags when I can get a robot to do it! I'm such a genius! Ah, if only Sataneal were here… no wait, the idiot just had to ditch with the Abyss Team all those years ago. It's all his fault! If he didn't ally himself with those magicians, youkai and other inferior races and worked in secret like me then I could have progressed faster without Azazel's watchful eye!"
I know I should be in awe of having an awesome giant robot right in front of me, but honestly, having the bad guy conveniently narrates his entire backstory and reasoning just sucks the joy out of me.
Like, why is he even doing this?
I feel like I'm in some kind of fanfiction sometimes when people just keep explaining shit in multiple long paragraphs without a strong reason, yet everyone takes them seriously or acts in an entirely stupid manner instead of behaving like actual people.
Having used the processing time in order to spread my influence, I was in a position to straight up kill him, however, he could be ranting just to make me lower my guard if he were aware of my presence.
I won't fall for that.
Yet, I won't just play along with this game either.
I'm going for the kill immediately, once I make sure that my assumptions are correct.
"Rise my BLACK BLAZING BLADE BATTLE BOT 2.5!"
I want to go home. This is just as stupid as Heydrich, well, a lot less stupid, but still stupid regardless.
As it activated, my senses tell me that a battle had begun in the room behind me, from what I can tell, Atago and Valerie had just engaged in aggressive negotiations. As for the robot, I could sense the familiar energy of a Vritra type Sacred Gear, yet it felt… muted, somehow, most of the raw power at the present seemed to be coming from a source of heat and draconic energy, it felt like there were several Sacred Gear users stuffed into that machine.
Or rather, there was at least one dead user, and one living user attached to it.
"Now go and pluck the rest of your materials. Then, you will be perfect! Just like Perfect Cell, only without all the disgusting method of absorbing other beings."
"I beg to differ. Everything about Cell was cool."
"Shut up heretic! Wait, what, how did you get in here?!"
It took shouting and pointing at me for him to realize that I made my way in here.
"I don't suppose you're going to let those children free? Aren't you?"
"You dare?! I am Tamariel! The-"
I crossed the distance, cut off his head with a swipe of my arm and quickly backed off.
And as I thought, any decent mad scientist would have a contingency for that, his outer "shell" and clothes detonated in a manner resembling a flashbang, which energy my body absorbed rendering its effect null, and I watched as several metal tendrils shot out of the bloody part of his head to reattach itself to the body.
Also, apparently, that was synthetic skin and he decided to become some kind of cyborg at some point.
"Fooool! Did you think that I would die that easily!? BBBBB 2.5, kill him!"
The robot was faster than I expected for a monstrosity that size, guess that's magic for you, that said, it was barely as fast as my 10% without my usual enhancements, meaning it moved well under a third of the speed of sound.
Too slow.
However, considering that I had no clue what esoterical effects Vritra's cursed flames surrounding the giant robot would have on me, I decided to not take the risk at all.
The thing about curses and automatic magical defenses, however, is that it required time to deploy. If the object or person it is meant to defend has been destroyed by an unknown assailant at a speed that is beyond it's "target identification" part of its magical formula, then it would fail to deploy.
While Sacred Gear generated effects are different, they do in fact have a reaction time component to it, it is something that I had discovered with my own Sacred Gear, which I have been rectifying ever since then, to the point where my contingencies would even activate if I am incapable of cognitive thought.
Deciding not to risk it by giving Tamariel any time whatsoever to prepare a counter or figure me out, I quickly went after him while leaving a clone in my previous location to take care of the robot and save whoever's in it.
I simultaneously activated two of my trump cards.
Through my clone body, I used a strike that could only be used by elevating my power and speed beyond the limits of my living flesh.
Isshin Rakurai
An attack that utilized elements from a multitude of techniques. Joukyuu Kunitoshi's Raijin, Boros's Meteoric Burst, Ikki's Ittou Rasetsu, Negi's Raiten Taisou the culmination of my own library of skills.
Raijin, the technique of a martial arts prodigy, using both skill and speed to make the user's arms disappear completely and create what looks like a whip of lightning. It thrashes the opponent around and then slams them on the ground, which makes the opponent feel like the user is controlling gravity. It is the whip-like motion that gives my technique both speed and the ability to modify the path of my attack.
Meteoric Burst uses latent energy to boost the body to speed and power beyond its limit, at the cost of putting an immense burden on the body and even shortening cutting off the user's lifespan. Ittou Rasetsu does something similar at a biological level in addition to shutting down all the five senses along with other body function, such as being able to breathe, while mustering all the strength for a single moment. Overwhelming power and speed are concentrated into a single attack.
Raiten Taisou takes the power from Lightning Magic into one's flesh and fuses it with the spirit. I cannot do such a thing, but what I can do will allow me a feat that is close enough to it.
Creating a sympathetic link between the "electrical" signals of my brain and body's nervous system with that of the concept of "electricity" and the human ideal of "lightning", for a moment, the flesh that I to perform my attack is elevated towards "lightning", both in properties and speed.
All this combined with the deadliness of my synchronized techniques used against that Sacred Gear user up the mountain had utterly destroyed the top half of the robot. The only reason it had not destroyed more was that I hadn't aimed it anywhere else, in order to not damage the corpse and living person kept within.
The attack was so fast that even my senses pushed to it's utmost could barely sense it happen through my other body. My eyes could scarcely keep up with the attack, it was like half the robot had just been erased out of existence. Had I not practiced with it as much as I had, I wouldn't have been able to control the destruction caused to such a fine degree.
"Wha-"
The only reason why the Fallen Angel for half a word out was due to my clone slowing down to quickly grab the two bodies out of the rest of the robot with some shadow tentacles support, and then to repeat the same lightning attack with the unused arm, destroying the rest of the robot.
My own cast time was, unfortunately, slowed down ever so slightly due to the backlash of the technique, I could feel my other body's arms pain, it was like every single cell within the limbs used for the attack was being burned.
From my experiments, if I had used the technique a second time without rest in the same limb, my bones would have been calcified and my flesh would be on the verge of a molecular breakdown.
Thankfully, I had four limbs in each body, and a lot of disposable bodies to throw at people.
" Nox Aeterna-!" Unfortunately, due to the complexity of this magic, I have to use some spell words to bind it together for now.
"How dare you destroy my creation! DIE!" He was high up in the air thanks to his wing's granting him immense aerial speed. I could cross it easily if it weren't for the light spears awaiting me that may or may not go through my magic resistant body.
A hundred light spears were thrown at me by the enranged fallen angel, to no avail, as my Anti-Light counter worked flawlessly.
My body turned into an all-consuming darkness, an abyssal umbra that drained all light, natural and supernatural, from the room around me, and I kept it that way, lest I end up blacking out the city by accident a second time.
His light was broken, shattered, taken into my body to fuel the technique even further.
This darkness is a mixture of spatial, light and darkness magic combined with my empowered gravitational energies. It sucks in everything like a black hole and stores it in the dark, a separate store of power altogether, a dangerous technique that can turn fatal if I manage it incorrectly.
This time, when I took his head, I removed the brain from his body. I kicked the body away, letting the last resort activated-upon-death curses eat away at the rest of his body. A shame that I couldn't salvage it, but I rather not risk myself just to test how well I would do against curses.
The brain was immediately placed in an extracting apparatus created by my power, keeping it "alive" to a point while I began taking his memories, knowledge, skills, and anything that might be useful.
I prioritized the immediate situation on what he intended to do to the kids.
Well shit. The dead guy whose Sacred Gear's functions had been extracted by the machine earlier has a little sister that has no clue what has happened.
With what the fallen angel knew about their history, I couldn't let the girl see her brother's body like this and not expect shit to hit the fan.
Also, it would be a double whammy for the teenagers if they find out that not only has their teacher betrayed their trust, but in addition to that, someone that mattered to them had died as a result of their blind trust… well, I don't want to deal with the fallout of teenage Sacred Gear wielders.
… While Valerie could possibly make the situation better, she has no experience in this, and I don't believe she should be obligated to do anything about it, nor should she have to defy the natural order for my sake, at least on this matter.
My other body had already managed the healing of the girl trapped within the "core" of the robot. As for the secondary core which held the corpse (eww, he looked like he was sucked dry by DIO), I created half a dozen clones, one to restore the body to its natural state and another to transform into a copy of the Fallen Angel's body.
The rest were taking all the information from the computers and whatever usable material in the laboratory.
I searched for Tamariel's thoughts and feelings about the students, disgusting as they were, and made sure to "program" the clone taking on his form well enough to sell the act.
As for the dead guy's body, I had managed to retain a "blueprint" of his Sacred Gear and take whatever power was left, even if it wasn't much at all. In addition to that…
"Fuck, I hate school, but a man's gotta do what a man gotta do…"
I couldn't fix the brain after what had been done to the boy, and even if I could have done so, it would only be a barely functioning soulless zombie without the brain-eating tendencies and decay.
My only option is to replace the broken brain with a new, functioning one. Quite frankly, there was only one brain that I could use for this.
If I replicate what I do with my clones then at the very least, I can help the boy settle all his affairs with both his sole living family and the rest of his schoolmates.
Level 20
Level 20
I poured my special hot chocolate mixture into two cups, levitating them with some kinetic and gravitational energy applied to a strand-thin line of my Sacred Gear, to the dining table of the shared hotel room.
Despite this being a family trip, the parents from both sides of our families were likely hoping I would slip up and get both Atago and Valerie pregnant as soon as possible, and so assigned us to a room together.
I would normally find a way to say "mind your own business" in a tactful manner for such a situation, yet, after yesterday's frustrating amount of bullshit I had to pull out of my ass, I'm just going to be thankful that we had plenty of privacy.
The cups settled in front of Atago and Valerie, who I had seated on one side on the table, while I had prepared my own drink on the opposite side.
Their eyes were glued to the table, heads down in shame for the utter idiocy they had gotten up to.
The glass of water filled to the brim with ice cubes soothed my soul.
"*Gulp* Ahhh… that was nice. Hmm, go on then, take a sip."
I watched as they took their drinks with dread in their hearts, only to realize there was no trick involved. While I had contemplated smacking them both with a rolled up newspaper on the head once or twice, I ultimately dismissed the idea (that could potentially lead up to some nice pet play) as I wasn't the type of "boss" that would physically punish those below me.
That sort of thing should be reserved for devils and the like.
Come to think of it… most of the supernatural seems to default to cruel and unusual methods of reformation (some Hero Faction members got put to work with magic spells acting as a deadly deterrent), sealing a being for thousands of years (Kokabiel and a couple of other gods like Loki and Nyx) or outright disgrace and execution.
I was brought out of my thoughts with the sounds of happiness from the two girls.
"Mmm! This is delicious." Valerie was as per usual, pleasantly surprised about tasting something new. She had been taking her time trying things in the outside world.
If I had decided to take her on a food tour with meals all day long, then she would have eventually come across such a drink. Such is to be expected of a training maniac like myself, even my relaxation time can be quite… intense, not all the time as I often reign myself in when it comes to dedicated rest times.
"You should make this more often." For someone that is technically part dog (supernatural one), Atago sure loves chocolate. I still remember the times when I would order her all sorts of other non-chocolate drinks during the first few weeks under the misapprehension that she would be allergic to it.
"I'll do that then. I never did enjoy hot drinks… so it never occurred to me till now." I only enjoy such drinks due to their heat energy content.
Note to self, add more "above room temperature drinks" to my list of gifts within the "food" category. I found myself smiling at the little addition to my personal notes on each of their preferences.
Come to think of it, there's always a good feeling associated with discovering something new to put on a cherished person's "liked item" list. It's similar to the feeling I get when I learn something new about a character's "likes" in Harvest Moon, Rune Factory and Stardew Valley, only multiplied by ten, as reality is so much more rewarding.
"I'll get right on to it then." Back to business.
At those words, the two girls sobered up. While a small part of me wanted them to feel bad about the mess I had to compensate for back in the lab, ultimately, I had to be the better person.
So I smiled. It wasn't anything unusual.
A smile a day, keeps the angst away.
"Lighten up. We're all adults here, be it by actual age or by our acts and disposition. There is no reason for us not to discuss what has happened in a reasonable and fair manner. Here, I'll start us off. First things first, let's go into why you engage those child soldiers in the first place when the plan was to wait for my "bad guy corpse puppet" to ensure their enmity is assigned to the correct individual?"
"I thought you would be busy fight-" "It was supposed to be a distraction for-"
"One at a time, please."
Both of them came to the conclusion that I would be so busy fighting Tamariel to the point where I would have attracted attention from the group waiting there a door away. As such, they decided to attempt to engage in diplomacy as a distraction to make sure the plan remained intact.
"… Honestly, did you really think I wouldn't have sound-proofed the room? Along with isolating it from impact, magic and the like? I had everything under control."
Well, not everything, as the little pieces of me hidden in their shadows were not sentient and more of a programmed AI assistant to allow them to contact me or use the lightsabers I gave them.
I asked how did everything escalate to a fight.
"I tried to greet them but…" Atago began, then looked to Valerie, who continued for her. "They called us intruders."
"We were intruders. How did you think they would react?"
"It uh… technically wasn't the first time I had been in that kind of situation? I had negotiated with aggressive groups in their territory before." She tried to defend herself.
"There's a difference between criminal scum and a bunch of teenagers that think everyone but them is out to get them. The former is open to negotiation due to their self-interest and greed. The latter, well, teenagers."
"Ah, yes. Teenagers." Atago's ears drooped down as if remembering the fact that human teenagers aren't the calmest, self-assured, reasonable and logical people out there. Then again, this is DXD, what is this "reason"? I'm sure many of the criminals her family has dealt with were power, hungry raving lunatics. "Well, I'm quite confident in my body and voice. A bit of charm goes a long way."
Valerie interjected, "And she completely forgot that the enchanted cloaks scrambled our figures and voices." Atago sighed as she remembered the blunder.
"And hence you both looked like some evil untrustworthy apparitions and defaulted to combat. Well, it's only natural, the both of you were using equipment you were unfamiliar with and could not adjust appropriately. Nothing a bit of operational training on our ends wouldn't solve."
The battle review was put through a similar process.
"Wait, what do you mean you forgot the stun only setting? That was the first thing I highlighted."
"I mean, the voice commands are pretty hard." Atago tried to explain why she accidentally cut off the limbs of one of the fighters with her double-bladed green lightsaber.
"Having to say "Intensity Setting: Minimal" is a mouthful." Valerie had a good point about how I programmed the pieces of myself that held enough power to utilize those lightsabers I made for them. "It's hard to remember them in the heat of combat."
"Mm-hmm. I see your point. This is reasonable, it is fair. Although, we can't forget that this is the first real combat scenario in which you two, used those lightsabers outside of practice. So there's an experienced matter that we should resolve as well. With some practice, I'm sure it won't happen again."
Eventually, we got to the "finale" part, quite frankly, the students were so riled up by Atago and Valerie's in-combat casual banter that they believed we must have been messing with them.
This got to the point where they believed their raving mad ultra-racist evil fallen angel teacher must have been a trick of some kind.
It technically was, but I was merely acting on Tamariel's actual thoughts and beliefs regarding their value in his life, which amounted to "meaty batteries" and "inferior human components".
There was a girl that had a crush on him which he used to further gain her trust without actually entering into a physical relationship, mostly because he looked down on humans, that required some extra acting on my part to convince.
Heck, I had to use the fake Tamariel body to shove her to the side and then blow up the room's ceiling in order to cause a cave in, just so that she and everyone else would believe he was actually using my (the intruder's) heroic tendencies to buy him some escape time.
Of course, I "saved" them from it, while also having another clone disguised as my other persona bring the fake Tamariel back from one of the legit emergency exits for me to "execute" in a manner that wouldn't leave behind a body.
I had no intentions to be their hero or anything, yet that was the only role I could set for us when the opposition was just that vile. I couldn't bury the truth either as it would lead to further abuses within the Fallen Angel faction and their child soldiers deserved to catch on to the fact that their recruitment was not for benevolent purposes, as Tamariel and a couple of manipulative fallen angels had led them to believe.
Once that was done, I had "jump-started" and hijacked the corpse that Tamariel had inside the robot, which happened to be a friend of the group's (that some of them were hoping to see by coming to the "special training camp") as a first-hand witness to the man's atrocities (read out from the memories I was extracting from the scientist).
Passing off the would-be female victim to the rest of her friends, I shattered the anti-teleportation wards and used the scientist's knowledge to replicated a specific teleportation circle, that would send them all back to the dormitory they were using in Japan.
Over the past couples of hours (and even right now), I was acting through the previous Vritra Sacred Gear wielder's body in order to make sure such an abuse of power would never happen again, push for appropriate mental health measures and ensured that his dangerous little sister didn't fuck everyone up by going mad.
I mean, what the fuck, how could they let some little girl with a deadly Sacred Gear go about with Yandere tendencies? It looks like my bonus stint within a Grigori child soldier meat puppet would be longer than expected.
Ah well, at least I get access to their computers and curriculum. More knowledge doesn't hurt. And more importantly, I can keep an eye for Khaos Brigade spies within the Fallen Angel and their Nephilim Academy institutions while enacting positive change.
"It's settled then. We will be training to fight or at least operate together so that something like this doesn't happen again."
I had my own inadequacies when it came to working with people on the field considering I had always gone out and battled on my own. Atago had more experience in this considering that she led her clansmen on occasion. Valerie pretty much had zero experience at all.
One day, the three of us would have to rely on each other. No one else would be able, or willing, to place each other as the most important people to be protected, damned the costs, but ourselves. We couldn't just keep to the roles we were comfortable with (Atago as support while I would be at the frontlines), instead, we had to know how to work together in all manner of situations.
Atago said that she would convince her parents to allow her to stay with us so that we could spend more time together. Valerie would have to get out more and commit to using the Sacred Gear that she currently dislikes at the moment.
"Ufufu, teamwork ahoy!" Valerie was totally taking random things off the internet. It wouldn't be long until she said "Capitalism, ho" when it came to the money she was raking in.
"Maa… if we live together then it won't be long before threesome time!" Atago was already thinking of the future.
"Okay, that type of teamwork works too."
SSTomoe Aaaaa, I'm sooooo boreeeeed! (-_-) zzz
ActuallyVritra Lmao, don't tell me that you're messaging me from school!
SSTomoe Teehee! (*)
Actually Vritra I said not to tell me.
SSTomoe Did I say anything?
ActuallyVritra You're trying.
SSTomoe I didn't say anything.
SSTomoe Soooo… what are you doing? ( ﾟﾟ)/
ActuallyVritra Family Trip. Beach. With best friends. _へ_(‾ )
SSTomoe AAAAAAAA 益
SSTomoe I'm soooo jealous.
SSTomoe Send me pictures okay? (/)/
ActuallyVritra Lol, sure.
Curiously enough, a few of my friends had taken the initiative of beginning a chat with me today. Normally I would be the first to greet and share whatever I thought was interesting with them.
Then again, I did remove my LINE messaging clone from work since I had to tail the fallen angel, so it's possible that they thought something happened to be when I hadn't said anything to them.
I wasn't that surprised that Tomoe would try to play around with her phone in her undeserved summer remedial lessons.
The messages from Momo, who was less outgoing, and Jeanne who was in a different timezone (it should be past midnight wherever she is), were a surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one.
MomoHana Gen-chan, Shitori heard from Tomoe that you wanted to tutor her.
ActuallyVritra Oh.
MomoHana She wants to do it herself.
ActuallyVritra She can get in line. Lol. I have perfect scores.
MomoHana I know. But she's not going to be happy.
ActuallyVritra Tell her to suck it up it's my turn.
MomoHana Gen, she's right behind me.
ActuallyVritra Suck it. I am the Sensei.
MomoHana Not. Yet. (This is Shitori btw)
ActuallyVritra It's conflict then.
ActuallyVritra Let's do this No Game No Life style, pick a game then the winner shall be her Sensei.
MomoHana Chess. Get ready to lose.
I vaguely remembering something about Sona being a chess freak like Lelouch. Yeah sure, why not? I wasn't going to give up the girl who pledged herself to my teachings (strictly educational) using those prequel scenes. I already had the perfect plan to win.
Maid_of_Orleans Boujour! Genshirou, your school holidays have just begun, right? I've got another summer project in Tokyo and Kuoh, will you be available?
Maid_of_Orleans I'm bringing some friends too.
ActuallyVritra Sure, no problem. Can't wait to see you again!
Maid_of_Orleans Wonderful!
ActuallyVritra Why are you staying up so late for?
Maid_of_Orleans I'm working in a church organized soup kitchen.
ActuallyVritra In a French Maid costume? Feed me too! And make sure to call me Goshujin-sama!
Maid_of_Orleans Nooooo! Not that kind! You Japanese keep perverting-
It's a bit odd that she would have a business in Kuoh. Tokyo, I can understand, given that I had a role in its "quiet" state. I sure hope her friends have Sacred Gears, I could use some extra research materials.
At any rate, it's great that she's learning to connect with the common folk, instead of you know, holding children hostage with a smile.
"Geeeen! We're done!" Atago called out as she came running alongside Valerie from the hotel over to the beach where I was waiting.
The rest of our families were taking their own sweet time as they were a little tired from their sightseeing yesterday. As such, only the three of us were hitting the beach at this time in the morning. Being able to manipulate energy helps in topping us three up with energy after the all-nighter we pulled.
I turned around to properly look at them instead of just relying on my advanced super senses and-
-Holy shit I wanted to rip those thin white pieces of material off her body and fuck her from behind against a random stone wall right now.
"Oh my, Genshirou, if I knew you would mistake these-" She sounded confident despite a slight nervousness in her step, as she bent forward a little and tugged on the string between her large breasts, "-for my eyes, then I would be wearing new clothes more often."
Spoiler
[img: https/i./qqWeGZH.png]
"You're so beautiful that I want to kiss you, push you down and rape you on the beach right now."
"Kyaa! Gen, not so loud! You could be arrested. I don't think that's legal~" Can I make it legal? "Also, don't forget Val-chan."
Unlike Atago who was low-key deriving pleasure from exposing so much of her body, Valerie seemed utterly at ease with wearing a bikini.
"Does this please you, my darling?"
Critical hit.
She always has a way to use affectionate titles with just the right words to make me feel embarrassed and happy at the same time.
Spoiler
[img: https/i./xmwnz64.jpg]
"I am so pleased with you that the first thought that came to my head on how I could be more pleased right now, is the idea of holding you down on the beach mat for some intense babymaking sessions."
"Let's go!" Valerie immediately agreed!
"Now, now, why don't we do that all later? We still have to go through the list." Atago took out a notebook and pointed to the first item on the list.
Rubbing sunscreen all over their bodies, both the back and the front.
"Good call, my cute pet."
Level 21
Level 21
The sun was setting, everyone had a long, tiring and fun day at the beach.
We had probably gone through all the beach episode tropes other than the nighttime-exclusive ones.
Looking at the trio of males that acted as the staple jerks that would aggressively hit on anyone, all the way at the other side of the beach, Atago asked, "… Are they making sand angels? Again?"
To her side, Valerie held up a small bowl with my freshly made Takoyaki to her, Atago smiled, thanked Valerie and dug in. "Mmm, shoo good!"
"It seems that they are… I think that mind trick of yours is a bit too strong." Valerie remarked.
"Nonsense. They simply had no resistance to it." I sought out a non-violent solution at the beginning. Honestly, Atago and Valerie could have punted those assholes anytime they wanted, but they were feeling so lazy and wanted to see how I would have handled it.
Of course, violence is so uncivilized. Which is why I started off with diplomacy until of course, the anime tropes of having unimportant males being moronic rendered negotiations pointless.
I didn't want to Mind Trick them into doing something humiliating either, so I directed their attention to having some actual fun on the beach instead of deliberately reducing their IQ levels by playing the stereotypical stock role assigned to them by fate.
I "told" them that they came to the beach for the sand and that they liked the "sand" more than going after girls. It worked. A little too well it seems.
"That said, I should have moderated it better… To be fair, I couldn't get any practice in."
Mind magic is so much more dangerous and volatile in comparison to my perfectly safe and stable practice of manipulating their emotional energies. It is only natural that I couldn't train it in a morally appropriate and safe manner.
Noting that the guys had been having way too much fun playing in the sand, I formed a clone on the other side of the beach to take care of them.
"If I was your Sith master then you would have gotten a failing grade." Atago's remarks on my "softness" when it came to the minds of humans did not convey the "baffled" tone that she had at the beginning of our friendship.
I'm such a positive influence.
Speaking of positive influences, I'm sure that cooking dinner for everyone has raised my "family man" points by a whole lot. I hope that my siblings would take note of this and learn how to become good cooks too.
Dinner was a lively affair that stretched on for well over two hours, as we all ate small portions (due to the cooking schedule) and spent the rest of the time having fun and deepening our familiarity with one another.
On my second last round of cooking, the rest of our family came back to me, the master of the (temp setup) kitchen, for more of my delicious Takoyaki.
Apparently, my Takoyaki, in particular, was the best one they had ever tasted in their entire lifetime. Naturally, they tried to dissect the secrets of my cooking prowess.
"What's my secret? Well, I don't make this often, so most of the credit goes to the quality of the ingredients in this case. You see, I figured that a tentacle monster might attack and stationed some clones underwater, waiting there in case any threat emerged. I was right, there was in fact, a rapey looking tentacle monster, so I killed it after negotiations broke down and here we are."
I bit into a Takoyaki ball I made with the octopus-like tentacle monster's flesh. Yummy.
"O-oh my, I-I see. That explains a lot." Sakura looked a bit flush while her husband Raiga had a slightly worried look on his face.
What's going on? Are they allergic?
"Wait, is that kind of magical species… something that not many people have a tolerance for? I'm so sorry, I tried it earlier and it didn't affect me at all so I just assumed it was safe. Hold on, I'll just scan-"
"I-it's alright! I'm fine, we're fine! Dear! We h-have haa… have to go to bed early."
"U-uh… thanks for the food, uh, start the fireworks without us."
… Well, they didn't seem in danger… perhaps it has an embarrassing effect on them? I could sense their heart rate and body temperature rising a little… I'm just going to block that out of my mind. I think I know what's going on, but I don't want to know, it's bad enough that I had to "watch" / feel them making my future sister-in-laws.
Hmm, the clone that's playing with my siblings had just seen my parents leaving for their hotel room too. Like Atago's parents, they don't seem to be in any danger at all… oh no… I did not want to hear them whispering dirty talk to each other.
Well, at least I managed to confirm that some of my fetishes were inherited from my father. Figures that DNA would work weirdly in anime.
Sensing their movement and intent, I needlessly spun the spatula in my hand several times and swatted the back of Atago's hand, as I side-stepped her lunge.
"Ow!"
"Come to your senses, think of this as poison resistance training."
"I-I can't! I need you now!" Her face was, as expected, very much red and she was panting like the bitch in heat that she was.
Figures that the magical rapist tentacle monster would have some kind of aphrodisiac effect on others even after being killed. Unfortunately, I was under-prepared for such hentai doujin elements.
"Itadakima- ouch!" I threw Valerie over my shoulder before she could try biting into my neck, throwing her unto the coarse, rough and irritating beach sand.
My tactic of allowing someone to think that they could sneak up on me from behind had worked out. It didn't help that this world's inhabitants had a tendency to speak before they act, essentially giving me a free turn to act.
"Gen~ Stay still damn it!"
"Darling, come on, just a little sip~"
"Resist dang it! Do you even realize how rare these "surprise poison in food" events are? Grind your poison resistance!" I shouted as I dodged their attempts while making sure the last batch of food was cooked properly.
Spongebob, guide my hand! Allow me to make a flawless Krabby Patty even in these troubling times!
As I continued my dodging mini-game, I spent some time reflecting on my lapse of judgment. Clearly, the myriad energies coursing through my body, spirit, and soul had increased my resilence to the point where I had to readjust my safety protocols again, lest I make such an error again.
On this specific issue, however, I needed to bump anti-hentai trope measures up a few levels.
I had placed it somewhere in the middle of my list of priorities, as being in a light novel battle harem meant that non-evil people with good relationships with their significant other would gain, at minimum, the B-Rank skill [Protection from NTR].
If this was a hentai series, a spineless good guy that wouldn't fuck their girlfriends vigorously or never would have even declared their love for them would have gotten NTR'ed, as some magical lust effect like this would cause the girl to have a bad-end with mind-break and prostitution tags.
But for me? This was simply a fortunate mistake that happened in a safe and humorous context. I will count my blessings and learn from this.
"Wait a second-" I flicked my finger to knock up the attack, "-why are you using your sword?"
She placed a hand on her cheeks as if it would help her keep focused, the other hand was on her enchanted katana, "It's humiliating you know~ That you aren't taking me very seriously. It makes me want you more, but I'm also feeling a little angry."
Note to self, magical rape monsters mess with logic and other emotions too, who would have guessed?
I could easily resolve this through my connection to her, either by curing her body or draining her energy, but after considering her mother's recognition of what had happened and deciding to go along with it, I could tell that this wouldn't be damaging at all so I may as well use it as a learning experience.
"If I took this fight seriously then you wouldn't be around anymore. There is a difference between moderation and condescension."
"Gotch-awah!" I dodged Valerie's dagger strike and threw her back into the sand.
Oh no, now there's sand on me. Anti-Sand Spell activated!
Okay, now it's not irritating me everywhere.
The clone with my siblings had escorted them far away from here and back into the hotel. The other clones had isolated the beach from any other being with some magical barriers.
Atago attacked again, only to leap to avoid the barrage of light spears, aimed at the ground in front of her. All my practice on extracting knowledge and skills had paid off immensely. I had already assimilated the mad scientist's degraded light manipulation and combat skills for my own purposes, his full range of skills will take more time so a few dozen spears per second is the most I can do for now.
"You two do realize that shanking me with something sharp isn't going to get you a good fuck."
"We can still ride your dick." "It's not like you'll die."
Okay, they had a point.
Now that the area was clear, this impromptu spar had ramped up a couple of levels.
Using my lightsaber would be overkill and my personally crafted enchanted weapons were too costly to use for a fight without anything on the line.
A nice and dandy light spear was more than enough to keep them at bay. I had to be careful with the intensity as Valerie still had a weakness to it as a Dhampir, keeping it down to a harmless level while focusing more on the construct integrity solved the issue.
I could use a shadow construct instead, yet using a light spear in combat helped me draw out the relevant memories of Tamariel much more quickly, if I can assimilate his experiences now then I could spend my time on doing other things in the future.
Hence, it was more efficient to grind these sets of abilities, rather than abilities I had already mastered to a higher level.
The fight dragged on for a few minutes before Atago's mentally impaired state finally caught on to using the modified version of Senjutsu I taught her.
Finally, I was waiting for that.
"Eh? Wait a minute? Why am I fighting you for? I'm smarter than this."
I made that particular version of Senjutsu to help counter the possibility of an enemy gaining control of our minds and body.
Simply put, badly done brainwashing removes the capability of combatants to use the full extent of their abilities without instruction, a god-tier brainwashing spell can force something to use power beyond their limits yet still carry the weakness of lack of independent strategic thought, which of course, is the point of brainwashing in the first place.
And the version of Senjutsu we both use must involve cleansing both our body and minds using a particular method of letting the world's energy remove foreign energies not under our control from us.
Thus, most mind and body controlling substances or abilities could be resisted, should we be compromised and be forced to fight "seriously". Quite frankly, neither Atago nor I would be as powerful as we normally were without Senjutsu derived abilities, so if either of us were to be brainwashed, the controller would have to force us to "fight seriously" and accidentally make us release ourselves from their control.
It was also very useful for dealing with possession and poisoning cases, kind of like this.
"Magic tentacle monster meat was used in my Takoyaki." I explained in a succinct manner.
"Oh my… are you stupid? We could have gotten quite a bit of money by selling it to alchemists." She huffed, looking away from me with a frustrated look on her face, although her current feelings weren't so much as directed to me but rather, on herself.
"I checked it's brain and found the rest of its family." I decided to let her have a few seconds to deal with them before she avoided it in a Japanese manner.
"It is critical we send a hunting group there immediately."
"You're right. It's an opportunity we can't afford to lose."
"Argh, why am I covered in sand?!" We both looked to see Valerie complaining about her situation after she had snapped out of it somehow, "It's even in my hair!"
I used the anti-sand (and a lot of other things) spell and Valerie was overjoyed from being sand-free. That said, she was completely done with the beach and decided to head back to the hotel.
Well, there goes the beach sex. Damn it, I really shouldn't have thrown her into the sand.
"You should patent that spell. There are repairing and reconstruction spells for both structures, clothes and the like, but not a true cleaning spell." Atago suggested after observing how it would selectively remove impurities from the surface of their skin harmlessly, and a couple of my remarks on how I used a derivative of the spell to save my mother time from washing the bathrooms.
"I highly doubt anyone's going to buy a couple of pages detailing how to clean things up with magic." I voiced my skepticism.
"You will be surprised…" She left it at that, seemingly running some calculations in her head on how to make it a success.
"I hope it will be a welcome one… I'm sorry, I messed up earlier when I thought that nothing was up. I should have taken into account the possibility that the anti-poison training I subjected my body to would have automatically rendered potential dangerous substances null, giving me the false impression that it was safe to eat and-"
"-Oh shush! I'm not angry about that… or myself, in case you were wondering. Yes, you had that worried look on your face."
Well, emotional care is always one of my top priorities. I guess she had gotten used to my usual concerns.
"Then what were you frustrated about?"
"That you thought more about using this as a training session instead of ravishing us?"
"… To be fair, lust-inducing substances are only acceptable to me when I deliberately administer them." If I don't need them then I would rather not use them, however.
"Oh, wonderful. Then we have to hunt down the rest of those tentacle monsters and procure their "essence" properly then!" I sighed at Atago's response, well sure, I didn't technically say "no". If it's her fetish then I'll go along with it for this round.
Sometimes I wonder which of us is more perverted? Well, only time will tell.
There were two types of gatherings that Momo Hanakai learned to specifically avoid these days.
Political campaigning and strange cultists. The first type is normal, yet annoying, as for the second? Well, it was simply weird as hell. (Yes, she's a devil now, and it's still weird)
Tokyo used to be normal. Sometimes she thought back to her less than satisfactory childhood and thought to herself about how "normal" everything was.
All the supernatural affairs she found herself embroiled in had a semblance of order to its madness. But the dozen or so cults that popped up over the past few months worshipping some "shadow" or "darkness" thing made her gape in shock.
The weird (yet harmless) "rituals" and recruitment campaigns wouldn't be far off from a comedy anime. It was annoying to say the least, especially after her locker started to be filled with at least one recruitment form every day.
She was starting to miss all those "meet me at the…" insert location type of letters where the boys would try to confess some "feelings" for her.
"When did my father get into clothes making?" She muttered, her voice betrayed how tired she was after being dragged along Tomoe's "training run", that she ditched half-way through to run some errands.
Her father asked that she by some black fabric and other materials on the way home today.
"Ah!" A little girl stumble and fell to the ground in front of her.
Momo quickly ran up to the girl, "Are you okay? Here, let me see."
She quickly checked for any cuts, thankfully, there were none.
"Thank you onee-chan!"
"Ku…"
Having been a single child, she had the occasional fantasy of having a little sister that she could spoil, somehow, it ended up being a weakness to being called "onee-chan".
She helped the girl out. "Does it hurt?"
"No! It's fine now. Thank you! Hey, onee-chan, what's your name?"
"It's Momo. Hanakai Momo."
"Ehehe! How do you write your name? Write it for me onee-chan!"
The girl held out a pen and paper for her.
"Sure! My name is written like-"
Wait, isn't it odd that a little girl is carrying a pen and paper around?
She looked down on the piece of paper, instead of a post-it note or a blank piece of paper, she found a familiar application form to one of the many cults in the area.
"Not the children tooooo!"
Grabbing her shopping bags off the floor, she quickly ran home, ignoring some of the neighbors who greeted her with application forms in their hands and slammed the door on the way in.
"My daughter, you're home! Ah, my friends are over, let me introduce you to-"
"-No thanks, I'm tired. Here's your stuf-"
Momo froze as she saw the darkened living room only lit by candles, occupied by well over a dozen men and women, all wearing black robes.
"Thanks Momo. You're so wonderful, you know that. Get some rest, we'll be done by dinner."
He took the bag from her hand and handed it over to someone, who immediately started to take measurements of what they hand, apparently sizing it for a member of their group.
"Y-yeah…"
She retired to her room, locked the door, then groaned as she laid on her bed.
Once she had the energy to get up, she opened the cookie jar gifted by her friend Genshirou and began to munch on them.
Tomoe would never be allowed to know just how many of his treats she had been consuming on her own. There was no way she would be sharing it with her.
"Mmm! Ah, this is bliss."
It's easier to just sit here, eat delicious sweets and not think about what is going on in Tokyo right now. She couldn't wait to move over to Kuoh. Everything is going to be so much more normal than here.
Checking over her phone, she could see that Tomoe was spamming many messages at her, saying something about how "it isn't fair" while talking about Genshirou.
Momo scrolled up and almost choked on her cookies. What the hell? Why are there two sexy young women all over him?
She carefully read Tomoe's messages and had to get a confirmation on whether Gen had actually said they were both his girlfriends.
Apparently, the answer was "yes". When the hell did a Star Wars nerd like him have the time to get two girlfriends? Let alone one?
She got another phone notification. Oh, it's Jeanne.
Wait what? She's coming over to Japan with "friends"?
Well, it's all still preferable than thinking about whatever her father is getting up to with his "friends". Ironically, the idea of hanging out with the devil race's "enemy" felt more "sane" than the weird stuff going on here.
Jeanne opened the door to the bedroom shared by one of the Vatican's most prolific inter-denomination teams.
"Saint Jeanne! Good morning!" The brown-haired girl that spent way too much time in the UK (horrible country), greeted her happily.
"Oh, morning. You are up early." Like her partner, the blue-haired (is that a streak of green?) girl spoke in English to her.
"Bonjour! Pack your things. We're leaving." She swapped over to Japanese, knowing that Irina Shidou would be able to understand that much. Rather than be forced to speak English (she wanted to stab a few of those bishops for not approving her request to borrow the "translating relic" again), she would rather rely on her rudimentary grasp of Japanese for the time being until she found a way to drag Genshirou around with her.
"W-wah? So early?"
"Change of plans. I have to make sure my friend isn't straying from God's light. He has two girlfriends at the same time!"
"Oh no! This is serious! Xenovia, pack your things, we're leaving."
The other girl clearly understood how important this was.
"What is happening?" Xenovia Quarta was confused.
Irina explained the situation to her in English.
"Okay I believe you."
Jeanne left to find the holy maiden that was supposed to accompany them on their trip. While it was a mission for Jeanne alone, she had managed to recruit the Japanese speaking exorcist (who needed to use up her paid off-days anyways) for the trip as the girl wanted to return to Japan anyway.
The user of Durandal was just a tag-along with nothing better to do, other than killing vampires, which is a duty as good as any other hobby. After spending time with the rescued humans from the vampire territories, Jeanne began to detest vampires at a higher level upon hearing about the many ways in which they exploit humans.
She asked the other warriors at the church as to where she could find the girl. They eventually directed her to the training room where a few holy maidens with healing powers were helping the warriors out with post-training recovery.
By the time she got there, the training area was empty, save for a single person.
Such clumsy movements and shoddy form would never be allowed within the ranks of the church exorcists, who had to contend with mighty monsters that preyed on humans as part of their duties.
Well, it's only natural that a nun that had never fought a day in her life wouldn't know how to hold a sword properly.
"Keep that up and you'll end up dropping it on your toe."
"Awawawa- Oh no!"
Jeanne quickly dashed in and caught the light sword she dropped.
"Learning how to defend yourself is all well and good, but leave the fighting to those that are called and trained to right, alright?"
"Saint Jeanne!"
"I told you that just Jeanne is fine. You would probably be a better saint than I would be."
She knew the blonde nun that was playing around with one of the exorcist training light swords. The holy maiden was rather famous around here, but Jeanne's experience with Asia Argento came from working together at some church-held initiatives and at the cafeteria's kitchen.
"Uuu, that isn't very true S- I mean, Jeanne."
"Modesty is fine, but you have to be honest with yourself more often. I know I have a long way to go myself."
"Perhaps… oh, what are you here for? Does anyone need healing?"
"I was looking for Teofila."
Jeanne vaguely remembered that particular holy maiden as being the one Darth Bobby had helped out in Romania. Her Sacred Gear could re-enact miracles, or rather, all sorts of supernatural phenomenon including magic. Until she met the devil, she had only reproduced other healing miracles.
Had she continued on her path then a worse fate might have awaited her, and even if she didn't follow the devil, she might have been branded as a witch anyways for using magic.
Thankfully, the fact that she could do so was only known to a select few, which is why she could still be part of the church without damaging the faith of others. Jeanne wasn't quite sure why the higher-ups were nagging on about it as she never paid much attention to the intricacies of it all.
"Ah, she just left for her room."
"Great, I was going to tell her to pack her things anyway."
"You're going on a mission."
"Yep. Got to investigate some cults, fish for information from a bookworm devil and see if I can get any leads on that Jedi-Sith pair."
There had been recent leaks from their "rogue exorcist" spies within the Grigori talking about how a few lightsaber wielders matching the "Darth Bobby" and "Master Cannoli" pair had saved some of their members from yet another fallen angel gone rogue in the name of heretical science.
It wouldn't be the first time such news would be heard within the Vatican. They had been getting sightings of those two in other countries across Asia and Europe. There were signs of strange happenings and other "miracles" across the world, either the pair was causing all of it themselves or they had inspired others to do so.
"Lightsabers are better…"
"Hmm?"
"O-oh, sorry, I just thought that the sound a lightsaber makes are… better than a light sword?"
Jeanne was mildly surprised that Asia was aware of the difference, then again, there had been many "research" nights which involved the warriors of the church marathoning the Prequel Trilogy in order to "understand" one of the warriors that easily dismembered many of her battle-crazy former teammates. (They were healed up later on and no one died so "Darth Bobby" wasn't labeled an enemy yet)
"I know what you mean. I'm still working on a holy sword to match that purple lightsaber of his but it's really hard."
"K-keep at it! I'm sure you can do it!"
"Yeah, I know I can! Well, see you soon Asia! Take care!"
"You too! Um, be careful of anyone with a red lightsaber. They might be a Sith Lord!"
"A Sith Lord? Oh yeah, they probably would be more hostile than those two."
Jeanne said her goodbyes and went to find the other holy maiden.
She found the young woman praying by her bedside, her long grayish hair with a shade of rose getting itself dirty on the floor.
"Oh? Saint Jeanne?"
"Hey there. We're leaving a bit earlier than planned."
"I've packed my things already."
"Woah! That was quick."
Yet it was understandable.
Due to certain rumors being spread, and as much as gossiping is counted as a sin, Teofila had gotten an unfavorable reputation for having even gotten the attention of a devil.
It was no wonder that she seemed eager to tag along to go to another country, rather than stay here, even if it was safer to stay.
There was a short awkward silence and Jeanne quickly tried to fill the gap.
"Soooo… what were you praying about?"
"To meet him again."
"Is that so?"
If there was anything that could be counted against her within the Vatican's walls is her strange obsession with meeting this "Darth Bobby" again.
"You know… when I first met him, I used my ability to break his concealment spell."
"His what? You never mentioned that earlier."
"It wouldn't have mattered. He was still completely covered and I didn't want to give the higher-ups any more reason to excommunicate me."
Jeanne was mildly surprised that the young woman was telling her all this, then again, Jeanne did spend quite a bit of time helping her out and defending her when they first arrived.
She felt strangely warm about managing to earn some of the Romanian nun's trust.
"I guess that makes sense."
"Grey."
"… Huh?"
"His eyes were very kind. I liked those gray eyes of his. It's funny, I think the color of his eyes is the same color as my hair."
Grey eyes… where had she seen them before?
Genshirou.
Wait a second… wasn't he in the same country, in the same town, that Darth Bobby was in at that time to help Teofila out? They were also in the same place in her last trip to Japan, hell, the whole "fight" where she teamed up with Sona Sitri was rather strange in retrospect.
Could it be…? Could Darth Bobby secretly be Genshirou Saji's long lost twin brother!?
Jeanne had read several books about how the main character used to be some ordinary guy and keeps getting help from some mysterious character that eventually reveals themselves to be a close relative!
Darth Bobby somehow being in the same country as Genshirou Saji in the two occasions that they met could mean that he was watching over his brother, making sure he could live a peaceful, ordinary life!
It was far fetched but it would be kind of cool if that was true.
Jeanne kept that thought to herself, no sense sounding like a girl who read way too many books she shouldn't be reading, right?
Level 22
Level 22
Tearing myself off the thorny spears was the easy part, dealing with the myriad layers of curses and expanding sharp barbs internally while escaping the fiery pillar I was engulfed in was the slightly more difficult part.
I dug a fistful of flesh tainted with curses and shadow thorns from my chest, ripping the parts of my lungs and ribcage along with it, then filled it with a curse of my own to cause a geas incompatibility induced magic meltdown.
Launching myself out of the scorching flames, I threw and detonated the improvised magical clump of reagents at the hundreds of cursed and nullification field covered light spears, negating the attacks.
I use my ability to substitute my flesh and organs while letting my trained auto-regenerative abilities take into effect.
My senses were dulled by the nullification field layered upon the continuous gravity multiplier curse, yet even then, I could feel the lightning-fast series of attacks coming. Knowing that my assailants would disrupt my attempts to evade through teleportation and 3-D maneuvering with their own abilities, I forced my arm to adapt Raijin and my own version of Seikuken into a momentary defensive maneuver at a speed that surpassed lightning.
For a moment, my entire body reached a state far beyond what I thought I would have been capable of achieving in just a short number of days, surpassing the speed of the attacks about to put me down in spite of the many forces that weakened me.
The bodies that came at me were annihilated, just in time to clear my vision to see a few large "death beams" coming right at me. With the new level of power and control I had attained, I caught the attack, absorbed it to accelerate my regeneration while also taking that power to defend myself against the rest of the attacks, using high-speed time-space "shredding" to nullify the assault.
Strangely enough, it was my response to the ear-drum breaking noise of the clash that helped me dodge the tiny spheres of "death" about to "erase" me and end this conflict. When most of my physical and supernatural senses were going to fail me, it was my temporary "silencing" of the sound energy around me that sharpened my spiritual senses just enough to feel the small "empty" sensations gravitating towards me.
Those small motes of "void" energy that simulated the after-effects of the Power of Destruction was an instant "loss" condition of my training course.
I twisted the entirety of my body, drawing on martial and spiritual elements founded upon the idea of "flowing", letting me flow the energy beams around me to break the deadlock of the simulated "Beam-O-War", dodging the thousands of "void" motes about to surround me.
Not before interlaying a few curses to the energy beam that would rebound at the user, not that I would expect the users to fall from just that, as they would be able to neutralize them just as well as I can.
After all, they were my clones, it is only natural that they could do what I could do.
I slam the ground, creating a temporary cloud of dirt that was almost immediately, split apart by a powerful Force Push. Of course, I expected that reaction from my clone (he's me, after all), and used the split second that he used to make the Force Push in order to dash right the attacker.
The attack I launched wasn't meant to land, and I drew back in order to counter the few clones waiting to ambush me in response to my assault, they couldn't let the designated "Pre-True Form Sirzechs" guy be confronted so soon, after all.
Each of the clones was given various designations and types of abilities to specifically emulate in order to prepare for future enemies. Unfortunately, there are little to no details within the light novels on the intricacies of end-game tier combat. Which is why I had to improvise with emulations of "overwhelming power" and "endless tricks" with my clones along with the designated "character enemies".
At a certain point of the intense session, it was once again time for a few of my clones to start healing and refueling my body with energy, all while we were fending off the attacks. I needed to learn how to heal on the run as well, it was only natural that the training was structured this way.
With my body recovered to maximum capacity, the supporting clones immediately turned on me, and I skewered them with a few shadow spikes before they could do the same to me.
Fucking unoriginal clones just couldn't help themselves in re-enacting Order 66.
I survived the second round. Great. The easy part was now over.
The next round was more vicious and painful than the previous one. The clones started using more subtle and cruel tricks, all the nasty tricks that I would have used in a real fight…
With the resources dedicated to the barrier and clones, I could continue this dangerous training cycle for up to seven rounds of increasing difficulty.
After a few more "rounds", I had finally exhausted nearly all of my accumulated nuclear waste "batteries", and had to end my personalized battle manga trope laden DBZ-inspired training from hell.
When it was finally over, one by one, the clones would reconnect with me in order to return both the power and memories of their time as the clone army.
The rest of the clones assigned to guard duty and the clone I stuffed in the "dead" (soul dead only, his body is fine) guy's body back at the Nephilim Academy, was placed on "auto-pilot" while I focused entirely on controlling my original body for the duration of my harsh training.
"Four hundred and seventy years left, heh, good." More efficient stored "life span" usage is always welcome. I had just restocked on those stockpiled years after we returned from our beach trip, those mad stray devils pop up like mushrooms!
I moved my body, while I didn't exactly feel any physical soreness, there was an undercurrent of fatigue deep down in my spirit.
It was unsurprising.
I wasn't a Saiyan. I couldn't just keep going through Zenkais or Garou-styled limit breaks over and over again without rest for an infinite amount of times.
Three or four more brute-forced instances of power (physical mental spiritual) growth is the max I can handle within the month should I pace myself.
It's best to just refocus on control and techniques, for now, I will have plenty of materials that I could occupy myself with anyways.
With the new elements added to my Sacred Gear, I now had plenty of curses to study and modify for maximum "conditional effects" exploitation.
The [Blaze Black Blade] Sacred Gear essence I had retrieved from the corpse I was puppeting, was part of the Blaze Black Flame series of Vritra Sacred Gears. The Dragon King's breath itself was layered with curses to the point where it can be compared with "hell-fire", whatever that was.
The thing is, that was simply the surface power. At the heart of Vritra's curses, it's origin lied with the Dragon King's vast knowledge of magic. Among dragons, I was certain that Vritra was only surpassed by the Evil Dragon Aži Dahāka.
Dwelling deep into the flames for the first time allowed me to understand what powered its might. For Vritra's flames to carry so many layers of curses to the point where it can curse a being's souls for eternity until they died (and after death), he had to perform complex magical rituals to inscribe that sort of power into his body.
The original form of the previous user's Sacred Gear was that of a sickening mass of flesh shaped like a blade that was set alight by black flames. The flesh was rather indicative of its true nature.
It was a piece of Vritra's lungs, the same lungs in which he carved all sorts of forbidden dark magic upon in order to give him a greater edge over his fellow dragons.
Perhaps both of us were the munchkins of our times? I really wanted to talk to him. I had hoped Vritra would awaken at some point, but so far, nothing seems to have had an effect on him.
I had been recycling my own draconic, soul and various other types of energies into the core spirit of my Sacred Gear, but to no avail.
Well, who knows, Valerie might accidentally mess with me and wake Vritra up like how she "accidentally" a "Balor" (fake) into Gasper's soul.
Drawing in the energies of the area, I removed the traces of the artificial dimension made possible by the knowledge of both my fallen angel and devil brain "hard drives".
I moved into a different field, one occupied by a clone of mine and my two lovers.
"Feel, don't think. Trust your instincts."
"I'm trying! Mmm… this is annoying. I've been at this for hours. If it were you then you would have this figured out by now."
"Even if that were true, that would only be possible thanks to having a foundation of high-level energy control. You have made great progress, be proud of that."
Atago was lying down on the ground, exhausted, as Valerie was being guided by my clone in how to consciously utilize her Sacred Gear's functions.
I formed a collar and leash discreetly around Atago's neck, walked up towards her then tugged on the shadow constructs.
"Ah!" She yelped with surprise and minor discomfort as I pulled her upper body up until her head was right in front of my crotch.
"Aww, look at you, all tuckered out aren't you?" Oh, I was certainly proud and happy with the progress she had made, and while I would tell her that in a more genuine tone later in the day, I wanted to use this "affectionately superior" tone to reward her.
"M-master." She instinctively knew that I was the original, quickly read the mood and acted appropriately for her training.
"Good girl. You have been such a good girl haven't you?"
"Yes! Atago did everything you told me to!"
She had quickly "stood" up in the manner appropriate for her race, her hands were placed in front of her like a puppy awaiting a treat from its owner.
"Good! Atago is a good girl! A very good girl, and good little pets like you gets a treat." I started to rub her ears and pat her head with one hand, the other hand moved towards my pants.
Despite her exhaustion, she had quickly moved to take in my cock after I unzipped my pants, sucking it with such vigor that made me feel very loved.
Nearby, I could see that Valerie was getting distracted by our activities, yet I saw no reason to stop now.
"Being able to utilize your Sacred Gear in all manner of scenarios is crucial." My clone grinned.
"What? I know that but how am I supposed to do this now? This is even harder, it's unfair." Valerie complained as her frustration began to peak.
"Not necessarily, this could be used as a… case study." I hinted to my clone, who had been granted a bit more sentience over the rest of the battle-focused clone army for the purposes of handling both Atago's and Valerie's needs.
The clone turned slowly to look at me and nodded before turning his head back to Valerie.
The goal was to help Valerie gain the power to turn on and off her ability to "see" the "soul" without my assistance in moderating most of the overwhelming information flows.
"It would seem that your past experiences have made it harder to maintain a coherent image when it comes to souls, specifically that of the dead. Hmm, I know… why don't you start with the "souls" of objects?"
"Pardon? How can objects have souls?"
"Valerie, this is DXD. Every supernatural principal and philosophy can work with the right attitude. Now, let me tell you about Tsukumogami…"
Through my clone, I explained some Japanese folklore before proceeding to talk about Bleach and how Fullbringers do their stuff, while omitting the unnecessary parts (for Valerie) like how their powers came from having Soul King fragments in them.
Meanwhile, the main me was busy fucking Atago in all manner of positions, mostly catering to her wide preferences.
"Mm-nh!" The perverse faces she makes as we kiss made her look like a wanton slut, a completely different person from the lovely girlfriend image that she dedicated effort to maintain.
Nowadays, nice loving kisses were reserved for our more romantic and gentle periods.
When it came to stress relief via pleasure, she would degenerate into a lewd person.
Atago dislikes the kind of acting she has to put up with to do her job even if she finds the good that she can achieve with her status as fulfilling. When she's with me, like this, I can see that she clearly enjoys herself without a care in the world.
"It surrounds us… and binds us. We are more than this crude matter, what you are looking for is the luminous beings in us, all around us! You must feel the Force, I mean, souls around you. Here, between you, me, the tree, the rock… everywhere! Even between that…" The clone pointed at the sexual acts Atago and I were up to even as he started ripping off Yoda's Force speech.
I was currently enjoying myself, lifting Atago up with a firm grip on her ass, then dropping her onto my erect dick-
"Ahh! My mind is going black! Dick-"
Valerie had the most perplexed expression, until understanding dawned on her, "Oh, I get it."
Somehow, Valerie managed to cobble up "soul sight" for objects. At this rate, she'll be pulling on "Pseudosouls" in no time.
A day later…
Four girls stood in front of a house's gate, several minutes of awkward silence had already passed.
"They should be awake now. I'll ring the doorbell." Xenovia said suddenly, she had decided to only act when her adjusted watch would hit 6 am sharp.
"Noooo! It's 6 am, do you know how early that is?" Irina was suddenly back to being overly Japanese *cough* social conscientious.
She was currently wrestling her partner onto the ground, preventing her from ringing the doorbell that would disrupt the sleep of the house's occupants on this fine weekend day.
"Maybe I shouldn't have forced us on the earlier flight." Jeanne suddenly felt a bit regretful at her hasty actions. "Whoopsie! Teehee!"
"Don't just teehee me!" Irina suddenly became a tsukkomi when she returned to her home country.
"Irina, are you alright? You are suddenly very serious." Xenovia placed a hand on Irina's forehead to check if she was feverish.
"I'm fiiiiine!" Irina yelled.
Jeanne placed a hand over her head, "For someone that didn't want to wake anyone up, your shouting sure is doing a good job of it."
"Haa… I'm going to take a walk to clear my head." Teofila informed them, not that the three girls heard her as they started arguing about whose fault it was before eventually, deciding to just pray, forgive and ring the doorbell together.
But the resolution of that conflict would only happen twenty minutes later.
By then, the grey-haired Romanian nun had ended up wandering about the streets, coming to a stop at a park. There was a large poster on the noticeboard about how there would be a "Shadow Lord Appreciation Club" meet-up at the park at a later date.
Once again, the nun sighed, "It's still not the same…"
She missed her home country, the type of walks she would go on in both the city and the parks. Now that she had begun staying in the Vatican, where she wasn't particularly welcomed among half of the members she had met, (and even then she was only fully accepted by one particularly clumsy Italian nun) she hadn't had the chance to have a pleasant relaxing walk without worries since then.
If it weren't for that bastard, that devil, she could still go home and live the life in the place she called home. Although, with how she was betrayed by the priest she had trusted for so long, she wasn't sure if she could call that place home either.
Eventually, she started to feel a bit thirsty, seeing a few vending machines at the center of the park, she walked towards it and attempted to put in the required currency, only to frown when she realizes that Jeanne was holding on to all the money at the moment.
She hadn't noticed an early jogger beside her until he had already purchased two drinks of his own.
"Here, it's for you." The young man held out a can of iced coffee to her, it took her a moment to process that what he had spoken was the English Language.
And by then, she had already said her thanks with her native Romanian language.
To her surprise, he immediately started making conversation using her native tongue!
"You're a long way from home, aren't you?" That question didn't feel very much like a question, but rather, a statement that spoke right at her circumstances.
"Is it even a long way when you don't even know if you have one anymore?" The bitter words left her mouth before she could even think about her answer.
"Well, I think that everyone comes to a point in their life where they feel like they have nowhere to go… maybe you just haven't found a new home yet?"
"I suppose so… yes, you're quite right. God will provide when the time comes." Somehow, she felt a new hope bubbling up from deep within. Just because she didn't feel like she belonged in anyplace now didn't mean she wouldn't find her calling in the future.
It was at that point she noticed that she didn't quite know who she was talking to. In fact, she hadn't even looked up at the person.
"Thank you kind sir. I didn't quite get… your… name." Her smile at the man slowly turned to one of shock as recognized his eyes.
"It's no trouble at all young miss. It's Genshirou Saji, Saji is my family name by the way. How about you?"
"T-Teofila Eliade. Wait, you don't happen to live um…"
She told him the street name, he chuckled and confirmed that it was indeed his house.
"Oh, so you must be a friend of Jeanne! How lucky for you to have caught me on my morning run, what say I escort you to your destination?"
"Yes, that would be… wonderful."
What were the chances that the first man that she looked in the eye in this country would carry the same type of look that the man that saved her had? She still remembered the little details around his eye, making his gentle expression surprisingly clear in spite of the mask, and those grey eyes of his…
As they were walking back to his house, she stopped him to ask her question.
"Yes?"
"Have we met before?"
Ever since she learned of the devil's lies, she had liked to think her ability to discern lies from truth had improved tremendously upon many, many hours of reflection.
There was no sudden change in body movement to indicate any shock, but the speed at which he took in order to play the "baffled" stranger was just a little longer than she expected.
"Your hair is quite distinctive. I think I've seen someone with your hair when I visited Romania… once or twice. If that counts as a meeting then from a certain point of view, that would be true." He spoke before continuing to lead the way.
He wasn't lying. That much she could tell for certain. Yet his choice of words could mean anything.
She was going to press on, however, there was a small commotion happening nearby.
Oh, they were already at their his house.
"Auuuggghhh!"
"Ah! Get it off me! My face!"
Teofila blinked and rubbed her eyes. She could have sworn that she had just seen a parrot spinning several full revolutions in the air before impacting Irina's face.
"Sheev! Sheev, stop that, no spinning at visitors!" A naked blonde girl just stepped out of the door-
-and was promptly pushed right back in by Genshirou, who had somehow sneaked around everyone and was at the door now.
"Valerie, remember your clothes!"
"I've got them, darling!" Another voice called out from within the house just as a pile of cloth smacked into Genshirou's head.
"Oh my go-goodness! They're actually real! You didn't pay off some supermodels!" Jeanne yelled out loud all of a sudden.
"Hey, that was uncalled for." Genshirou protested.
"Ha. I told you they were awake." Xenovia looked stupidly smug as she helped the assaulted Irina off the ground.
It looked like Teofila would have to postpone her own personal "investigations" until later on.
Level 23
Level 23
I would technically be lying if I said I had everything under control.
Ensuring that Jeanne, Irina and Xenovia made it to Tokyo alright after they suddenly changed their flight plans? Piece of cake.
Keeping them occupied at my front door without waking the neighbors out through subtle sound absorption while hiding away anything that could give away my secrets? No problem.
Pretending to take a morning jog like a Mapo Tofu loving priest to help a foreign nun out? Everything that has transpired has done so according to my design… oh fuck, she totally suspects me, doesn't she? How? Well, it's not all that terrible. I get the feeling she could keep a secret if I handle things correctly.
My parrot smacking Irina in the face by hurling itself in the air with a 920 degrees spin while screeching aggressively? To be fair, there's no way to really prepare for that.
Salvaging the rest of whatever the fuck Atago and Valerie were getting up to after I left the house was doable, thankfully. Note to self, get to the bottom of why Valerie "forgets" her clothes.
"Oh my, so this is the friend that you stay up all night to chat with?" My mother Haru had immediately begun saying misleading things to Jeanne as we all sat down to have breakfast around our large (new and expanded) dining table.
I sighed and translated what she said to Jeanne, making sure to put in the extra effort in matching my mother's tone before grumbling once I was done. I was a professional translator and I wasn't going to leave anything out on account of my own personal feelings.
"Mom, it's not like that, you know that I have a tenuous relationship with the concept of sleep." I repeated what I said in French to Jeanne, the girl was sitting on the opposite side of the table right in front of me.
She was laughing hysterically, "Hahaha! You're serious? Wow, I appreciate it a lot you know." Turning to my mother, she said, "And thank you very much for telling me that Madame."
"You're very welcome dear. I'm so glad that Gen is making all sorts of… friends, everywhere."
Somehow, I got the feeling that her definition of "friends" have changed, specifically in regards to me. Which is weird because I have plenty of normal friends like uh… Tomoe and Momo? Sona is closer to an acquaintance so she doens't count.
Raiga is going to be my father-in-law, and I'm going to be the godfather to his next set of children… who would be my sister-in-laws… this is getting weird real quick.
At least I don't have to worry about any incest with such a huge age difference. This is DXD, any story would never leave the confines of 3 years from the start of canon, so it's impossible to get any additional wives outside of that period.
Unless it happens off-screen… oh shit. I've avoided any Sirius Black and Fem!Harry stories for a reason! It's time to make some plans to avoid any weird shenanigans with my future extended family.
I continued to play translator for Jeanne both on the dining table and within the living room after we were finished with our meals. Irina was crying tears of joy after eating a proper Japanese breakfast, Xenovia spent quite a bit of time prodding Irina for cues on how to eat properly as Irina was getting a bit of (food) tunnel-vision. Valerie was speaking with Teofila in the same language, well, they both came from Romania so that was to be expected.
Atago ate her food as elegantly as ever (she acts the opposite if it's my cum) with Valerie doing something similar, although the dhampir tends to savor her food more as she was used to far worse types of sustenance. Gosei and Kouho were enjoying their childhood and continued to eat the food in a carefree manner. My mother was becoming pickier with her food now that her pregnancy had progressed further, with my father taking the responsibility within the household to inform me (the only other official chef in the house, Atago might get kitchen rights now that she has moved in soon) of her desires.
Breakfast passed by in a flash, my father had began to make conversation with Xenovia as she understood English well enough, then introduced her to Lego Star Wars and started to play it with her, saying that he too, was trying to understand the modern generation.
I was busy managing Atago, Valerie, Teofila, Jeanne, and my mother (damn it, I wish I could have my clones with me here). So far we've only been talking about more pleasant things, it seems that Jeanne does know how to slowly broach the topic that seems to be bugging her.
Irina was… playing with other individuals of similar intelligence levels, aka, my siblings.
"I attack your life points directly!" Irina pointed her finger straight at my brother Gosei.
"Nooooo!" My brother was pretty dramatic about it.
"I banish you to the shadow realm. Wait a minute, don't these Yu-Gi-Oh cards look a bit like occultic- ah! God, I have sinned-!" Irina started repenting all of a sudden.
"… You only just realized that now?" Kouho was now bullying Irina.
"Kuh, I was too caught up in re-experiencing my childhood." Irina seemed to be remembering the "fun times" with her childhood friend that thought she was a boy.
"Hey, onee-chan, your English is really good right? My brother made these puzzles for us to improve our English since he hates how Japanese schools teach the language. Can you help me? I'm stuck."
Irina eagerly began to help my brother fill up the crossword puzzle I had created and was doing a very good job of it until it reached the final word that I had planned out.
"Gen?" Atago noticed I was now looking at Irina and little siblings.
"Shh, I've been looking forward to this."
"Oh my…" My mother seemed to have caught the reference.
"It looks like we must watch this with great interest." Valerie remarked, and translated that for Teofila, allowing the nun to also pay close attention to what was about to happen.
"… I have a bad feeling about this." Jeanne's gut feeling was kicking in for the wrong reasons.
Gosei read out the final word he was stuck at, "Um, what's a word that can also mean "deception" or "double-crossing"?"
Irina quickly answered, "Betrayal."
"We only have seven letters." Kouho informed her, Irina puffed up and answered confidently once again.
"It's "Treason", then."
"Aaaaauohaaa!"
And was promptly assaulted by my squawking parrot in a manner that would strike fear to the hearts of Jedi Masters.
"AHH! Get off me you- stupid-bird!"
Xenovia turned around and frowned at Irina, "Irina, you made me crash my pod! Now I have to start the level all over again."
"Why are you complaining about that? Help me you stupid idiot! I'm your partner here."
No one was really helping Irina here as we were all fascinated at the scene as if it was a particularly surreal piece of art.
Sheev then flew off Irina's face and perched himself atop Xenovia's shoulder, giving her encouragement, "Squawk! Good. Goooood."
"Yes, I beat it!"
"You have done well."
"Irina, Sheev is really nice, I'm pretty sure he likes you too."
"You turned her against me!" Irina accused my parrot of a crime that clearly did not exist, disagreeing with her partner in this matter.
"Oh yeah…" This was bliss.
"Haaa…" Atago gave an exasperated sigh, then smiled at me in a warm manner, "You really can't go on a day without any prequels memes, can you?"
"Even if something like this didn't happen, I do still practice my speeches in the shower, so yes."
"You're not talking about the spinning, are you?" Jeanne asked while leveling me a worried look.
"Oh no, not that meme… Avez-vous entendu la tragédie de Darth Plagueis le sage? Ce n'est pas une histoire que les jedis vous raconterons. C'est une vieille légende sith-"
"I'm just going to stop you there and thank you for not spamming my chat with any of that." Jeanne quickly put an end to that and addressed my mother, "More importantly, madame, are you aware that your son claims to be having romantic relationships with two women at the same time?"
Well, that escalated quickly.
Teofila's eyes widened considerably, it seemed that it was the first time she's heard of that.
"Oh yes, we're very aware. They came back from Europe with Valerie-chan and she has become a welcome addition to the family. Sending Gen and Atago-chan off to Europe for their break with the hope of early grandkids was probably the best decision we made as parents for him." Haru stunned Jeanne and Teofila with the answer, Irina and Xenovia seemed to have also heard what was said but paid it no mind, likely because they weren't exactly my friends and this concern was all Jeanne.
"O-okay? But what did you mean by that?" Jeanne asked, and I translated it back to my mother, feeling just as eager to hear my mother's words. I was aware that they had less experience with parenting due to me being a reincarnate and all.
My mother continued, "Gen never needed much parenting, he was a good, independent and smart boy. Back then, we wondered if we were raising him right, and now-" she glanced at my father, who placed a hand on my mother's shoulder in support, "-we don't think it matters since he's made us very happy and proud. On the parenting side we have Gosei and Kouho… and even more children on the way, so we've gotten more confident in that. In any case, our son is more than capable of making wise decisions, and we very much approve of these two wonderful young ladies in his life. They will all make each other very happy, we're sure of it."
Wow, I mean, my parents would often support us in that over-excited anime parents manner. I wasn't quite sure what I was feeling after hearing such explicit support in front visitors, I would reflect on this later.
Atago and Valerie both poked one side of my cheeks, ah, I had just gotten lost in my head, hadn't I?
I repeated what my mother said to Jeanne, I wasn't quite sure why, but I was having some trouble conveying the message in a professional manner.
"There, there…" Atago, why are you rubbing my head, that's my job.
Valerie dabbed a handkerchief gently at my eyes, "There's no shame in shedding a few tears, my hero."
"G-geez, I knew that." Damn clone ninjas must be cutting up onions in my shadow inventory or something. Unfortunately, I haven't assigned any to such random duties.
"Well, if you say so… I won't say something like how it's going against God's word since you're a self-admitted "backslidden" believer. Just make sure I'm invited to both weddings okay?" Jeanne was surprisingly cool about it.
Teofila was staring at me intently, I briefly considered the situation and realized Valerie said those last two words in her native tongue, not a language anyone else here aside from me would understand.
Was that a slip of the tongue? Or did Valerie do that deliberately?
Ah well, it's not that big of a problem.
I showed Jeanne my bedroom filled with all manner of books, games, Star Wars related items, my Musashi Miyamoto (FGO) figurine and cushion. The only thing that the exorcist had been slightly concerned about was the "occultic" symbols on the Fate series related covers.
None of them would be able to feel any signs of magic after I covered everything up with my own "blank" and "normal" layer of power.
Atago could hide her power and features just fine against Xenovia and Irina's detection skills, Teofila's ability was more limited, but Jeanne's was on a whole other level, so I needed to cover up Atago's illusion magic that hid her ears as that was her main weakness when it came to concealing her status. It was quite a delicate process.
Valerie, the user of the Holy Grail, could be concealed much more easily in the presence of these trained exorcists, ironic. All it took was a bit of my power being lent to form a shadow construct to cover up her fangs, and using it as a stronger relay for my power to flow and conceal her.
Sheev was freaking sneaky, that is all.
The rest of my family were 100% normal so no problems there.
"Genshirou, Teofila was just telling me about this "Shadow Lord Appreciation Club" or whatever meeting at the nearby park in a couple of days. Irina wants to see her childhood friend as soon as possible so we were thinking of going to Kuoh first before doing my uh, research project in Tokyo." Jeanne explained her plans to me.
"It sounds particularly exclusive, I wouldn't mind trying to participate." Teofile chimed in, seemingly deliberately involving herself more than Jeanne expected.
"R-right, that sounds like a good idea. Your Sac- I mean, your eyesight is better than mine so you should totally go there and see what is going on up close." Jeanne quickly covered up her slip of the tongue.
"Well, okay then. I'll tag along as well, can't have you two ladies going out at night without an escort, now would we?" I invited myself along.
"Ufufu! That sounds like fun." Atago popped in, her hearing helping her in picking this up, "I missed out the last time Genshirou went around hunting urban legends, it sounded like a lot of fun. I wouldn't want to miss out this time around." Looks like Atago would be joining in as well.
Jeanne and Teofila looked slightly uncomfortable with the idea but agreed anyways.
"I just heard that you were going to Kuoh town, I'll get the car ready." Valerie suddenly volunteered to drive us there.
Atago gulped nervously, "Um, there won't be enough space so uh… I'll just call a cab for us. Gen, I'll ride with Jeanne-chan and Teofila-chan okay?"
"Hey, why do you get to deci-" "But I would rather-"
Atago quickly cut off Jeanne and Teofila's protest with a scary look, "Look, I'm doing this for your own good. You don't want to be in the same car with her. Have fun Gen! Oh, and please go download that Initial D song." She suddenly swapped to a cheery tune all of a sudden!
I knew that Valerie got a drivers license thanks to some "help" from Sophie, the leader of the vampire-nekomata hybrid clan, and apparently, Atago was in the car with Valerie once or twice…
… Oh well, I may as well confront my own fears.
I sent some messages to Sona, asking if she would be up for that match today. I may as well kill two birds with one stone and get this over with. Sona quickly sent back a reply, confirming the place and time after considering my situation. Atago and the rest were already in the cab on the way to Kuoh.
"Ah, there's that new car smell." Irina remarked excitedly in the backseat, "Yosh! I can't wait to surprise Issei."
"Will he even remember you?" Xenovia asked as she buckled up right next to her.
"A boy's memories can be pretty terrible in their early days. Who knows? Maybe he thinks that his childhood friend is actually a boy or something?" I "joked".
"It would certainly be troubling." Xenovia answered back.
"Okay everyone, we're off!" Valerie started the car and drove us onto the road at a perfectly legal speed.
What's so bad about this?
"I'm surprised that you managed to get your license so fast." Irina commented on Valerie's rather speedy acquisition.
"I had some help, Atago's family had a friend in the government. But don't worry, I know all there is to know about traffic laws." Valerie gave us a thumbs up and a bright smile.
A rude driver honked a couple of times and overtook us just as she said those words.
"… Ah, he passed me… that impudent worm!"
What the fuck?
Sensing what she was about to do and recalling Atago's words, I did the only thing I could do and connected my phone to the car's audio and began playing the Initial D parody song.
"W-wait, why are we going faster?! Hey, did we just go past the speed limit?!!" Irina began to grow more and more worried.
"I don't know what is happening but I'm starting to get excited." Xenovia was just rolling with it.
"Please no trucks, please no trucks…"
Level 24A
Level 24A
The car ride wasn't as bad as advertised. Once I actually faced my fears by seating on the front seat my minor aversion to road vehicles was quickly resolved.
It was like putting off an injection only to realize it wasn't as painful as expected.
In the end, I managed to derive some entertainment from Valerie's pro-driving skills (approved by the Initial D and Irisviel driving academy) and the reactions she elicited from the other passengers.
"Sweet ground oh how I missed thee!" Irina had leaped out of the car right after Valerie parked it somewhere near our destination. Irina was currently "hugging" the low ground, how uncivilized, she should at least make an effort to find the high ground and latch onto it.
"Irina, why are you swapping to Old English, it wasn't as bad as a Shakespearean tragedy." Xenovia was genuinely mystified by her partner's response. "It was heart-pounding, but in a good way."
"I'm glad that you think so." Valerie cheerfully began a conversation with her race's mortal enemy (to be fair, she denounced the "uncivilized" vampires as a whole) about the other vehicles she enjoyed driving.
Apparently, she has this really cool custom motorcycle on the way, bought with one of the favors I managed to get from a Youkai clan head (that I assigned to Valerie as payment for her part-time work).
At any rate, those two were still utterly ignorant that they were talking to their organization's sworn enemy. If Valerie had identified with vampires at all, then she would have been enjoying the whole situation just as much as Palpatine enjoys fooling the entire Jedi Order as they stand right in front of him.
"Tch, now I've got to save up my pay to buy one then."
"You have a part-time job?"
"It's actually a… full-time vocation."
Xenovia was surprisingly graceful in side-stepping her actual job.
Oh man, it's hilarious that they actually think we're a bunch of normal civilians.
"Hmm, that's all well and good, but you should start planning for future financial freedom. Being a wage slave isn't very conducive to starting a family, my father's situation has improved, but back then he barely had the time for me at all." I added my 2 Yen to the conversation, remembering a particular detail about how Xenovia wanted to start a family, and so I decided to give her some advice.
"That is… something that I should consider. Right now I'm stuck in my line of work however, you see, my mother has passed down her trade and I've learned everything I know from her since I was little. It isn't quite that easy to change my career path." Ah yes, Griselda Quarta, the lady just a step or two below that humanoid monster Strada.
"I understand, it's hard to see yourself doing anything else. In any case, I suggest you begin with money management first, being able to handle money will help you in your life no matter what you do in the future. Who knows? You might end up as an entrepreneur."
"That does sound useful… thank you. Your advice is appreciated." She thanked me and quickly turned to Irina, "Irina! Did you hear that? Money. Management. Sounds useful right? Why don't you start learning that so you don't blow our budget on so-called "authentic" Japanese food in every other country we visit!"
"Oh? So it's just me that's burning our budget? Who's the one falling for all those "fashionable" accessories that were clearly shoddily made again?" Irina shot back.
"You and me both." Xenovia replied, earning an awkward silence.
"Oh, you're right. Walked right into that one."
"Me too."
"Truce."
"Yep."
Seeing as their banter had ended, I spoke, "It's settled then. Everyone here should get a crash course in managing their finances. Valerie? Do you happen to have any-"
"-I'll compile a pdf file of my top tips. Irina, could you share your email address with me? I'll send it over." Valerie already had an answer prepared!
Irina happily shared her contact information with Valerie. Hopefully, when the truth comes out, their friendship will help Irina get over her "Black and White Morality" when it comes to "Church good. Heretics, Fallen Angels, Vampires, Devils are bad" ideals.
We made our way to Issei's home easily enough. We were the first ones here. It seems that the other group hadn't arrived yet… mostly because Valerie ignored the traffic laws (I had to erase the records from the cameras and other devices employed by the government) to get us here quickly after she overtook the guy she was pissed off at.
Irina rang the doorbell.
"COMING!" We heard a boy shouting from inside the house, he opened the door for us, "Haa… haa.. Sorry for the delay. How can I help you?"
It was Issei Hyoudou in the flesh. I must say that he's shorter than I expected.
He was currently dressed in simple shorts and a T-shirt, no doubt due to the summer heat. Tied around his forehead was a headband with an encouraging slogan, looks like he's pumped up for studying, in order to pass the Kuoh Academy entrance exam, no doubt.
Issei looked like he had close to no sleep. It was almost noon and the sunshine was as blinding as Irina's bright smile (probably, from his POV).
"Issei-kun! It's so good to see you again!"
I knew that he was rather snarky inside his mind whenever he was fed up with the stupid shit that happens in his life (despite his own breast-powered shenanigans), yet I couldn't say I was prepared for his response to Irina.
"… Look, not that I don't like being greeted by a girl as hot as the summer sun. But I don't believe we've met before…?" I take it that being exposed to sunlight after hiding in his room, feeling the pressures of the summer heat, mentally strained by his studies and a lot of other factors contributed to the non-typical response expected of a male harem lead.
Irina, as expected, started sputtering in light of the compliments (she was more self-conscious due to being in the "early" stages of puberty) and blushed heavily (normal vision can't see that at this angle, but even if I'm standing behind her, I could still "map out" what was happening) in response.
"I-Issei! W-what are you saying? Save those things for when I'm wearing my skin-tight… wait, you don't remember me?!" How lewd!
"Did I just hear "skin-tight" something?! Where?! This isn't a dream right? A bishoujo started talking about cosplaying right at a first greeting? Hahaha I love this dream!"
"Issei you PERVERT!"
And then she wrestled Issei into the ground as if they were children again.
"Oww! Hey, this isn't a dream?"
"Idiot!"
"Woah! What is this soft feeling? This is just like an anime!"
"Nooooo! Shut up!"
Why am I not surprised?
"Pft! Ahahaha!" Xenovia laughed and pointed at Irina, not bothering to hold back. "H-he totally forgot."
"Oh my, oh my, what a tragedy…" Valerie shook her head and gave Irina a sympathetic look, "Pft!" And ruined it instantly by joining Xenovia in making fun of Irina.
I have rather entertained myself, even so, I had to compose myself. After all, I planned to drive the knife in deeper then let them twist it themselves.
"Well, Shidou-san, look at the bright side! At least you didn't give him your first kiss as a child before you left and then he goes on to completely forget about it."
The two were silent for a very awkward moment.
"…"
"… What kiss? Wait… didn't that boy back then…"
"Hahaha! Wait, no way, that was actually true? He thought you were a boy! Let me laugh even harder! Ahahaha!" Xenovia was utterly brutal today, they truly were BFF's.
It was at this point that Atago, Jeanne and Teofila arrived at the front of the house, dropped off by their cab driver.
"Oh dear, did we miss the fun?" Atago asked me, to which I responded with a nod. "Aww."
"That must be Irina's childhood friend! Hi there, O… what was it? Osananajimi-chan!" Jeanne attempted to speak Japanese.
"That's the wrong honorific." Issei still had the energy to be a Tsukkomi.
We were all let into their above-average home a few seconds later. Issei quickly ran up to his room in order to wear something more presentable and came back down to serve us some tea immediately.
His parents were out of the house, presumably on a date with each other. How romantic. I wouldn't be surprised if their sex life was equaled to that of my own parents.
It took quite a while to explain the long story on how Irina managed to find the time to visit Japan. Issei then explained his side of the story on what he knew of their childhood memories together before getting a bit more detailed on Irina's "sanitized" background.
"So… you four are in an international boarding school-" Issei referred to Irina, Xenovia, Jeanne and Teofila, "-and came here for a summer project and vacation at the same time. Jeanne-san is friends with the Tokyo crusher-"
"Wait, stop right there. Who the hell is this "Tokyo crusher" of which you speak of?" I asked after Issei pointed right at me.
"You're freaking viral. There are videos online and all sorts of articles about what you've done."
"Oh… carry on."
"Right, so due to their friendship, Jeanne came to the rest of you with the idea of visiting Japan since she needed a temporary translator then the rest is history… so uh… who are the other two?" Issei was still wrapping his head around everything and so barely managed to avoid looking at Atago and Valerie in a lewd manner.
Well, I may as well help the guy out in the future in getting laid, planting some seeds in his mind to give him a head start would be my good deed for the day.
"Well then, allow me to introduce my girlfriends."
"Bwuh what? Girlfriends? As in plural?"
Valerie gave him a kind smile, as if he was a funny little boy (like Gasper, maybe), "I think we can introduce ourselves as visitors to this household just fine. I'm Valerie, Valerie Tepes. And yes, I am in a relationship with Genshirou Saji and will be joining his family legally as soon as I can."
Issei's mouth was left open as if he was a surprised Pikachu.
"Oh my, Valerie-chan, that was quite a knockout blow! Well then, I'm Atago Kaiza and Genshirou's fiancee."
After hearing Atago's words, Issei slapped his own cheeks, "Is this for real? I could have sworn I just got Isekai'ed into some weird anime."
"If it makes you feel any better I was just as surprised as you were." Irina pretty much confirmed our story.
"A modern-day harem… this isn't some joke you're in on, right Irina? I'm all for it but even I find it rather unbelievable."
I'm mildly surprised that Issei didn't go full Kingdom Hearts and said 'okay I believe you'.
Well then… sounds like an opportunity. I turned to Atago and looked straight into her eyes, she noticed my attention immediately, quickly returning my gaze, "Hmm, Atago, wasn't exhibitionism and humiliation on your fetish list?"
I could feel her tense up in anticipation, her embarrassment at airing her preferences out in front of everybody made her lose her elegant posture, "T-that is correct."
Before anyone else could respond, I stood up from my chair abruptly and walked towards her quickly, "Stand up."
I commanded her, she quickly obeyed with a quick "Yes".
Her training ensured that she complied despite the social context, and it was the delicious conflict of both anger and pleasure at being humiliated in such a manner that made her enticing enough for me to disregard the rest of my qualms with what I was doing.
"W-what are you-" Issei was the only one that could get a word in before I wrapped an arm around her body to pull her to grope at her right breast.
"Ah! No!" I pulled her closer to me with that same arm, despite her vocal protest, her face was already twisted into a lustful smile.
"You say "no" but your smile says yes." I gave her tit a good squeeze and brushed one of my fingers up, "They have gotten hard, see? Your body agrees with me." I used my other hand to turn her head around so that I could kiss her and demonstrate a good amount of my tongue's skills.
"P-perverts! Issei, don't look!" Irina quickly tried to cover Issei's eyes.
"Get off me! I have to confirm this isn't a dream! O-OPPAI!" Issei was fighting back against her.
"Is this how babies are made? Is this normal for the Japanese? What a heretical country." Xenovia almost jumped out of the chair when she heard Atago moan loudly, yet she continued to watch in fascination.
Jeanne and Teofila were so utterly shocked at the foreign sight that they didn't know how to react. Valerie was already standing at the side with her phone camera recording the act and everyone's reactions.
"Ah…" Atago made a small sound filled with disappointment as our lips parted, I responded by moving my right hand down from her breast to her ass, gripping it hard while using my left hand to grope her other breast.
"I know what you're thinking, pet. You want me to take off your clothes and play with your bare breasts in front of everyone. You're getting off the idea of it, aren't you?"
"Y-yes I am! Please, master-"
"Oh no, we're starting with the little steps. This is all you're getting for now."
I released my hold on her and then slapped her ass in front of everyone for good measure.
"Aaaah!"
"My dear Valerie, please take this pervert to the bathroom and help her finish off."
"Of course, darling."
Valerie pulled Atago who had that "my mind is blank" look out of the living room.
"Was that evidence enough?" I shot Issei a confident smile.
I could feel his jealousy bubble up within him, yet I could also sense something akin to awe as well.
He broke out of Irina's grip and all but fell at my feet.
"Boss! Teach me your ways! I want to become a harem king too!"
"Gooooooood…"
"NOOOO! You've corrupted Issei!" Irina accused me.
"Oh no, I'm afraid that the boy you knew as Issei Hyoudou has already changed greatly."
"He's right Irina. Right now I'm studying to get into Kuoh Academy, an all girl's school that's just turned co-ed. The girl to boy ratio is like 8 to 2, it's a paradise! I'm going to build my harem there! I've always been like this."
"The boy you played with, gone he is. Consumed by the beauty of breasts."
"Yes, ever since that day, I began to fall in love with breasts of all kinds! Especially the big ones!"
"N-no! I can't believe this!"
Irina started to make a run for the door.
"Irina!" Issei shouted.
"Stay away pervert!" She yelled right back at him.
"Wait, no-"
The door was slammed on the way out.
"Well, what are you waiting for?" I said to Issei, who looked conflicted with both guilt for chasing away his childhood friend, and also shock for how abrupt everything was. "Go talk to her."
"But she told me to-"
"Your first lesson is to never make a girl cry. And if you did, it's your job to make things right again. Go!"
"Yes boss!"
Issei ran out of the door.
"Can someone explain to us people that can't speak Japanese what the heck just happened!?" Jeanne started yelling in French.
I looked towards Xenovia instead, "You might want to run after your partner. But take your time, I'm sure they'll resolve things by themselves." My clones would make sure of that.
"Very well. You better explain what just happened later."
And that left Jeanne and Teofila within the living room.
"Long story short, Issei proudly proclaimed his love for the female body in front of his childhood friend that still had a crush on him. Irina was upset, ran away, and I sent Issei after her. Xenovia is chasing after her best friend."
"O-okay? Wait, stop skipping that part!" Jeanne didn't buy my derailing of what she wanted to know.
"What part?" I replied in English, I played dumb for a bit.
"The part where you… where you were using her to satiate your lust through illicit sexual acts in front of us." Teofila finally mustered enough conviction to confront me on my actions.
"My lust? That was all for Atago's sake. I am hardly getting any sexual pleasure out of this when compared to her. Also, it was hardly illicit. We are engaged, we love each other and she had given me her approval to do so. Atago is a pervert that enjoys being degraded, of course, I take care of her and ensure that I wouldn't humiliate her in important situations. But here? It was the perfect occasion to fulfill her fantasy."
"He's quite right." Atago popped by the living room just as I was finished, looking as prim and proper as she had before I toyed with her, "I've been begging for him to "put me in my place" for months! If our chances of getting caught weren't so high, he would have walked me like a dog right at the Vatican's borders when we went there for our holiday."
Jeanne's mouth opened to say something, and then she paused as if thinking of something else to say.
"… Okay. Wow. I have to admit… the two of you have guts. Now that I think of it, I'm not particularly angry… huh… I'll pray over this." With what I've been sensing from Jeanne, I could tell that her primary feeling was that of "curiosity", and a bit of lust. She doesn't realize it yet, however, as it's all rather new for her.
I know it's probably wrong, but I really want to be the one to "teach" her about her newfound 'feelings". Huh… no wonder Diodora likes Christian girls.
Valerie began to explain our dynamic to Teofila. The nun was more comfortable talking with someone from the same country. It took a few minutes until the silver-haired holy maiden seemed to understand that I wasn't "using" Atago (with how Teofila feels about devils, the church and other people in general after what had happened, it's no wonder she hates the idea of being "used"), and that we were being responsible for each other's happiness in different ways.
Atago was doing the same with Jeanne (I had "copied" my knowledge and skills with French to her), the latter was as curious as a school girl when it came to relationships.
"I see, that is quite… eye-opening. I didn't realize that relationships can be… like that." Teofila managed to wrap her head around it.
"Well then, let's head out for lunch." The owners of the house wasn't present so we may as well leave to complete our own business.
Elsewhere, I could see that Issei managed to turn on his harem protagonist charm and win Irina back, only, there was a small confrontation with someone I didn't quite expect.
Either way, it was resolved "peacefully", no harm had been done. Issei managed to show off his "protective" and determined side by calling the stalker out on his shit. I can only imagine how many Social Link level ups he just got.
Xenovia was actually impressed with Issei's action to defend her BFF, then stepped in just in time to let Irina and Issei get away.
Thing is, that particular "stalker" was a very angry Yuuto Kiba.
Level 24B
Level 24B
There must be some correlation between being "blonde" and "strange", Issei entertained the strange thought after the most recent events.
The modern-day martial arts manga character visiting his house with well over a handful of pretty girls was most likely the root cause of this impression. Aside from being living proof that his dream of being a Harem King was totally possible (two of the girls were part of the guy's harem, after all), he had seriously appreciated the gift in the form of the eye-candy and the… live-action show, not that he'll ever admit how hard he got while watching it and how he wished his new "boss" would have continued.
As for the second person that reinforced this view, the Romanian hot blonde that was part of Genshirou's harem was quite obviously, a fellow pervert considering that her first action was to record everything that had unfolded before doing some Yuri stuff at her boyfriend's order. He could totally respect that, but she was still strange for a girl, as from his experience, girls usually would shout and beat him up if he even hinted that they were perverts too.
Unfortunately, the last incident wasn't nearly as pleasant. There was some blonde handsome bastard that wouldn't be out of place from one of Issei's hated NTR doujin list trying to mess with his childhood friend (which regrettably, he totally forgot and thought was a boy the whole time) in a creepy manner.
"Gah! This stupid game! Let me win!"
Irina's voice brought him back to the slightly dull scene of watching her attempt to win a prize from a claw game at an arcade. After running away from the creepy stalker, Issei decided to play the tour guide to Kuoh to make up for lost time and his insensitiveness to Irina's feelings earlier, their first stop was to play all the games they wanted to play in the game centre.
"Ohohoho! Then I guess it's up to me, Issei, to get you that Pikachu!"
"You can't pull off that Frieza laugh, so don't try it, ever again."
"Gah!"
They were both crazy Super Sentai fans when they were young, but they had also watched Dragon Ball as well, keeping up with the series on their own as they grew up.
Unlike Irina, Issei had wasted a lot more money on claw games before (to get certain figurines…) and thus had more experience than her, it was only natural that he managed to get Irina the toy she wanted after a few tries.
"Here you go. One Pikachu."
Irina snatched the toy right out of his hands.
"Yatta! Aww, aren't you the cutest? Thank you Issei-kun!"
What she did next surprised him.
He felt all his blood rush up to his face and his lower body part when she gripped him in a tight hug.
"Issei-kun, it's really hot today…"
"Y-yeah… the heat is really something…"
"Let's get some ice cream! You're paying!"
"Oi! Ah whatever, just don't go overboard. I need that money to buy po-"
"What?"
"Reference books."
It was a weird day, but a great one, that's for sure.
At some point, his parents had called up to check on him, allowing him the chance to get them caught up on what had happened. He didn't bother telling them about the more crazy stuff, and so only focused on Irina (and her smoking hot best friend).
In the end, his parents had extended the invitation to Irina and Xenovia to stay with them over the length of their vacation, and Issei had no complaints about that at all.
Normally, she would go ahead and kill the pitiful being that fell to one of the lowest places they could possibly fall to, yet she couldn't muster the mood to take all of this seriously.
She certainly was aware of the danger this person in front of her could be to her life. Even so, she could tell that her potential foe had some twisted sense of honor and wouldn't attempt to harm her should she not draw her sword.
It was a good thing that they had to leave behind the Excaliburs back at the Vatican then, now she technically had "no" swords on her person at all. This so-called "knight" of Gremory wouldn't harm her, despite what Issei Hyoudou had believed after seeing her partner being glared at with such hatred.
"… and that's why I hate the church!" Yuuto Kiba (likely a second name) popped open his can of iced coffee after he finished his complaints.
"… I see." Xenovia nodded and continued to humor the devil.
They took their "conversation" (his one-sided ranting) over to a corner, happened across a few vending machines, to which Xenovia went ahead and patronized for some iced green tea.
The summer heat was killer in this town.
"No, I don't think you understand-"
"You're right. I don't. It's quite clear that I have not lived your life so I won't bother saying I do." She didn't have many kind words to say, especially to someone who blamed an entire institution, it's members, a few inanimate objects and God for his pain, and then proceeded to spit on all the good that is being done by happily accepting life as a devil.
"You… !" At this point, his anger was something she expected. She wasn't in the mood to match his anger, but she was getting very, very annoyed.
"That said, you clearly went through a lot. I know it's not much of a consolation but I can tell you that the one responsible for those experiments has been excommunicated, the church tried to imprison and punish him further but he escaped."
"The church can't even clean up their own messes!"
"You're missing the point. I'm trying to say that if you want vengeance that badly then you can hunt him down whenever he shows his face."
And that stopped him short.
"… Huh… good idea. And the church wouldn't care?"
"Why would we? He's as much a heretic as you, only, your only crime is being a devil."
"This is not how I expected this to go. Aren't you going to attack me or something?"
"I'm not smart, but I'm not that stupid. First of all, you're a servant to Rias Gremory and the higher up's would get pretty mad if I went ahead and started a war. Secondly, I am unarmed. And lastly, I am on vacation."
"… Ha?"
Xenovia took out the folded copy of her leave application form from her pocket and showed it to the devil.
"You get off days?"
"Of course we do. Don't you?"
"Uh… I'm still a student."
"I strongly suggest you discuss your vacation terms with your master."
"Wait, how does being on vacation stop you from wanting to do your duties?"
"It's a case by case basis. If I see a monster actively messing with humans in the vicinity then, of course, I'm going to find some way to kill it. But in your case? I was having a pretty good day until you came along and I have no intentions of having the rest of my day ruined by instigating something."
"You don't feel like an exorcist at all."
"My beliefs are flexible. Now, if you will excuse me, I have to make sure my partner doesn't do anything stupid."
As Xenovia left a slightly dumbfounded devil at the corner, a certain red-headed devil that was badly hidden behind a streetlight (that didn't hide her at all) nearby decided to walk up to Yuuto Kiba.
"Yuuto! Are you okay?"
"I… think so? I was angry and now? I'm just very confused."
"I'm so glad that you aren't hurt. Now, why don't we go very far away from the church people so that you don't have to think about them!"
"Buchou… that sounds like a great idea!"
"It's reason, then."
Sona sighed as her human friend snickered to himself after spouting yet another derivative prequel meme, no doubt replaying something he thought was funny in the confines of his mind.
She was giving the Kuoh Academy school tour to Genshirou, Jeanne, the other nun (who was eyeing her and her peerage as if they were out to kill her for some reason) and his two girlfriends that she had yet to be properly introduced to.
"Sorry about that. So let me get this straight… you got yourself elected in your first term because the previous president fucked up big time. Must be convenient."
"It was hardly convenient. While I had planned to contest for this role I did not have the time I would have wanted to properly campaign across school grounds."
"Sounds to me that you're upset you won in a non-standard manner. Did anyone ever tell you that you are a competitive person?"
If only he knew just how competitive she was with a certain rival of hers. "Once or twice. Care to take a guess who told me that?" She wondered what his Star Wars rotted brain would come up with.
"Was it recent?" He was grinning, his expression matching her own. If he had the gall to make up his own jokes within his mind in her presence then it's only natural that she would not obliged him
"Maybe." She wasn't going to say 'possibly' no matter how much he wanted it. That conversation veered way too close to that scene from Attack of the Clones.
"Nice dodge. I see you have studied the Prequels well."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
If he didn't have the satisfaction of her acknowledging the embarrassing amount of research on the Prequels just to understand whatever he was referencing then she could rest easy.
"But… Prez, didn't you make us all watch it with you?" Unfortunately, she completely neglected to brief her peerage of her intentions. Sona whipped her head around to see who had said that, to her horror, it was her own 'Queen' Tsubaki Shinra, who had betrayed her unknowingly.
"D-do-"
Genshirou's growing smile was not something satisfying to watch, especially if it was at her expense.
"All of us had to do write-ups on every single used meme ever." Her Bishop Reya Kusaka had been the next one!
"If what you've told me is true, you will have gained my trust." As expected, Genshirou had taken the opening immediately.
"Stop enabling him! Henceforth, the both of you are on pool cleaning duty!"
Wait, did she have to be so dramatic about it? As she asked herself that question, she soon realized just what she had done.
"Heh, henceforth…"
"That was not my intention… I hate you so much."
"I know."
Unfortunately, the ability to research any topic does not always give her usable intelligence.
She felt a hand on her shoulder, Genshirou's Japanese girlfriend was giving her a sympathetic smile, it would have been comforting if her eyes didn't look so dead.
"You get used to it."
"I don't want to get used to it!"
Eventually, they settled in the office of the student council, which she had recently renovated with the right kind of furniture.
Genshirou's blonde girlfriend who looked a few years older than them all had her eyes on the cabinets and her desk.
"That's a lot of paperwork. Have you considered going digital?" That was the first question that she asked.
"I considered it, but convincing the school board to migrate our processes and database to an electronic format has not been… fruitful." Sona answered the young lady, who frowned and immediately took out her cell phone.
"I have a couple of links to articles on how to sell technology to more "experienced" folks, what's your email address? A phone number is fine too. Or social messaging account-" The Sitri heir thought that this girl must have been a real millennial.
"I don't believe I've gotten your name." If only because Genshirou had started distracting her with his constant meme'ing. Thankfully, he was pre-occupied with speaking to the rest of her peerage, who seemed to enjoy his presence more than she did. He seemed to be actively encouraging the Romanian nun into talking with Reya, Tsubaki and Tsubasa.
"Wow, I didn't know Kuoh's language classes were so inclusive! To think that everyone here can speak Romanian too."
That sent them all into a momentary panic when they realize their racial [Language] skill had almost screwed them over. Thankfully, he was thus far completely obvious to their supernatural abilities.
"My, my, just like Gen, I find myself impressed with all your language skills. I've been speaking my native language the entire time and I find that your accent has been impeccable." Sona turned back to the one she was conversing, who seemed to only look at her with an innocent sort of "awe" over everyone supposedly being an omniglot, "Oh, where are my manners, I'm Valerie, Valerie Tepes."
"I'm sorry, what?" She had to make sure that the girl seemed to be introducing herself in the western fashion, not the Japanese fashion, in order to check whether she heard the last name correctly.
"Yes, yes, I know. Oh, I heard that name in some vampire folklore. Well, newsflash, I'm not a vampire. I have a reflection, I'm not sparkly in sunlight blah blah blah… all I know is that my mother and father was a distant descendant from that Vlad guy."
Well, it wasn't as if there weren't dhampir bastards that ran around and got their bloodline diluted, and over the centuries, ended up being near-completely human.
It would explain Sona's inability to sense anything remotely unusual from the girl, not even any diluted vampiric traits, which meant that it was impossible for the girl to be anything but human.
If Valerie were a vampire, she would have sensed it.
Jeanne was catching up with Tomoe and Momo, which means she wasn't going to snap and kill them all anytime soon. With what the reports she had gotten from her sister on Jeanne's past track record… yes, it was an actual concern of hers now.
That left one more person unaccounted for.
"The two of you don't seem particularly worried about your boyfriend being around other girls." Sona turned around to address the girl who had gotten way too used to Genshirou's memes.
"Oh my, it's not that much of an issue. How do I say it… it makes it easier to evaluate the people around us this way." The girl reminded her way too much of Rias's Queen with her mannerisms, although, everything about her screamed traditional Japanese high-class lady rather than someone that "acquired" a set of behaviors like a few other students she knew.
"I don't believe we have been introduced."
"Gen's mentioned you quite a bit. Kaiza Atago, a pleasure to meet you."
The devil had to double-check her hearing again.
"Ka-kaiza? You mean "that" Kaiza?"
"Oh my, whatever could you mean by that? There are plenty of people that share such a family name. Unless of course you are looking for a family with a bit of old money and inherited property, then I suppose I would be a member of "that"."
And with that last word, the devil felt an invisible "weight" burdening her body for the briefest of moments, before it lifted as if it had never been there to begin with.
"… Oh."
Had this been a year ago she wouldn't have even heard that name from anywhere other than a single line in her sister's report about the Youkai Faction.
She liked to consider herself a progressive that was above racism, for the most part, yet like many devils, she would have naturally brushed off Youkais as a threat.
The first key fact was they couldn't compete on quantity. Their population was much lower than that of devils, their high species diversity played a key role in this.
And even if they did compete on quantity, the fact of the matter was that for the most part, they were simply lacking in quality. There were only so many Daiyoukai that could rival Ultimate-Class devils and even in that regard, they were outnumbered, and had nothing that could rival their Satan-Class devils outside of their home turf advantage. Furthermore, the vast majority of their power was concentrated within those Daiyoukai and not the rest of the Youkai population, in a way that made the devil's class structure look good in comparison.
If the devil's class system was a pyramid scheme then the Youkai power structure looked more like a flat cookie with a single chocolate chip placed right in the middle as a topping.
With a not-insignificant amount of high-class devils having one or two youkai races that have been objectified or sexualized to different extents in their peerage, where tales of unsavory methods of recruitment wasn't uncommon to say the least, and with little reparations to the Youkai Faction, well… it was quite clear that the faction could do very little against them.
That all began to change a year ago when the police and security forces under the Kaiza clan became hilariously competent. Surveillance wise it was like modern China, where one couldn't get anywhere without being caught on camera.
As for the enforcement? It was like watching a more serious Spanish Inquisition in Monty Python's film. They had eyes, ears and their noses everywhere.
Not to mention the strength to back it up.
There were quite a few dead and severely hurt devils left screaming impotently at their leadership for revenge against the Youkai with no legitimate reasons. Her sister Serafall had little patience for their nonsense and in no uncertain terms, told them to shut up after they got their just desserts for infringing on another faction's territory.
Needless to say, the Kaiza clan had done quite a lot to give the Youkai faction a… reputation.
For the heiress of the clan herself, she had recently heard that the young lady stumbled upon a devil noble attempting to have his way with a Nekomata.
And that she killed him and his peerage with a pair of chopsticks. If it weren't for the coroners report no one would actually believe it… seriously, who actually does that?
"Are you alright? You seem a bit pale." Genshirou was walking towards her, looking very worried.
"Y-yes, I'm fine." She replied quickly.
"I'm sorry, did I say something troubling? I hadn't intended to do so. Please, take a seat." Atago gestured to her office's main chair. The chess set and the clock was already prepared.
Sona decided to focus on what she was here for. Whatever relationship the disguised youkai had with Genshirou wasn't any of her business, besides, it looked innocent enough considering that the boy had absolutely no clue on anything supernatural, other than Star Wars and a few other anime.
"How many times have you actually played chess before?"
"I haven't played against another player in my entire life. But I read the rulebook and watched a few videos, seems simple enough."
He told her the absolute truth, and she only made her feel both irritated and disappointment. It wasn't the first time she heard someone look down on the game, but having taken the time to set this all out and for him to not take this seriously was particularly insulting.
She was going to crush him while giving him a handicap, that was the best revenge.
"You will find that it is you who are mistaken about a great many things…"
It was best not to waste any more time in annihilating him, and so, she decided on playing one of the variants in speed chess.
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Sona blinked, twice, and then a third time.
"I guess that's checkmate then."
"Ah… ah…. What?"
How can this be? How could she possibly lose to this… this degenerate?!
The rest of her peerage was in shock of her surprising defeat while Jeanne and Teofila were laughing in a bad display of grace and kindness.
"My young apprentice, it is time for you to learn the intricacies of the curriculum."
"I renew my pledge to your teachings."
"Wait just a second!"
Genshirou and Tomoe were already ready to hash out their tutoring sessions.
"What's wrong? You lost, so that makes me the official tutor. Gen-san Daishouri!"
"No, I don't believe it, this is beginner's luck! Or you cheated! Or…"
"Sona, calm down. I'm sure this can be um… ascertained with another game." Tsubaki quickly calmed her down, her Queen was right, she had to keep cool.
Unfortunately, Genshirou was a professional at annoying her, it was unusual enough for her to lose her composure, but whenever he was around she couldn't help but act out on her emotions.
"Eh, I know how to cut my losses, I already won my 'sensei' title so why would I risk another game?"
"Oh? Then how about a wager? Like you said, No Game No Life style."
"I'm listening."
"We won't touch our previous agreement, you can tutor Tomoe however much you want, but this time the loser has to obey the victor on whatever they demand."
"Limited to one action, if it requires continuous behavioral modification, is only subject to enforcement within vicinity to one another."
"That works fine for me. If I win then you cannot use prequel memes around me."
"Bring it on. If I win, then you have to approve this next year."
Genshirou took out a… stack of forms and placed it on her desk.
"A… school club formation application?"
"Atago and I are thinking of transferring to Kuoh next year for high school, my parents have been thinking of getting a new house here so I thought, why not get into a school where I know my friends are going to attend? I looked the place up, couldn't find the club I wanted, so I drafted my own one."
"… "Politics, Economics and Sociology in Pop Culture Research Council"… for example, discussing Prequel era politics and how it applies to the real world and… this is just a cover for your Star Wars appreciation club, isn't it?"
Sona Sitri wasn't even surprised at this point. The custom position name for the club president position being "Grandmaster of the Order" was just making it downright obvious he wanted this club solely to make Jedi Council related memes.
"Oh, are you afraid to lose?"
Okay, Sona Sitri was a bit more than just a little competitive.
Spoiler: 1 Hour Time Card
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"… I hate you… so, so much." She glared impotently at her new rival.
The bastard hadn't even spared more than a second to think about making his next move. She would be right to say it threw her off her game, but it didn't change the fact that everything move on the board had somehow transpired according to his designs.
"I know you do. I can feel your anger, it gives you focus, makes you stronger-"
"Ahahaha! Gen is, Genshirou is actually bullying her! This is the best!"
Anyone that called this Jeanne a Saint was clearly delusional!
At least her day couldn't possibly get any worse.
Level 24C
Level 24C
Is it wrong to say that getting forcibly "hugged" by her species' sworn enemy feels like an actual improvement to her situation?
"There, there, I know how you feel, what it's like to lose. To feel so desperately that you were the best at your particular hobby only to lose to someone you thought was a beginner."
Jeanne's words were a slight comfort despite the naturally dread from being in close proximity to a girl that could suddenly gut her with a holy sword at any given point in time.
And then Sona remembered that Jeanne's hobby likely involved lots of killing. The number of infamous exorcists that could slaughter as many monsters as Jeanne could within a short period of time was less than twenty.
Who the hell did she compete with? Griselda Quarta? No wait… considering that Jeanne thought the person was a beginner it would have been someone younger. It could be Nero Raimondi…
Sona quickly put a stop to that train of thought. Being near Jeanne had always given her mixed feelings of both fear and fascination, allowing herself to behave in a way that was inappropriate as a [King] in front of her servants was unacceptable.
"Ha! I imagine that your humbling would feel worse than getting hustled by this conman." She quickly removed herself from Jeanne's overly friendly embrace.
She could see many of her peerage members started to visibly calm down, the Romanian nun also looked as if everything was now right with the world.
"Ouch, Shitori-san, how could you say that? You were the first person that I ever played chess against." Genshirou looked completely honest and well-meaning with his words, but having been around him for a decent amount of time, she knew that it was his way of riling her up so that she would "loosen up" a bit.
While it was grating at times, the lengths that he goes to make his friends comfortable (and apparently, he goes a lot further with his girlfriends) was proof that he wasn't a malicious person at all, and when Sona reflected on her interactions with him, it became clear that he was trying to get her in on the fun.
"If what you said was true then you must have a chess program installed into your brain."
"I'm pretty sure the mind doesn't work that way."
"Oh? Then tell me, how did you win?"
"It's simple really. I just had an idea of what the board should look like at the end and then worked towards it."
"If I keep asking you this question then will you keep giving me answers that make less and less sense with each iteration?"
"Would you like to try me?"
"Hmm, I think I will."
If only to see him eventually flounder and say something lame.
Judging by the proud look on his way (as if she was learning from him, as if… !) he seemed to have acknowledged the inevitable yet decided to go along with it anyways.
It seems like he was no stranger to handling someone else a victory. Normally, her pride would bristle at such an act, yet she found this to be surprisingly satisfying.
"Well actually, I'm totally some sort of inhuman hive mind thing that powers itself through thousands of brains just to beat you at chess."
"How flattering, okay, and the real reason?"
This was his fifth "actual" reason thus far.
"Okay, you got me, it was-"
The widening of his eyes at that brief moment didn't match the look on his face whenever he would stumble on his words in an attempt to make a meme about something.
"Oh shit! I totally forgot it was Sheev's birthday! No wonder he was cranky enough to spin at our guest today…" Genshirou suddenly said something utterly random.
"Your parrot?" Sona recalled one of his many tales that further solidified his position as the most prequel obsessed memer in Japan.
She noticed that his girlfriends, the Kaiza clan's heiress and Valerie Tepes, also shared his shock.
"What? How could this happen? I would have remembered it. It is critical that we prepare a special parrot treat immediately." Apparently, this parrot must have been rather lovable for the Saji household, if someone from a different country like Valerie seems to care for it that much.
"Mmm-hmm, she's right. Sheev is part of the family. It's a birthday that we can't afford to miss." Atago Kaiza, who was supposed to be the bastion of sanity within Genshirou's best friends, had immediately gone along with this!
"Well, our business has been settled her anyways. We gotta go set up a party, thanks for having all of us! We should all meet up again before summer ends though, you're all really cool!"
And they all left just like that.
Sona wasn't quite sure if her day was better or worse off now that they were gone.
"Why are you still here?" Having the dangerous exorcist near her, and within killing range of her entire peerage, didn't change her feelings on the overall satisfaction rating for her day at all.
"Me? I wanted to catch up with you. I'll head back to Tokyo a little later."
Preferably without killing all of them while there were no witnesses around.
"And your friend?"
"Teofila will be fine. She gets along with her fellow countrywoman, probably has a crush on Genshirou and… between you and me, her last encounter with a devil was… really terrible to say the least. I don't think she likes you all very much, sorry, I think she's racist."
"It's not really between you and me when you're saying it loud enough for everyone to hear it. And really, calling her out on racism? You of all people shouldn't be casting stones."
And indeed, literally, everyone in the room (her peerage) had heard what Jeanne had said.
Tomoe and Momo had immediately got on Jeanne's case for being racist against the English before they all sat around the table to discuss all sorts of things.
Jeanne was curiously enough, seemed perfectly willing to divulge information on the general "feel" of the church at this moment. It was nothing majorly sensitive thus far unless one counts a sudden rise in movie marathons within the Vatican as an issue of concern.
"Meh, nothing's secret these days, information security is a joke. We have spies in the Grigori, they have spies in the church. Apparently, our priests are selling out nuns to devil nobles and I wouldn't be surprised if there were deals for information from our side as well-"
Wait what?
"Hold on a second, I was pretty sure that sounded like a serious accusa-"
Before Sona managed to finish her sentence, she felt a familiar presence that hadn't been felt in quite awhile. The doors to her office were kicked right open, thankfully, no one had been standing under it.
"Sona-chan! Your beloved big sister came here to see youuuu!"
The big sister missile knocked her off the chair and trapped her in a tight hug.
Sona's mind froze. She was being hugged in front of everyone. Right now she was as trapped as a pillow within her big sister's arms.
Her day had officially, gotten worse.
"Is that the Leviathan-sama that I've been hearing about?" Momo looked confused about what to think.
"No way! That's our boss's big sister!" Tomoe, don't look! Sona screamed inside her head.
"I can see the resemblance." She took Jeanne's words as a compliment as at the very least, the exorcist didn't have a strong reaction to her sister.
"Why didn't you reply to my letters? Geez! You didn't even come home for the summer. How could you delay our long-awaited reunion where we'll launch ourselves into the air for a big hug while yelling "Onee-sama!" and "So-Tan!", then embrace ourselves in a Yuri-"
"NYEH!" Sona used the knowledge of the self-defense instructor that she hired in order to slip out of her sister's grip, and quickly got back up on her feet. "Haa… haaa… what are you doing here?"
Serafall pouted, a clear attempt to guilt trip her.
"Aww, didn't you hear a single word I said? So-tan-" "For the hundredth time don't call me that-" "-Has been so cold to me lately-" "I've been busy." "-and didn't come to see me at all so I decided to visit you instead."
"That can't be all!"
"But it is! Especially when my special barrier powered by my sisterly love-" "There's no such power, wait what barrier…?!" "-Activated in response to a large amount of holy light energy some time ago, and I didn't get a response, I had to fight my way out of an ancient temple to a forgotten god to-" "What were you even doing there?!" "- save my sister!"
She was out of breath from all the retorts she made as her sister explained her "logic" or lack of it. She made a note in her head to look out for any secretly tampered parts of her home, school and even clothes to make sure her sister hadn't placed any weird spells on it.
"Somehow I get the feeling this is my fault." Jeanne pointed at herself with a huge grin on her face.
"Oh wow, you think?" Sona responded automatically, not bothering to keep herself composed when her sister was embarrassing her like this.
"That's right. It's your fault…" An aura of cold air began to surround her sister. Huh?
She could catch a few flashes of movement, unlike the time when she never perceived the Sith Lord's movement speed when he became serious, yet she couldn't react to it all the same. Serafall was now right behind Jeanne with a hand placed on the girl's shoulder.
"It's because of you that my Sona isn't home with me."
Jeanne put on a brave smile, one that was braver than most that would be caught in that kind of situation, and answered without turning around to face her sister. "That's quite odd. I don't remember doing anything."
"She's still in Japan because she would rather meet a "friend" from the Church of all people rather than her super cute big sister."
What? Now that was just ridiculous! Sona wondered why Serafall would think that. Honestly, she would have avoided Jeanne if she could, but there were extenuating circumstances on why she couldn't.
Although… she had to be honest that she wasn't quite sure who she would pick in this sort of instance.
If it was for a social related event, she would have picked Jeanne over her sister, if only because Jeanne could be diplomatic when she tried. But a private or family related event? Well, she would have been happy to spend some time with her big sister.
In this kind of scenario, she would rather just run away from both of them, as disgraceful as it may be. Not only was it embarrassing, but she was pretty sure Serafall was about to do something that would kick start the next Great War.
"I wouldn't say that. "So-tan" is the epitome of a cute little sister who tries to act serious and mature all the time!" Jeanne started saying nonsense all of a sudden!
"What?" Sona's brain was getting blue-screened again.
"Eh?" Even her sister was confused!
"I only met her last month but I could see that she loves her big sister very much and misses her all the time. She would always look out the window whenever we ate at a restaurant with a lonely look."
"W-what are you-"
The devil heiress could scarcely believe it. The so-called carrier of Jeanne D'Arc's spirit was lying her ass off!
"Kyaaa! I knew it! I knew it, knew it, knew it! So-tan is like that tsundere heroine that pushes the people she loves away but actually gets really lonely-"
"NOOOOOO!!! Onee-sama! I can't take this anymore!"
She ran away.
"Wait! Sona-chan! Don't run away! If you keep acting Tsun you'll never reach the end of my route!"
"I'm not listening!"
She had run countless circles around the school before she fell face flat on the floor of her office.
"Whew, that was quite an impressive run." The conniving fake Saint Jeanne remarked.
"I never knew that Prez was so athletic! Why don't we run together in our training sessions?" Drat. Tsubasa Yura was on to her. Now the exercise freak was going to drag her into it.
"Sona! I caught you!" And then her sister was now on top of her.
"Uuuuuh…. Help me already."
"Um…" Her peerage needed to be trained more in the art of being loyal over fearing for their survival at the hands of her sister if they were hesitating in separating them.
Thankfully, her sister eventually relented and took a seat (damn you Genshirou…) around the table. The rest of her peerage was standing up as if this was some important meeting while Jeanne sat on the other side of the table.
"I'm always happy when my So-tan-" "Don't call me that." "-makes new friends. But honestly, the two of you should be more aware of the repercussions."
Jeanne continued smiling as if she had done nothing wrong, "I don't see why that might be a problem. We were doing normal people stuff like urban legend hunting with a mutual normal friend of ours quite frankly, all this faction stuff doesn't really need to come into it."
Sona didn't quite agree even if she had gone along with it.
Surprisingly, Serafall nodded with an approving look, "I get it. If we devils aren't on any official "business" that doesn't involve endangering humans, you don't really care, do you?"
"I joined up to kill monsters. Not humans with a bit of magic, wings, a severe case of missing church services doing normal human stuff."
"If only other people could see it that way. Then we could have like, world peace or something."
"You mean between our factions? Well, that would certainly improve our resource flow and let us concentrate on killing the bloodsuckers. Those bats that can't survive off exploiting humanity should really just go and die."
"I know what you mean! There was this one time I tried talking with their diplomatic party and this bitch vampire was like, "I'm gonna have a snack" then ripped the head off a servant girl and started drinking her blood!"
"That's sick and wrong! We should have a joint operation to kill all the vampires!"
"That's a bit much. We should just kill off enough of their population until the rest would have to live as valued members of civilized society, only taking approved allocated blood "resources" from donations and stuff. That way, I can satisfy the "catch them all" crowd among the high-class devils that are really into inter-racial and get rid of enough of the mind-controlling stereotypical monster of the week vampires."
"Hmm, well, I get it. It's not like we have to kill them all. That "Sith Lord" we ran into showed that there were vampires that didn't want to act the role of monsters."
"When did this conversation about peace turn into one of genocide!?" Sona interrupted the increasingly terrifying conversational flow.
Jeanne had a terrible grin on her face, "Aww, Sona, I'm so sorry that we ignored you."
"Wah! Jeanne-chan is right!" Serafall once against started hugging her, "It's been so long since we saw each other, I shouldn't be talking about work here!"
Sona had some choice words about what Serafall considered as "work". Jeanne? Not so much, that's literally in her job description.
She tried to find some way to not let Jeanne properly derail the conversation by throwing Serafall's attention at her.
"A-anyway, what was that accusation again?"
"Sorry?"
"The one about priests being bribed to give up nuns to a devil noble?"
Serafall released her and made sure to sit up straight, seemingly going into work mode.
"While what a high-ranked devil takes action can be upon their discretion, that only applies so long as it does not threaten the ceasefire put in place hundreds of years ago. What is the church's official response to this?"
Jeanne replied with an annoyed expression, "Oh, the usual. Downplay the issue to make it go away, you know, for the sake of "peace". Officially, they say that a devil that "claims" to be "Diodora Astaroth" had seduced and tempted a holy maiden in Romania." Her tone began to darken into one of disdain, "The deception was done with the sole purpose of having her excommunicated, isolating her from her support network, then tricking her into becoming his servant before revealing his lies as he rapes her into submission, crushes her belief then rebuild her from the ground up. And a lot more sickening things that the devil himself elaborated in great detail and with a gleeful tone that shouldn't be said lest I sully my own mouth."
"T-that's…" Sona didn't quite know what to say to that. She knew that there were devils that likely hated the Angels and the Church enough to commit that kind of evil. Even then, they should have really just dealt with the grudge by killing their enemies.
"Ah… well, that was quite detailed." Serafall looked slightly worried. "How much of that was the official statement?"
"The first sentence. The rest of it was classified, very eagerly if I may add, by a few priests that looked worried for the wrong reasons."
Sona knew damn well what Jeanne was implying.
"If such a claim could be validated then I could point the right kind of people in that direction. But you must understand that I cannot do anything about such claims."
"It's fine. I got a crash course in devil politics from the higher-ups after my last visit. I get it. Just letting you know in the spirit of good faith."
"Okie dokey. I'll take that as it is. I think Ajuka-chan will need to know about such horrid rumors about his old clan, especially when the heir to his old family somehow happens to be filled with all sorts of infamous excommunicated members of the church."
"I take it nothing will really happen, eh?"
"Not unless the stability of the Underworld was at risk and there was a lot of proof."
"Sting operations?"
"It wouldn't be credible."
"Drat."
The conversation became noticeably lighter as they simply talked about "general" topics from both the devil's side and the church's side of things. Jeanne eventually started telling Serafall all about their "adventures" from her point of view.
"Wait a second! This Genshirou guy, who has that crazy violent Kaiza heiress as his longtime girlfriend, has been taking you all around town to all these supernatural places without getting directly involved until he was kidnapped and had his memory erased by this "Darth Bobby" guy…"
"Yup." "Yes." Jeanne and Sona looked at each other before slowly nodding and replying Serafall.
"I-isn't it obvious? Are the two of you blind? Are your friends blind as well?!" Serafall pointed to Tomoe and Momo who looked equally confused.
"Onee-sama, I don't understand what you're talking about." Did her sister find out some sort of truth from hearing Jeanne's side on the story and how Jeanne met Genshirou in the first place?
"He's that side character!"
"What?" "Huh?"
"He's so obviously the normal but super useful side character that shows up with all sorts of clues to help the main Mahou Shoujo heroines find out where the bad guy is! And like, give all sorts of advice that leads to "Eureka" moments!"
"Who are you calling a Mahou Shoujo! I refuse to be part of your fantasies!"
"Hahaha! Side character! I'm going to call him when I see him again."
Of course, Sona would vehemently refuse to live whatever strange "main character" role that her sister was trying to put her in, especially a magical girl related one.
She would never be caught dead in any frilly magical girl-like costume.
Level 25
Level 25
"Side character eh? Ironic. They can see the narrative roles of others, but not their own." The printed transcript in my hand crumbled into its base particles, the collection of fibers separated and were blown away by a convenient gust of wind.
I'm starting to think that I might actually have a Mahou Shoujo anime's side character power to create dramatic imagery on will.
"I don't suppose that you will be explaining the joke to me." The semi-independent clone in disguise as someone else looked rather irritated.
"No, I don't think I will."
"Endgame memes? Really? A man of your talents?"
"As much as I would like to talk to myself-" "Lame." "-the nun is on the way. As you well know." "Fine. I'll clean up the trail."
The information trail was long and seemingly disconnected.
The conversation after I left was recorded by a miniature device, all electronics, no magic. It was marked by a molecule of my power, the shadow molecule only had enough power to exist for a few hours, unable to do anything other than serving as a marker.
I had assigned a disguised independent clone go all the way to international waters to open up a split second portal through the Dimension Gap, wrapped it around the targeted area marked by the shadow molecule, connect the two spaces and retrieved the item. After that, I had the conversation transcribed into a text file at an internet cafe in South East Asia, printed out through a hacked printer somewhere else, sent all the way (the original was destroyed later) to a corporate office in Japan through a fax machine (obsolete tech has it's uses) where yet another clone was waiting for the document.
The document was then sealed, handed over to a delivery service and sent to a nearby convenience store that I knew would be close enough for the same day delivery. Another clone went to pick up the package and ran all the way to the nearby park to delivery it to me.
It's best to mix both mundane and supernatural means to hide one's identity. With the knowledge of the experienced long-lived devil and fallen angel, I had been made aware of pretty much all the supernatural communities' methods of information gathering and came to the conclusion that my more secure roundabout method would not be detected.
The transcription I received also confirmed this, having brief notes from the clones to inform me of how smoothly the process went. Serafall hasn't noticed a thing as she had already left the room hours ago, by the time the device hidden under Sona's desk was retrieved, the student council office was empty.
The clones would then go about performings some vigilante activities to muddle the trail even further, "go dark" by hiding somewhere that wouldn't even be loosely connected to the domains of any gods for at least 24 hours, then finally reassimilating with me and the rest of the clones.
"Hmm… I wonder what Atago and Valerie have in store for me tonight…"
I spoke those words within earshot of the newly arrived Teofila Eliade. In truth, I told the two to create a reason for me to be "kicked" out of the house for a bit after Sheev's belated birthday party (which my family was in on thanks to being informed by a clone of myself beforehand), and they decided on arranging a 'surprise' for me within earshot of Teofila and Jeanne (who got back in time for the party).
There wasn't any doubt that Atago and Valerie wouldn't come up with some enjoyable for us all regardless of my initial intent for this to be a mere excuse. I would certainly show how appreciative I am for that efforts and cooperativeness later on.
As everyone knew I was going to wait at the park, it was only a matter of time before a certain someone decided to gather up the courage to meet with me alone.
"Huh?"
"Oh! Teofila, you're here. Did you come out here by yourself? Tokyo may be one of the safest cities in the world, but you should still exercise a bit more caution."
"This park isn't that far from your home, it's safe enough for me. How about you? You came here alone."
"Ah, but I am more than capable enough to take care of myself just fine. So what brings you here? Oh no, I forgot, I'm your translator. I shouldn't have just left you there."
"N-no, it's fine. I didn't need you for that."
"So you need me for something? How can I help?"
"It's… nothing. Nothing really."
Hmm, did she figure it out and decided to not broach the topic out of consideration? Or did she just think to herself how "silly" it is that I might be some "Sith Lord"? I wouldn't read her mind to find out lest something similar to Asia occurs when our Sacred Gears interact, not unless she consents to it, that is.
"Want to join me for a walk then?"
The silver-haired maiden's frown turned upside-down as she quickly hurried up to my side and joined me for a quiet walk around the large park.
As we spoke, I made sure to pay attention to the way her mouth moved, ensuring that I wouldn't be caught out if she started speaking in a different language should she start using the magical phenomenon to imitate the Language ability, as she did back then at Romania after I told her to find Jeanne.
"Have you been enjoying your visit? I understand that it wasn't quite the normal day for you."
"Yes, very much so. For the most part."
"Which part did you not enjoy? Just for reference so I can be a better host."
"The meeting with those d- your student council friends… and the Chess match! I can't say that Chess is very exciting." She corrected herself and added that last bit about Chess abruptly in order to cover up what she really wanted to say.
Honestly, it's no surprise that she has acquired a disdain for devils.
"You and me both. I only read up the rules since my friend challenged me to that game. If it were up to me, we would be playing Laser Tag or something."
"Oh… that sounds interesting."
"I'm more surprised by the fact that you pretty much said, by omission, that you enjoyed watching me pleasure Atago in front of you all."
"T-that's I, it wasn't…"
Her stammering reminded me of Asia whenever she senses lewdness, unlike my good friend however, Teofila quickly got herself under control without my assistance.
"You should be thankful that Valerie helped explain your… relationships, to me. Honestly, how no one acts as if it's an oddity confuses me."
"With your current reaction, I dare say that you fit into the category of "no one"."
"Excuse me?!"
Unsurprisingly, she was indignant about my insinuations that she doesn't find it all that odd anymore just like everyone else, but her lack of outright denial suggested that her feelings on the topic were a lot more complicated.
"No need to be angry. It's not like being "no one" is something bad, sometimes a bit of privacy and lack of recognition can be pretty nice." I was just playing around with words right now just to keep her off her feet.
"…"
Somehow, it worked, just not in the way I intended.
Sensing a bit of wistfulness from her, I asked, "Is something the matter?"
She shook her head, "No, it's just… I just thought that being "no one" to others would have been so much better."
"… Something happened didn't it? With how distinctive you looked, or perhaps something you were renowned for, someone decided to hurt you for it?"
"Yes. He… he made me feel special, I thought he loved me and…"
Oh geez, she's crying, I guess I pushed her a little too much.
"What's his name? I'll punch his teeth in for you, and depending on what he says, I may just do a lot worse."
"You can't! He's… you won't find him anywhere anyway. And no one, from "home", will do anything about it."
"Your family can't do anything about it?"
"It's not that they can't, but they won't!"
Breaking the seemingly "proper" demeanor, she snarled out a couple of Romanian insults and cursed "them" for "betraying" her in the ways it counts. I knew I had to look somewhat confused, and so I did for a bit, before showing a bit of understanding to her general situation.
"Sorry for… dragging up all this hurt."
"No, it's fine! I'm sick of just pretending it's alright anyway. Fuck those self-righteous pieces of shit!" Thank goodness we aren't at home. I don't want Sheev learning any of this foul languagen in Romanian.
Oh dear, now she's kicking that poor trash bin! This counts as vandalism, doesn't it?
… Is it me? Or am I doing Diodora's job for him? No… the church has done this themselves.
Making holy maidens lose their faith in the Church and of God is Diodora's schtick, after (or as) he reveals his true intentions and rapes them that is. I'm afraid that in this case, the DXD humans (I don't count my parents, or any decent and not irrationally fearful of the unknown humans, in this category) within Animeland's church has pushed her away themselves.
"Uh, normally I would just say something like "your hate has made you powerful", but in this case it clearly isn't particularly healthy. Anyways, surely there are at least one or two people who have always been there for you, right?"
"No, there aren't… I mean, I just met them but Jeanne and another girl I know, Asia, has been very kind and understanding to me. They both stick up for me."
Aha! Good job Asia!
"Asia? Asia Argento?"
As expected, she was surprised that I knew her friend.
"How do you know that name?"
"I met her once during my summer break in Rome. I was with Atago at the time and it was a few days before I met Valerie. We talked about a few things, she's a sweet girl."
"S-she is. Sometimes, it feels like she is the only one who is… righteous, at home."
"You make it sound worse than Sodom."
She caught the Biblical reference right away. "That's… a bit of an exaggeration."
"Genesis 18:32 sets the bar I think. I'm pretty sure you can find at least 10 people in this institution that you find yourself hard-pressed to call home that will do you right, if you look hard enough."
"Well, I shouldn't need to look hard to find them!"
Teofila was angry about the fact that the people at the Vatican weren't as holy as she thought they would be. After being betrayed by that priest she trusted, she likely thought he was just a bad apple, only to see the characteristics of such a person in the higher-ups of the church, leading to her further disillusionment.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't be… acting out like this."
"It's alright, your reaction is understandable. You've been disappointed and treated unfairly."
"Yeah…"
If I had ended my words there and tell her what she wanted to hear then I wouldn't be any different from Palpatine.
"The question is what are you going to do about it? You're not going to let them just get to you like that, will you?"
"You don't understand! I can't do-"
"Not with that attitude. Yes, you're a bloody victim, but you can't spend your whole life pitying yourself and expect people, who tend towards being apathetic or judgemental by the way, to be saints and help you out."
"How dare you!"
"How dare you vandalize that poor trash bin in your anger?"
"What?! Is that what it's about?!"
"No, I was just getting off track for a bit."
Deliberately, if I might add. I knew her temper would have cooled a little with that small break.
"You shouldn't be angry with them, not forever or for long, at least. In the end, people will be people. I've learned not to have much hope for them. If you want to be angry at anyone then save it for the one person that deserves it. There's no need to let whoever that bastard that hurt you win by seeing you become a bitter person because of it."
"What, no… I…" The gears seem to be turning in her head, I felt her emotions, the turmoil and pain as she remembered Diodora's clear intentions for her. "Damn it." She cursed, likely finally realizing that she's unintentionally letting herself "fall" to the level Diodora Astaroth intended, if only by a little bit. "Damn it all… uuu…" The tears began to fall for real this time.
It was only once I was sure that comforting her wouldn't make her dependent on some unhealthy validation and reassurance that I moved in to put a supporting hand on her shoulder. If I did it anytime earlier then I wouldn't have lived up to my own standards and she might end up in a bad place, mentally and emotionally, just like a lot of canon characters.
I'm not sure why, or if this was going to be a common thing with girls in this world, but they seem to have the tendency to quickly escalate into something like a full blown hug.
Which Teofila did, and I was forced to adjust accordingly to make her feel better.
A few days passed since then, I had gone through my usual list of things to do with my increasingly frequent overseas visitors that likely don't do a lot of normal human stuff.
Valerie resolved the clothes part of the visit with a trip to Harujuku and other famous places known for fashion. Valerie and Jeanne seemed fine with street fashion while girls like Atago and Teofila preferred something more "proper" given their upbringing.
Atago handled the cultural visits while I managed our "food tour" based on wherever the girls decide to go. Good food is my specialty, after all.
Jeanne had confronted Atago some time on her "intentions", which I was observing without the former's knowledge, thankfully, Atago had pretty much allayed Jeanne's misgivings of simply letting our relationship be. I guess my show of dominating Atago had also helped in flipping around Jeanne's assumptions on the power dynamics of supernatural and mundane individual relationships.
I bought quite a bit of gifts for Teofila to bring back to Italy, the majority of them was reserved for Asia, saying I was a "pen-pal" of hers. I had informed Asia of my meeting with Teofila and Jeanne the night after the incident at the park, hence our stories would align by the time Teofila got back.
At any rate, the nun stopped staring at me randomly to search for any clues that might lead her to "prove" my other persona. That made things easier to manage.
Eventually, we all decided to "attend" the "Shadow Lord Appreciation Club", which included about a few hundred "cultists". It wasn't anything weird in my opinion, a lot of it was just testimonies about how they got healed or were saved from being a victim of a crime while noting down a flicker of a shadowy hand upon them.
To be fair, I was a lot slower with my abilities back then. It's not like I was trying to start a religion or anything, I certainly wouldn't do so in a more religious country as that would attract the attention of gods.
What the city of Tokyo has right now is fine since it creates a positive community without affecting the Shinto religion (honestly, most people just consider it folklore and there's not real faith in it, so what's happening here really doesn't make much of a difference to them), so there should be no logical reason for the Japanese gods to be hostile…
Jeanne was recording the proceedings with a newly purchased video camera to send to the church.
"We will now offer this virgin's blood for the blessings of the Lord of Shadows-"
Wait, what the actual fuck?! How did that random guy hijack the microphone? Why are there a group of black coneheads carrying some girl strapped to a repurposed wooden table?! Why is the girl actually happy about it?!!
Oh shit, they're taking off their clothes.
I don't want to run a sex cult! I'm not a damn hentai villain!
I quickly sent my shadow threads through the ground to reach the crowds, preparing to interface with all their minds to sort out the final details of my contingency plan.
"Oh no! We have to save her!" Teofila was quick to react.
"Somehow she doesn't look like she wants to be saved." Valerie guessed it right. It takes a pervert to know a pervert, I suppose…
"I uh, will be right bac-" Jeanne started to excuse herself, only to be stopped by Atago.
"I don't think that will be necessary. Your goal was to get more information on this "shadow" right? Surely, if this shadow is so benevolent, he will be interfering to prevent such a thing."
As Atago said her piece, Valerie was pushing her power through our connected shadows, assisting me in what I was about to do.
A few seconds later, all the gathered crowd stopped what they were doing, frozen in place as I created an individual "mind space" in each of their heads where I spoke to each of them personally in the guise of a humanoid shadow, sometimes I linked a number of individuals together to speak to them as a group.
"Hey, what's up with them?" Jeanne's question was answered by the crowd suddenly returning back to reality.
"Yatta! He spoke to me!" "Me too!" "Akihiko-san, you there? It's me Hironori-san!" "Dude! Over here!" "Hey, don't forget me! I'm the one investing the money for this business!" "Me too!" "You're Shizuha-san right? You needed someone to take care of the kids at-"
I essentially processed a good amount of their memories and their most recent concerns before telling them all that they didn't need to sacrifice anything to me, simply be good people and don't stand by to let evil triumph yadda yadda yadda…
Then I gave them a headstart by linking them up with each other based on who could help each other the most, who was appropriate, etc… making sure that the rich didn't get any misconceptions like throwing away all their money to the poor with reckless charity but instead, using it to make more money through collaboration which enables them to help more people by developing others.
I would be following up with them in the future through their dreams on how to make some money in a practical and decent manner, among other things… that should help out the poor within this group of people and potentially have positive economic repercussions down the line.
I also had to step in to help some people out emotionally by speaking about their lives, comforting them, even promising them that things will change. I now have quite a long to-do list on dealing with certain bullies and assholes at the workplace.
The crowd kept on talking to one another about their "miraculous" experience, at some point, however, some guy (Is that Momo's dad??) hijacked the mic and restored "order" to the proceedings. He pretty much told everyone to reflect on their encounter, go home and do their "god" proud by living life correctly.
After I specifically told them that I wasn't a god.
I'm so embarrassed. How did things end up like this? I was just giving them the help they needed and now this happens.
Honestly, I don't think another "encounter" would help sort out the issue, considering they're starting to look more fanatical about it.
Well shit. I forgot that DXD humans (and other races) can also go completely crazy in a "positive" direction through sheer admiration. Issei's fans were one example, the devil population was pretty much hero worshiping him like crazy back in canon.
"Huh, well, I guess I have to put "active god" in my report then." Jeanne turned her video camera off. Oh geez, this is going to be so weird.
We waited for most of the people to rush out of the park so that we wouldn't be "caught" by the cultists that would be more than happy to talk to us about their experiences about their "god". Jeanne had apparently gotten some warning messages from Momo about how persistent they were.
While Momo had a point, she did over exaggerate on their "annoyingness", I mean, she's describing them as if they were Axis Cultists. That was just outright insulting.
These good people were harmless!
Aside from those group of guys and that perverted girl that was most definitely an exhibitionist at the very least… but they were just, well, I'll chalk it up to this being a world running on ecchi logic.
"Genshirou, our flight back will be tomorrow so… I want you to know that I truly loved the time we spent together, I mean, with your family and friends!" Teofila started to talk to me about it as the flight they would be getting on was an early one, she must be feeling that there wouldn't be many convenient times left to speak with me. "Thank you for everything. I'm glad that I came here…. But um… Japan is really weird."
"It isn't weird. These are merely unusual times!" I don't know why, but Atago was very defensive about this country at times. Then again, she's essentially one of the few people in charge of the country's security, on the supernatural side. I think she's feeling rather responsible for all this.
Suddenly, something very odd happened. I could feel the "void" energy gather at a deserted place, just a few minutes away, then a pillar of light pierce through the sky.
Everyone in this group saw it.
And I knew that all of us could recognize that the concentration of light wasn't normal.
"Was it a fallen angel? No, it couldn't be. This concentration of holy light was a lot more "pure" than most, but also different from that of an angel's… argh, I'll find out when I get there."
"Less talking and more focused on the path please."
Jeanne was currently carrying her expert on magic (the only one she had on hand), Teofila, in her arms as she ran across the roof of buildings towards where the pillar of light had equipped from.
There was no doubt in her mind that it was a signal of some sort. Someone wanted them to come.
Atago was making sure that Genshirou and Valerie stayed put at their homes (through some convincing reassurances and how they needed to be home soon lest they evoke the wrath of Gen's parents, while their guests were exempt from this) as Jeanne and Teofila went out to examine the phenomenon. Jeanne was thankful for that, she didn't want her recent friends to be in danger.
As they arrived, Jeanne let Teofila down before they walked to the area together, finding themselves face-to-face with three young men that looked a year or two older than her.
"I'm glad that you ladies have decided to respond to my invitation. I'm pleased to meet you both for the first time, Jeanne and Teofila."
Teofila was startled by the black-haired man's knowledge of her, Jeanne on the other hand, had a much different reaction.
"What is this? Are you hitting on me? I'm sorry. I can't. I don't think we can start a relationship like this. If you are one of my admirers then please leave your fan mail at the church's office like everyone else."
Silence reigned supreme for about 5 seconds.
"You make it sound like you deal with a lot of stalkers and fans." Teofila remarked suddenly.
"I can't help being cute and popular." Jeanne shrugged, she had gotten used to dealing with many church warriors singing unwarranted praises.
"Um, hello, your attention please." The guy with the glasses, a magician from the looks of it, started waving his hands. "We have a schedule to adhere to."
"Quite right Georg. My name is Cao Cao, a descendant of-"
He started going into his backstory, showing off his True Longinus (which caught both their attention for quite a bit before they managed to refocus on his talk), spoke about the plight of many Sacred Gear users which was common sense before beginning to talk about his own understanding of their frustrations.
Which were… kind of outdated.
Yes, they certainly had their misgivings with the church, the people there, etc… and they certainly did have problems with a good amount of the supernatural world and sympathized with the plight of their fellow Sacred Gear users, but-
"-How did you go from helping Sacred Gear users to using them just like every other faction?!" Jeanne exclaimed out loud.
Cao Cao had shamelessly and brazenly admitted to the "unfortunate" actions he had to take with people that didn't want to join his cause, stating that it's only "logical" that he denies his enemies the "resources" (Sacred Gear using soldiers) if he couldn't "secure" them.
It was outrageous to both girls. How could he think they would just accept that? After thinking over about it, they realized that in the worst case scenario, if they had disagreed, he would have no misgivings about making sure they were "forcibly recruited" or eliminated.
Jeanne reflected that had she been the same person (or had kept on going as she did) as she was a year ago, she likely would have agreed with his "necessary sacrifices" for the sake of doing her duty in killing as many supernatural beings (or monsters, the way he phrases them) as possible.
"You are misunderstanding something. We are "heroes", just like you two, we are born with a power that makes us precious existences. Many of us are squandering that power under the yoke of the beings that we are meant to protect humanity from. They treat our people like rubbish, if you're useful then like commodities and resources to be traded! It is up to us to make things right! So what if I use people? It is for a greater cause, a heroic one! I know that you have been spending time with those "devils", what have their silver tongues filled your head with? Are they pretending that they aren't a threat? Wake up! See through their lies!"
For some odd reason, Jeanne thought about a certain someone talking about seeing "through the lies of the Jedi", and quite frankly, didn't know whether she wanted to thank or slap Genshirou for making that line stick in her head.
If there's one thing she doesn't want to be, it's a bloodthirsty power hungry self-righteous maniac.
"… Hold on, we serve God, who created the angels who serve him, whose blessings are the Sacred Gears bestowed upon us. Are you actually trying to convince us to fight against our Lord and the heavenly host, who are, by the way, responsible for this power you are speaking about?" Teofila raised a very valid point in Jeanne's point of view.
Cao Cao merely smiled and answered it quickly. "Certainly not. Heaven will not be a target so long as the angels don't get in our way. We are grateful for God's blessings, no doubt about it, but with the way the world is, it's quite clear that their method of handling the affairs of humans are… flawed, to say the least."
"Hypocrite, you're just saying what's convenient aren't you?" Jeanne spat out, displaying her disgust openly for his callousness and blasphemous words.
"While I agree with some of the things you are saying, I am sick and tired of being used by someone else!" Teofila's temper was flaring up at seeing someone that, while not as malicious as the devil she met, was certainly similar in the sense that they saw nothing wrong with taking everything (even free will) from others.
Before Cao Cao spoke again, the third male, a large young man with gray hair like Teofila's, laughed and took some steps towards them.
"Haha! It looks like these ladies didn't fall for your charm Cao Cao! I'll just get right to it then!" He cracked his knuckles, making it clear that the time for talk was over.
Cao Cao sighed, "Very well then. Worst comes to worst, Jeanne can be our holy sword factory and we can use Teofila's body to supplement the barrier maintenance mechanisms. Don't damage them too much Heracles. I want to make sure this isn't a total loss."
The way he looked upon them like mere resources disgusted them.
"Get ready! My Sacred Gear is Variant Detonation, which makes my targets explode when I attack!" Jeanne didn't know what to say about him explaining his Sacred Gear out of the blue.
Heracles attempt to close the distance was met with a blade propelled right at his chest. Instead of being pierced by it, the newly created blade sent him flying back, crashing through a tree.
"… Is that it?" Jeanne's question was met with an explosive noise, and the sight of Heracles rocketing off towards her at high speed.
"Hahaha! That was great! Now it's my turn to smash-"
Several blades sprung forth from the ground and shot up with such force that they completely diverted his path of attack, sending him up into the sky, while they didn't manage to pierce through his supernaturally sturdy body given to him by his ancestor's spirit, this attack managed to land some minor cuts.
"If he's going to be this slow then this really isn't that much of a problem." Jeanne wasn't that impressed.
Cao Cao raised a finger, "Wait for it…"
"Balance Breaker! Mighty Comet Detonation!"
Sensing the projectiles sprouting from Heracles's body would be dangerous, Jeanne grabbed Teofila and deposited her somewhere else before running to the other side of the deserted area chosen as a battle ground.
The explosive missiles were met with a storm of blades, the concussive force of the detonation was sufficient to disrupt her movements despite the distance between her body and the point of impact, allowing Heracles to drop down from the sky and land a blow on Jeanne's back.
"Gotcha-arh!"
And ended up kicked through yet another object as part of Jeanne's counterattack.
"Whew! That was close!"
"Fuck! What the hell! Why aren't you hurt!? That was a direct impact!"
"Hahaha! Did you really think I wouldn't be ready for a brute force attack?!"
Jeanne pulled up her shirt slightly, revealing what seemed to be chainmail under her casual clothes, "This is my special training armor made out of countless tiny holy swords with the properties of being sturdy and causing resistance as I move my body. I keep this materialized under my clothes whenever it's possible to do so without anyone knowing!"
On the inside, Jeanne wanted to slap herself for making the same mistake of explaining everything to the enemy.
"What!?"
At least she didn't mention the part where her speed and strength increase by a lot after she dematerializes it.
She can also make better blades when she isn't focused on keeping the blade armor intact.
This time, she created a few dozen blades in the air, and dropped them on Heracles, piercing through his skin and pining him to the ground.
"What the hell? How did your blades pierce my skin?"
Must not explain… must not explain…
Jeanne kept the urge to explain down, but then Cao Cao started a long exposition that was 70% correct on how she did it. Not that she would tell him that, he was an asshole, after all.
"Well, this battle would provide some intriguing data. Let's see how your holy swords will hold up to the Holy Spear."
The true Longinus was certainly no joke.
And neither was this self-proclaimed "hero".
Despite all the training, Jeanne had put herself through, she was still a tab bit slower and weaker than Cao Cao, the various attributes of her blades helped even the fight out but her opponent was a combat genius who managed to quickly counter and nullify any momentary advantage that Jeanne could grasp at.
"You're strong for a woman, I'll admit that."
"Oh wonderful, you're sexist too."
"I'm not. It's simply the case that pretty much all our female members weren't strong enough, either in body or heart, to make it to the inner circle."
"Wow, I wonder if that had anything to do with your wonderful personality, asshole!"
"Such rude words coming out of the mouth of a Saint."
"The Saint is the girl that was burned at the stake. I'm just Jeanne, thank you very much!"
Georg interrupted at this point.
"Cao Cao, the schedule…"
"Hmm, yes, we shouldn't go above time. Do you have the girl?"
"Quite so."
"Teofila!"
The magician had the struggling nun suspended next to him by a few magic spells. Heracles was up and about despite the wounds he had received.
"You seem to care a great deal for her. Perhaps you would be open to negotiating for her continued wellbeing?" Cao Cao offered with a casual smile.
"You bastard!"
"Hmm? Sorry, what did you say?"
"Kuh…"
Just as Jeanne was about to do the "right" thing by offering herself, Georg started grasping at his throat, "Gah… ah…"
His wheezing drew all their attention, and when they turned their gazes on him, they found him being suspended in the air as if some invisible hand was holding him by the throat.
The magician's body suddenly shot up into the air, then was slammed into the ground hard and fast enough to create a deep human-sized hole!
His limp body was then flung out of the hole, the magic barriers seemed to reduce most of the damage to his body, but the result still was that of a young man that had way too many bones broken and could barely stand.
"You seem to have a knack of finding yourself in trouble."
"You're here…"
The on-lookers looked back at where Teofila was and saw the rumored black-clad Sith Lord carrying Teofila in his arms.
"I merely go where the Force guides me."
Jeanne couldn't see the expression on Teofila's face, but somehow, she can imagine that her friend was feeling rather comfortable right now.
"Interesting… so you weren't just some shared delusion by the Church and the Grigori then." Cao Cao was wary for the first time since the battle started.
"Leave, boy! I am running out of mercy."
"Boy?!"
"You are no hero, just a child playing as one. Clearly, your parents haven't taught you properly. Then again, they did sell you to the highest bidder all those years ago. Hardly counts as parents at all."
"… How do you know that?"
"I have known of you since you were born, Cao Cao."
"Bullshit! Tch… this is a waste of time."
Cao Cao went up to Georg who was still more than capable of using his Sacred Gear, creating a mist that took the so-called "heroes" away.
Darth Bobby didn't seem inclined to stop them and surveyed the damage done to the area instead. "This is going to take a while to fix."
The two girls watched as he fixed the area with a few magic circles, undoing the damage wrought.
Teofila thanked him, and was about to ask him something, only to think better of it.
"Hmm?"
"No, it's nothing. I just… wanted to say thank you again."
"If you say so."
Then suddenly, Jeanne chimed in with an unexpected question.
"Bobby! Are you Genshirou's twin brother?!"
"WHAT!?"
"You are, aren't you?"
"What possessed you to think that!?"
Jeanne listed down her reasons, to which Darth Bobby went ahead and made it clear that he's been all over the world, the only reason that he was in Japan was due to the "Will of the Force".
"Come on, it makes sense right? You're also conveniently near me all the time. Could it be that you've been taken by my charms?"
"As if."
"So why did you leave your family? Is it to keep them safe?"
"I'm not listening to this prattle any longer."
And he was gone just as quickly as he arrived.
"… He totally is his long lost twin brother! It's the only reason why he would deny it so much!"
Teofila slapped her forehead with the palm of her hand.
"Jeanne, there are a lot of reasons as to why he would deny something so far fetched. I don't understand your logic at all."
"He's just being Tsundere."
"I don't think you understand what that Japanese word means."
"Well, fuck. That was a complete disaster." Heracles complained as he got his wounds treated by their base's medics.
"I think I'm going to have nightmares about not being able to breathe." Georg was also in the infirmary for his latest wounds. "Ouch… ouch… I think I need armor, around the throat too."
"… Who the hell is this guy?! Why don't we have any decent information on him!" Cao Cao was just fuming from having his opportunity to coerce Jeanne to work for them taken away from him.
Suddenly, one of their members ran into the infirmary, "Boss Cao Cao! Someone… someone just broke into the base! He claims that he's here to see you!"
Cao Cao crossed Ophis of the list of the very limited number of people that could find their main base as anyone of their faction would be able to recognize Ophis as part of their required education.
"Now isn't a good time at all… is he hostile?"
"Come now Cao Cao. We both know that I'm only violent towards those supernatural fucks."
Everyone in the infirmary turned to see the intruder who somehow made his way here without being detected.
"Y-you are… !" Georg had dealt with the man before on a one-to-one basis, and so recognized the man despite the changes that made him look… better.
"Koji Sato!"
"The wielder of [Deleting Darkness]? That Vritra Sacred Gear user? I was under the impression that you perished at the end of an unknown assailant." Cao Cao recalled their footage of his ill-fated battle on the snowy mountain had been sabotaged somewhere and had nothing useful they could use, outside of Koji's earlier successful attempts at "nullifying" free will of those Youkais, a similar process to their brainwashing techniques.
"The powers that dwell within my Sacred Gear had a pathway to many abilities some consider to be… unnatural." His shadow flickered, suggesting that he had become something more than human. "My memories are spotty, but I do know that I "met my end" at someone dressed in all black and had a metal mask."
"Ah… Darth Bobby."
Well then, Cao Cao supposed the day wasn't a complete loss if they had someone this committed to wiping out any supernatural being.
"So that's his name… I don't suppose you have a slot open so I can take a shot at him?"
"Is it me? Or has dying helped you become more…" Georg jumped into the conversation.
"Sane? Sanity is subjective. All I care about is killing those fucks that took my sister away from me! I don't need to be sane to do that!!!"
"Koji, this is an infirmary. Pipe down. Anyways, lucky for you, we have a slot on our inner circle open that would be a perfect fit for you. It's probationary, of course, but if you prove yourself…"
"Deal."
"Great. Now, I trust you have no problems with what you've seen so far…?" Cao Cao was now making sure if their newest member would do what is necessary.
"Your drones are very impressive. You must be very proud… I will do what I must."
Cao Cao decided to be positive and consider the day, partially salvaged.
Level 26
Level 26
Mobilizing a community from the shadows was an interesting initiative, as opposed to the interesting but stressful raw power training that I put myself through.
As I couldn't well train myself to the brink of breaking down and degradation so soon, I was more than happy to develop new abilities and countermeasures from the information I was getting in my Hero Faction espionage activities as I managed a large group of people in Tokyo.
Business! Money! Capitalism Ho!
There were a few materials and components in Tamariel's mind that could be replicated by modern methods in a scalable and financially profitable manner, after reviewing them, I decided to bring a few of them to the market in order to support the scientific and industrial advancements of human civilization.
Those Fallen Angel mad scientists sometimes forget the fact that they can make astounding amounts of money if they sold just a little of their weirdly useful but replicable creations.
Valerie would be owning certain technologies and patents in her name while I handled the business and development portions with some of my guises. The friendly neighborhood cult would be able to have jobs in managing the businesses related to these products and some other businesses that my clones have set up.
Speaking of Valerie… I think we have been on enough dates to justify moving our relationship to a new level.
I was brought out of my reflection session by Atago's frustrated shout and subsequent actions.
"Why do I get all the trade negotiations? These clans should handle them themselves!" Atago flipped over the largely empty table in our shared room. "I'm supposed to be handling security and keeping the peace!" My table hasn't experienced much peace recently, please fix that first.
"Perhaps things have gotten too peaceful? For now at least." I dropped what I was doing to go over to her, sitting on the floor in order to be in a good position to pet her head and spoil her.
"Nnnh! Mmm… I don't think so. There's still trouble here and there…"
"I guess your clansmen are starting to do their jobs well enough to bring peace, freedom, justice and-"
"-Don't finish that."
"Okay…. Your new empire."
"My new empire? Gen, I serve the country and eep-!"
I pinched her right ear gently.
"What were you going to say?"
"I live to serve you Master! Of course!"
She had that stupidly cute horny face on her, as expected, politics is a pathway to many abilities to change one's expression at the drop of a hat.
"Good girl! Now, you've had a tiring day, so why don't you take a rest and lie down here."
I shuffled to the side and laid Atago's head on my lap. This wasn't exactly a lap pillow considering the reversed gender positions… that, and I knew that doing this would encourage Atago to "relax" in her favorite manner.
Atago didn't waste a second in turning her head around so that she would be facing my body. She reached out with her hands to unzip my pants, unveil my dick and proceeded to have her favorite meal of the day. I gave her a "surprised" look and stood up, relocating to our bedside so that she can properly help herself.
She's gotten so good at this, I'm so proud of the effort she has put in to improve her technique.
If only I could say the same for her physical training, then again, I shouldn't expect anyone to push themselves to the same extent that I do. Thankfully, I am in the process of creating a technique to force Atago and Valerie to train at an appropriate level, without them actually being totally conscious of the fact. I would have to run it by them in the future, but considering how perverted they are, I have a feeling that they would agree to it.
The magically locked door to my room opened just as Atago swallowed her third shot, Valerie stepped in and took a moment to stare at Atago. When Atago looked up to see Valerie briefly, the dhampir princess quickly gave her a look as if she was staring at a piece of garbage, causing Atago's lust levels to shoot up significantly.
Of course, Valerie was hardly disgusted by her sister-wife's cum guzzling face, she was simply being kind and helpful by assisting Atago in getting herself off.
"Welcome home. You bought something?"
"Mmhmm, a new video camera for our homebrew porn videos and another camera for photography purposes. Can we go to Africa?"
"I'll send some clones to check the place out and organize a trip to the best spots for you to shoot those photos. Any preferences?"
"Hmm, not really. I don't know much about the country at all. I heard it's really diverse though!"
As usual, Valerie gets excited at the prospects of experiencing new things. With the way Atago's ears perked up, I could see that she was interested in it too.
Atago was in the process of removing her mouth from my length in order to say something, and I quickly put a stop to that by forcing her head back down.
"Mm-mph!"
"Did I say that your opinion was needed? A good pet doesn't need to think of going on a holiday, leave the planning to your master, yes?"
Her surprise had quickly given way to various feelings suitable for a submissive lover.
I turned back to Valerie, "Let's go after Comiket then. That should give us ample time to pack our things."
"Should I book the tickets?" Valerie asked, already taking out her phone.
"No, we'll make this a discreet trip. Did you ever wonder how it's like to fast travel by dropping out of orbit?" It wouldn't be the first time I had done it, so far, the novelty hasn't run out yet.
"Oooh!" Valerie had stars in her eyes as she imagined the view from entering a country from such a height. "It sounds like fun!"
Atago's protest was muffled and ineffectual, then again, I suppose it's hard to voice an opinion with a dick in her mouth.
"You know what else is going to be a lot of fun?"
"What?"
I beckoned for Valerie to come nearer, she did so, then I whispered my proposition to her. Suffice to say, she wasn't quite expecting something so "bold" and needed some time to think about it.
Ultimately, however, she had a favorable disposition to my proposed "deflowering" plan.
Assimilating and developing many new abilities from what I've learned from the Hero Faction's Sacred Gears and their other projects (like the black tentacle box meant for Ophis) took up most of the week after.
The faction was a treasure trove of research data. Cao Cao had a lot of intel on many other factions and their gods as well, most of it was preliminary, but from what I can tell, it was a lot more than what the Biblical factions would have. Studying them thoroughly would help me plan out future countermeasures against the gods. So far, my enthusiasm has been met with great satisfaction from the Holy Spear user.
As I felt that all parts of my existence has fully recovered from the rapid growth I put myself through a month ago, I began to gather materials to fuel my next stretch of "Zenkai" and Shounen Trope filled training.
Before I got into it, however, I felt a familiar buzzing at the back of my head. A faint voice calling for his "other self", and with what I scarcely remember about this character's brief appearances, I knew damn well who this "other self" is.
Well, of course I know him. He's Me.
"Vritra, finally awake?"
The snake-like dragon made a dramatic entrance within the Sacred Gear space by appearing from a pillar of black flames.
Spoiler
[img: https/vignette.wikia./highschooldxd/images/3/30/Vritra%E2%80%99s_in_DxD_HERO.jpeg/revision/latest?cb=20180515150016]
And released a loud roar-
"OLOLOLOLOLOLOL!"
-that was not at all as terrifying as expected.
"Uh…"
"Oh, my mistake. I haven't spoken in a long time, so my ability to project my voice telepathically is a bit rusty."
"This is understandable. It's fair."
"Can I start again?"
"Be my guest."
This time he managed to do a proper war cry worthy of a Dragon King.
"Thank you for humoring me. It is customary of a dragon to let loose a roar of epic proportions alongside their flames upon meeting someone for the first time."
"It was pretty awesome. Wow… you know, I've seriously wanted to meet you for a long time."
"Hmm, and so you did."
"Have you been watching all this while?"
"Certainly not. I was asleep most of the time. I have, however, had a lot of impressions… images, sounds, pieces of information, it's all very interesting. I do not have much context on what has happened, although I can tell that whatever you have done is very impressive indeed. Strangely, as fragmented as I am, I can tell that my abilities have grown substantially. Oh, I'm rambling."
The dragon awkwardly slumped down onto the ground. He must be feeling rather unsure of how to proceed after being in a state of… well, he was essentially a brain-damaged comatose patient until recently.
I gave him a reassuring look and offered to show him everything. He accepted.
I placed my hand upon the jewel on Vritra's head and copied over a good amount of my experiences. Including that of my past life.
"Woah."
"Is everything cool?"
"Better than cool. You have done well, very well. I can rest happy to know that my other self has pushed the boundaries of power!"
"Awesome, um, just a question. Why do you call me your "other self"?"
"Hmm, I would suppose it is because the description is quite accurate. You see, I am not the same Vritra as I was back then, before Indra, before the chopping times… your efforts in restoring my soul have brought me back to my full power and beyond, yet I lack many techniques I should have and my knowledge is incomplete."
"So you do not remember much about your life?"
"I remember the rough outlines and I have a good idea on all my techniques, yet I cannot remember every single detail. My personality is different as well, but that is to be expected, my soul was sliced up like an onion after all. The only reason why I have my current intelligence and willpower is that the gaps in my very being are filled up by reflecting elements of your soul."
Ah, I understand. This Vritra may have the power of the original Vritra, but a lot of what made him Vritra has been lost and would likely never be regained. This is where my own soul came in to play. What Vritra's soul has done is filled up the gaps by imitating parts of my own soul, changing his personality while granting him newer abilities.
This process essentially makes me one of the most crucial pieces to his sense of self, to the point where I can be called another part of him.
"Likewise, due to the way you use my power, and that of the unique way of how my Sacred Gears are created, my inherent abilities have also been reflected upon your soul."
"And that is why I've been able to use your abilities without the Sacred Gear being active at times…"
"That is correct. You will need to hone those abilities until they truly become yours, that way, your powers will not diminish should my state of consciousness recedes to a level worse than my fragmented self."
"It wouldn't diminish completely?"
"No. Our circumstances are not like the case of the "canon" wielder of the Boosted Gear who required Ddraig's consciousness in order to function. You were using my abilities to a greater level even without my involvement. Should the worse happen, I suspect that you may only find it twice as hard to do what you currently are able to do."
Well, that's a relief!
"Do you have time right now?"
"Well, yeah."
"Good. Then let's achieve Balance Breaker. You have more than enough mastery of this Sacred Gear and enough accumulated "drive" to become stronger that it would only take a small push to attain it now that I am awake."
"So I don't have to go through an absolutely horrendous period of my life in order to unlock new powers by sheer outrage or grief?"
" I have seen the way you train. Your perseverance in attaining greater power makes all the "heroes" I met in my time look like lazy layabouts without a clue on what to do with their lives."
"… Fuck ancient heroes with all the in-born hax!"
"Haa… don't get me started with the rest of the evil dragons. They were born with a lot more power and talent than me, just thinking about it reminds me about how outrageous and unfair it was…"
Vritra managed to alter the Sacred Gear space to that of something similar to my inner world, seeing as we were a part of each other, it was no surprise our worlds have a lot of similarities.
His world, however, was sideways.
"You have more than enough accumulated "drive" to create a handful of sub-species outside of what I have to offer you. That will be done on your own time."
I look for Vritra and found that he had taken up a human form!
He looked like someone really familiar. His clothes were casual but fashionable. A T-shirt with a jacket over it, a nice pair of blue jeans and a matching pair of shoes. With that beard, he really managed to pull off a…
"KEANU?!"
John Wick, I mean, Vritra… nodded.
"Yeah… Well, I mean, this human looked like a really great guy so I thought, why not?"
"We have got to get you caught up with all the John Wick movies!"
"I would like that. A lot."
Vritra led me to a really tall building that like everything else, was sideways in this world.
"Why do I get the feeling that whatever you have planned is going to be ripped off from Bleach?"
"It's because your gut feeling is correct."
"Oh… We're going to fight, aren't we?"
"Yeah. And by the end of it, you will be walking out of here with at least the standard Balance Breaker, and maybe a sub-species courtesy of my own power."
"Does it work that way?"
"Reality can be whatever I want. Besides, screw the rules, everyone else is going to be doing it soon anyways. And I will not play second-fiddle to Ddraig and his Oppai ways."
"… I am in full agreement."
I suppose there was some logic to it.
With how our souls are a part of one another, we were pretty much in a situation similar to that of a Shinigami and Zanpakuto spirit, as such, it made sense that we could fight each other to become stronger.
The armor was certainly powerful, but it definitely gave my identity away.
The sub-species, however, catered to my preferences. Although it was a bit… too chuuni for casual use.
I would have complained about it to Vritra, but I knew that he designed it based on all my childhood fantasies, specifically when I was a complete Bleach fan that got hooked at every cliffhanger at the end of a chapter.
What? Kubo knew how to make freaking awesome panels!
In the end, I could only thank Vritra for the very sincere effort.
"Gen! What happened?! You were meditating and then you were getting wounds all over!" Atago was understandably worried.
"I could tell you were in battle… but I felt no real danger so I didn't intervene. Did I make the right choice?" Valerie seemed unsure of herself.
Oh dear, I should have informed them of what I was going to get up to first.
"My bad. I made a mistake. I should have told you what I planned to do first so that I wouldn't worry you two. I will try not to let it happen again. And no Valerie, you didn't do anything wrong. Thank you for trusting in me and yourself."
"You better not. Well, all's well, I suppose?"
"Thank goodness…"
"Yep. In fact, I'm better than fine… what say we go for a quick spar?"
Woman's intuition in an anime world is very strong indeed. They could tell that it was going to be very painful for them and quickly declined on this case.
Well, suit themselves.
Later, I made it back to the shared dreamworld with Asia, intending to ask about Teofila and how is everything back in Rome.
"Oh! Things are alright, usual, I mean… I became friends with this really kind man called Vasco Strada when he found me visiting the training- I mean, gym."
"Hoping to get some muscles Asia?"
"Not exactly. I um… want to increase my sense of balance, and I want to get a little fitter, if only so that I can run better."
Hmm, so Asia attempted to practice using Light Swords, but in the end, she could only manage to get some general exercise due to her own clumsiness. The fact that she has gotten in more contact with Vasco Strada is interesting, but it likely wouldn't change anything in the short run.
"Have you tried on all your new clothes yet?"
Asia nodded happily, "Yes! Well, in my room, that is. Nuns don't wear different clothes much, but I use them whenever I go out to town with Teofila. Oh! Sometimes, when Jeanne isn't too busy, she comes and finds me so that we can all go together!"
"That's great. I'm so glad that you are all getting along!"
"And how is Teofila?"
"She's been doing well. I'm glad that she's a lot happier and at peace with… everything."
"That's great."
"… Yeah."
"Hmm?"
"Gen? She told me… about um, your talk at the park."
"I see. All of it?"
Did she mention the part where I referenced what I did with Atago in front of everyone?
Asia wracked her head to remember what she was about to say before finally answering.
"She said the both of you talk about other things, but she didn't really mention anything about what they were. I think she began with what you said about the benefits of being "no one"."
"Ah yes, the play of words."
"Mm-hmm. And then you um… helped her to face her own feelings."
"Yes, I suppose I did."
"Mmm, thank you Gen."
"What for? You would have done the same for your friend."
"I-I'm not sure. I mean, I would have comforted her, but… I'm not sure if I would have just told her that it was wrong to blame… well, everyone else. I think that, I would be scared to lose her friendship if I told her that. Does that… does that make me selfish? For wanting to keep our friendship more than doing what is right?"
"Asia, who can truly say what the right path is? Maybe it might make you selfish, maybe you just don't want to see her hurt at all and it comes from a place of selflessness? People are complicated, motives aren't one-dimensional, who can truly say?"
"I suppose you're right… thank you Gen!"
"It's no problem-"
Suddenly, a very distinctive presence made it's way here.
Oh hell no!
"WEEEEEE!"
A black dragon crashed right in front of us.
"This is a strangely calming place. Oh! Hello there! You must be Asia! Ah, Genshirou, my other self! How are you doing? Did you like your Balance Breaker?"
Vritra, what the hell are you doing here?! Oh wait, he's a part of me too. I should have guessed something like this would happen.
"EHHHHH!? A-A dragon!?"
"Uh…."
"Good… what time is it there? Oh yes, good evening young lady!"
"Good… good evening to you too Mr. Dragon. I'm sorry for being rude, I may have been a bit scared back then."
"No problem."
"Genshirou, why does Mr. Dragon know who I am? How does he know you?"
"I've never met this dragon in my life."
Vritra started to play act as if he just got stabbed in the heart.
"Gen, why did you just quote Loki from Thor Ragnarok? Wait um… if you are using that meme then… Do you know Mr. Dragon?"
"Well, yes. Okay. Asia, this is Vritra. I just met him earlier in my mind today."
"In your mind?"
"Turns out I have something called, a Sacred Gear. Some sort of superpower. Go figure."
"… Gen?"
"Yes?"
"Be honest with me."
It looks like Asia picked up enough from our talks and all the movies we watched to know when someone is hiding something, at least when I deliberately make no attempt to truly hide it.
"Asia, walk with me. Vritra, make yourself smaller and come along too."
"Okay." Vritra transformed himself into a smaller size, shoulder pet size, and rested on Asia's right shoulder. "I'll just be hanging around here."
"Aww, you're so cute!" Asia started petting Vritra, giggling at his "cute" reaction containing his obvious happiness.
"Ahh, that's it. That's the spot…"
I rearrange my mindscape's city so that we stood at atop a safe and long walkway overlooking the city, the night turned dark so that I could better illustrate what I wanted to show Asia.
I gave her the same smile I always gave her and held out a hand to her. She took one look at my face and returned the expression, trusting me and taking ahold of my hand.
Walking along the pathway, I began to create images from my memories and projected them upon the night sky.
"One could say that when I was born into this world, I was cursed with knowledge."
"How can knowledge be a curse?"
Asia asked innocently, while she would likely arrive at the correct answer upon reflection, she hadn't truly understood the magnitude of the threat that we all lived under on a daily basis.
"It is when you know that there are terrifying beings, out there, with the power to snuff out entire countries at their mere whim, or as collateral damage… take your pick."
I replayed a memory of Tamariel's, illustrating the Great War between the Biblical Factions, the scent of blood, the sounds of devastation and the sight of beings of power fighting against one another.
"W-what is that? What is happening?"
"That, Asia, is the Great War. Between the Angels, the Devils and that of the Fallen. Look upon their might, together, they can level cities to the ground in a matter of seconds. And that excludes the so-called "Ultimate" class beings and above."
I drew up another memory, one where the Fallen Angel witnessed his father God battle against other Pantheons, back when he still lived under his father's grace.
"And this is a battle of the gods."
Asia was terrified, of course, but thankfully, being able to see the face of god thanks to the fallen angel's memories meant a lot more to her than her fears. I didn't tell her about how I got these memories, these visions, as they were unimportant to the story at this point. Eventually, she would get the whole story, but not now.
"And this, is what I wish to protect."
A recent scene, that of me spending time with my family, Atago and Valerie sticking close to me, as we ate dinner and had lots of fun.
"Your family?"
"Yeah. Ever since I was born, I had been aware of the dangers of this world. And also…"
I flashed a few scenes of my past, showing how I followed my parents and narrowly drew their assailants away from them.
"… the threats they were to my parent's lives. I had to fight several life and death battles to keep my family safe, to make sure my siblings aren't orphaned."
"Oh no!"
"It's fine. I unlocked my power at a young age and had been training it since then. Even now, I aspire to gain more power to protect the ones I love, to keep them from dying."
Asia's grip on my hand tightened.
"Um, what did you mean by that?"
"I train a lot in order to have the power to protect my family."
"W-what kind of powers?"
"Why, all sorts of powers. I couldn't list them all down for you. It would be too dangerous and heretical for someone of your position to know."
"A-are you… Teofila said that Darth Bobby had grey eyes… "
"Oh?"
"D-did you… did you ever cut off the limbs of several men of the cloth?"
"Possibly. Were they attempting to kill the victims of vampires that I rescued?"
The image of a lightsaber manifested in her hand for the first time in this dream world.
She ignited the blue blade and pointed it at me, sensing her fear, I quickly raised up my hands in surrender.
"Y-you're the Sith Lord!"
"Are you going to hurt me?"
"N-no. I know that…" The blade retracted and the imaginary item faded away, "I know that you did what you needed to do, to keep people safe. Those warriors… they were violent. Even though I healed them, even though I didn't want to see them hurt… I can't be angry at you for stopping them the way you did."
"Thank you Asia. For being so understanding."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"I wasn't going to get you involved in my world if I could afford to. If you knew, you would have wanted to help me somehow. I couldn't risk getting you in trouble and being kicked out of the church, your home, the place where you feel you belong."
"I-I understand. Genshirou has been thinking about me all this time! Now that I think about it, you always make sure I learn all sorts of "lessons" whenever we watch movies or talk about things."
"I try my best to make up for your rather sheltered education."
"Mmm, okay fine. I admit that what I learn at the church is, maybe a bit limited."
"Heh."
"Gen! Don't be mean!"
"I'm sorry, you're just too cute when you pout like that."
"Mmmm… oh!"
"Hmm?"
"Genshirou, um, if you're so strong then could you… can you teach me how to protect others?"
"… Well, I will see what I can do."
I created two lightsabers and tossed one to Asia, who barely managed to catch it.
"Turn it on. We will start with Shii-Cho."
It's been a month since then.
I had ensured that I would have a lightsaber for Asia ready when she needed it, although my current protections for both Teofila and Asia would be my first line of defense if they really needed help, then I would just teleport right over to them. Aside from spending time with Asia in the dream world, I also used it to train her in various things.
She hadn't mentioned my identity to Teofila at this point, nor was Asia informed of a great many things, but what she knew right now satisfied her so I left it at that.
Vritra has taken a liking to Asia and has been spending time with her by staying asleep even after I had woken up for my day. Dragons with no set working times can sleep all they want… how nice.
The weirdest thing I heard from Asia was when she accidentally called the human Vritra (cough, Keanu) "Papa", once. I think Vritra has essentially adopted her since then. Which makes things weird, because that means I'm sort of related to her, kind of.
There has been significant progress on Atago's and Valerie's training after I developed my body "hijacking" method to train their bodies to the limit without their mental limits getting in the way. It helped that they had some fetishes to make the process somewhat enjoyable.
They did not, however, enjoy the soreness in their bodies after that. On the bright side, by using this method, they can focus more of their intelligence in mastering their techniques rather than exhausting their mind in painful physical activity.
Not everyone can keep up with the way I trained, so it is only natural that I found a way that suited them the best. If I handle the physical training part for them, they could focus on honing their own racial based abilities that I can't help them with anyways.
"Um, Genshirou, I thought about it and… I think I want to do it."
"Very well, Valerie. Do you want Atago with you too?"
"If it's alright with her to just be there for support then I would be… most delighted."
There was a stark difference from recording a sexual act performed by someone else and being the subject of the recorded sexual act.
Valerie was discovering that right now.
It all began with a series of thoughts. She missed her friend Gasper, who was still out of reach as he was kept in the Underworld, who would only be in Kuoh in about a year and a half later.
One day, she would reconnect with him. Valerie however, hadn't wanted to make Gasper feel as if he missed out a lot of her life, she wanted him to feel like he still knew her.
Genshirou gave her the idea that she could make things easier for him by showing him pictures, by going places and taking pictures of herself living life, experiencing things, and talking to Gasper about it either through writing or through a video.
Valerie had begun making sure there were records of her life every so often.
She knew that for her continued safety, at least for the first half of the school year, she wouldn't be able to speak with Gasper much in order to maintain the image of being a "normal girl".
Yet she hadn't wanted to go out of the way to avoid him.
This method would buy them both time and allow him to catch up on her life.
"And what about another important aspect of your life? Say, your romantic life?"
"You are the love of my life, it is only natural that Gasper, my friend, knows about you too."
They were currently recording her message to her friend on video, censored, of course, to give the impression that they were still normal people.
"Valerie, love… you shouldn't speak to Gasper as if he isn't there."
He looked at the camera, reminding her to do the same.
"Yes, oh, I'm so sorry Gasper, I shouldn't be ignoring you. I'm still getting used to this. Um, what's the next part again?"
Valerie looked past the camera being handled by my clone, to Atago who was holding up a large placard with the word "SEX" on it.
"Oh, yes. Gasper, I will be marrying Genshirou Saji, he's the man that I am very much in love with. As I have mentioned before, and um… today, I will be…"
She looked to Genshirou, who was sitting at the bedside right next to her for help, he smiled kindly and lifted her up to his lap, before parting his legs so that she would be sitting in between them.
"I think it's best that we start from the beginning so Gasper doesn't get lost. Don't you agree, dear?"
"Yes, that's a great idea darling!"
"Haha… well then."
"Ahh… !"
She gasped and moaned as Genshirou groped her breasts in front of the camera, in front of her sister wife… and also, Gasper as well. Yes, she could imagine that he would be at the other side of the camera, one day, that is.
Her husband-to-be began to undress her, unbuttoning her shirt and unveiling the special white floral patterned bra that she wore just for today.
"Go on." He whispered into her ear.
"O-okay… my name is V-valerie Tepes…"
"How old are you?"
"I-I'm twenty, now… nh!"
"Keep eye contact with the camera Valerie, at least for now, you can look at me however much you want later."
"Y-yes!"
"What are we going to do now?" He asked loud enough for it to be picked up by the camera and then removed her shirt.
She heard the click sound as her bra had been undone.
It was one thing to video Atago getting fucked in front of a recording device, it was another thing to be the one that was about to be fucked and have it all on record.
"Y-you will be taking my virginity. T-this will all be recorded, to-to commemorate the milestone!"
It must have been a shameful sight.
Even so, she could now understand why Atago enjoyed it so.
"G-gasper, your big sister is going to become a woman!"
She hoped that all her joy would be captured by the camera.
This way, she could make sure Gasper knew how happy she was with her new life. He didn't need to worry about her at all.
Not one bit.
Valerie found herself imagining what all the future videos would be like. Threesomes are a must, a few gangbangs would be fun too… even if they sent a copy to Gasper, they would certainly be using them for themselves, to look back and remember all these joyous times.
Level 27A
AN: This takes place a bit under a year later, Issei and Gen are first-year students at this point.
Level 27A
Masato Asai started each day with a grateful heart. It was only natural, he had a lot of things to be thankful for. If he was the same man he was a few years ago then it would have been impossible to think he could be this happy.
After being overworked to the point of hospitalization, the "black company" he worked at fired him and blasted his reputation at work into a huge black mark on his record. He wasn't able to get a job since and had fallen into debt due to the exorbitant hospital bills. Simply living as a jobless, unemployable, homeless young man in debt without any family to rely upon was one of the worst time in his life.
Of course, life could still get worse, and it did. As if the world was mocking him, he got into an accident involving a truck, resulting in even more debt and permanent damage to his body. He thought that death and reincarnation would have been kinder than being rescued from the wreckage of the accident.
But everything began to change just under two year ago when a tendril made out of pure darkness touched him… and healed him.
It was a miracle that he could scarcely fathom back then.
Many months later, he experienced another miracle alongside many others touched by the shadow, they were people from all walks of life yet in that moment, it was as if they were all connected together and shared a deeper understanding of one another despite never having met before.
While no one could remember much details outside of the words and instructions of the god hidden by the shadows, it felt as if they had joined together to be part of one big family.
Masato remembered being told that he would work under a rich industrialist to handle logistics regarding a new "component" that would be given to them. He met the people that would be working under the same man who received the appropriate instructions from their god too. In a week's time, they were in a factory office managing the production of the component, that began to do very well in a handful of months time.
His debt had somehow been paid off, his pay was generous, he wasn't being abused at the workplace, nor was there any social pressure to work any overtime and everyone did their jobs to the best of their abilities.
That wasn't all, however.
"… darling, wake up darling~"
"Hima… wari? Good morning!"
The familiar and sweet voice of his wife gave him the motivation to get out of bed quickly, ignoring his desire to laze about in his bed.
He was now a husband to a devilishly (pun intended) good-looking woman! And he was determined to be the best at his new role out of both gratitude and understanding that this was one of the purposes his god had chosen him for.
After all, one didn't just find a pregnant woman with both amnesia and bat-like wings on an empty road back from work. Her lost and troubled look reminded him of his own situation, and so, he had resolved to help her as much as he could. The flickering shadows that morphed into the shape of a thumbs up under the light of a streetlamp were considered approval enough for him.
The woman seemed to act as if this was Japan from about a hundred years ago at the beginning, yet she adapted quickly before they knew it, they fell in love and married one another. The baby she was pregnant with at the time was just as unusual as she was, having black wings like that of a raven when he came out, but even that was perfectly acceptable for Masato.
"Wouaaaaaaaaaa!"
"Whoops. I woke him up."
"Hehe, you're always so loud in the mornings. Tamriel, mommy's here! Shh, don't cry…"
Masato wasn't surprised that they both had that strange foreign name appear in their heads after the child was born. He wasn't shocked to see the doctor and nurses in the hospital ignore the wings of his newborn son.
His god always provided for them. It was his purpose to provide for those that have been placed in his life as well.
Ding Dong*
"I'll get it. Coming!" He quickly began to put on his clothes to answer the door.
"Hold on dear! The flowers at the entrance have wilted." Himawari was as serious with flowers as she was with her self-made "wifely duties" (not that he was complaining).
Aside from those devil-like wings that could appear and disappear at will, one of her many strange abilities was to manipulate plant growth. It only took her a minute to "fix" the flowers at the doorway, after that, she retreated back upstairs to take care of their child while he handled his guest.
"Hello, how can I help you- Toshi!? You're back!"
The man in front of him was one of his "co-workers" that took a few days off in order to make a trip overseas after receiving a "revelation" from their god. These revelations had been frequent during the first two months after the "Gathering" at the park, nowadays, most believed that the decreased frequency meant that their god was very much happy with what they all had achieved.
Even so, now and then, any strong and "clear" revelation much like how their god's sacred name was revealed would be treated with just as much seriousness as the "minor" ones back then.
"And so I am! I have succeeded in my mission! It was an amazing journey… Masato, you up for lunch? I'm getting our comrades together so that I can share my testimony."
"Of course! Ah, um, let me check with my wife first."
"Hahaha, married life suits you!"
"And how about you? Have the "shadows" provided a partner for you?"
"Hmm, as a matter of fact… they did."
"Really?"
"Yeah!"
His comrade leaned in and whispered the customary phrase that served as a reminder to the turning points in each of their lives. Naturally, Masato responded in the same manner.
"Hail Vritra."
"Summeeeeer! Man, Summer is the best! The season of bikinis and breasts that go boing boing~ Ain't that right guys?"
"Screw you! Flat is best!" "You're only saying that because you have a girlfriend!"
"Heresy! And you're just jealous!"
"You're the heretic!" "Damn right we are!"
The sight of the Perverted Trio engaging in a civil war was a common one. At this point in time, their classmates (and the school as a whole) had learnt to derive some sort of entertainment from their fights. For the females, they were hoping that the boys would end up hitting each other hard enough to the point where they wouldn't be able to perv on them.
During the first few weeks, those three perverts (including the one that claimed to have a girlfriend) had gone around attempting to peek at various girl's changing rooms, only to have given up at some point.
It wasn't the beatings that dissuaded them. Certainly not. It was simply the case that all the peeping spots (the fact they were there in the first place was promptly raised to the management, and dismissed for unknown reasons) were covered up by some unknown person.
As a result, at worst, the trio would only ever talk loudly about sexual topics, make lewd remarks and "admire" the girls. Admittedly, almost every single male in the school did the same as them in the sanctity of their own mind, or in a discreet fashion, it was hard not to do so with the Kuoh Academy uniform as it was…
A broom came swinging down at their heads in three consecutive strikes, one for each of them.
"Ow!" "Hey!" "What gives?!"
"Do you idiots mind?! I'm on cleaning duty today and you're fucking the classroom up!"
The class president, Aika Kiryuu, would normally just watch Issei, Matsuda, and Motohama rail on each other with mild amusement. But she had a meeting with some friends after school to attend to, hence why she wanted them to hurry up and end their usual spat already.
"Oi oi, it's only been five minutes since the bell rung." Matsuda, the school's best track team member (after he was kicked out of the photography club for unknown reasons) who was better known as the "Sexual Harassment Paparazzi" and (unofficial) pornography dealer of the school voiced his displeasure in front of the class. "Aren't you overreacting? What? You're on your period or something?"
The other boy adjusted his glasses, "That was last week you doofus." Motohama has been known to have all sorts of creepy information on every girl, including personal information like every girl's three-sizes. And for that, he was nicknamed "Perverted Glasses" and "Three Sizes Scouter".
The most perverted of the three when it came to breasts, also happened to be the nicest and friendliest among the trio, was Issei Hyoudou. "Guys, she's kinda right. We're lucky we didn't break anything and damage school property. I'd rather not get into detention again, how am I suppose to get a harem if my affection point events get taken up by whatever trouble you guys get me into?"
"Say what? You're blaming us?!" "You're the bastard showing off your "girlfriend" you self-proclaimed non-virgin!"
It had been a topic of in-school contention on whether Issei Hyoudou had a girlfriend or not, the same was extended to the case of his virginity, and thus far, only two students had actually "confirmed" the answer to be "yes".
Said students were also known to be a hugely perverted couple.
"Oi! What do you mean self-proclaimed?! If my dick goes into a hole then it counts."
"Lies!" "Deception!" "No way this Irina is real!" "Childhood friends that fall in love with you are a myth!" "Especially the ones that go overseas-" "Yeah, they get dicked by big black men with huge dicks-"
The rest of the classroom had slowly emptied out of the place, not wanting to hear anymore "nonsense" coming out from the boy's mouth.
"Can you three please just get out already? And also, with Hyoudou's size, do you really think he wouldn't be able to at least keep a girlfriend? He's not like you two." Aika interjected, enraging the other two perverts that weren't Issei, who blushed and covered his crotch from her ability to calculate his manhood.
"You calling me a cuck? Bitch!" "Pot meet kettle. You may be a girl but you don't have much to show for either!"
There wasn't a lot she hadn't heard before about herself from some girls she was "acquainted" with back in middle school. She shouldn't have been bothered by it. But hearing it from these two idiots who were at the bottom of the social ladder? Now that was just plain out insulting.
"Now you're asking for it you fucks-"
"Is there a problem here?"
"Boss?!"
At hearing Issei's exclamation of that title reserved for only one person, Aika and the other two boys already knew who was standing right at their classroom door.
"How long have you been standing there?" Issei quickly calmed down after being surprised at Genshirou Saji's sudden appearance.
"Hmm, long enough. Issei, come over here. I've got something for you." The second most popular boy in the school, and most well known outside the school, was holding up a box for Issei.
Everybody simply stopped to watch what strange thing could be happening between the young man with two girlfriends and the wannabe "harem-king".
"W-what the hell is this?!" Issei screamed as he peered into the contents of the box.
"Why are you so surprised? Irina doesn't intend to lose her virginity to you at this point after all." Genshirou smirked, eyeing Issei's classmates for their reaction as if he was expecting it.
And he got it.
"Hahahaha! I knew it!" "Fake! Fakeeeeeer!"
"S-shut it you two! Boss! What gives?!"
"Oh? What do you mean? If it's up in the ass then it doesn't count right?" Genshirou winked and repeated the phrase that "convinced" both Xenovia and Irina that it didn't count as "sex" if it's not for the sake of procreation. Issei still got a headache thinking about it, it was hard to get around to the idea that it even worked in the first place. "The mouth doesn't count as well, and if it's just being squeezed in between her boobs then it's obvious not sex either. As far as Irina wants to believe, you both are still virgins."
"Ahahahahahaha!" Aika laughed in Matsuda's and Motohama's downcast faces after Issei caught on to what Genshirou was doing.
The breast obsessed boy thanked his "boss" in his mind, although he still wished the guy could be a bit more straightforward in supporting his story instead of causing him some distress at the start.
Then again, that was to be expected of the most well-known sadist in the school. By this point, half of the female population was appalled by the almost casual "abusiveness" that their beloved "Atago onee-sama" got off on a daily basis while the other half wanted to "be" her.
Atago Kaiza, the second year female student was popular among the school students for a different reason compared to people like Rias Gremory, Akeno Himejima or Sona Sitri. Instead of being admired from afar, like some sort of school idol, the rich girl from a "traditional" family was known to be very friendly and down-to-earth, who took the time to get to know everyone and did things like playing handheld console games together with the fellow gamers in her class.
On the other hand, she was seen as some sort of weird deviant for being madly in love with the strongest, smartest first-year student. Who is better known for being a real-life martial artist protagonist, a Star Wars fanatic, president of his own club (council, as he would exist) and sadistic boyfriend with no qualms in having a second girlfriend.
"Boss… did you actually bring all this to school?"
"The benefits of having a clubroom that the student council can't raid is a pathway to many hidden goods some would consider to be… contraband."
"… What the hell is this?"
"Issei, you still have much to learn. Irina is worried you might accidentally use her pussy in the heat of passion, yes? The answer then is to use backless panties, or specialized "maebari" items like this. If you really want to get more kinky, then there is this swimsuit with nipple and anus cutouts-"
The boy was currently bleeding from his nose as he imagined his childhood friend bending over while wearing the clothing within the box. Matsuda and Motohama literally died in their hearts. Aika was simply impressed in how "advanced" and considerate Genshirou was, oh, and she had plenty of dirty thoughts too…
"Boss…" Issei looked to be on the verge of tears, "I've disappointed you. I haven't been appreciative of the advice you've given me. I've been rude and I apologize." Issei had slacked off whatever "training regime" lists that Genshirou had given him and only stuck with some exercises for more "thrusting" power and "bedroom stamina". "I've just been so frustrated with not seeing Irina for so long that I start to think "what's the point" then lose motivation."
He had even gone so far as to yell at his friend for "annoying" him to do "weird martial arts stuff". The same friend who had helped him lose his virginity by teaming up with Xenovia in "advising" his and Irina's first date last winter when she came to visit, holding up placards with all sorts of advice that eventually led them both to having "not-sex".
Issei had felt guilty about not apologizing for the recent outburst. He was the type to hold on to that guilt when he felt he wronged someone and sought to be better than that. But even so, at this point, he couldn't find it within himself to commit to whatever "training" that Genshirou wanted him to go through.
Genshirou simply smiled, "Don't worry Ise, I'm sure that things will happen on their own timing… one day, you will be strong and wise. I will be very proud of you then. It won't be now or anytime soon, but hey, we're all a work in progress. Don't beat yourself up over it. Go on, enjoy summer!"
"Gen-san… yes!"
Issei took his stuff and left.
Genshirou turned to look at the other two boys left in the room, "Do I have to remind you two that you should be more considerate of the feelings of others?"
The two male perverts quickly shook their heads then apologized to Aika after realizing they may have went too far, Aika herself apologized for being too frustrated and escalating things to that point to begin with.
"Now then, Kiryuu-san, if I heard correctly… you have a meeting to get to, right?"
"Y-yes."
Aika felt her heart skip a beat when he placed a hand over her shoulder.
"Then it's best that you get a move on. I'll handle cleaning up the class."
"What? Are you sure? Wait, no, you shouldn't need to-"
"I have time. Don't worry. You should get going, have a great holiday. If you try hard enough, I'm sure you'll be able to show off your new boyfriend to those hopeless perverts in a few months time."
"T-that's… um, thank you! Sorry for the trouble!"
She rushed out of the classroom, hoping he didn't see her expression as she left the classroom.
Eventually, she made it to the cafe that acted as her friend's regular "meeting venue".
"Kiryuu-senpai! What's wrong? Your face is all red. Do I need to punch someone's teeth out?"
"Why is the first thing you think about is beating someone out?!"
"Whoopsie. Sorry, I'm still working on my "habit"."
The only one that got to the meeting place on-time was a girl in the middle school division in Kuoh, a third-year middle school student. The cutesy looking girl was Ruruko Nimura, a short girl with brown hair in long twin ponytails and green eyes.
Despite how she looks, she was a former leader of a gang of delinquents until their defeat by the "Tokyo Crusher" Genshirou Saji. Due to some gang war-related instability, she had gotten into a lot of trouble, only to be rescued by the boy one year her senior, who was actively "laying down the law" for most of the gangs instead of just leaving them be like he did in Tokyo until they sorted themselves out.
The girl had been in love with her "boss" ever since, not that he would know, considering that she's only spent her time admiring his "carnage" from afar.
"That's… great. Anyways, it's fine Nimura-chan it's just…"
"Just?"
"Saji-kun came by my class today…"
"He did? What happened?"
"A lot of things… But the best part was when he put those perverts in their place and got them to apologize again. Honestly, he's the only boy that says nice things about me… and makes me feel… aah! I want to die! He said that I should get a boyfriend before summer ends to show off but he's the one I want, damnit!"
"Ouch."
The reformed delinquent patted the perverted girl on the bed as she groaned into the palms of her hands.
Yes, despite their quirks, the two of them were fellow maidens in love with the same man.
In fact, the rest of this particular circle of friends were as well.
"AHHH! Made it! And only fifteen minutes late, so none of you are legally allowed to leave!" The next one to arrive was Tomoe Meguri, like Aika Kiryuu, she was a first year student at Kuoh Academy. Tomoe was also a member of Sona Shitori's student council.
"I wasn't thinking about it either…" Aika shifted in to make more room on the side for Tomoe, who opted to sit on this side of the table along with Ruruko and Aika.
"Why do… you have… to run everywhere?" Momo Hanakai dragged herself to the seat on the opposite side of the table, along with her senior by one year and fellow student council member, Reya Kusaka.
"Sorry for being late! Kaichou kept us working on some things!" Reya apologized to the younger students (specifically Aika and Ruruko), who understood just how demanding Shitori-senpai was from hear-say.
"That's fine. So, um, the topic for today is…" Aika looked to Tomoe, reminder her that it was her turn, the energetic girl quickly brought her bag up and placed a folder of documents onto the table.
"The midsummer romance attack group plan!" The "founder" of the unofficial Genshirou Saji fan club began laying out the agenda for the meeting. "Due to our numbers having officially grown… again…" Tomoe stared at Reya for a moment, "We had to delay our coordinated efforts to this summer."
Reya was the most recent girl to have fallen in love with Genshirou Saji. It had something to do with him knocking down a suspicious person that happened to be a thief that stole a book from Reya's home. Aika and Ruruko weren't privy to the details, but the book was certainly important to Reya and they had begun to spend some time with each other after that just talking about things.
Before long, Tomoe and Momo had inducted the second-year student into their little "club".
As for Momo Hanakai? Well, no one has managed to get her to spill the details yet.
All of this was done in secret. Sona Shitori's "love-hate" relationship with Genshirou Saji was one of the most talked about topic at school. One shudders to think what Sona would do if she were to learn her own student council members were part of an "illegal" club with the goal of coordinating a group confession on a man she considered "infuriating to the highest degree".
Why did they need a club for this? Well, turns out that just because a guy has a harem, it doesn't mean that he's "easy" at all. Both his girlfriends and himself had made it clear to the school students that he took commitment seriously and wouldn't casually date anyone.
In order to maximise their chances, they wanted to find like-minded committed individuals that believe they can handle a polygamous relationship in the future together, pool together their knowledge and efforts in order to co-ordinate an "attack" that shows how serious they were about this.
"So long as we don't intend to become anything "more than equal" among anyone, I don't think his violently overprotective girlfriend Kaiza-senpai-" Aika still wasn't sure why Tomoe (and the other student council members) had the impression that Atago Kaiza was like some fictional violent Yakuza Princess, "-would kill us all. Valerie should be fine so long as we don't intend to use him or anyone. Remember people, love is the key here. Now then, because it's summer… we have complications in the form of these visitors."
Tomoe started to read out a full dossier on a hot french girl called Jeanne, and her Romanian companion who likely hates half of them here due to "racism", Teofila.
It may seem a bit much to most people. But for these girls?
Love is war.
Interlude: Perseus, The Hero Faction, and a Night at the Opera
AN: Okay, this got longer than expected. This is going to be labeled as an interlude.
Interlude: Perseus, The Hero Faction, and a Night at the Opera
"Now scram, ya hear? This is the only warning you're getting from me!"
"B-but we have nowhere else to-"
Perseus stabbed his adamantine harpē into the ground, just a millimeter away from the right side of its neck.
"Hiiii!" The oddly cowardly werewolf screamed and rolled across the floor, all the way to the other side of the collapsing building.
"Exit's that way." Perseus pointed to the side with his weapon, allowing the teenage werewolf to scurry away in the right direction.
As the rest of the compound began to break down as a result of the earlier battle, several floors worth of concrete began to fall upon the young hero, who simply stood there and held his shield up above his head.
After a few seconds, Perseus pushed his way out of the rubble, looking no worse for wear.
"Seriously, how do these guys build secret bases so fast? Is there some supernatural contractor for this stuff? Where can I get this guy's number?"
This was the fifth mission that involved chasing off monsters from locations near human settlements this season, and all of them happened to be in either a really tall conspicuous building in the middle of nowhere, or some hidden bunker underground.
"I'll kill yo-"
A loud *bang* silenced the threat permanently.
"Eh?!'
"You shouldn't let your guard down, idiot…"
The dark-skinned beauty in uniform twirled her rifle after making the shot, before allowing the materialized weapon to disperse into its original form as ribbons.
Even after all these months, Perseus still couldn't figure out how Lakshmi turns a Sacred Gear that forms ribbons with "sealing power", to that of weapons with "sealing" power formed out of ribbons.
He personally blamed it all on the hellish "Shounen Jump Training Arc Camp" (SJTAC for short) that the Hero Faction's Executive, Koji Sato, had recruited him (along with many others including Lakshmi) into.
"Ahaha… sorry, you had to save me again!"
Not that he needed to be saved from an attack of that level.
He was already aware that the attack had begun, how could he not, especially after the horrifying and ridiculously killer trials of the "SJTAC" had trained his danger senses up to an intuitive level.
Not to mention allowing him to unlock a sub-species of his Aegis Mineralisation Sacred Gear, allowing it a second function of creating a skin-like barrier over his body that defended against attacks and petrified his attackers as a counter-attack.
That level of attack wouldn't hurt him, but he didn't want to point it out to his girlfriend.
"Hmph! That makes it 11 to 9 then!" The inheritor of Lakshmi Bai's spirit, aka "India's Jeanne D'Arc", "Honestly, if you let me save you more times than you saving me, then all the other Greek heroes will make fun of you and-kyaa!"
The Indian girl slipped on the hill of building material as she was about to continue speaking.
"Whoa! Gotcha!"
Of course, Perseus was there to catch her. It was something that he was used to doing considering that his girlfriend inherited some pretty bad luck to go along with her abilities.
"T-that d-doesn't count!"
"Of course, of course…"
He nodded happily in the face of her stubborn denials.
Looking at her in his arms now, her face flush with embarrassment after the little debacle, he couldn't help but be overwhelmed by the young lady's cuteness!
"When can I expect the invitation to the wedding ceremony?"
"Woah!" "Eep!"
Lakshmi quickly got off his arms and almost would have fallen down by accident (again), if Perseus hadn't grabbed onto her arm at the last second.
"S-sato-san! What are you doing here?" Perseus took the chance to greet the Executive he was closest to, other than Cao Cao, who had recruited him personally.
Of course, just because Koji Sato had been a total bro, wingman (who hooked him up with Lakshmi), and a good friend… didn't mean that Perseus was unaware that the "man of shadows" was literally powered by hate and vengeance, with a dash of insanity.
"I came to check up on you two and deal with a few… runaways you had missed."
Did he kill the ones Perseus and Lakshmi had let go? Perseus could feel his lover's body become stiff as she came to the same conclusions as he did.
The man who could be counted among the top three most versatile warriors of the Hero Faction alongside Cao Cao and Georg hummed as he adjusted his suit (according to Koji's own words, he wore a suit to look "cultured" in front of monsters that were "so uncivilized"), "Oh, don't worry. Those younglings weren't worth killing. I was speaking of the vampires that you hadn't detected nearby, who intended to attack this werewolf safehouse, only for you to spook them away."
It was only among the carefully selected trainees for the SJTAC that got to see the "merciful" side of Koji.
"And also, stop calling me Sato-san. What are you, Japanese? I know I am but I'd like to think I'm cosmopolitan enough for you to not adjust your mannerisms around me. Or did you perhaps watch too much anime and became a weeb?"
Lakshmi jumped in before Perseus could defend himself, "He's been obsessed with Shield Hero lately. I'm starting to think he likes girls with um… tattoos over at…"
"It's not like that! I, uh, Koji, please give me a minute."
"Take your time."
After a bit of the typical arguments between a couple, they sorted out their own misunderstandings and discussed a few personal matters, taking Koji's advice to settle these things through communication rather than letting them fester.
The Executive was patiently giving them the time they needed, as expected of the biggest supporter of romantic relationships within the faction!
Lakshmi ended up wrangling a promise from him to spend less time reading about fictional "Shield" heroes and to stop searching for doujins about FGO's "Shielder", while he managed to convince her to not antagonize literally every British person on their side.
From what Perseus had heard, the inheritor of Jeanne D'Arc's spirit (who had refused to join them), was also racist against the British. It made him wonder if the historical British people were just that bad to fight against, as two inheritors of heroes that fought against them still carried such prejudices!
The pair delivered their report to the Executive in charge of the "liberation" teams, the division tasked of freeing human civilization from "uncivilized" monsters that relocated nearby, with the intention on preying on the defenseless.
Their division was managed by Koji Sato, who insisted on implementing a "two-man team" system in order to prevent "Conservation of Ninjitsu" and foster closer ties to one another.
Actually, most of the division was sure that the system was just a vehicle for his personal "shipping" activities. Not that they were complaining. The guy was a damn good matchmaker when he wasn't spouting the "Prequel Memes" that Georg seemed to be fond of.
The two Executives seem to be having a competition between each other on who can use the most memes in the most appropriate settings. So much so, that a "Meme War" had almost erupted between the two of them, only for Cao Cao to reign them in before it could begin in earnest.
"Lakshmi, if you could give me a minute with your boy toy-"
"-He's not my boy toy! We have a perfectly loving and equal relationship thank you very much!"
When his girlfriend realized she was baited by the Japanese man in a snazzy suit into admitting something like that, she screamed and ran in the opposite direction!
Perseus didn't know if he wanted to punch Koji or thank him for showing him such a sight!
"So… what do you have to tell me personally? Me! The men-of-men Perseus-sama!"
"Two things. First of all, you suck at trying to sound proud. And second? Stop being a fucking weeb."
"Gah!"
"Anyways…" Koji patted him on the back and leaned in, "I came here to deliver the good news."
"Good news?"
"I have advocated for you to become a member of the Executive Council."
What? The Executive Council? The decision-making body (formerly called the Inner Circle until a vote took place to change the name to something less "ominous") of the group that elected it's own members and consisted of Cao Cao's most trusted advisors and the other division leaders?
"Me? An Executive? That's… that's a great honor." Persues paused, remembering a certain thing he overheard by accident. "I'm overwhelmed. My loyalty to Cao Cao is beyond doubt, but they will never accept this. The last I heard, Heracles was…" Talking shit about him, "… saying something about me being "too soft to do what must be done". And his decision carries some-"
"-Relax Perseus. I think they will. They need you more than you know."
Perseus woke up breathing heavily.
It was a horrific nightmare.
The details were scarce yet he could clearly make out the sight of the leader he was loyal to torturing and killing his lover while she called out his name, begging him to help her.
"What the…"
It couldn't have been real. Yet it felt as if it was… a truth, of some sort.
A vision? It felt like one of the visions given to him by the Oracles back when he was employed by the Greek gods.
He looked to his right, checking to see if Lakshmi was still sleeping soundly. To his great relief, she was right there, as she always was when they stayed the night together.
Moving to the side of the bed, he clutched his head, massaging it until the slight headache faded away as he calmed down.
Getting out of the bed, he walked to the hotel room's couch, sitting there thinking about what to do.
Should he tell someone about his dreams? He would be meeting the Executive Council for his (hopeful) appointment to join their number. The wise magician Georg might have some insight, Koji could certainly search him in order to check if it was due to any outside influence thanks to his nullification powers, Cao Cao could… no, he couldn't go to him, while he believed that his leader was righteous, he was also paranoid to a fault.
If Cao Cao thought someone was trying to subvert one of his loyal members then he might quarantine him at the very least, not allowing him to do his duty to humanity and to serve his leader loyally.
Perseus had to keep it a secret.
A soft touch brushed along his shoulder, Lakshmi's face was abundant with concern and worry for him.
"What's bothering you?"
"… Nothing."
"If it's anything I learned, is that men always act tough by saying "nothing" when they actually mean "something", mmm…" She moved up closer to him, sitting by him and held his hand, "Won't you tell me?"
"I… it was a dream. A bad one."
"A nightmare."
"Yeah… I saw the lea- I mean, I saw someone stabbing you to death slowly with a spear and I couldn't… you were calling for me and I couldn't do anything."
She was naturally alarmed by it, although she questioned why it bothered him so much, and he told her that it was similar to the many encounters with oracles he had in his life, back when he still served the Greek pantheon.
"They always come true. One way or another… but damn it! I'm Perseus, the men-of-men, the sole Greek hero that lived a happy life-"
"-in a few interpretations."
"-The others don't count. I'm not going to let this… whatever I saw, happen to us."
"Perseus… what about the baby?"
"… What baby? Wait what?"
"I'm pregnant. I wanted to tell you earlier but I knew you would try to keep me from fighting."
"Well, of course, I would!"
"See! That's exactly the problem! You, uh, I'm sorry, it's just…"
He cursed in the confines of his mind. This must be one of those mood swings he's heard about. What was he to do? He wasn't ready to be a father. He doesn't know how to be a father. He could barely even remember having one. How was he going to-
Such thoughts plagued his mind until the sun rose and it was time to return to the Hero Faction base. He tried his best to push such thoughts out of his mind as he faced the Executive Council.
The Council sat around a big semi-circle table in fancy chairs with expensive looking cushions, each Executive were seated in their respective chairs, seemingly decorated to match the themes of the divisions each of them led.
Cao Cao was seated on the farthest point from the door, with each and every other Executive seated to his left and right.
Perseus felt like he just walked right into the meeting room of a secret conspiracy.
"Ah, good, right on time Perseus. We were just wrapping up our discussion on you." Cao Cao greeted him warmly as ever.
"I'm glad that I made it on time. Sorry, I uh, was running a bit late." Perseus replied sheepishly.
"Pft, well, we know what kept him busy." Heracles words got the other guys (literally every other member of the council) to chuckle, everyone seemed to be coming up with their own conclusions. While Perseus thought that Cao Cao was only joining in as a courtesy, he was sure that everyone else sans Koji had dirty thoughts in their mind.
Every member of the council were all still single young men, after all.
"Enough Heracles. At any rate, allowing this appointment of someone that has been noted to have some… differing opinions on how certain operations are run-" Cao Cao frowned in slight disappointment, somehow, Perseus could tell that it was as fake as a female devil's virginity, "-has not been done before, as we believe that unity of purpose, beliefs and methodology will result in more productive meetings and decision making."
Perseus nodded slowly and solemnly, "I understand."
He really didn't. Truthfully, he thought that Cao Cao was simply saying that anyone that didn't agree with him was someone that acted against the interest of the faction as a whole.
While he believed that Cao Cao was well-intentioned, Perseus thought the young man was too extreme in his thought process, at least when it came to other people.
Yet, someone that could unite so many descendants of heroes, and was destined to wield the strongest Longinus… would surely achieve something greater than any other man. Perseus wanted to be part of the world that would be created by someone touched by destiny in a profound manner.
Cao Cao looked to Georg on his right, who gave the verdict apparently held by the majority of the council.
"You are on this Council, but we do not grant you the rank of division leader."
"What?"
He was shocked. This was unheard of! He felt mocked and insulted!
Being on the Executive Council meant that you not only led an entire division by yourself, but you also had free reign to enter the other facilities governed by each division head. The Hero Faction ran very strict security protocols, the facilities were in many disparate locations and movements between divisions were heavily restricted for the sake of their continued survival should the worst happen…
Perseus saw that the other executives like Siegfried, Guan Yu and Heracles were trying their best not to laugh. Georg was looking outright gleeful before he schooled his expression.
Cao Cao looked somewhat sympathetic but it was clearly faked. Koji looked surprised and a bit put out by the way Georg responded.
"How can you do this? This is madness, it's hardly fair. How can you be a member of this council and not be a division leader?"
Georg gestured to a very plain looking chair with no cushions, placed right next to Koji, "Take a seat, Perseus."
"… Fine!"
As he made his way to his seat, he caught Koji glaring at Georg, who smirked back at Perseus's biggest advocate.
"We were on the verge of greatness, we were this close." Koji made a strange gesture, causing Georg to slam his fist on the table in frustration.
Perseus didn't know what just happened, but if it made Georg mad, then he was perfectly alright with it.
The rest of the council began delivering their reports to Cao Cao, seemingly having waited until Perseus could join them so that he would be in the loop as well.
"Well, as you well know, my division acts as a small and elite group across the globe. So far, our efforts have been productive, but due to certain circumstances… many of my numbers will be taking their paid vacations for this month." Koji began, and waited for Cao Cao to gesture to "get on with it" when there were no remarks, before continuing, "I'm looking for volunteers, there has been activity in the Caribbeans-"
"What about the Vampire attack on the Canadians?" Georg interrupted midway, instigating an evil glare from Koji and a loud audible groan from Cao Cao.
"Would the two of you please stop it with the memes for one damn day?! Anyhow, Georg has a point, Ontario… along with our own base located there, is at risk due to the vampires acting erratic searching for something… someone. It is critical we send a capture and suppression group there immediately. We need to find out what they are looking for."
"Go, I will. Good relations with the Maple Syrup, I have." Koji suddenly jumped right in.
"You can't have relations with maple syrup." Heracles shouted.
"Not with that attitude you can't." Koji snapped right back.
"Hahaha! Mr. Loco's got you there!" Siegfried laughed while reminding everyone that Koji was a bit… insane, to say the least.
Perseus wanted to defend his friend but he couldn't really disagree with their view.
"Right, well, I volunteer my division to take over Koji's duties while he and… Perseus, can go and deal with the vampires. They are, after all, the most suited for missions that require our targets alive… surprisingly." Georg suggested, then continued, "Koji, would it be possible if you get your division members to schedule a… medical check-up at my facilities. I still haven't quite cracked the "something" you saw in discovering such potential in a select few of our members. The results can't be replicated by some mere drug as I have meticulously tested and I wish to-"
"Georg, enough. Let's not go into details that would… confuse our newest member, shall we?" Cao Cao smiled dangerously at his best friend Georg, who quickly understood some unspoken words and stopped talking.
Perseus looked to Koji for clarification, the young man shook his head subtlely, indicating that they would talk after the meeting.
"I will see what I can do. However, you must realize that if my members refuse, I won't force them to do anything. Let's just say it won't end well for your laboratory and medical facilities if my… eh, jumpy members get a bit too stressed by your methods."
Perseus supported Koji's statement by regaling a tale about one of their "situational awareness" training methods, which made everyone shudder in discomfort.
"Well, our meeting is settled then. You all know your tasks, we will convene once again next week." Cao Cao summoned his spear and walked off through a portal, leaving the secure alternate dimension to continue on with his own business.
The other members went off on their own as well, although Heracles approached Perseus and surprisingly, was behaving rather friendly.
"Sorry for giving you a hard time. Look, I know how it feels, you don't get to be a leader and you start feeling like you're not trusted. It's not like that… probably. Uh, for Koji and I, we both needed to prove that we could actually lead people before we were given our divisions. Not many others are told that so that they don't get their hopes up on becoming an Executive." Heracles patted him on the back before leaving through another preset portal.
"Uh, yeah. Thanks, I guess."
"By the way, don't you dare catch any of the crazy from Koji! He's way too… you know." The bodybuilder "hero" made a double "swirl" motion with his fingers after placing them at the side of his head, as he finally left the premises.
"How rude."
"Gah!"
Koji was behind him all of a sudden!
"Why are you so surprised? I never left. I merely reduced my presence so that no one would notice me."
"Could have fooled me! Oh wait, it did."
Perseus asked Koji about what Heracles had said earlier, curious about whether it was the truth or not.
"Oh certainly, the part where we needed to prove ourselves capable of leadership was true… but have you ever wondered why I never allowed any of those that worked under me to go to Georg's division, even for the more severe injuries?"
"I… I thought about it. I don't see a reason why not."
Koji smiled in a brotherly manner, "Walk with me."
They left through a portal that led to Sweden, only to suddenly fall into a hole!
Only, it wasn't a hole. It was another portal, a dark one made out of… shadows.
Perseus felt a stinging sensation at the back of his neck, "Ouch!"
He turned and saw Koji's fingers holding onto a needle that seemed to glow with holy energy, only for it to be enveloped by the shadows that formed that man's body.
"We're here. We can speak freely now. Whilst I was sure that Cao Cao's little device wasn't active then, it wouldn't have hurt to permanently disable it."
"Huh? What? What are you talking about? Are you saying that Cao Cao was spying… on me?"
"He spies on everyone. He gave up on me after a lot of headaches when my powers would simply render his efforts meaningless. While his Longinus has a higher "authority" level, he can only devote so much power to it… even someone like me could easily snuff out his token efforts with ease."
Perseus felt that what Koji was saying was the truth.
While both Cao Cao and Koji acted suspiciously at times, the latter somehow came off as a lot more genuine in his concern for them. Lately, Perseus had begun to think his world view had just been flipped upside down.
Just yesterday, he would have hailed Cao Cao as being trustworthy while only using deception for a good cause, but with what he had seen in the council meeting today, deception seemed to be his go-to method in order to keep control of everything for his own convenience.
Perseus had even begun to entertain the idea that Koji wasn't some hateful ball of darkness that intended to wipe out all supernatural kind.
"They don't trust you Perseus. Especially with the "truth". They don't think you can handle it, they know you won't accept it."
"What are you talking about?"
"Haven't you wondered why Georg's research and medical division is the most highly guarded division among us?"
"…"
"I thought not. Here, take this. This is a device I made from my Sacred Gear and some magic. It will hide your presence just like how I would hide mine, change your appearance to look like mine and allow you access to Georg's division."
"Huh? Wait what-"
"I need your help Perseus. But for that to happen, I need to know if you are willing to learn the "truth", no matter how painful it is."
Perseus thought back to his nightmare about Cao Cao somehow turning on him, killing Lakshmi, and wondered if the "truth" had something to do with what could transpire in the future.
"Yes, I will do it. Honestly, though, I'm sure you're exaggerating."
"Oh, we shall see… I will be in London, catching up on some shows."
"The theatre?"
Koji slipped him a ticket to an expensive opera box seat, "Join me some time. Perhaps you will enjoy the show, or… we could have a nice chat."
Alone outside the opera house, a lone man erratically walked about, trying to walk a straight path into the building.
There was no crowd outside the theatre building as the show had just begun.
Perseus paced about the lobby of the theatre building until an attendant was kind enough to point him towards where he needed to go. He stumbled upon a few steps on the way up, he could barely think about how to get there properly, only that he needed to speak with the one person he could trust with what he had learned.
Part of him wanted to tell the woman he loved what he had discovered first. Yet, he couldn't, not when she was pregnant with his child. He couldn't put this on her when he had already unintentionally put something else in her belly.
That left only one other person he could turn to.
If it were just a day ago, it would have sickened him to think that he hadn't even considered Cao Cao on that list, but after what he had learned, after what he saw…
He wasn't even angry about it. He was only stunned.
So stunned about being lied to and having been a party to such evil that he could scarcely comprehend that he couldn't even remember how he had made it out undetected in the first place.
He couldn't remember how he found the portal to the United Kingdom, paid for a cab and directed the driver by pointing at his ticket as if it were his lifeline, before finally making it to where he needed to be.
"Koji!"
"Ah yes, Perseus, come closer and sit, please."
Koji was seated comfortably in his seat overlooking the beginning act of the show.
Ordinary.
As though this is merely another one of his friendly conversations, the casual chats they've enjoyed together for so many months now.
As though nothing has happened.
As though nothing has changed.
Perseus couldn't remember following Koji's instructions as he took a seat next to his friend.
Only that he did.
"You must understand that it is difficult for a young boy who could never actually rely on other people to empathize with them in the same way. A lone boy travelling the world with only his spear as his companion after his parents sold him off to the highest bidder for a pittance in comparison to his true worth. Is it that surprising that he values people just as much as he believes that they valued him?"
He knew who Koji was talking about. Even though he had never heard the story about, after everything that has happened, there was only one person that he could have been referring to.
"His desire to become a "hero" certainly is genuine. That is, if the definition of a "hero" is utterly compliant with his point of view."
Cao Cao, there was no other person that Koji could have been talking about.
"-There are many ways to determine what makes a hero. Is it the recognition and public opinion, the views of the masses, that decide who is a hero and who is a villain? Well, that is one way of looking at it, the strongest human Vasco Strada subscribes to it, certainly. You and I, on the other hand, both follow a… broader view of heroism."
His friend smiled, then leaned in to tell him the words that Perseus wanted to hear. The words that he needed to hear to know that he was not alone in his struggles.
"We simply can't ignore evil wherever we see it, especially when it endangers our loved ones so."
That was right.
There was a reason why Perseus even tolerated Cao Cao's unhonorable and shady methods earlier on as a "necessary evil". He simply thought there was a greater evil that could be eradicated by committing a smaller evil.
Then suddenly, he learned that there was no difference between those that he fought and those he fought with at all.
It simply wasn't right.
The human experimentation, captive beings drained dry of their essence, their own members having their own powers forcibly utilized to create resources like holy swords for them, people that disagreed with Cao Cao being painfully brainwashed into mindless drones… and gods, the mountain of corpses piled up in the "garbage" room.
He had never dreamed there was this much evil in the hearts of man.
Until he saw it for himself.
"You're right… you were always right. What have I done? All those… I-I actually captured some of them, there were some people who I thought were traitors, I snitched on them to Cao Cao and- and look how they ended up!"
He could admit the truth of his sins without fear here.
The room was protected by Koji's power, in here, there was only him and his friend.
His friend was in the exact same situation as he was, what other reason could there have been for Koji to have given the truth to him in such a manner?
"I know. I know… believe me, it hurts me to keep this charade up. I'm doing as much as I can to save them and dupe the rest but, I can only do so much. I have managed to swap a few living beings with some fakes but… they'll catch on eventually."
"What can we do?"
"You leave that to me. I have plans… but I need your help Perseus."
"Anything, what can I do?"
"First of all, we need you at the top of your game. Our only way to save as many people as we can, not just from Cao Cao's ambitions, but also from the other factions, is to let him continue until we reach our peak."
"What?!"
"Think about it. Too early… the status quo remains. Too late… then the factions that we eventually will go to war with will cull our numbers and capture the survivors, turning them to their causes. But if we break away at the correct time-"
"-Then we can save as many as we can from both those supernatural buggers and that faggot Cao Cao!"
"Gooooooood. You're getting it. Now, back to sorting you out. Remember Lakshmi?"
"Oh gods! What am I going to do? S-she's… I, I don't even… I can't let her die. He's going to kill her. When I betray him he's going to kill her. She loves me, I know it's true, I can feel it, it's so pure I just can't let her die-"
Koji held up a glass of water right in front of Perseus's face.
"Perseus, take a sip."
"A-ah, thank you."
Now that he calmed down slightly, Koji seemed willing to share something that would help Perseus in keeping Lakshmi safe and averting the horrible nightmare he had.
"Did you ever hear the Triumph of Master Cannoli the Wise?"
Perseus had vaguely heard about there being a greater "Jedi Master" than this "Darth Bobby" enemy that Cao Cao had briefed them on once based on flawed reports from their spies at the Vatican.
"No."
He certainly hadn't heard of this story before.
"I thought not. It's not a story the Executives would tell you. It's a Youkai legend."
What did the Youkai had to do with them? Wait a second, didn't Koji hate the Youkai the most, at least… third to the devils and the Five Principle Clans? Perseus had such thoughts in his head.
"Master Cannoli is a human master of the Sage Arts. So powerful and so wise he could use the Sage Arts to influence the cells to create… life. He had such a knowledge of the life side, he could even keep the ones he cared about… from dying."
"He could actually… save people from death?"
"The Life Side of the Sage Arts is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be… miraculous."
"What happened to him?"
"He became so powerful, the only thing he was wary of people finding out and begging him to help them, which eventually, of course they did. Unfortunately, he was a bleeding heart and helped the Youkai to reproduce, even accelerating some birth cycles too, all for a couple of favors at the cost of all his time with his loved ones. Ironic. He could give others a life, but not himself."
Perseus didn't care too much about the guy's personal life, what he needed to know was if this guy was real and could help prevent his nightmares from coming true.
"Is it possible to get help from this man?"
"Not from a hero."
Of course, neither of them were "heroes" by Cao Cao's definition at this point.
"I will do whatever you ask."
"Goooooood."
They left the opera house after the show had ended, Perseus found himself enjoying the music even if he completely missed out on the context.
He guided Koji Sato to the hotel where he and Lakshmi were staying in.
"Perseus, where have you been all day? I've been worried sick."
"Lakshmi, I'm fine, really. I came to see you. Are you and the baby safe?"
"Yes, of course we are, why are you- Oh, Koji! I'm sorry, I didn't know you were here, wait, how much did you hear?!"
"It's okay my love. He knows everything."
"O-oh…"
"Darling, will you pack your things now? We're leaving."
"What?"
Koji quietly and patiently waited for them to pack their things.
Perseus hadn't told the love of his life anything yet. Why would he need to tell her now? It would only complicate matters.
"Perseus, where are we going? Whoa-"
"-No! I got you, I got you… hahah…"
He had quickly caught her before she fell, as per usual, and couldn't help himself from laughing in relief.
"… Are you alright?"
"Never better. Of course, I'm alright. So long as you and the baby are safe, I will be alright… no matter what…"
"Perseus, you're scaring me."
"Have faith, my love. Everything will be alright, I promise. I discovered a way to prevent my vision from coming true. We simply need a man that is able to operate… outside of fate, be it by natural means or… otherwise. Koji will take us to him."
Thankfully, she didn't ask too many questions when it was their lives on the line. Perseus still wasn't sure how to break the news that Cao Cao was a lying evil self-righteous maniac that made them unwilling parties to evil.
He needed to do it in such a way that Lakshmi's inherited spirit wouldn't spur her to lead an obvious revolution against Cao Cao. It wasn't part of Koji's Grand Design, Perseus's role could not be fulfilled if he had to worry about his girlfriend and his child all the time.
Perseus didn't want to think what those madmen would do with his child if they got their hands on them.
Lakshmi had panicked slightly when they were suddenly in Youkai territory, thankfully, the clinic that Master Cannoli had set up shop was already vacated for their private "session".
They had to knock her out so that she wouldn't resist after being told about what needed to be done. Honestly, she should be thankful that the entire pregnancy period would be skipped through the accelerated birth process, from what Perseus had heard, the birthing process would be horrendously painful!
"What…"
"Look Lakshmi, she's a girl. Oh, I didn't pick a name yet since you'll probably punch me for doing it without your input-"
"-Huh? Wait what? How can I… how much time had passed?"
"About… half an hour. You're perfectly healthy by the way, so is the girl, haha! Turns out that those blasted oracles can't predict the influence of a Jedi Master!"
"I'M GOING TO PUNCH YOU NOW!"
She punched him even harder when he told her that they wanted to keep her here, far from the "Hero Faction"'s reach, so that she would be away from danger. He would be faking her "defection" from the Hero Faction after rehearsing his story with Koji later on.
It took several hours of begging and explanations until she finally forgave him enough to let him kiss her and hold the baby.
Whilst Perseus still believed what he had done was "right", he had nonetheless, learned an important lesson about informed consent and getting input from his life partner.
"Wait what? Why do you have to keep working with that scum Cao Cao?"
"My dear, our brainwashed brethren had certain "orders" imprinted into their minds by the evil sorcerer Georg, we need to trigger them in our favor at the right time in order for the greater good."
"Greater good?! I am your wife. I am the greatest good you're ever going to get!"
"Say what? Koji, help me out here!"
Unfortunately, when he needed him the most, Koji vanished.
"Fuck!"
"Don't swear in front of the baby!"
"F-I mean, I'm sorry…. wait, did you say wife? Does that mean that you'll marry me?"
"Look, I am not letting my child grow up without a father."
"Yes! I'll get you a proper ring as soon as I can-"
Perseus felt a small object being thrown at his face, he caught it, and found that it was a ring box.
"Thanks, Koji."
Interlude: Jeanne, The Church and Many New Opportunities
Interlude: Jeanne, The Church and Many New Opportunities
"What the- what happened to my room?! Jeanneeeeee!"
"Hey, hey, Teo-chan! It's been awhile."
The French blonde girl gave Teofila a quick wave from the bed she was lying on. Jeanne had been lying on her stomach while watching anime on her high-end gaming laptop, all in the confines of Teofila's bedroom.
Teofila surveyed her messed up room from where she stood at the entrance. The silver-haired maiden sighed when she beheld the sight of her room's environmentally friendly mini-bin, filled to the brim with snack and sweet wrappers.
The room was originally meant for two occupants, but as no other nun other than Asia wanted to be her roommate (and Asia had her own home church near the Vatican that she lived in half the time), it essentially became Teofila's personal bedroom.
In Jeanne's case, she had pretty much taken up permanent residence in Teofila's room, instead of using the rooms allocated for the warriors of the church. There were several reasons for this, although only two reasons stood out from Jeanne's long list.
It helped make sure Teofila wouldn't feel lonely, and also, because Jeanne could finally have a place that she could consider "hers".
"We saw each other off a week ago. And also, since when did you start using Japanese honorifics?"
"No I didn't."
"Yes you did."
"It's an affectionate nicknaming method… from a certain point of view. Oh, dam- I mean, darn you Genshirou!"
She managed to stop herself from swearing crudely at the last second.
Jeanne shook her fist at the ceiling while thinking of her meme obsessed best friend, as she did so, she managed to catch a wistful expression on her Romanian best friend's face.
"Oh?"
"Huh? What?"
"Nothing~"
Jeanne stopped grinning when Teofila started to nag her about the usual things.
"Honestly you… anyways, why haven't you unpack your things?"
"But what if I have to leave tomorrow?"
"Then you will pack your things again like a normal person."
Jeanne expressed her intentions by spreading her limbs towards the four corners of the bed, eliciting an irritated look from her friend, who huffed, "Fine! Go on, be slothful. Don't blame me if God punishes you for it."
Despite all that, Teofila opened up Jeanne's luggage bag and began sorting it out, setting aside the clothes that should be washed aside from the other things Jeanne had brought back from her travels.
It wasn't the first time her friend went out of the way to make sure Jeanne felt as if she were right at home.
Jeanne alt-tabbed on her keyboard to open up the window displaying her electronic copy a light novel Genshirou recommended her, pretending to be busy reading the piece of literature that was most certainly heretical, she looked up over the screen in order to watch as Teofila placed her new purchases along with her other things.
Her things.
Until recently, she had never truly contemplated the idea of having belongings. Her early life was bereft of personal belongings as she never really considered a life devoid of battle against the forces of darkness.
Her natural gifts allowed her to train and fight at an age where many exorcists were still being trained vigorously. She had roamed the world with many different warriors of the church, rarely ever stopping in one country long enough to call that place home, although she would always have a special place in her heart for her home country of France.
The only attachment that she truly had besides an affection for her home country and fellow believers were her beliefs in the Lord. If her best friend had known of this, she would surely have been compared to a Prequel Era Jedi.
Of course, things were different now. And Jeanne was alright with that.
Be it the Vatican or a faraway country like Japan, with good friends like these, she had truly felt the warmth of having a home.
"Jeanne? Where do I put this?" Teofila held up the items she had gift-wrapped somewhere.
"Oh, that? That's for you. I know it's a little late, but I'm not going to let Genshirou and Asia be the only ones to get you a birthday present." Jeanne had taken some time off during her last mission to get Teofila something.
"You didn't have to." The girl that was displaced from her home due to the Astaroth event hadn't had her birthday celebrated until this year, being so far away from the place she once called home likely reduced her expectations a lot. "But… thank you. Can I open it?"
"If Genshirou were here, he would say "stop being so Japanese and open the damn present", or something." He wasn't the type to be overly polite if he could afford to, which is one of the reasons why Jeanne liked talking to him. "Go on."
"Okay then. Let's see what it… is… WHAT IS THIS!?"
It was a matching crotchless bra and panty set, obviously.
"Like it?"
"P-perverted! What kind of undergarments are these?!"
"Come on, you've seen these kinds of things when we were taken shopping around Japan. Why don't you try them on?"
"As if I can, t-this is sinful!"
"Only if you're trying to cause believers to stray from God's light~ if the man who sees you wearing it isn't a believer then it's okay!"
"You need remedial theology! And also, what kind of man are you referring to? There's no one like that in my life…"
"Did you know that Gen's girlfriends use their phones to send him "selfies" of their bodies?"
"W-why are you mentioning that? That's… not relevant…"
Speaking of topics of relevance, Jeanne had actually bought a pair herself just to try it out and subsequently hid them under her bed. Teofila certainly didn't need to know that. Jeanne would still like to avoid being called a hypocrite by her (female) best friend, for convenience's sake.
That said, she had no intention to pursue a relationship, at least while she still had her duty to God and the church. If there were a lot fewer monsters to fight however, she may just "semi-retire" and go out killing monsters as a hobby.
"Anyways, anything happen while I was away?"
Teofila's expression darkened a little as the young lady thought about what had occurred in her absence, "Oh, the usual. A beloved nun somewhere was excommunicated recently, in spite of being rescued from a certain devil's trickery and the testimony of our favorite "Pagan Exorcist"."
That designation was granted to certain individuals that fought the forces of darkness and protected humans while being neutral to the Church factions. In a way, it was a signal to the rest of their warriors to consider the individual a "tentative ally", in the event of a monster threatening the safety of humans.
The tradition had, according to their records, started after Richard I and the warriors of the church had to team up with Saladin and the Hassan-i-Sabbah of that generation to root out powerful vampires in Jerusalem at one point.
It was unusual, however, for the designation to be handled down by a Cardinal Priest as renowned as Vasco Strada.
Apparently, his Eminence Vasco Strada had an encounter with the "Sith Lord" sometime a few months ago, and confirmed that the lightsaber wielder "completely lacked bloodlust and killing intent" against him, despite battling with the man for hours when Strada tried to bring him in for questioning. They had supposedly departed on friendly terms, although no one was able to get out any more information from Strada about the man, who had battled monsters all across the globe before the Church could even deploy warriors to resolve the problems.
Jeanne stopped feeling bad about being unable to defeat Darth Bobby when her savior (back in the Cao Cao incident) was apparently, at the bare minimum, a match for the Church's strongest.
"Darth Bobby… and again? Seriously?"
"Yeah."
"And those old farts have done nothing, as usual…"
The girl was apparently whisked away somewhere by Darth Bobby after the ordeal left her without a home, Jeanne could believe that she would be alright, with what she knew of the man thus far.
"Did you really expect anything less?" Teofila's opinion of certain people too keen on maintaining the status quo was nothing less than biting.
Jeanne really didn't expect anything different either.
If it wasn't for the fact that only a tiny minority of the higher-ups were secretly corrupt (the rest were just a bit hard-headed and thought too highly of themselves), and were likely tricked by other supernatural factions to make deals for "the greater good" at the cost of a few "small sacrifices", then Jeanne would have started a small scale Order 66 and slaughtered them all before leaving the Church.
"Even so, until the Lord shows us a new path, we can't help but stay in his house."
Jeanne's momentary shock and fear at not noticing the newcomer quickly died down when she recognized the voice.
"Asia?"
"Good evening. I'm glad that you managed to return safely!"
Asia Argento's genuine smile was certainly able to convey her joy abundantly, to the point where Teodila and Jeanne were both smiling in a blink of an eye.
That said… the fact that Jeanne hadn't even noticed Asia walk into the room was both disturbing and miraculous at the same time. Jeanne wasn't sure where she attained such a skill, but it could only have been a gift from God, as the girl's transformation from a klutz to a graceful maiden seemed very improbable.
The kind nun had walked right into their room without making a sound, her form was covered by a black robe that wouldn't be out of place in a Star Wars convention. If Asia hadn't look so adorable and harmless, she would look like some little child attempting to be a Sith Lord.
"Aww, of course I did! It wasn't much you know." Jeanne did her best to not brag about how easy the mission was. Thinking back to the virtues that she should be embodying, humility was always something she had to work on when it came to showing it in her day-to-day life. "Being able to produce holy swords gives me a big advantage. I was just a little stronger, that's all."
Curiously enough, Asia sighed and glanced to the side with only one eye open, as if she was looking at someone else, "I wonder where had I heard that before…"
"I think I saw that look from an anime before." Jeanne pointed it out immediately.
"Eh?" Asia looked confused.
"You know, that Fate series!"
"I guess the Emiya family's habit is a bit similar…"
For whatever reason, Asia was thinking out loud while glancing to the same side as before.
"Huh… I didn't know you knew of that series." Jeanne didn't think Asia would manage to watch anime with the strict watch she was usually under.
"I-I only knew it from Gen's letters. He wrote something about how fictional expressions like that don't actually work in "real life" unless you're in an "anime world"."
"Hmm, then again… I heard that in the case of modern media the words "Art imitates Life", would be rather appropriate." Teofilia chimed in.
"Somehow, I can only see devils and fallen angels that are trying too hard to be cool doing something like that… Or! We actually live in an anime world! I mean, Asia looked kinda cool doing that."
"Fweh!"
After teasing Asia a bit, Jeanne asked about why Asia came to Teofila's room. She was quickly briefed by Teofila that it was a semi-regular thing.
Long story short, Asia had made great advancements in her healing ability, to the point where she could simply heal a chapel's worth of people simply by spreading her healing power from her feet. That said, when the higher-ups caught wind of it, they were being passive aggressive about how it's "not the proper way" and that God's glory had to be shown through personal healing and a bunch of other nonsense… which sounded like complete bullshit.
Asia had argued that it shouldn't matter if it was seen that she had prayed over and touched others before they were healed, as it was by God's grace that they were healed in the first place, and by doing things the way it has always been done, it would be an act closer to glorifying how "holy" the people of the church were instead of God.
It wasn't the first time Asia had been yelled at for subtlety healing the masses outside of the designated areas whenever she travelled overseas to perform healing for those in need. Even then, to their surprise, she continued to argue back to the point where they couldn't refute her, and had simply ordered her not to do so continuously.
"Sounds like they need a real kick in the ass…" Jeanne muttered.
"Do not be tempted so easily." Teofila chuckled a little.
"It isn't fair at all. If I can help more people, then why not take the chance? There's nothing wrong with wanting to help others… well, I've found a workaround."
Apparently, she had healed a powerful magician that was well connected among the supernatural community from the effects of a degenerative disease, and the man was so thankful that he was helping Asia in getting whatever she needed. The person supposedly looked like a very famous actor.
"He will be waiting for me somewhere nearby, if it's not too much trouble, would you please cast that spell on me?"
"It isn't, it will only take a few seconds…"
"Teofila? I thought you swore off magic?"
"Well, I'm not casting magic… I'm just replicating the phenomenon known as magic without running the calculations, so from a certain point of view, I am maintaining my vows to the Church."
After the spell was casted, Jeanne couldn't see into the interior of the dark hood that Asia pulled up over her head, rather than a mini-Sith Lord… she looked more like a member of Organization XIII.
"Thank you! Oh, would you like anything from outside?" Asia would apparently be going off to another country to have her "healing fix" before returning, and would likely buy a few things with the money that her co-conspirator so happily provided her.
Normally, Jeanne would be more suspicious of this person, but it seems like the man was someone that knew Darth Bobby very well, and after the most recent meeting she had with him, Jeanne could safely say that she considered him an ally.
"Some snacks will do fine. Jeanne ate all of mine." Teofila pointed her thumb at Jeanne.
"It was just laid there… menacingly… I had to eat it." It was the lamest excuse she could think of at the time.
"… Oh my… when I get back, remind me to do a full check-up. Aside from healing, I've also improved in helping people get "healthy"." Asia happily offered her services.
"Oh! Thanks Asia! I kind of need it too, I think I trained too hard some time ago…"
"Well, you shouldn't do so. At least, not without someone that can take care of you if something goes wrong… yes, that goes for you too."
"Huh?"
"Nothing!"
Jeanne and Teofila both agreed that Asia should really get more friends aside from Genshirou is she keeps speaking to some imaginary friend.
Before they could enact their plans however, Jeanne's chance meeting with the man Asia had described had quickly changed the course of her fate.
Sometime later…
"No way! The best kill had to be the sword in between the eyes. That was so cool! It's like a bullet, but bladed." A blonde teenage boy in priestly vestments made a "pew" sound as he arranged his fingers to the traditional finger gun.
The blonde girl with long hair walking alongside next to him nodded to herself as she recalled that particular kill.
"I suppose that was kinda cool. But come on, we both know that this is your win. Who else can say they killed a vampire by fisting the bitch!" The female warrior of the church poorly imitated the young man's hand-to-hand combat skills by executing a lewd version of his uppercut, that had killed a high-ranking vampire instantly with a direct hit up the vagina.
Jeanne would never let Nero live it down.
"That was only half-intentional so it didn't count. This is the "best kill" competition, not the "grossest kill" one anyways."
"I give bonus points since you made it funny."
"Okay, fine, seeing that vampire bitch's face go "OOOO!" before blowing up was sort of awesome."
"That's the spirit!"
"I still need to wash my hands in holy water for another week or so. There's no way I can play with the kids after soiling my hands like that."
"Hahaha!"
"Hahaha… haha…"
"Haha… Oh yeah. How's the "Captain Church" costume coming along?"
Their laughter was brittle after managing that short moment of genuine humor. After what they had seen and learned off, including the part the church had played in their self-assigned mission, making small talks, joking around and thinking about the "positives" of their experiences was their way of taking their mind off more important matters.
"Well enough, I guess. I've got to thank you for introducing Teofila to me, she's really good at this sewing stuff."
"Ehehe, I didn't do much. She's the one that loves helping people with this stuff. Unfortunately, I'm not very great with housework."
"Outside of being a waitress. Have you tried wearing a maid-ow!"
Jeanne pinched the side of her "combo" partner.
"-Don't finish that suggestion. You're not the first person to suggest a "french maid" outfit."
"If I can wear a costume you can too!"
Nero Raimondi's reply was about to be met with a slight escalation of violence, were it not for them both sensing the presence of an old man looming right behind them.
The shadow cast by the two-meter tall man was one that both of them were very familiar with.
"Buon giorno, my wayward students."
Before the two could move away, a single hand was placed on each of their shoulders, an enormous amount of pressure held them both in place, it felt as if their hearts themselves were being gripped tight.
"Y-your Eminence Strada, h-hey! How is everything going?" Nero sputtered out as he attempted to bury away any thoughts that might make him feel even a bit guilty in his teacher's presence. He really didn't want to explain any further.
"As always, God has been gracious to us all. And yourself? I hope you do not attempt to hide your injuries in order to avoid the healers."
"But I want a scar or two…"
"You must not deliberately mar the body you've been given, Warrior Nero. And you, Saint Jeanne?"
"Please don't call me a Saint, teacher! You know I don't like that title." Jeanne was a lot more used to getting into trouble and wasn't as worried as Nero was.
It didn't matter if it came from the Cardinals (that she respected a lot less these days…), or the person who had personally trained her.
"And I believe you know how much I dislike seeing two promising young ones running off to sate their bloodlust… what did you write again, Nero? "Imma starting Vampire Hunt 2: Electric Bongaloo?""
The two teenagers looked at the muscular man with a youthful body (with a contrasting wrinkly head) oddly, finding it surreal that he actually repeated Nero's little note before they slipped out of the Vatican word-for-word.
"Well, see, yeah we know… but we had a good reason to do so." Jeanne attempted to placate Vasco Strada, the only human that (in his prime) had ever terrified the current Satans of the Underworld.
"I was sold the moment she mentioned vampires-" Nero interjection earned him a death glare from his battle partner, his indulgence of his hobby of killing devils and vampires (as he listed in his social networking accounts) was never a good conversations starter, "-but really, believe me, I had never been angrier in my life when I heard what the vampires were doing."
Vasco released his grip on both of them when both of them shook involuntarily as they remembered what they saw. Jeanne's face softened in sadness while Nero had clenched his fist in anger.
The old man moved away from their backs and appeared in front of them both in the blink of an eye, leaned down and hugged them both.
"I'm very sorry that the two of you had to take up these burdens that this old man have released onto your shoulders."
"T-that's not it! Don't apologize! There's nothing wrong with letting us deal with these things." Nero protested even as he took comfort in the kind man's hug.
"… What he said. Besides, someone needs to keep those higher-up's reined in." Jeanne's disdain for the various cardinals was no secret, "If it weren't for our Great Teacher Strada we'll lose an entire generation to the amount of stupid concentrated up there."
Vasco "tapped" Jeanne on the head, making her yelp in pain.
"Repent from slandering your leaders."
"I'll apologize for stating the truth later."
"Haa… at least mind your insolence more often."
Nero took the chance to poke Jeanne's side as payback when she was vulnerable.
"Ow!"
"Hey, mind your insolence. The idiots upstairs might take offense."
The young man also got a "tap" on his head for that.
"Now, what were your reasons again?"
Jeanne started to explain how it all happened.
"So I was walking down the street eating my gelato-"
"Fat-free right?."
Nero started hopping on one foot after a pin-prick sized holy sword poked his toe, eliciting a shout of pain.
"-When suddenly Keanu Reeves walked up to me-"
"Oh, the one from the Matrix." Vasco nodded after recalling that particular movie.
"He's also John Wick." Nero added as he continued hopping, attempting to remove the tiny holy sword that wouldn't truly harm his body, other than causing the most annoying type of pain possible.
It was the one holy sword in Jeanne's seemingly unlimited arsenal that everyone in the church hated the most because they could never truly find enough evidence to stop her from pranking people that annoyed her.
"-can both of you stop interrupting me for just a minute?"
Jeanne got a quick apology from both men.
"Thank you. Right, so Keanu walked up to me and said that he found an orphanage somewhere deep in vampire territory, Romania, and that really terrible things were happening there. Of course, I tried to get his autograph first, so he gave it to be on the back of an envelop carrying tons of pictures of vampires… eating younglings."
"What?" "Huh?"
"I mean children." Jeanne shook her fist at the sky while thinking of Genshirou before continuing, "Now, you might be wondering what's different about this situation. Well, think of it this way, why is there a human orphanage deep in vampire territory?"
Jeanne reached for the backpack she had carried along for her trip, containing the proof that she had received, and further evidence she found after they arrived at the place.
"This is a diary of the vampire countess we hunted down. Read the first few pages of every bookmark-"
Vasco Strada took the book from Jeanne, and read it while relying on his vast knowledge of many languages… and exuded a powerful aura in righteous anger after he began to comprehend the depravity and cruelty of the creature they killed.
Jeanne handed him the records from the orphanages, the pictures and names matching that of the children the vampire wrote about and recorded as part of her entertainment.
"It was a farm, your Eminence. A farm where human children have been raised like prized cattle from birth, for over two hundred years, to be food and entertainment for high-class vampires."
Tears fell from the old man's eyes out of compassion for the children.
"It was an idyllic orphanage with a dark secret straight out of The Promised Neverland." Jeanne made a reference to Japanese media that the two didn't fully understand, yet comprehended the horror behind it nonetheless, "And there was more, the images he got… were actually taken by the vampires themselves and mailed somewhere to taunt someone that was involved in it, "Keanu" or whatever his name is intercepted it and passed it along to me. When I saw where it was addressed to, I had to leave the Vatican immediately."
She had learned that one of the Cardinals had actually "procured" a few humans for the vampires to introduce fresh blood into the place decades ago, all for the sake of an unenforceable "agreement" that the vampires would limit their influence among human trafficking groups. Evidently, the man felt guilty enough to the point where the vampire continued to taunt him about his sins, yet not guilty enough to confess it all and to resolve it.
All who gain power are afraid to lose it. When Jeanne managed to sneak into the man's home to collaborate the evidence, she had finally managed to see through the lies of the church.
Jeanne had immediately sought backup from the only person crazy enough to back her up in this and sought out her recent partner in monster hunting.
"I wanted to kill that bitch so, so badly, and I knew I couldn't trust the information to the church then." Nero added to her sentiment.
He may have been a battle maniac, but he loved and was loved in return, by many children of the church, being a hero in their eyes for his accomplishments of defeating monsters with only his fists. Children were his soft spot, and when he learned the full details of what had been occurring, he had almost left straight for Romania without any supplies whatsoever, only for Jeanne to grab him by the legs just in time to come up with a proper plan.
After hearing both of them out further, their teacher that was known by many his enemies as "The Violence of Heaven", had only one more question to ask.
"… Who?"
"You're still leaving?"
Teofila watched as Jeanne packed her things into her luggage bag, standing in a spot that reminded Jeanne of when she first told the Romanian girl to pack her things a year ago.
Ironic. Jeanne thought… and regretted that instantly when she realized it was yet another infection of the memes.
"Yep! I'm done. His Eminence Strada may have cleaned up all those involved and moved many to confess their sins, but well, we know it's not over yet."
There was no evidence found for any devil-related deals. Of course, the single devil's influence that they really wanted to be rid off would hide his tracks way too well… the devil was truly a detestable thorn at their sides.
"I suppose not… where do you think you will be going?"
"Where else? Japan!"
"Not without me, you won't."
"… Well, what can I say? Other than I kinda expected that."
"Someone needs to take care of the slob."
"Excuse me? I'm an experienced and independent traveler here."
"A hotel room functions differently from a proper home. And I suspect that you are thinking of staying with a certain family that has moved into a much bigger home in recent months?"
"Pack your things, we're leaving."
"I have already packed."
Teofila pulled out a luggage bag from under her bed. It seemed like she was more than ready to leave, and was likely waiting for Jeanne to do so first…
"Oh, and don't forget these. It's yours."
"What?"
Jeanne caught the item thrown at her by her best friend, and was mortified to see the heretical undergarments she bought in her hand.
"And sent."
Then she saw Teofila snapping a photo of her.
"Wait, put the phone down! We can talk about this."
"It's too late. I sent it to Genshirou already."
"NOOOOOOO! Just you wait, I'll have my revenge."
Asia was apparently out of the country at this time so they didn't get a chance to say goodbye to her. They simply left a note in their rooms so that the church could "accept" their resignation before sneaking out of the place with the help of Jeanne's specialized presence concealing holy swords.
"How mean! You were leaving already?"
"Asia!" "Huh!?"
Asia was at the airport, simply sitting at the departure hall, as if expecting them to be there.
She smiled angelically, "Vri- I mean, my friend already heard the news. I was on the way back and decided to sneak away to wait for you here."
"We didn't mean to-" "We were in a rush so-"
"It's fine, really! I'm a little sad to see you go, but I will pray for your happiness. God willing, perhaps I will be seeing you in around… 9 months time?"
Asia looked like she knew something that they didn't know and had plans of her own… although, that couldn't be it, so the pair simply rationalized that Asia was putting on a strong front.
They said their farewells as Jeanne and Teofila were going past the security checks, Asia had told them to give her regards to Genshirou, handed them a letter and with a request to pass it to Genshirou when they met him.
To their surprise, their surprised encounters hadn't stopped there.
"Hey ladies, I heard the two of you are heading over to Kuoh? What a coincidence! I was thinking about building my vacation home there."
Jeanne had seen the man's files before, and while Teofila wouldn't have recognized the man, the holy power surrounding the man's body made it abundantly obvious what faction he had hailed on.
"Azazel-!"
"Oh cool, you know me! That saves me a lot of time."
"Wait what? Azazel, as in, that Azazel?"
"Do you know any other Azazel's? Well, I assure you, they won't be able to show you as much of a good time as I can."
"I will not hear anymore of this." Teofila seemed to be rather sick of these handsome supernatural beings trying to flirt with her after her previous experiences.
Jeanne however, could see that he wasn't serious about it at all, "I don't think my friend will ever be up for your crude jokes. So! What do want to talk about Azy-chan?"
"You're adapting to Japan so quickly?! Haha, well, it's more like a proposition really."
"I have no interest in joining."
"Well, I figured that was the case. But what about a… part-time job?
The handsome Fallen Angel passed Jeanne a business card for a school of his.
"Nephilim's School for Gifted Youngsters? Isn't this a little derivative?"
"Don't blame me, blame the damn elected school board. They are maniacs when it comes to shoving references and memes."
"I'm too cool and beautiful for school."
"I was going to offer you a teaching position. Your reputation and skill set is rather well known. I can make being a part-time combat instructor for our students very tempting if you will allow me."
"Hmm… by all means, tempt away."
There was a lot of money being offered… a lot. Just selling a few permanently manifested holy swords to the Grigori (for both combat and research purposes) would make her enough money to live luxuriously for a year, the per-hour pay for instructing their students in advanced combat was also…
"Oh, and since you're moving to Kuoh, as you know… devil territory, I thought you might also want the deed to the abandoned church there."
When she was offered this, Jeanne thought of Teofila, and decided to take the offer.
The girl had likely missed the church she considered home for all those years, while it wouldn't really be a replacement, she might find some closure somehow by being able to have a place like that all to herself.
Azazel gave her his contact number and would send her further information later on.
Eventually, they made it to Japan, and was promptly picked up by their friends.
"Hey girls, I got your message so me and my girlfriends came right over to pick you up after checking up your flight number. There's Valerie with the car, over there, wanna come?"
Genshirou pointed outside, where Valerie was waving her hand from the large car she drove.
"Well, we kind of ran out of money for the taxi anyways. Thank you!" Jeanne thanked the Lord for providing for them as always.
"She bought snacks on the plane." Teofila immediately blamed her eating habits, which was unfair, because Jeanne really did eat a lot more in order to fight as hard as she did… okay, maybe she had a bit more sugar than she really should have at times.
"Oh my, then it's a good thing we packed the car with lots of snacks and drinks in case you two were hungry." Atago quickly convinced them to get in the car as soon as possible.
The girls quickly got comfortable and had lots of good talk that was "censored" for the sake of the normal people like Genshirou and Valerie, as they talked about the things that had happened lately. They managed to get their story straight and framed it as their… religious school's faculty being found guilty of certain crimes.
In return, they managed to get the news from their friends. Turns out they both Atago's and Genshirou's mothers had recently given birth to more siblings!
As if they were rethreading familiar ground, Genshirou's mother gave birth to another pair of twins. As for Atago, well… her mother had quintuplets, and Genshirou became the official godfather for one of them, even being given the right to name her for some reason, and had named the girl "Miku".
Turns out that yes, it was a manga reference, as Jeanne has suspected.
Jeanne had handed over Asia's letter, Genshirou thanked them but did not open the letter, saying that he would open it when the timing was "appropriate".
They managed to reach Genshirou's new family home in Kuoh Town (Jeanne couldn't wait to "surprise" Sona later) and made it in time to join them for dinner in an hour.
"I hope these rooms will do fine."
"Woah, so these are seriously ours?"
"T-this is a bit too much."
Of course, the entire family was more than welcoming and insisted that they take those rooms too.
They spent 15 minutes to be given a tour around the huge house (in their opinion) before Genshirou took them both to the backyard without Atago and Valerie following along.
"What's going on?" Jeanne asked.
"I find that it is best to make sure you girls are acquainted with some of the secrets that I have shared with my family, especially when you will be staying with us." Genshirou made his way to the end of the garden, grabbed the nearby shovel and started digging at the corner of the wall.
"It isn't your family porn stash right? I didn't think the Japanese were so perverted to have all family members share the same fetish."
"If you repeat those words in front of Atago I think she will actually try to kill you."
Jeanne was slightly worried about her own chances if that actually happened.
"Your family didn't murder the previous owners and buried them here?"
"I regret ever recommending you murder mystery novels."
Teofila's imagination was running wild at this point.
"Ah, here it is."
It was a small wooden rectangular box.
Instead of opening it, Genshirou took out Asia's letter and handed it over to Jeanne.
"Read it first."
"But she addressed it to you."
"Oh, I don't think so."
Teofila decided to get it over with and took the letter from Genshirou's hand, as the nun opened the envelope, Jeanne leaned closer to see the contents of the unfolded piece of paper.
There were only nine words written on it.
[Genshirou is the Sith Lord you've been looking for.]
Purple light accompanied by a familiar snap-hiss sound shook Jeanne out of the utter shock instilled by those few words.
The holy swords she created to block the attack was knocked right out of her hand.
"Good. Your powers have doubled since we last met after all."
The wooden box dropped to the ground, one side of it was burnt black by the heat of the lightsaber as it ignited its blade through the box that kept it.
No masks. No robes. No misdirection.
There was no Darth Bobby in front of her, only her best friend Genshirou Saji.
"I knew it! Hah, I knew it! Yes!" Unlike Jeanne, Teofila was utterly elated, seemingly vindicated.
A small part of Jeanne still denied her instincts and the reality in front of her.
How could she be so blind? This was impossible. She would have sensed it.
"You… what have you done with Gen! Where did you hide your twin brother!?"
"Are you still on about that? There is no twin brother, it's just me damn it!"
"But how can you be in two places at once?!"
"… Uh, hello? Illusion magic? Puppetry? Golem creation? Or well…"
He pointed at the house, where another Genshirou had just taken the older twin siblings out to play with lightsabers!
"Clones."
"… Figures that you would even make your abilities Star Wars related."
"Did you ever hear the Triumph of Master Cannoli?"
"That was you too!?"
Jeanne wasn't even angry at this point.
Stunned, yes. Shocked, yes.
Betrayed? After everything they've been through, surprisingly, not at all. Looking back on their time together, he had wanted to help her every step of the way.
She could accept this, she could certainly do so.
And somehow, it made her feel happy that he had offered his secret without asking for anything in return.
Oh, sure, she certainly gave him a lot of shit for messing with her, but it was all for a good cause, she could admit that.
Not wanting to attract the attention of well-connected people like Sona Sitri, Rias Gremory and many others that might make life very difficult for someone not-aligned with any faction was pretty reasonable.
They had a perfectly ordinary dinner like always, it was as lively as ever, especially with two very young babies for the family to take care off too. Now that Jeanne and Teofila were let in on the secret, the family was happily chatting about supernatural affairs like it was no different from world news!
Jeanne was completely surprised by the revelation that Valerie Tepes, was in fact, a dhampir that was born into the Tepes Faction!
"Anyways, if you will be fine with it, I can help you clean up the church tomorrow or whenever you want to." As expected, Genshirou had even known about Azazel's offer to Jeanne, and was speaking to Teofila about helping her out.
"I would like that… W-we don't have to do it now or tomorrow, I mean, before the weekend will be just fine. Before that, I would like to um…"
Something just clicked in Jeanne's mind back then. She was too shocked to realize it back then, but now that she's calmed down, it seemed so obvious in hindsight.
"Wait a second, Asia knows too?!"
"Well, it's about time you figured that out. We've been dropping hints like crazy!"
Interlude: Atago, Youkai Faction, and a new cabinet position
AN: This was shorter and more brief as I found this rather tiresome to write since Youkai politics wouldn't actually matter for the plot in comparison to the intricacies of the Hero Faction or Atago's personal struggles.
Interlude: Atago, Youkai Faction, and a new cabinet position
Atago woke up to the sight of a very familiar floor.
If she were an Isekai protagonist then it would have been a ceiling. But she wasn't one.
Being able to properly remember what had happened the night before was also a point against her Otome / Regular Isekai Protagonist score. Not that any further point deductions would matter since simply being a non-human, beautiful girl that by all accounts was a winner in life, had completely disqualified her from the Isekai lottery.
Unless it was what Gen would call, "A typical QQ Mind Break, Fucked Silly, Dubious Consensus story involving very OOC Dom/Sub dynamics, or just some guy's paid OC" fucking her through reasons beyond that of rational logic.
If she were a simple unfaithful slutty bitch then that idea may have appealed to her, however, she had long outgrown such childish fantasies after all the extensive "training" she had been put through.
"Mmph…? Nnh… !" Just a slight twitch of movement caused the black chains to tighten around her body. Soreness, pain, and pleasure intertwined together… suddenly, she felt her hair being pulled, forcing her head to rise.
"Oh good, you're awake now." She glanced at the side with what little movement he permitted her, "Did you have a good dream?" She could only catch a bit of his face after he bent down just enough to meet her eyes.
Atago recalled the faint images of what he "forced" her to do under his power, she had quickly forgotten the brutal physical training he put her body through and only recalled the little "indulgences" he partook in, using her body like a marionette to make lewd poses in front of a video camera.
"Haa, I… yes! It was… a good dream."
Now that he forced her to look up, she could recognize the walls of the training room currently set to it's "mirror" setting, allowing her to observe her own naked suspended body with her smile twisted in obscene pleasure.
"Good." Thankfully, he avoided dragging the word as long as usual and made it short and sweet. She felt his finger trail over her back, his mere touch making her body tremble with anticipation, "Then you can go through this day without any more of this."
"What?" Her mind immediately screamed in protest, no, this couldn't be happening, how can he just leave her this wound up today of all days…
Well, of course, he can. He was her master, her brain helpfully supplied the reminder.
"How can you do this? The meeting with all the leaders is happening today and… I need this relief!"
Even now, she was still a glutton for rewards, punishments, attention and any sort of affection from the man she loved more than anything else. She may have been a "natural" in embracing the sex part of "sex slave", but a wholly obedient and servile slave that simply accepted every little whim of his? Atago was certain that such a role belonged to a different type of girl.
"Hmm? Would you like to repeat that?" He released her hair, growling out that question, the chains around her tightened as it responded to his will. Powerless to resist when restrained like this, she quickly attempted to craft an answer that would satisfy him.
"T-that was…" If she said it was "nothing" in this situation he would punish her for lying, the punishment for that had an equal chance of being the "good" kind, or the one that would result in not being allowed any release for a week, she couldn't afford to risk the latter and had to answer carefully.
All of a sudden, she felt waves of pleasure travelling through her body, "Ah… !"
Her body had been particularly sensitive after what he had just done, such that the sensation of his fingers running across her breasts and over her nipple was enough to amplify her arousal to bring her closer to orgasm.
"An… ah…"
But she wasn't there yet. Not yet.
No matter what, he wasn't going to let her enjoy that sweet release. The more she thought about how futile it was to change her circumstances, the more excited she became. .. truly, she was a hopeless slave to pleasure.
"Speak up fuck puppet."
She would do anything, say anything to gain his favor. She stopped caring about the consequences, her own principles, her dignity and even her won promises to herself.
Atago only knew one sure-fire way to save herself from a horrifying day, potentially a week, of being kept on the edge without being allowed to cum.
"Master… I've disappointed you. I have not been very appreciative of your affections. I've been entitled, and I apologize. I've just been so frustrated with the council."
She had just swallowed her pride and gave into the memes just to be allowed to cum at least once today. If this was a doujin, she would have gotten a "moral degradation" tag just for that.
Atago could beg him for his cock, lick his feet, let him film her body as much as liked… but she had believed that it was alright so long as she had set certain "boundaries" in their relationship.
Atago had thought that if she simply wouldn't budge on those "boundaries" she had set when they just began dating, she would have still gained the pleasure of being his sex pet while still being disciplined in "normal" life.
As inconsequential as not allowing prequel memes during their sexual activities were in comparison to the other rules, that prevented her from behaving in this manner in front of her parents and her peers, the fact of the matter was that she had finally caved just under two years since they began having sex.
"Ah! Amazing… ! Yes! So good… an~"
All of that shame and remorse was quickly swept away after being forced to cum again and again.
Her mind was almost completely blank as she was dragged by her hair to the shower room installed in the secret training facility. She only started to regain her awareness as she felt herself being cleansed by the hot water, soap and the efforts of Genshirou's hands.
"Wha… what time is it?" She asked as she was being washed.
"It's five minutes past 8 right now, breakfast will be ready in 15 minutes and your meeting is scheduled at 10, just in case you forgot the time." Genshirou helpfully supplied her with the information she needed.
Nowadays Genshirou had been going through all her work, summarizing and recording the data rapidly before transferring it directly to her mind in order to save time. Her life had become a lot easier after she had surrendered more of her duties and burdens to her ever capable master.
"Mmm, what's for breakfast?"
"If I said that it was right here? What would you do?"
"Ah…"
Atago turned around so that she could help herself to his seed, only to be stopped by him, as he pulled her into a kiss instead.
She began to felt the heat and arousal she felt draining away from her along with the slight sluggishness that she felt, a few moments later, as their lips parted, her body began to feel lighter than before.
Feeling rejuvenated from the healing and energy transfer, Atago could think more clearly, and relaxed into Genshirou's arms when he hugged her.
"I love you Atago. If you ever feel like I don't say it, or show it enough then, by all means, tell me and I will listen."
"Then I don't think there is anything more I need to say. Hehe, well, other than I love you too, Genshirou."
After washing up properly, Atago walked up the stairs to another floor of the training room along with Genshirou, peeking through a door, she saw Jeanne tap dancing as another Genshirou watched with a bored look in his eyes. Teofila was mindlessly fanning him with a palm leaf at the same time.
"Their mental resistance training isn't doing too well." The Genshirou next to her shook his head.
"I bet… half a year." For Atago herself, it took around 3 months until she was deemed "ready".
"Wow, you're optimistic! Valerie placed a bet for 8 months, without her assistance of course."
Of course, Longinus HAX is too OP. As Genshirou had complained time and time again.
Genshirou took her hand and led her out of the training facility created by his extensive research into the technology of all the organizations he had infiltrated and was further improved upon using his own brand of thinking and intelligence.
Atago hoped that for Genshirou's sake, the two of them would be able to have adequate mental defenses soon, so that he could pass on his knowledge and skills to them without fear of it being extracted by malevolent forces.
Both Atago and Valerie had to go through extensive training so that they could outright ignore "ancient" level mental magics. Those magics were found and copied by Genshirou, sealed away deep in an almost forgotten vault by the Grigori. It's "unfortunate" they left an electronic record of the location on their computers, with that hint, Genshirou, and his clones had found the place easily and made off with a copy of the knowledge. Apparently, they used to belong to long-dead gods before the God of the Bible dealt with them, and sealed away from those "forbidden" spells, only for it to be stolen by some of the Fallen when they fell.
With Vritra's knowledge adding onto it, Genshirou managed to form a comprehensive training course designed such that they could even shrug off powerful curses that would force them to give out any information or control them.
The only way Jeanne and Teofila could catch up to the level where they could "barely keep themselves alive" (by Genshirou's standards) is through acquiring a copy of Genshirou's knowledge and skills before building upon it themselves.
That was the way it was done with both Valerie and Atago.
Atago herself had managed to develop two new sword styles that fused "Sage Mode" with some conceptual effects based on purifying her Ki towards two distinct Ki "types", "Dou" and "Sei", just like in that martial arts manga. And on the magical side, well, Vritra told her that she had a "knack" for curses, which was high praise considering he inherited Genshirou's high standards as well. Couple with his intensive training of her body as she "slept", her physical ability had grown to levels that she had once thought off as impossible, although she needed to refine her movements by herself afterward.
After having breakfast with Genshirou's family, she changed into her formal kimono and got her customary "off-to-work" kiss from her husband-to-be, only to have felt something unusual around her neck before she left through the teleportation circle.
"And now, you look perfect."
"What did you… wait, no, a collar? I want one but I can't let everyone-"
"-Oh? Who was the one that gave up on her little rules just so that she could cum again? What's one more?"
He sent her off as the teleportation magic activated, placing her at the location of the meeting. No one other than the security staff (her clan) had arrived thus far.
She spent the better half of the hour before the meeting fantasizing about the disgrace she was about to face, only for the West Faction Youkai leader Yasaka, the person she ultimately reported to, compliment her on the beautiful "necklace" she had been wearing.
Atago had quickly excused herself to observe herself in the mirror, true enough, it was a necklace. It was merely enchanted with a mildly uncomfortable curse to make it feel like she was wearing a tight metal collar.
She had been too distracted to sense the magic on it.
Somehow she got the feeling that Genshirou was trying to illustrate why it was so important to check every single item near their vicinity for traps.
"My apologies, there was something I needed to check."
"No worries. We still have plenty of time before the meeting." Surprisingly enough, the nine-tailed fox sighed audibly in front of her, "Honestly… what were they thinking, saying that they should hold the meeting in Kyoto instead of the usual place at the last minute."
Normally, the meeting would take place at a neutral Chubu region, the center of Japan in terms of geography for the sake of fairness and security purposes.
This was a meeting that the Youkai leaders of the North, West, East and South regions would meet together. The Council of the Daiyoukai (Great Youkai) would be accompanied by key clan leaders and powerful Youkai that made up the respective executives (or Secretaries of a particular department) of each region's many functions.
In Atago's case, she had been handling affairs in place of her mother, within the capacity of Secretary of Security and Defense (for the Kansai and Chugoku region, that the West Youkai Faction manages) that the Kaiza clan has historically headed since for over a thousand years.
"The first thing that comes to mind is… ah yes, the Grigori has increased their business investments there, also, they seem to be expanding their network outwards with Nagoya City as their base." Her clan had managed to uncover that much before she managed to get confirmation from Genshirou about what had been going on in the area. "A small amount of their fighting force has been relocated there, although, most seem to be human from the looks of it."
While she was loyal to her faction, her loyalty only extended so much, and she wouldn't volunteer any information given to her by Genshirou and others if she couldn't explain how she got it without implicating them or raising suspicions on overstepping her bounds. The answer she had given Yasaka only covered what was known by the clan, officially that is.
There was no need for Yasaka to know that they relocated one of the Nephilim Academy branches to that region, much less the fact that Atago's housemate Jeanne, was a part-time teacher there.
And with what had happened with some rogue youkai, fallen angels, magicians, the five principle clans awhile ago, Atago knew that some youkai from the other regions were itching for revenge against Sacred Gear wielders. If Atago had brought up the Grigori's school with Yasaka, then her "leader" might volunteer the information to the rest of the leaders today, if she mistook the academy as a threat or felt that revealing the information might resolve an issue.
"Is that so…? Do you think that perverted governor is attempting to start an all-girls school with himself as the principal?"
"… What kind of impression did you get from your last meeting with Azazel?"
"I don't want him anywhere near my daughter. I'm sure Sakura shares my sentiment."
"My mother definitely does agree with your view… Hmm, they've arrived."
"Huh? Oh my, your senses are quite strong. Can you tell who has arrived?"
"All of them."
"Eh?" Why was Yasaka surprised? Atago had literally passed her the security brief on the new procedures just a few days ago? And surely, the nine-tailed fox should have sensed everybody coming.
If Genshirou were here then he would have sighed and complained about faction leaders not training enough. Thankfully, he wasn't here to gripe… Atago glanced at her own shadow and was reminded that his influence may as well have extended here as well.
She was now half-expecting him to start complaining through mental messages.
Having the North, West and South faction leaders teleporting to the entrance with their retinue at the same time wasn't a coincidence. She had her clan re-route any teleportation magic to a waiting room so that all of them could be escorted in together.
Once they were cleared, they would also have to pass through a custom teleportation circle that had additional security measures added onto it, to ensure that no tagalong biological parasites, impostors, or what Genshirou called "the usual culprits" would sneak into the meeting in order to sow discord or spy on them.
Her aunt Sophie (Secretary of Commerce) along with the rest of the West Faction clan leaders came along with the other youkai faction leaders. Unlike Yasaka and herself, no one else was required to arrive earlier to the meeting place, as it was only the Kyuubi clan and the Security department that had to play host for everyone.
Atago's presence caught the eye of some of the other senior youkai, although Yasaka helped to explain the circumstances, citing that her mother was on maternity leave and would not be present while she has to take care of her newborn children.
Nurarihyon of the East took a glance at the smaller West Faction group seated on one side of the large table, "Is it just me, or has a lot of the pretty ladies I'm used to seeing all on maternity leave?"
"We are experiencing a baby boom at the moment." Yasaka joyously informed everyone, getting mild looks of envy and resentment from a few other executives.
The meeting progressed rather normally after that. Atago hadn't needed to do much other than recite some statistics about how safe and secure their territory was, deflect whatever accusations on the Kaiza clan "overstepping" in creating a monopoly by providing security technologies as simply business, and remain calm despite the occasional jab at her young age.
There were some topics brought up on how Tokyo was "suspiciously safe" and how there was a "dangerous cult" operating there by Yamamoto Gorozaemon of the North. Atago was about to retort with the power of facts before surprisingly, Nurarihyon had been the first person to argue in favor of what had been happening.
Considering that the Kanto region was supposed to be under Nurarihyon's purview, Atago supposed it was natural that he tried to take advantage of Genshirou's efforts, at least to rub it in the other faction leader's face about how peaceful things are there in comparison to the usual inter-clan disputes and external conflicts that would arise in each territories.
Jinno Warugoro of the South didn't have much to add, other than there seemed to be a trend towards the "young ones" from his side wanting him to provide more "justice and security" than before.
"It hasn't even been half a century and now suddenly, the youngsters are calling for a return to martial law. I just don't understand it." Jinno looked baffled.
Atago would have felt similarly if Genshirou hadn't went on and on about how the Empire came to be through the manipulation of people's fears and desires for peace and stability.
"Now that you mentioned it, I've received a lot of complaints about how us Youkai as a whole have… what did they call it? Inefficiencies. Too much bureaucracy and all that." Yamamoto seemed slightly more out of touch with how things work on the ground.
"Truly? Then what do they wish for?" Atago was getting the impression that Yasaka was either ignoring the reports she had been sent, or was playing ignorant in order to trick them into thinking she was in the same boat as them, to fish for more information.
Either way, Atago considered it a brilliant play.
"It's probably centralized security. Just a few days ago, I got a signed petition from clan leaders asking for a police force for all Youkai without distinction, not just from my side of Japan but from all of yours too, calling themselves the "Delegation for Peace, Freedom, Justice and Security".
Oh no. Has Genshirou's prequel memes somehow became airborne? She didn't expect it to be this viral…
"Oh yes, I've received that too. It's uh… under the stack of paperwork I have." Jinno, please improve your office's processes!
"They were being too loud so I shooed them out of my office." Atago sure hoped that Yamamoto hadn't done so violently.
"That sounds like a wonderful idea. Why don't we discuss this now?" Yasaka seemed eager to discuss the feasibility of this.
2 hours later…
"And so, I believe that the position of Director for our National Police Agency should be given to Atago Kaiza."
Huh? What the hell was Yasaka saying? Atago was wondering to herself as she stared at the strange joke that Yasaka was playing on her.
And then suddenly everyone was in on the joke.
Atago knew that there would always be a workplace culture where the newbies or "youngsters" like herself would get bullied by her superiors or elders, but this was starting to get obsessive.
"We object!" Thankfully, some youkai weren't in on the joke, Atago was somewhat happy that the ferret youkai and the dog youkai from Nurarihyon's faction weren't going along with this.
"I am from the East youkai, Retsuza of Kamaitachi." The ferret youkai then brought out blades on both of his hand. "Likewise, I am a part of the East youkai, Lightning Beast Kumowatari" The dog youkai with the cloud all over him was sparkling electricity.
The pair made up one of the strongest youkais in the East!
That said, she still disliked the dog youkai since their clan played a part in her kidnapping back when she was young. Dumb mutts.
They started saying something about how only strong youkai could lead the police force, which Atago completely agreed on, but then they started to attack her!
She quickly knocked both of them out with the sheath of her sword using one of her special Ki techniques.
"… What…?"
"Huh?"
"What just happened!?"
"No way… !"
Atago was just as shocked as everyone else, after all…
"I can't believe it. After all that… how did these impostors get in!?"
After all that security enhancements they still allowed these spies to enter and attempt to disrupt the meeting with violence… or worse, they were planning to incite war by sending suicidal impostors that were weak enough to be easily killed!
Were that to happen, Nurarihyon's faction would be honor-bound to declare war on whoever killed them, weakening the Youkai as a whole and… ultimately, there would be an invasion or the chaos would have been the goal itself in order for the third-party to retrieve something of value from Japan. Could it be vampires? Have they found Valerie?
Thank goodness that Atago decided to start off with a non-lethal move.
"Nurarihyon-sama, we must act quickly in order to save the real Retsuza and Kumowatari! I will dispatch the police in order to search for them immediately."
"Uh, yes, that would be helpful Kaiza-san."
Fortunately, her clan members and the rest of the police force hadn't managed to search far before Nurarihyon's subordinate Magari, the Nekomata's leader, found the real ferret and dog youkai somewhere.
They had been knocked out and locked up somewhere nearby, for some odd reason, the bruises on their heads were in exactly the same spot where she had struck the fakes. It was probably an advanced puppetry technique that borrowed the victim's appearance through a strong sympathetic link, at least, that would be what Genshirou would have suggested if they were able to make it through their improved security.
Unfortunately for Atago, her swift action led to the leaders all but forcing her to take up the role they were joking about earlier. They even told their current leaders that managed their region's security to begin the handover process!
Atago wanted to cry. She didn't want to do any more work. All she wanted was to go home and get fucked like a good girl.
She told everything that had transpired during the day to Genshirou who was particularly mean today and was on the verge of laughing the entire time.
"Pft… haha…"
"What is so funny?"
"Ironic."
"You cannot just say "Ironic" to every little thing you find funny."
"True… do you remember how we first met?"
"Like it was yesterday. Why?"
"Remember what I told your mother after making all those misleading statements?"
Something about getting the real guards…?
"What have I done!?"
Level 27B
AN: Here we go~ Anyways, for reference, with how little pics there are of the Teofila (since she's just an unnamed mook in the anime with only these two relevant pictures, see below), I will be using the third picture I added for reference as her rough look thanks to her nicer life in this scenario.
Spoiler: As a queen getting buffed
[img: https/vignette.wikia./highschooldxd/images/c/c6/Diodora%27s_Bishop_healing_the_Queen.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20161114162539]
Spoiler: Nude after getting nuked
[img: https/i./ioS0x0f.png]
Spoiler: Silver hair Amber eyes
[img: https/i./o1WUDwb.png]
Level 27B
Throwing more firepower at the problem seemed to be the solution of many factions of this world, seemingly under the impression that more (magical) "dakka" would defeat even Ultimate/Satan/God class opponents.
I have tabled the possibility to Atago on whether such ideas were actually propaganda made by the leaders, in order to make those below them in both authority and combat power feel better about themselves.
Give them the illusion that they are important to society, to the military power, that they are needed… all to keep them content with their lot in life, whether they belong to the rich and powerful high class or the poor and mundane hard-workers that worked their way up.
Huh? That sounded like some kind of political extremist rhetoric. I should write them down and put it into a book.
"Loading of enchanted ammunition complete!"
"Firing in three… two…"
Funny how I have such random thoughts whenever I'm in the midst of advancing further in my own training. To think it all started after having bullets fired upon my from literally every direction (the sphere made out of machineguns with a tiny platform for me to stand on still looked stupid from the outside) as part of my tests.
Of course, ordinary bullets stopped having an effect on me ages ago. Even the enchanted ammunition used by certain exorcists, monster hunters and some supernatural races that liked to used guns had become ineffective against me at this point.
Unless they had further enchantments and additional personal power, these magical bullets would have no effect on me, even if it struck my open eye.
Honestly, if someone of my power can tank this with ZERO damage, then what chance does the majority of the supernatural world have against the strongest beings in the world?
Anyways, now that the "disintegration" test had been completed with the normal and wholly magical ammunition, it was time to see how it would my new powers would fare against a hybrid approach like this.
The two clones triggered the mechanism.
I wrenched away the nuclear force that bound the nucleons into the atomic nuclei, simultaneously with its mystical equivalent, the "thought power" that bound ideas, concepts, calculations, beliefs, and reality together to give magical energy its effects.
Every single bullet was disintegrated as it touched my skin, it's atoms breaking apart harmless against me, it wasn't as difficult as I had envisioned once I had those two different energy manipulation methods down to pat.
I was on the crux of achieving the "unlimited" power. Just a little bit more until I could properly transform mass into energy outright.
And when I do… I can escalate my training to a more adequate level without giving away my presence to anyone of significance.
"Test complete."
"We will dismantle the apparatus."
"It's dinner time."
"Oh boy, our mum has claimed the kitchen today. Guess we're in for a surprise."
"We'll be dead by then."
"From a point of view."
"You know, going "pop" doesn't seem so scary anymore when it happens nearly every day."
My clones started chattering away as they casually speak about their imminent cessation of existence as semi-sentient constructs.
To simply things, I decided not to join the conversation, so that I wouldn't have to be reminded of the fact that I talked to myself when the memories of these independent clones eventually return back to me.
Elsewhere, the clones with a more direct connection had all shared a smile as I made even further progress with my abilities, the clone at Nephilim Academy earned a "tell me more" look from the dead boy's sister as she asked what was I smiling to myself about.
The "Koji" clone next to Perseus looked as insane as ever, those that were handling security all across the world and nearby were, thankfully, spared the odd looks from others as they all shared my joy.
Vritra was informed immediately and quickly took the "me" traveling with him to get celebrate "dragon-style", whatever that was.
Even though Atago was playing together with me on our Nintendo Switch, she still managed to pick out the meaning of my smile and asked the "me" over there about what had happened. In the neighbouring room, Valerie was pouting about how "distracted" I was even as she was bobbing up and down my dick, although she seemed to be happy for me regardless.
Jeanne was too focused on racing "me" on our competitive bicycles to have noticed how satisfied I was with my own progress. Teofila was more used to my facial expressions due to spending a significant amount of time staring at me when she thought I wasn't looking, hence, she was able to ask the right questions from the "me" currently cleaning up her newly refurbished church together with her.
The other group of independent clones with a few of my directly connected clones were quickly informed of the good news and had gotten even more fired up to achieve a power greater than any Jedi ("Legends" included, obviously).
I spent the time before dinner with another set of clones, all of them attempting to disintegrate me while I tried to hold on to the integrity of my body, soul, and spirit. It would be the height of foolishness to not develop the ability to be immune to my own brand of disintegration.
Of course, as expected, it's a lot easier to destroy rather than create. After a few rounds, I had to spend the rest of the time recovering the dispersed fragments of a small portion of my being.
It's a good thing that I found out that my new abilities were deadly enough to the point where even my usual defenses needed massive upgrades to keep up with my offensive capabilities.
I couldn't let my defense fall behind. Someone like me can't afford to let my defense, speed, techniques lag behind pure offensive power like the rest of the supernatural world.
If I had a weakness or an imbalance in my "stats", it needed to be rectified immediately or I could end up one-shotted due to the power of dumb tropes, like the one that relied on my enemies "exploiting that one weakness" in spite of how outmatched they might be in other aspects.
The same applied to the trump cards that allowed me to fight way beyond my current level by ludicrous degrees. I can only afford to use them sparingly in real fights.
If I allowed it to become my "normal" fighting state, my trump cards and many Balance Breakers would quickly become "outdated" by the next one or two major fights. As the main characters across many series have demonstrated time and time again.
Long story short, I had to hold back a lot so that I could pull off more "You FOOL! This isn't even my final form! Wait until you see my TRUE power! HYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-" moments.
That methodology was one of the few countermeasures I have to stay ahead of the incoming non-sensical power creep. If all goes well I would only need to go full power, and beyond even that level, should Trihexa be unsealed anyways.
One year. And only slightly more than that.
I only have so little time left to stock up enough strength, knowledge, and skill to pull off an attack of the magnitude that I am envisioning. If I can just crack the mass to energy ability, then I could at least solve the required energy issue ahead of schedule.
Dinner had progressed as per usual.
Our dinner table has been upgraded once again now that our family has grown.
If I counted in all my baby siblings and Vritra… usually, we would have twelve people at the dining table whenever we had a meal. That number is increased whenever I invite visitors into our home like Tomoe and Momo, or when Atago's family comes to visit.
I sure hope Vritra doesn't grant his newly adopted dog, Daisy, a seat of her own.
That would be outrageous and unfair to Sheev, as my pet parrot has not been granted a seat on the dinner table. Rightfully so as he was too small to take a seat. Besides, I figured that Sheev was satisfied with Valerie's shoulder, despite the occasional (rightfully deserved) abuse he got for messing with his "Master".
A few hours after dinner, Teofila found "me" (as in one of my clones, not that they were hard to find around the house) alone in the attic. I was working on magic based on Astrology while tinkering with some new magi-tech on the side as I awaited the results of a magical experiment regarding horoscopes.
Of course, I was literally all around the house interacting with everyone, as per usual.
I always make sure to assign at least one clone per person whenever I'm officially "at home". If someone wants some alone time, that clone can go do something else while remaining in our large home. This also giving a chance for the same person or someone else to approach that clone for some private talk later on.
"Oh, Teofila. What's that delicious sweet thing I'm smelling?" I asked as I turn to face her.
The attic was lit up by the moonlight along with many tiny floating magical lamps the size of glass marbles, they were used in order to simulate certain patterns of the stars in the sky, while also making them useful in providing a (no pun intended) seemingly magical environment that I could relax in.
The silver-haired former nun, now self-proclaimed pastor, blinked as she tore her gaze away from the beautiful lights to focus on what she came here to do.
Smiling prettily, she moved the plate she hid behind her back, bringing it forward to put it in front of me.
"I made a dessert. For you. Um, I would have made more for everyone too. Buuuuut eh, I wanted you to try it first."
Taking the feelings I was sensing to account, I gave her a bright smile and thanked her for her thoughtfulness. The young woman's heart fluttered with joy at my positive response.
I looked at the fried dough sprinkled with powdered sugar on the plate. While I had a good idea of what it was after narrowing it down through her nationality, I still asked anyway, as it would probably be a great conversational starter.
"Plăcinte cu brânză dulce, fried dough with sweet cheese." She answered in both her native language and Japanese, despite the knowledge transfer, she still maintained her Romanian accent just like Valerie had did, "Anyway, I was at the market the other day, and I saw some cheese that was on sale for a good price so I decided to buy it to make something back home."
I perked up at the last word in her sentence, she could see that I was happy with what she had just said.
"Um, what?" Teofila still hadn't quite noticed what I had been so happy about.
"You called this home."
The girl's amber eyes widened considerably, strong feelings of contentment and joy radiated from her.
"What else would I call it?" She asked, daring me to provide an alternative that she would no doubt reject outright.
"I wouldn't have you call it anything less."
Sitting side by side, we laughed and chatted a lot as we ate the dessert together.
I enjoyed it greatly and made sure she knew it. In addition to that, I also provided her some feedback on how she could both improve and modify it to create some variations to cater to the different palates in this household if she desires to make it again.
"Of course I would make it again. This is my specialty."
"You have a specialty?"
At my surprised look, she grinned and explained further.
"I know how to make lots of things. When I was back at the church I cooked every day. I've been saving this for a special occasion."
Hmm, what makes this such a special occasion?
"A night alone with you certainly makes this a very special occasion."
Her thoughts quickly changed trajectory towards the lewd direction.
"Y-you say that with every girl, don't you!?" Her face was red as her imagination ran wild, she pouted at my reply, conflicted on whether to feel happy or offended.
Well, I suppose I should answer that question for her.
"I suppose I do say that a lot." Before she could respond in an angry manner, I cup her face and turned it towards me, "But that doesn't make it any less true."
"G-genshirou, I-I… do you…"
"Will you let me?"
"Yes! I've always… always loved you."
I kissed her tenderly. The affection we showed each other for the rest of the night was just as innocent as that kiss was. I was more than satisfied with that for now.
A few days after that, we were finally ready to go for our long-awaited beach trip to Okinawa.
My parents and the rest of our family would be visiting my grandparents with a clone of me as a separate trip.
Meanwhile, I would be going along with Atago, Valerie, Jeanne, Teofila and my school friends that we've invited to join us (aka, the fan club that I can scarcely believe that I even have).
Sona wouldn't be coming due to her returning to the Underworld in order to spend precious time with her beloved older sister. Too bad. Teofila and I could really use Sona to divert Jeanne's teasing to someone else, aka, her favorite target Sona Sitri.
Our household had arrived a day earlier so that I could make sure to give them the alone time each of them deserved before the group of girls that were "not in the know" arrived.
I hadn't wasted any time before I pounded Atago and Valerie against the rocks present on the beach. Not this time, I wasn't about to cockblock myself with some "training" nonsense.
Even I want to enjoy my summer!
My beach episode shall not be ruined this time.
Especially when I will have to manage five new confessions on this one trip.
"Genshirou, if it's not too much trouble…" Teofila gestured to the beach mat I laid on the abominable sand, "Can you rub sunscreen over me? I-It's my first time."
Spoiler: Teofila
[img: https/i./kCh4dXD.png]
Oh yes, don't mind if I do!
"Hey, me too! I don't want my beautiful skin to get sunburned. I mean, I don't mind getting a tan but if everyone ends up laughing at me then I don't know what I'll do!"
Spoiler: Jeanne
[img: https/i./ouOaUPD.jpg]
Wearing a more conservative type of swimwear than Teofila did, Jeanne was also asking me to rub sunscreen on her.
Come to think of it, she seems to jump in a lot whenever I'm showing Teofila a particular amount of attention… oh, she's a bit jealous.
And she has no idea what she's feeling. I guess that is to be expected from a girl that spent most of her life fighting and not living as a normal girl. Still, she knew enough to figure out that Teofila harbored a crush for me since the beginning.
Ironic. She could comprehend the feelings of others, but not her own.
Okay then, I'm just going to increase my goals a bit.
Make that six confessions for this trip.
Level 28
AN: Well… my usual habit kicked in and I couldn't bear to gloss over things, so yeah… now that I've done setting up the location, people, etc… I should be able to get through the rest of the girls in the next update. Two down, four to go.
Level 28
The original plan had called for a collective invite to visit a local beach somewhere not too far off, but that plan had been tossed out the window immediately after they had gotten the invitations from their target himself.
Invitations for an all-expense-paid trip to a luxurious Okinawan beach resort.
While this would normally cause worry among normal people with regards to a person's spending habits, it is a well-known fact that Genshirou's "harem" was collectively wealthy. Atago was known to be part of a wealthy lineage, Valerie was an obviously rich foreign girl and Genshirou had made mentions of receiving royalty money from various business ventures he had a key stake in.
Hence, the five high-school girls that were invited onto the trip were more flattered by the act of being personally invited, rather than aghast at the amount of money spent on them.
"You know, somehow I imagined that we would be going to Okinawa on a ferry." The youngest of the girls, the third-year middle school student and former gang leader, Ruruko Nimura, found herself feeling somewhat cheated out of something as she walked out of the plane.
"If you want to spend 20 plus hours on both a train and a ferry for three times the cost of this flight, by all means." Momo Hanakai, first year high schooler and one-year Ruruko's senior, spoke out of experience as she recalled some less than stellar family holidays.
Ruruko held up one of her hands and began to do some mental mathematics.
"Let's gooooo!" Tomoe Meguri exclaimed as she made a dash for the exit, only to be quickly grabbed by her fellow devil Reya Kusaka.
"Um, we still have to get our luggage." Reya reminded her friend.
"You mean your luggage? We're all hand-carry only." Aika Kiryuu, one of the two humans on this trip, made a slight correction to Reya's statement. "I wonder what could you be keeping in that second bag? Ah, did you bring your "toys"?"
"W-what? N-no! I didn't bring anything like that. T-they're just books. And uh, some books that I borrowed from Saji-kun that I wanted to return to him." The normally soft-spoken girl looked to the side in a suspicious manner, none of the other girls believed that was the full story.
"So you plan to pass a whole bag to your classmate to take bag home? Sure…" Aika grinned as she continued to tease her schoolmate and fellow "fan club" member.
"Why do I get the feeling that some of us aren't just going to stop at the "confessing" part?" Momo muttered to herself, until she felt a familiar presence, looking behind, she spotted her (over)doting father in a bad disguise behind the group. "H-hey, let's get a move on, like, now!"
She hadn't shared her full itinerary with her father other than the fact that she was going to Okinawa. She would have done so if her father hadn't overreacted when she let slip that it was Genshirou that invited her. Thankfully, there were plenty of anti-gun laws in Japan, or Genshirou would find himself being shot at by her father with his imaginary shotgun friend that he talks about in his sleep.
Momo managed to guide the group in such a way to lose her father and make it to the resort without him following her.
Their benefactors were there to greet them in the main lobby, Genshirou went ahead and helped them all carry their bags to their rooms like a proper gentleman. It still looked weird as hell to see him balance so many bags in his arms like it was nothing. If his martial feats weren't so well known at this point, the devils of the group would certainly wonder if he was actually human.
Perhaps the most startling thing for them to see that day was the obvious dog collar that Genshirou's first girlfriend had worn around her neck. If the devils had any doubt about the Head of Security for Japan's supernatural world truly loving Genshirou in that manner, then such doubts were surely erased at that moment.
As they were all sitting in one of the room's to discuss what they were going to do today, Genshirou picked up his phone to check his notifications and quickly shared what he saw with everyone.
"Atago, Valerie, look. Issei posted a picture of him and Irina on the beach. Aww, they look so cute together!"
"Huh, puberty does hit hard." Atago's comment got an odd side glance from Genshirou, as if he were saying "look who's talking".
"Is it really okay to wear something like that? Isn't she supposed to be a good Christian girl?" Valerie got the rest of the girl's interested in the photo.
"Oh, Irina? I haven't seen her in awhile. She's dating her childhood friend?" Jeanne was slightly out of the loop, for everyone's convenience, she was speaking in heavily accented Japanese.
"Last I heard, he's also "not-fucking" her too." Aika whistled as she moved to get a good view on the picture, "Wow, she's hot."
"Wait, what does that mean?" Teofila asked for an explaination, which Aika happily gave, talking about how Genshirou pretty much convinced the girl that Anal doesn't count as sex. The former nun threw her hands up in the air, "Does no one practice proper theology anymore?!"
Jeanne looked at her silver-haired friend and muttered something under her breath.
"Well, since he's shared a picture like this to me on his social media account I may as well return the favor. Come on girls, selfie time!" Genshirou moved to some other part of the room to get the lighting right.
Atago and Valerie were by his side in an instant!
Genshirou paused and turned to Teofila, "Earth to Teo~ You're in this as well."
The silver-haired maiden looked momentarily shocked, but she quickly followed his lead with a smile and joined the group, smiling a bit awkwardly at the phone camera as Genshirou took a couple of photos of them together.
Jeanne looked a little left out as she stood at the side by herself.
For the girls that came together as a group, their minds had easily pieced together the various bits of information to realize the truth of the situation.
Genshirou was taking a photo with all his girlfriends. Teofila was included, ergo, she was his girlfriend but her slight hesitance showed that she was unused to her current position. Jeanne was a close friend of Teofila yet wasn't included in Genshirou's photo, hence, she must have been the third-wheel (or was it fifth-wheel since he had three girlfriends at present?) of the group.
This small event was also enough for the Genshirou "fan club" to realize yet another thing… the French girl showed the exact same wistful disappointment that they had when they realized they weren't in the picture with their crush!
"I know it's a little late but… can we improvise for a plus one?" Tomoe whispered softly to the group, getting incredulous looks from them.
"Do you have a death wish?" Reya Kusaka hadn't been as familiar with Jeanne other than that one encounter with her in the student council room, and thus, considered the scenario rather differently.
While it was known that Jeanne had left the "Church" on an official capacity, the girl was still considered a "Saint" and an "exorcist" by trade. Tomoe considered the entire scenario on the level of individual friendship due to her personal friendly relationship with Jeanne, but Reya had been in the Sitri peerage a while longer, hence was slightly more used to considering the political aspects of such a suggestion.
If it was found that a devil servant was willingly engaged in a relationship (even if they were part of a harem for someone that wasn't affiliated with any factions) with an exorcist, rogue or otherwise, it would be a recipe for disaster for both the peerage and their master.
"We could just play it off like Atago-senpai. If no one thinks it's serious then they wouldn't think twice."
The rest of the school and the supernatural world believed that someone of Atago Kaiza's status wouldn't associate with a normal human in such a manner. They were under the impression that she had deeper motives for attending a human school within devil territory and was using such a "baffling relationship" as a cover for her true intentions.
Genshirou's immediate friends and these particular girls knew otherwise. Whether it was by seeing a glimpse of the girl's true character, belief in the purity of their love or had seen "undeniable" proof of it, they knew that the Youkai girl was utterly devoted to her man.
Well… that, and it is kind of hard to not believe it when they had just seen her getting wet at simply being seen wearing a dog collar like that.
After that little event, Valerie went ahead and offered the girls several lists of things they could do today. This was a weeklong vacation and while they had plenty of time, there were also lots of things to do around Okinawa.
The girls put it to a vote and unanimously picked the beach first anyways.
Genshirou departed for his own room as they were going to change into their beachwear.
Before he left, Reya saw Genshirou and Aika having a little chat together.
Aika's face slowly heated up with embarrassment and also excitement as Genshirou slipped something into the girl's hand for her use. She had only managed to catch a small glimpse of the item, and it immediately dawned on the normally quiet bookworm that her openly perverted classmate wasn't just "all talk" as she had initially assumed.
Reya made a note to have more chats with the human girl in private sometime. In her research on the topic of romance as of late, she had "stumbled" onto much "research material" that she wished to discuss with someone else. Now that the covert pervert had confirmed that her fellow "comrade" in the war for love wasn't just faking it, she felt that she finally had someone to talk to about the "reference material" she brought in her luggage to help in her quest for Genshirou.
Spoiler: Aika
[img: https/i./kkNtc9u.jpg]
What the hell was wrong with her?
This was one of the few occasions where she could think those words without wallowing in angst or disgust over something she masturbated to.
Yet she was still going along with this.
The first thought that came to her mind when he made his "suggestion" was that he was out to embarrass her to fulfill some mean spirited prank, like that one boy she liked back at middle school. She had quickly dismissed the possibility as only a shitty hate sink character in a grudge/revenge Isekai story or doujin would so such a thing, and Genshirou was pretty much the exact opposite of that archetype.
"My mother is going to kill me if she finds out."
"Hey Aika-chan, you done in there?"
"Yeah! I'll be with you in a bit."
Aika quickly answered Tomoe before doing some last checks on her swimsuit.
She exited their shared Japanese-styled room together with her travel group till they reached the meeting point.
Just as they were about to start their day at the beach and say some cliche lines to commemorate the occasion, Aika's legs had suddenly closed up together as a reaction to a strong sensation.
The remote-controlled vibrator that Genshirou "asked" her to put on had just been turned on at the strongest setting.
The involuntary and brief scrunching of her toes made her trip over nothing.
"Ah!"
"Gotcha. Are you alright Kiryuu-san?"
The blonde young man caught her before she stumbled, while his words carried the same kind and concerned tone that she was used to at school, the slight grin on his face matched his usual expression whenever he was teasing his girlfriend, Atago Kaiza, in public.
Aika covered up her embarrassment by focusing on the indignity caused by his actions in the first place, facing his grin with one of her own, "Oh, of course, Saji-san. I just slipped a bit."
"Okay then. I'm glad you're alright."
To the side, Aika caught Reya looking at them both. Genshirou's soft-spoken classmate's face was beet-red for some odd reason.
Aika did her best to get used to the varying intensity of the vibrator just under her swimsuit as they walked along. Genshirou was off making conversation, dedicating equal amounts of time to everyone.
Atago couldn't come along all of a sudden as she had to manage some aspects of her "family business".
"Oh my, it seems like one of the employees we have in Okinawa has broken some guidelines or two. I have to pop in to "sort him out"." The ever pleasant and friendly smile on the older girl's face gave way to a rare angry scowl. Atago must have been very angry as she was currently crushing her own smartphone to the point where the screen was cracking!
"SORT HIM OUT!?" Reya, Momo and Tomoe screamed at once, the student council trio suddenly hugged each other tightly as they stared at Atago in fear.
Ruruko and Aika both looked confused at their reaction.
"What a pity. Don't worry Atago, I shall complete our grand sandcastle myself!" Valerie started randomly talking about sandcastles!
Genshirou's blonde Romanian girlfriend pumped her fist in the air, then quickly grabbed her fellow countrymen, Teofila's hand, and lifted it up as well.
"Team Romania!"
"Wah! You can't just steal my teammate! Geeeeen! She can't do that! Stop her… or something." Jeanne, of all people, protested in a childish manner.
Genshirou explained to everyone, "We came a day earlier because of Atago's schedule, started a sandcastle building competition and well, yeah, we got competitive."
He pointed at the massive sand sculptures located at the resort's private beach. Some of the other residents were already there posing for pictures! What a minute, how are those works of art even considered to be mere "sandcastles"?!
Aika's brain was having a hard time processing what she was looking at. Thankfully, she wasn't alone in this, and the rest of her friends were also similarly stunned.
"Hmm, I think we should only spend one more hour on this. Anyways, I renounce my position as judge and join Jeanne's team! Go Team Blondies!"
"For the blondes!"
Aika and Ruruko paired up to form a new team while Tomoe and Momo made up the other team. Reya designated herself as the new Judge by default.
After 15 minutes, the new teams had all come to the stark realization that their sand sculpting arts were no match for the other two teams.
Everyone else decided to give up and commentate on the two remaining team's activities as if it were a professional sport. Aika noticed that Reya didn't seem to be paying much attention to the competition, and was sneaking glances at both Aika and Genshirou very frequently.
"It's over Romanians! I have the high ground! Vive la France!" Jeanne declared victory after the time limit had passed, she had built up another level onto her sandcastle, resulting in claiming a geographically higher position than Teofila and Valerie.
"If you're claiming this for France then I may as well do it for the UK."
"Treason!"
Genshirou got kicked off the castle by his own teammate.
"Uh yes, Team Blondie wins!" Reya got her act together and declared victory.
Teofila and Valerie looked satisfied regardless of the loss.
"Okay, that's it. The beach is fun but the sand is irritating. I had enough of sand, now if you will excuse me-" Valerie retrieved her phone from the bag she placed on a beach mat, "I have stocks to sell and money to make. Have fun!"
"Well then…" Genshirou moves next to Teofila and takes her hand, his newest girlfriend smiled shyly at his action, "Guess it's just us huh?"
"Hey, don't forget me!" Jeanne was the only one that had the courage to interrupt at that moment.
"I didn't forget. When I said "us", I meant all of "us". Of course, I have to pay special attention to my girlfriend, don't I?"
"I certainly would appreciate that." The silver-haired foreigner looked really happy about that.
Seeing them like this, Aika was beginning to wonder if Genshirou was about to spout some maximum lovey-dovey lines, only for her thoughts to be interrupted by the sudden jump in vibrational intensity.
"Eep!"
"What's wrong Kiryuu-san? Were you bitten by a crab?"
Nevermind. He was still focused on messing with her.
Everyone else was all tired out at the assortment of games and activities that Genshirou had planned ahead of time. As they were all heading back to their rooms, Aika was taken to the side by the man that had given her the perverted task earlier in the day.
Somehow, she managed to survive the day without anyone figuring out that she had a sex toy attached. She was, however, at her limit. After being worn out by the activities, she wasn't sure if she could muster enough energy to hold herself back at this point.
"Did you enjoy yourself?"
He asked her after dragging her around the resort to a secluded spot. From what she could tell, Genshirou had surely planned this.
"You can be a bastard if you try huh?" She attempted to dodge the question to no avail.
"That wasn't a "no". I'm impressed, you actually went ahead and kept it in for the entire day."
"Heh, I had practice."
Though she may have tried to sound confident, it was quite clear to both of them that this was the first time she had done something like that.
"But had you ever felt this excited? Not knowing when the next session will start, at what intensity? Whether or not someone would have seen you quiver in pleasure like this? Or if they would-" He placed a hand on her thigh, stroking his finger up her skin in a way that made her feel good, "-see you this wet?"
"No. Of course not, what else do you want it to say damn it?" She wasn't angry despite how frustrated she sounded, that said, she wanted him to get to the point.
"Were you happy?"
"… Yes."
"Then I'm glad." He released his hold on her, to her surprise, "I was worried that you wouldn't enjoy yourself. I took a bit of a gamble, you know, followed my gut feeling and hoped you would actually like this sort of thing. If not, well, you could punch me now."
"Eh? Well, um… I don't feel like punching you… wait, so this isn't part of some hentai plot where you keep me on the edge for the whole day before taking me to the side and fuck me silly?"
"Do you want it to be?"
A hint of uncertainty crept into Aika's voice as she voiced her answer, "Would you… be alright with that? I mean, your girlfriends are like… hot, like, super hot. And I'm… well, me. Surely you could do better than some perverted nerd with a childish hairstyle and big ugly glasses like this."
Honestly, she's made plenty of stupid decisions in her life. When she was in middle school she was bullied for being a bit too cute, she overreacted and changed her look in a drastic manner before applying to a school where all the girls were said to be super pretty, then before she knew it she had gotten way too comfortable staying at near the bottom of the totem pole.
It's not as if she needed to look the way she did. She was a high school girl after all, and her fashion sense wasn't utterly abysmal. If she wanted to, she could at least look "decent" rather than match the looks of her perverted acquaintances, at least, that was what she told herself.
These days, she has been feeling a lot less confident about that.
"If I was so shallow then I wouldn't have gone through all of the trouble, now would I?"
"Huh?"
"There was something about you, how do I say it… I guess I had a feeling that you had quite a bit of potential, you know. In the sense that you would be open and accepting to a lot of things, and I kinda like that thing in a girl."
"What are you talking about?"
"You don't notice it but you actually make friends, or at least acquaintances, very easily. You worry about not being accepted into groups while you're probably the most accepting person in the school, outside of a few others."
"Now you're just flattering me…"
She supposed that from a certain point of view, that could be true, considering the people she hung out and spoke with on a daily basis. She could have been judging herself a bit too harshly in that regard.
"And I like that. That's the main reason, you're also pretty, so that's a big plus."
"That's not true."
"I'm not the type to lie about those kinds of things."
She felt him place a hand on her cheek and forced her to look at him straight in the eye. Somehow, she could believe him when he said that.
"I know… that's kind of, why… I like you."
Aika felt him kiss her on the lips, she couldn't find it in herself to disagree with his actions and decided to see where he would take her.
"Then if you'll have me."
"I think I'll have you now."
"Right here? Outside?"
"I already had that fantasy in mind the whole day thanks to you. The least you could do is fulfill it."
"Don't mind if I do."
"Ah!"
She yelped as he turned her around, parted her swimsuit with his fingers and took her virginity in record speed!
He didn't stop there and proceeded to fuck her against the wall until she couldn't think of anything else other than his dick.
She recalled him fucking her in all sorts of positions before guiding her to the bathrooms that led to the open-air baths. By the time she was there, she took a few minutes to comprehend what had just happened and washed herself up before returning to her resort room.
The girls questioned her about what had happened, and in the spirit of their agreements, Aika provided them details.
Very explicit details.
Spoiler: Jeanne
[img: https/i./KqVXMeo.jpg]
"You did what?"
"You sound surprised."
Genshirou responded casually as he placed the finishing touches to the sleep spell on Teofila so that she could get some rest. Her best friend was feeling worn out and wanted to get a lot of sleep, and so enlisted Genshirou for help in that regard.
Meanwhile, Jeanne was questioning Genshirou's recent choices in engaging in sexual intercourse with his schoolmate.
Jeanne thought it wasn't her place to do anything more than proclaim God's word and laws before letting him make his own decisions. Yet, she felt unusually irritated about this particular act of his.
"But Gen, you barely know her."
"I can get to know her better over the course of a year. We did agree to a trial period of a year to see if I could keep up, after all."
That sounded more like a "performance guarantee" to the girls rather than anything else, not that he had a chance to fail to meet up with the standards he had set. Even if he kept a single body to manage all the girls that aren't "in the know", he would still be able to pull it off somehow.
"That's… not the point. Um, she's just a normal girl, if you get involved with her then, I don't know. I'm worried, that's all." It wasn't all, but her worry for both their wellbeings was certainly real.
As always, Genshirou seemed to have an answer ready for her. This time, he had delivered it in a more pleasing manner… by sitting next to Jeanne and laid his hand over her own, his physical touch itself playing a role in reassuring Jeanne.
"A girl like her has a chance of running into a devil contract pamphlet at some point considering where she lives. And you know how I am with not interfering in their business in these cases. Even so, that's not the main reason. I just want to give it a shot too, dating a normal girl, building each other up as people through our relationship, exploring the future together… at least for awhile. Then I can introduce her to my super awesome "how to win at life and not be a wage slave" plan later on."
"Well… I'm glad that you're not doing it as a spur of the moment thing. But how about the supernatural world?"
"She will take it well. I know it. And as for how I know… you will have to complete the mental interference prevention courses in order to find out more, just like Asia did."
"Heeh?! Oh come on! And what? Asia completed that stuff!?"
"Why else would I be mostly fine with letting her know so much information that can be used against me? Other than our friendship, of course."
"… Point. That fits you, a lot. Wait, did you make her tapdance too?"
Jeanne was still rather annoyed at the fact that he made her tap dance like an idiot after putting her under those "god-class" ancient spells.
"Nope. I used her body to play music on the piano."
"I feel mistreated."
"Don't be so overdramatic. At least I didn't make you sing God Save the Queen."
"I will kill you. I swear if you make me do it, then record it, I will kill you."
"That's the Jeanne I know."
"Is it wrong for my best friend to remember me by my hatred for all things British?"
"That could be a light novel title."
"I disagree, it's not specific enough. And it doesn't have "Isekai", "Maou" or "Dungeon" in it."
"You have learned well."
Jeanne enjoyed the usual conversations they had when they were alone. Atago was still working, Valerie was out on the beach attempting to make some sort of "sand monster", Teofila was asleep, so that left Genshirou all to herself. (Other than the clones running around in every other city, factions and family)
As she was enjoying bantering and talking about all sorts of things with him, she noticed his gaze occasionally drifting somewhere else. Following his sight, she saw him looking at Teofila's cute sleeping face.
"Why?"
"Jeanne?"
"It's rude you know. Looking at another girl when you're talking with someone as pretty as me."
"I think you left your humility back in Kuoh… Hmm, isn't it only natural to stop and stare at your lover's sleeping face? I'd like to think so."
"I guess."
"Hey."
"Hmm?"
"We're friends, you and I."
"Of course we are. You're my best friend!"
Jeanne declared loudly, wondering why he was saying something out of the blue like that. As if she needed a reminder that they were just friends.
She wasn't sure why she was so unsatisfied with just that fact, as of late.
"I consider you one of my best friends too." He smiled warmly, seeing him happy like this made her feel less restless, or what was the word? At peace, yes, that's it.
The times when she see that her friends and those she considered family are safe and happy like this, are the times when she could wholeheartedly say she was living in the Lord's peace.
Or was it joy? Her theology was a bit rusty at this point.
"As you should. Hahaha!"
"Yup. And you know, it's because that you're my best friend, that no matter how many lovers I'll get, I will always make time and be there for you too."
"R-really?! Like, really really?" Jeanne turned her face and pressed it forwards her nose was almost touching his.
"Always." Genshirou promised with utmost seriousness, in that always reliable manner that she had come to associate with his "warrior" personas.
"I-is that so…? That's um, I'm glad to hear that."
She wasn't quite sure how to respond to that even though it made her feel very happy.
"That said…"
"Hmm?"
Genshirou seemed to be taking his time, which was convenient for her since she was still trying to catch with what she was just feeling.
If she had to be honest, the only thing that would make her happier would be if he promised to spend just as much time with her as he would with his lovers.
Well, she couldn't hope for that to happen.
Unless of course, she became his girlfriend too and eventually marry him.
Why was she thinking about such things? Perhaps all her internal reflections about how "Christian" relationships should be in contrast with how Genshirou had managed his relationships had begun to take root in her mind?
To the point where she was actually considering a romantic relationship with him.
Could she even do romantic? She could tell it apart from normal love but she never experienced it herself. Or had she? She didn't know.
What would she even say? If he suddenly kissed her then what would she do?
Her imagination began to run wild at this point.
Although, in all the scenarios she imagined, there wasn't a single one where she didn't say-
"I want you to bear my children. Won't you be my girlfriend too?"
"Yes!"
Wait what? What did she just say? Eh? EHHHH!? Did she just speak her thoughts out loud or let that slip out somehow? What had she done?!
Genshirou's eyes widened slightly in surprise, he asked in a hopeful sounding manner, "Are you sure? Is this what you really, really want?"
"I-I… mnn…"
Was she really okay with going through with this?
Until she met him, all she ever knew was the life of a warrior, to fight for the sake of mankind's continued survival and for God's will.
Would it be okay to let a part of her live the life of a normal girl too?
"Um…"
Jeanne nodded furiously.
The words wouldn't come out of her mouth after her initial embarrassment, but they hadn't needed to, as he accepted her response regardless.
"I see. I'm going to do something I've wanted to do for a very, very long time. Will you let me kiss you?"
"K-kiss, y-yeah, of course, I would be fine with that. Haha, a kiss is always a good place to start a relationship at, instead of you know, suddenly jumping into premarital sex. Not that I thought about it at all, I only thought about having children but since I'm a pure saint I never thought of what happens in between and-"
He finally saved her from embarrassing herself further by taking her first kiss.
Level 29
Level 29
The next day began with a local breakfast in town before a bit of sightseeing. As much as the Kuoh Academy students enjoyed the experience, most of the girls felt awkward whenever they addressed the sole male of the group.
Having heard Aika's very descriptive account of what happened yesterday and the girl's sincere admission of how she "can't live without his dick anymore", they couldn't very well look at their crush without imagining ending up as Aika had.
The open pervert was currently latching onto one of Genshirou's arms as they walked about the typical tourist's spots, Jeanne held on to his other arm with a curious look as she took in all the foreign sights.
Teofila was being "consoled" by Atago and Valerie after having her expectations of holding hands with Genshirou dashed when Jeanne and Aika beat her to it. His long-time girlfriends already had their "fill" of Genshirou in a private place with his clones when they were finished with their personal tasks, as such, they weren't rushing to claim Genshirou's limited time (in a vacation scenario with a reduced clone presence).
"Did you ever hear of the most famous snorkeling and diving spot on the main island of Okinawa? I thought no-"
"It's the Blue Cave."
Atago quickly reigned Genshirou in before he finished his low effort derivative meme.
"Yup. Who's up for it?" Genshirou asked for some hands up.
Five out of nine of them were enthusiastic about it, the rest weren't really interested.
"I'm pretty sick of getting wet… with ocean water, I mean." Atago corrected herself to everyone's confusion.
"The sea is overrated. Pass." Teofila had enough of the ocean.
"I uh… rather not go swimming again."
"I'm not up for it either."
Ruruko and Aika weren't keen on it either, the former couldn't really swim well while the latter was thinking of buying some new clothes for with the hope of using it for future sexual activities in Okinawa.
"I heard that it has a wondrous atmosphere. It'll be like a whole new world, ooh, there's a song for that, isn't there?" Valerie was up for it, along with Jeanne, who wanted to go snorkeling for reasons other than killing aquatic monsters.
"I didn't get a chance to try it last time. Count me in." Momo was looking forward to it. Her best friend Tomoe was also keen on going, Reya nodded and raised her hand quietly to indicate that she was participating too.
"It's settled then. Atago, Teo, Aika-chan and Ruruko-chan can go sightseeing or get some shopping done while we go snorkeling."
Valerie arranged the transport as Genshirou made conversation with everyone else until she was freed up to join in. The girls had also noticed that Jeanne's relationship with Genshirou had changed somewhat and pestered her for information too.
Having been privy to this trip's main purpose of setting up midsummer romantic situations (that she somehow had opted in at the last minute), Jeanne found the idea of her man seducing Sona's loyal devil servants away (with love) to be an enticing idea, and became committed to creating the environment that would allow this..
Jeanne could already imagine Sona's frustrated and conflicted face when the devil would see her servants apologizing over and over again for being "disloyal" as they were getting fucked silly by Genshirou.
"Jeanne, you gotta tell us what happened." Tomoe whispered into Jeanne's ear as they sat at the back of the car, the rest of the girls were also looking eager to hear more. Valerie was driving the rented car (as the only one old enough to legally do so) with Genshirou sitting next to her as usual. "How did you, well, join them?"
With her voice toned down to that level and with such a distance between them, it was only natural that devil girls assumed that Genshirou and Valerie couldn't hear them.
Jeanne figured that the full truth would be the most effective method, even if it gave them the idea that Genshirou might be the one to make the first move instead, which might reduce their resolve to confess on their own terms.
"We talked a lot as usual, and um… he figured out that I was worried that he would spend less time with me if I wasn't his lover, said I was his best friend and promised that he wouldn't let it happen. I was happy and confused then. I only understood my own feelings after "that"."
"T-that?" Reya repeated, stammering as her imagination began to go ham.
"Did he do something? Was it a kiss?" Momo was also super interested, the white-haired devil was listening intently.
"He told me that he wanted me to give birth to his children and asked if I would be his girlfriend. I said yes before I even realized it."
"H-heh?! I feel that he's skipping through several checkpoints there!" Tomoe exclaimed as she was startled by the French girl's words.
"Children? A birth must mean… impregnation, which comes from mating pressing against… iiiii!" Reya pressed the book that she was holding with her hand over her face as it began to change to a bright red.
"C-children? So he's already thinking that far ahead?" Momo Hanakai was shocked yet strangely pleased with Jeanne's account, for her, Genshirou's desire for children of his own would fit well with her own desires.
"T-then, what did he do next?" Tomoe pressed on, leading the follow-up questions as her other friends were stuck in Imagination Land.
"He asked if he could kiss me, then, well, I mean it's the first time someone I love asked me that so… ah, it's was so embarrassing I couldn't say a word and could only nod."
Even Jeanne was getting a little flustered by Tomoe's increasingly passionate questioning as the devil swordswoman edged closer and closer to Jeanne with a hungry look in her eyes.
"So you did kiss him! What was it like?"
"I don't know, I mean, it was like everything was just right, I was really happy and… I'm not good at this. Didn't you ask Aika-chan about her "experience" last night?"
"How did you know?!"
"It was pretty obvious you were going to."
Jeanne used her "deflect" skill to change the subject towards the girls, saving herself from describing their super lovey-dovey night in detail.
At this point, the former warrior of the church would have curled up like a hedgehog if she had to answer more questions, especially about how it felt to… hold hands.
Whoever ripped their club's tagline off a manga's title clearly had no idea what they were doing.
Love wasn't war. Love meant making and sharing happiness with others.
"Hehe, these clothes will make you very "accessible". Try it on." Aika suggested a tank top and shorts combo only to be bumped aside by the silver-haired self-proclaimed pastor.
"Dressing like a whore won't help you be noticed in a positive manner. But I agree with Aika's assertion that dressing differently will captivate his attention, hence, wear this dress." Teofila held up a pretty frilly dress-up to Ruruko, it was something that she hadn't worn before since she was a tiny child.
"Ufufu, Ruruko-chan, forget about those clothes and put this kimono on instead. I was his first girlfriend and I wore kimonos all the time. He doesn't dislike refined girls you know…" The big sister-like Atago was pushing for Ruruko to wear something traditional yet very expensive.
"Uuu… maybe the kimono?"
"Yay! Victory!" Atago made a "V" sign with one hand to the dismay of the other two girls who slumped in defeat.
After completing their initial shopping spree (souvenirs and local products), they visited a shopping mall (western-styled) to buy some new things.
Ruruko didn't actually have that much money due to her family's situation and was planning to use her "funds" from the fighting matches that she won to buy some things back, but Atago had happily (and fiercely) insisted on footing the bill for everything.
Technically, Genshirou, Valerie and Atago were all footing the bill as part of a shared scheme. Atago was simply their representative since the other two had gone snorkeling with the rest of the girls.
During this time, Atago and Teofila completely dropped any pretense and directly asked for Ruruko's opinion on how she wanted to approach Genshirou. Aika adapted accordingly and the trip began to double as a "support their cute junior's midsummer romance" plan.
When Ruruko saw how they were selflessly helping her out in pursuing the man they all loved, she was touched by their kindness and recklessly promised to confess to him by the end of the day!
Which kind of led to more time being dedicated to helping Ruruko gain the confidence to pull it off… the first thing that she wanted to remedy was her lack of confidence as a "girl". Getting the right clothes was the first step for this.
Unlike Aika who deliberately went for the unassuming nerdy look, Ruruko was more used to male clothing and tended to keep her hair wrapped up as she pounded other gang members' faces into the ground, hence, actually had zero experience in female fashion.
Everybody pitched in a lot, and for that, Ruruko was very grateful for them.
Especially Atago who was both a very encouraging big sister type and a female role model to Ruruko, after she witnessed the older girl knock out a creepy guy tailing after them with only one hand.
Anyone can use violence, but not everyone can use violence well.
She hoped to level up enough in her own martial arts ability so that she could do cool things like Atago and Genshirou do all the time.
Ruruko got changed into her new kimono on everyone's insistence. They were going to meet up with Genshirou and the rest at a fancy restaurant so it would be best if they were all dressed for the occasion.
Spoiler
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"H-hello, um, how do I look boss?" Ruruko did a quick twirl in front of him to show off the new kimono.
She almost wanted to slap herself immediately for reverting back to her "gang slang" when she spoke with him. It was a common habit of hers, especially when she was nervous and was with people she wasn't used to being around.
Outside of the few times they met on the streets and talked at school, she couldn't say they were especially close at that point, even so, she admired Genshirou for his strength (capacity for carnage), skill, dedication and compassion as well (for not defeating every gang in an overly violent way like she was used to).
The same couldn't be said from his perspective considering that she was likely seen as a strange girl that was a sort-of friend who followed him now and then when he went on to "lay down the law" around Kuoh.
Then again, he did invite her along with everyone else, so that must have counted for something.
"Boss? Well…" He reached out to her and grabbed her arms.
"Huh!?"
"Hold on."
Then he adjusted her kimono, pulling it up until it covered her properly.
She hadn't realized that it had become loose at some point, and had fallen down her arms, exposing her shoulder and a little of her chest.
Thankfully, none of the other customers of the restaurant seemed to have seen that.
"Whoopsie, I didn't notice that at all…"
"It's fine, I can tell that you aren't used to these clothes."
"Is that so…"
So he was saying that she wasn't girly enough for them?
"Do you like them?"
"Yes."
"Then it's fine. Oh right, you look really cute in it. Sorry, forgot to answer you earlier."
"It's fine! Hehe…"
She was being silly. Genshirou seemed to like the way she dressed a lot.
"Well, honestly, you looked pretty cool in your gang get-up. Way better than those female delinquents back in Tokyo in my opinion. They overdo things like crazy but you're all-natural, and that's great in my books."
"R-really? Aww, then does that make me awesome?"
"It sure does. Speaking of which, you use your fists a lot right? Why don't you come to learn under me sometime?"
"So I get to be your apprentice? Is this the part where I pledge myself to your teachings?"
On the other end of the table, Tomoe was giving Ruruko a big thumbs up for reading her hand-written "meme cheat sheet" properly.
"Haha, if you're tough enough to go through with it."
"Bring it on bitch!" She was all fired up now!
"Oh? We'll see how that turns out." Genshirou patted her on the back while laughing before taking his seat down at the dinner table.
After sitting down, Ruruko felt Atago patting her on the shoulder and turned to look at the older girl who gave her a pitiful look.
"Don't worry. I will pay for your hospital bills if anything goes wrong."
Valerie walked over to Ruruko and got her attention, "Good luck. I hope you're either a masochist or a battle maniac."
Even Jeanne and Teofila gave her worried looks.
Honestly, it made Ruruko anticipate her training sessions even more! It looked really intense from the way everyone was acting.
Seeing as there weren't that many hours left in the day, Ruruko asked Genshirou to teach her a cool move after dinner, which he obliged to, getting her to meet him at the beach at night for some awesome training.
He thought her some Muay Thai basics, after a while, Ruruko managed to get excited enough to pop the question.
"Boss! I love you, can you make me your subordinate? I mean, uh, girlfriend, too." Yet another slip of the tongue was made.
The young man that she admired seemed to roll with it, "Ruruko-chan… thank you for your feelings, I will happily accept you as my girlfriend. Also…"
Grabbing and pulling her into his strong arms, Ruruko let herself be caught in her strong grip, "I think I like the idea of a subordinate too, why don't I show you several interpretations of that and you can pick what kind of subordinate you-" He leaned down and moved his lips closer to her own, until she could feel his breath over her lips, "-want to be."
As he took her first kiss, she became very enthusiastic in exploring all the different aspects their relationship could take, such thoughts were swept away momentarily by the flood of happiness that she felt as he kissed her relentlessly.
What was she going to do?
Reya Kusaka was asking herself that question in many different contexts in these past few days.
She had questioned whether it would be "alright" to even be involved with someone from the "ordinary" world many times, whether this decision would bring harm to the Sitri peerage, whether she truly wanted to be in a relationship with such a man… and many other things.
She hadn't been sleeping well after hearing Aika's detailed account on the first night, Ruruko's tame yet passionate encounter on the second night didn't help matters either. Her mind was restless as she imagined her own romance with the man who had helped her back then.
Reya could still remember it like it was yesterday. Her house had been broken into by a magician thief that held a grudge against her grandmother's lineage, stole a grimoire that was a precious keepsake of hers, given to Reya by her grandmother at a young age before she even got involved in magic and devils.
With no teleportation magic detected in the vicinity, it was clear that the human magician intended to escape through a mix of mundane and magical means, which would make it nigh impossible for Reya to track even with Sona Sitri's help.
"Hey, I saw your name on this book, this yours, Kusaka-san?"
The most prolific student of Kuoh Academy returned the grimoire to her after knocking a "suspicious guy" down through brute force based on his "gut feeling". He had resolved to take responsibility if he knocked down an innocent man and decided to take the risk by getting involved anyways.
She asked him why he would do something like that. If he assaulted a man like that without due cause then he could have derailed his entire life at worst, and at best, it would have still been an offense if he was right.
"I have always lived my life by doing what I felt was right and needed to be done. Why would that change now?"
The girl born into a witch's lineage found his decisiveness and selflessness fascinating.
The thief was brought to justice by the Sitri clan's friends in the police force and then transferred to the Underworld for the crime of theft against a member of the Sitri household. And from then on, Reya had taken time to learn more about him and happily speaking to him on all sorts of topics whenever he came up to talk to her.
Just as well considering that she was a rather passive girl. This stemmed from the two different ways she was raised, by her grandmother who taught her a Witch's curriculum, and her parents who rejected magic and made her live a normal life.
Due to their mutual agreements, Reya would often flip-flop between a year of "normalcy" and that of a Witch-in-Training. Until of course, she made her decision and chose neither, by making an informed decision and accepting Sona Sitri's offer in return for her service.
Her grandmother, father, and mother weren't happy about it, to say the least. She found it ironic that after all these years, it was her own decision that made them reach a point of mutual agreement.
Ever since then she had developed a bad habit of fretting over many things, fearing the consequences of her own actions.
Yet, after she met him, it became a lot easier to simply live with her choices after making them.
After hearing a "cleaned up" version of what happened between her family and why the book was so important to her, Genshirou spent a lot of time encouraging and debating with her on why reconciling with family is important, along with his own thoughts on how she could get them to make peace with her decision.
He supported her during the reconciliation attempt by being there for her up to a point (outside of their homes so that they could have privacy), and thankfully, it all worked out in the end. She was on speaking terms with her parents again and her grandmother was now teaching her "proper spells" (with a lot of devil magic bashing) in exchange for a devil-magician contract with her so that her grandmother can chat with Reya more often.
She was grateful for his support and found herself continually thankful when he helped her figure out some magic equations through "hypothetical situations". He had stumbled upon her working on some spell circles in the library, asked what it was about, and proceeded to remark on how it was cool to have a "scientific" way of handling magic. Then he decided to "role-play" the magical researcher role by being the arithmetician that handled all the equations while suggesting various ways to "munchkin" different spells.
Reya marveled at the actual results of his assistance, she found it hard to keep herself from thanking him honestly for all the help it was for her magical studies.
If only he had some magical power, if he did, Reya would have wanted to ask him to be her apprentice in the mystic arts. She was sure that he would enjoy magic a lot, especially since he was a genius and could already handle the calculation aspects of it.
Then they would do this and that in their shared magical laboratory one day when Reya got her "Witch's costume" and…
Spoiler
[img: https/i./OdEvQ09.jpg]
… her reminiscence of the past, her feelings, and of Genshirou had suddenly turned into a lewd fantasy right out of a doujin from the Summer Comiket.
"… What am I going to do…"
She stared at the phone clock displaying the time as 5:13 am.
There was no way she could sleep like this.
Feeling the urge to take a walk, she snuck out of bed, put on some clothes and slipped on her sandals so that she could spend some time alone walking along the beach.
It was relaxing, soothing even, although the sand was irritating whenever it got into her sandals.
She knew that Genshirou would have said stronger words in relation to sand if he was here.
Continuing along the beach, she spotted the shape of a man walking his dog along the beach, slightly further ahead of her.
Reya was curious about what breed the dog was and decided to run-up to the man to get a closer look.
But as she walked closer, she had to wonder if her own eyes were deceiving her, and that her lewd imagination and lack of sleep was causing her to hallucinate.
No matter how many times she rubbed her eyes, the sight still stayed the same.
"There you go, there's a good girl…"
"Arf! Haa… haa… !"
"You like that don't you?"
The "dog" panted harder and nodded eagerly, her posture resembling that of a dog waiting for a treat from its owner.
"Gooooood… then let's go over there to that corner. And I will give you your favorite treat, Atago."
Reya Kusaka could not erase the sight of one of the most feared women in Japan, Atago Kaiza, walking on all-fours, naked, like some deviant sex pet to her "master" Genshirou Saji.
"W-what… am I looking at?"
It was a rhetorical question.
She knew exactly what she was looking at.
The one called the "Bloody Hound" among certain devil circles was currently enjoying herself with a vulgar exhibitionist act while wearing a slutty face.
"Hmm? Good morning Kusaka-san. How are you? Wait, silly question. Couldn't sleep?" He asked her as if nothing was out of the ordinary.
"S-saji-san, K-Kaiza-senpai is…"
"Atago? Hey, Atago, don't be rude. Go say hello."
Genshirou crouched down and lifted Atago's hands, and waved his lover's "paws" at hers.
His pet "dog" seemed to be deriving even more pleasure at the degrading play.
"Why? Isn't this too… I knew the both of you did these kinds of things but, isn't this too much?"
He smiled at her, "Nonsense. Atago's been wanting to do something like this for ages. Admittedly, I wasn't a big fan of the idea for a long time, but she slowly won me over to her way of thinking. Look how happy she is now."
Upon closer inspection, there were sex toys protruding from both Atago's ass and pussy, that were obviously placed upon there by the young man.
Genshirou gave his pet's ass a hard slap and teased the girl using the inserted objects right in front of Reya, the quiet book-loving girl watched in perverse fascination as her youkai girl moaned and screamed out in pleasure.
The older girl's face seemed so carefree and joyful. It was as if the girl doesn't have a care in the world.
Could she be that happy if she were in the same position, she wondered…
"Well then, what are you doing to do Kusaka-san?"
"E-eh?!"
"I can see two choices here. You can either go back to your room now to give us some privacy… or follow along, perhaps you will see something that you will like."
And with those parting words, he turned around and pulled Atago by her leash, towards the end of the beach where they would be able to get some privacy for even more deviant acts.
Reya Kusaka felt that she was at a turning point.
She could walk back to her room, attempt (and fail) and forgetting what she saw then possibly, get a nice and normal romance after talking it out with Genshirou at a later date should she confess.
Or she could follow along and see for herself what kind of wait could await her.
With all the "stories" she had read, what she had heard about his prowess from Aika, what she knew about him, his pre-existing relationships, along with her own desire to be in a pleasurable, carefree position like Atago to fulfill a number of her own fantasies… she had many ideas on how she would end up if she took him up on the offer.
Reya made her decision.
She took a step forward, then another, and another… until she was walking right beside the man she desired to be with.
Level 30
AN: Surprise "power-up" chapter in between the beach episode! And well… a very nice ending, if I do say so myself.
Level 30
The Persona series had it right all along.
Social Links is where it's at.
I would have seriously considered proactively seeking multiple relationships with more young women had I known that a harem protagonist-tier (RIP Carnival Phantasm Shiki and Shirou) date scheduling war room's derailment would lead to the one hint I needed to unlock nigh-unlimited power.
That was a lie.
Discovering something new after going off on a tangent was a rather common method for me to come up with new ideas and solutions.
These near-daily planning sessions involved a group of clones gathering around and discussed, planned then broke down the tiniest aspects of every subject I could think of, anything from engineering designs, spell matrixes and interpretive dancing moves… all in order to create something that can be used to further my goals.
It just so happened that sitting around with the boys (my clones) as we debated on the best ways to cater to my female friend's needs somehow led to a facepalm worthy "revelation".
One clone of mine began making a low effort comparison of a girl's romantic fulfillment to that of an economic unit of utility, which led to some arguments on whether we could mathematically quantify it. Somehow that led to several games of Paradox-Billiards-Vostroyan-Roulette-Fourth Dimensional-Hypercube-Chess-Strip Poker, accusations of illicit card rearrangement, then the idea came to all of us as if a supernova had gone off in our heads.
Most of the applications that I had envisioned for it involved long-ranged bombardment and deadly miniaturized detonations. I had been so focused on rearranging Einstein's mass-energy equivalence equation (E=mc) in the outside world that the idea of doing the same within my internal domain of control, like so many of my conceptual techniques, failed to occur to me until now.
It is always harder to tell the world to go fuck itself, then it is to fuck yourself then let the consequences of it catch up to the world.
I already had nigh-absolute control over all the relevant types of energy and concepts needed within my own domain. All I had to do was rearrange the principles of physics on a micro-scale in order to achieve my goals.
"-and of course, after some preliminary testing, I believe that it is best that all of you get to see the fruits of my effort."
I flipped the chalkboard with all the relevant equations upside-down, making enough noise to shake Jeanne from her daydreams.
"Huh, what?" She seemed to be a bit out of it, a little bit sleepy too.
I guess that she was still quite shocked over my progress with Reya over the past two days.
Our vacation in Okinawa would be coming to a close in a handful of days, spending quality time with most of the girls using only one body was a challenge, but it was worth it, as it acted as a trial run for the upcoming year of romance.
I made sure to make things extra special for Tomoe and Momo on this trip as a special thanks for their long friendship with me at school, with two days to "recover" from seeing Reya in such a slutty state when I was just getting started with her, the two best friends will be in a good mental state for them to enjoy the festivities I had planned.
Anyways, back to the purpose of this demonstration.
"Oh, Jeanne… What did I say about overdoing things? Geez…" Asia touched Jeanne and healed her, using a bit of our "workarounds" in order to help Jeanne recover some mental stamina as well.
"Oooh! I'm awake now. What did I miss?"
"Literally everything your limited education cannot comprehend." Atago sniped from the side, causing Jeanne to attempt her holy sword splinter trick to no avail as Atago managed to block it with Touki.
We were all gathered in an artificial dimension created and maintained after ritually sacrificing one of my clones in an uber edgy ritual. The 0.01% of my soul used up as a sacrifice had already recovered in the time I spent explaining how I achieved my new powers that would definitely save those I care about from dying.
"As someone that never attended formal schooling as well, I feel slightly insulted by that." Valerie placed her hand over her shoulder and flipped her hair for no good reason (other than to look fabulous as she did so), "But I don't need no education so it's fine."
"There are so many things wrong with that statement but I can't muster the will to care about that right now. I mean… Genshirou is talking about causing massive destruction at a whim here." Teofila helpfully supplied her opinion.
"Yeah. So… explosions soon, right?" Vritra, in his Keanu guise, made a gesture with his hands.
I nodded and gave him a thumbs up.
He returned a double thumbs up with a ludicrously happy grin.
What's with dragons and explosions?
Anyways, I should get this over with so that Asia could get back to the Vatican as soon as possible, stupid time zone differences preventing us from hanging out for long periods of time…
After some internal grumblings, I took out a few items to help illustrate my technique.
Man, the pocket dimension "shadow inventory" technique is so convenient.
"This is a 1-liter bottle of water, which convenient is also 1 kg, or 1000 grams. Remember the E=mc, substitute that number into "m" and we will have about 89,875,517,874 Megajoules, convert that into tons of TNT and we get 21,480,764. Does anyone here wonder what that much heat energy would look like if it was simply released at once? Anyone?"
I gestured to the audience who began to look at each other nervously.
"Is it going to look like the Scorched Halloween scene in Onii-sama the Anime?" Valerie asked, somewhat fearful and excited about the answer.
"Well, that's for you to decide. Several of my clones that got caught up in the blast and aftermath have their own opinion, but well, if I had to describe it then…"
I recalled the scorching heat and force of the explosion of energy that I released at another artificial dimension that was 50% larger than the Asian continent for testing purposes.
It was fascinating. There's something special about an explosion when it doesn't affect the people and things you care about.
It was terrifying. When it reminded of the fact that those overpowered bastards all around me can simply snuff out everything I care about just like that.
"… It's something that I wish I wouldn't need to use for anything other than training and daily living. Now then, wonder no more, and see for yourselves."
A clone appeared and ran at speeds many times faster than lightning to where I needed him to deposit the water bottle.
In my mind, I had already marked the water as the designated target, all I needed to do was pull the trigger.
I erected a barrier of darkness that would heavily dim the incoming light and protect us from any debris made out of the false matter created alongside this dimension.
It is unfortunate that I can only manipulate just over a kilogram of matter in this way, thankfully, my upper limit seems to be improving along with my efficiency.
If I were to micro-manage tiny drops of water instead of a larger amount of water, my total mass limit could go up to 50 times higher than my "single object targeting" limitations.
I always was better at many little things instead of one big thing.
I snapped my fingers.
A miniature sun manifested far off the horizon of this artificial replication of Earth that no one was able to see it at the beginning.
Then the rapidly swelling air, gushing infrared rays, shock waves, and metallic steam annihilated everything.
The random structures that were slightly farther off either detonated or were burnt to ash.
The surface of the fake ocean was roasted by the scorching temperatures, causing countless steam explosions. The resulting hurricane and tsunami swallowed the shores of the island of which we rested above.
Using the "satellite vision" spell I developed, everyone could see the result of the catastrophic inferno.
I wouldn't blame my loved ones for being unable to hide the paleness of their faces.
Asia looked as if she was halfway between crying and laughing hysterically, I could sense that she was recalling the scenes of the Great War that I had shown her with the memories I acquired. Teofila was so shocked that she could scarcely comprehend what she had just seen, Jeanne's jaw had dropped all the way down and she struggled to find the right words to describe how she felt.
Valerie was trembling with a sense of wonder as if she had just witnessed the most beautiful sight ever. Atago looked at the explosion with a… face of resignation, it seems that while I had surpassed her expectations, she had already anticipated the result and could only feel pleasantly surprised.
Vritra looked like he just found out his offspring had just killed John Wick's dog.
"… Oh."
The dragon's reaction shook everyone out of their self-induced stupor.
"Woah. That was… wow. Can you drop one on Mount Meru please?"
"No, I'm not nuking fucking Indra. Not now."
"Aww…"
Asia took out her special holy water bottle and sprayed Vritra with it, stinging him due to his natural "cursed" physiology/
"Bad Vritra. You can't just ask Genshirou to obliterate your enemies like… like that! It's wrong, what if the uh… "good" pagan gods get caught up in it?" Even now, Asia was still as caring as per usual.
"Ow! Ouch… okay, okay…." Vritra backed off.
Teofila slapped her cheeks a little in order to get herself together, before giving her thoughts on the matter.
"Well… at least Genshirou is the one who's holding all this power." I was able to pick up her faith in my character reaching max levels again after faltering briefly.
"Yeah! I mean, it's really scary, but if it's Gen then everything should be fine." Asia seemed to bounce back quickly too.
"Thank you, I will do my best then!"
"You know… if my parents saw it, they will definitely be getting World War 2 flashbacks." Atago remarked lightly, barely disturbed by what she saw.
Or perhaps she was just used to it?
"Please don't liken me to a horrific tragedy of war."
"Ufufu, were you annoyed by it?"
I will punish her further later on.
"… I think I see why information security is so important. If anyone else knew you were working towards this, and had achieved it… they would be terrified. Ah well, guess it just means I need to hurry up my mental resistance training… hey Genshirou, I want to make a sword that can do it to! Is it possible to learn this power?"
Jeanne was already eager to unleash a new type of warfare against monsters.
"Not from a casual."
I would like to think my harsh "catch-up" training would put me just above those that trained casually like the main and side cast (whose name is not Sairaorg).
"Ahh… so beautiful." Valerie seems to have discovered her inner "Michael Bay".
"Well, I'm glad you like it. By the way, I can handle a lot more mass if I manage it on a smaller scale. Like this."
I took out a large rock that weighed about 50 kilograms and used my abilities to split it into millions of tiny pieces.
I warped it all into the distance and detonated millions of explosions as powerful as a Neutron Bomb. Compared to the Material Burst rip-off it was pretty 'underwhelming', but it was really pretty to look at.
The wall of explosions was probably a lot weaker than the hundreds of millions of explosions that Othinus and Ollerus can pull off on a casual basis, yet it was beautiful in its own way.
A few of the girls ( Vritra) clapped at the pretty destructive light show.
"And now for my next trick, by rearranging the formula and reforming a structure atom by atom, I can turn energy into matter. Voila."
I took a rock out of my "Inventory", turned it into energy in the palm of my left hand, visualized the desired atomic structure and rearranged it to form the desired item in my right hand.
I released the recreated confetti as if I was a clown performing for a kid's birthday party.
"Oooh…" "Ah…" "Why didn't you start with that instead?" "Yeah, we wouldn't be so scared if you started with this…"
The audience's comments were just as critical as if I was a professional clown!
I had expected one of the Christian girls to bring up my Matter Rearrangement technique as blasphemy to the Creator God, but apparently, they understood that what I did was simply rearranging things that were already made rather than creating things outright (like the HAX matter and energy generation of so many Sacred Gears). But honestly, even if they didn't, I think they wouldn't care one bit.
If I had an internal best girl ranking then I would have given them a lot of points for it, but for the sake of fair treatment, I wasn't going to rank any of them in my head if I could help it.
"Anyways, one final trick before we leave this place. For this trick, I will require my two beautiful assistants up here." I gestured for Atago and Valerie to come up to me.
My two lovers did so immediately, looking bemused at the role I was taking.
"Here is a very sensitive weighing scale. If you would please put something that belongs to you that weighs anywhere from 15-30 grams each."
The first thing the pair did was to start stripping!
Asia jumped onto Vritra's back to close his eyes even though the dragon had already seen everything due to our shared soul storage. Even so, Vritra was being a gentleman and turned away regardless.
Jeanne and Teofila were shocked at their actions as expected of their background, although Jeanne was taking it better all things considered.
"Aww, I thought my underwear would weigh less than this." Atago looked a bit disappointed when her backless bow-tie lingerie was around 3 times the max weight that I wanted… then she summoned her katana to slice the undergarment into 3 pieces.
She handed me one of those pieces.
"My one is closer." Valerie's thong was near the required weight.
Is it really necessary to compete on whose underwear weighs the least?
After trimming off a bit of the mass, Valerie handed over her the remnants of her thong and both the girls went to make put their clothes back on upon my request.
I wasn't surprised by the fact that they intended to continue without any of their clothes.
I performed my technique once again and clearly imagined the objects to the finest detail.
Hiding the two items in the palms of my hands, I signaled to the audience that my "show" was coming to an end, "And for the finale-"
I dropped to one knee, held up one hand towards each of my girls and slowly revealed it's contents.
"-I dedicate the fruits of my labor to these two most lovely and precious women in my life."
A flood of gasps and squeals of joy erupted from the peanut gallery as the engagement rings were revealed to the eyes of all.
"I know I'm skipping a few steps here, but even so, will the two of you marry me?"
Their joy was evident on their faces. I didn't need some fancy emotion-sensing technique in order to pick that up.
Valerie looked to Atago and made a gesture as if to say "go on", clearly, letting Atago have her turn first.
"Yes… yes, of course! I would say it a thousand times, Yes! You have no idea how long I've been waiting for you to ask me that. I love you, I belong to you, now and forever."
Even though I was almost certain that her answer would have been a "yes", or a cheeky "no" only to make a joke about how she wanted to assert a bit of "free will" before agreeing, despite all that…
… I still felt a sense of happiness and relief that outmatched anything else that I had ever felt in this life of mine.
Atago allowed me to put the ring on her and kiss me gently on the lips before making way for Valerie.
The blonde dhampir smiled, laughed a little as she tried to find the right words to say, yet failed to do so.
I tried to help her out, only to find myself overwhelmed with joy and laughter, for once, unsure of myself in how I wanted to go about it.
"You know, Genshirou, a… a day hasn't gone by when I haven't thought of you… when I haven't felt anything but love towards you. For the rest of my life, I only ever want to think and know that I'm with you. So… well, my answer is, and always will be, yes!"
That day, I became the happiest man in the world. And I promised myself that I would do everything in my power, to make sure that I can tell everyone how happy I am, every single day for the rest of my life.
Level 31A
AN: I thought of a really fun event with Tomoe, did my "research" and planned a good amount of it out, then I realized the comedic tone of it wouldn't mesh well with Momo's event. After seeing that Tomoe's story would fit well with the "surprise" story I have tentatively decided to include, I decided to put this up as the first half of the last chapter before we go all the way to canon. I know this has been a long ride, but the focus to me has always been in the character journeys and the plot. If I don't develop the characters more now then no one would care about them when we get into the main plot, which in many fanfictions, can be summarised as "It's Free Real Estate Harem Selection".
Anyways, like Teofila, she's kind of the " normal" girl of the group. I was going to include her father interrupting their date, but figured that in-character, Genshirou would have prevented that so I decided to include it later.
Level 31A
For all of Sona Sitri's efforts to maintain her position as the most "sane", "logical" and "composed" (in the devil noble's own words) within her peerage, the results had been less than stellar.
Especially when her obsession with Udon, acceptance of the oddest occurrences (e.g. calmly watching a monster getting swallowed by a bigger monster in a sequential manner over the course of 15 seconds, the quote, there's always a bigger fish comes to mind) and her passionate one-sided rivalry against Genshirou reared its head.
Tsubaki was their King's long-time friend and most loyal to Sona, and ended up passionately supporting the student council president all the way. Tsukasa was all up for Sona's latest shenanigans in the Underworld and went along with it. Reya was quite obviously, a pervert (it was bloody obvious she had something in her ass for an entire day). And as always, Tomoe was Tomoe.
As such, within the Sitri peerage, that left Momo Hanakai as the person that valued sanity and a degree of normalcy the most.
"… Where the heck is everyone?" Their shared room was entirely devoid of living life forms.
She spied a note on the living room table, got out of her futon and made her way there.
It was a short message from Tomoe, written in two languages, Japanese and the devil script (official written language in the Underworld).
The message in Japanese read "I'm going mountain biking with Jeanne for the day!", which would make a lot of sense as aside from Genshirou, the only other person that would be sporty enough to go mountain biking would be Ruruko and quite frankly, the middle school student was enjoying a girl's romance way too much to leave Genshirou's side at the moment.
The hidden message in the devil script read "Jeanne and I spotted Darth Bobby so we sent him a swordsmanship challenge. We're doing last-minute training together before we have an awesome rematch".
Momo smacked her forehead with her right palm.
It looks like she will have to use the Phoenix Tears that Sona gave to her as compensation to re-attach Tomoe's limbs.
Such was the deadliness of lightsaber combat.
It was probably too late to stop them anyway. And even if she did find Tomoe and Jeanne, there would be no way for her to dissuade them and they could easily just knock her out before leaving for their fight.
Sona was nearly uncontactable at this point due to her busy schedule and "special training camp" that she had organized for herself so reporting their actions to Sona wasn't viable either.
As such, Momo went for the next best choice and decided to report this matter to the proper authorities.
Even if the rumors were likely to have been highly exaggerated, the Kaiza clan heiress's actions do paint her as an overly patriotic Authoritarian, so there is a good chance that the Youkai of monstrous strength will put a stop to such fights within the borders of Japan.
After putting on some clothes that were suitable for the summer weather, she made her way to Genshirou's shared room with his girlfriends.
Spoiler: This, but with a longer skirt… or not
[img: https/i./AVkIW4W.jpg]
She rung the electronic doorbell and got a swift reply.
"Morning, who's there?"
"Gen-kun, it's me, Momo."
She replied Genshirou.
"Ah, Momo-chan! Uh, I'm getting changed and uh… it'll take a while. I'll slide the keycard through the door, you can let yourself in about… 8 seconds?"
Well, at least she didn't have to wait outside for very long.
Momo counted to eight before tapping the keycard on the reader to unlock the door.
To her pleasant surprise, it would seem that the living room wasn't turned into a den of debauchery. She left her shoes at the entrance and walked in, still not spotting anybody else.
Listening carefully, she could hear the sound of someone showering alongside some typical bathroom singing-
"-the Dark Side ~ Is a pathway to many abilities-"
"He wasn't joking?!"
Genshirou was actually reciting the entire meme as part of his daily routine! Momo had thought that his admission to doing so was a joke, but it turned out to be real!
If she wasn't so stunned by the fact, she would have been busy fantasizing over his naked manly body instead.
"Hmm? Oh, Momo-chan, did Genshirou let you in?"
Turning around, she could see that the person she had been looking for was formally dressed in a kimono, as expected, and was standing right in front of the master bedroom.
"Kaiza-senpai, that is… Genshirou slid the key under the door so that I can come in."
"Makes sense. I was still groggy after being woken up…"
Then she must have put on her clothes at super high speeds! Is it possible to learn that technique?
Hmm, what was that behind Atago?
Momo moved her body to the side subtlely in order to take a peek at the room.
The first thing she saw was the color of skin.
"Oh my, was I blocking your view?"
Before she perceived it, Atago Kaiza had moved out of her way to reveal several bodies laying on the bed!
Momo could recognize Reya at first glance, her fellow comrade was currently bound in the traditional "Shibari' technique, with some accompanying "accessories" like a blindfold, ball gag, and linked nipple clamps equipped onto her naked body. Aika was wearing a leather outfit that revealed much of her body, the red spank marks on her backside made her recent activities very clear. Valerie was reading things on her phone while remaining butt naked.
To the side, she could see that her junior Ruruko was still clothed, although her disheveled appearance did indicate that she had a "busy" night as well. Teofila was also there, she was sleeping soundly with a pair of fluffy ear muffs on that was likely blocking out the sounds of the room.
"A-ah…"
"They're all pretty, aren't they?"
"W-why are you saying that?! Anyways, uh…" Momo tore her faze away and focused on Atago, "Could I talk to you for a second, without anyone else listening in?" She pointed at where Genshirou was showering.
The Youkai woman understood what Momo was asking and casted a spell, "We can speak privately now."
They moved to the couch where they could talk without Momo getting distracted by whatever was in the Master Bedroom.
Momo explained what she found in her room this morning.
"Darth Bobby? Oh my, I'm afraid that I can't help you there. He's filled up all the paperwork to set up an artificial dimension at a designated location for his battle with my department, so there's no problem at all."
"Wait what? There's paperwork for this?"
"There is paperwork for everything…" Atago stared at Momo with a dead look in her eyes, "Everything…"
She felt really bad for the young woman right now.
"You don't… sound very surprised about it all. Wait, how did you learn of Darth Bobby and all this?"
"Fufufu, it's my job to know all these things. Especially when it happens in Japan. Besides, you could say that he and his Master is an… affiliate, of ours."
"That… sounds like something we should know."
Momo felt the temperature of the room drop from typical summer morning to zero degrees instantly!
"By "we" you mean "devils" in general, or "we" as in your friends."
That smile on her senior's face was only superficially pleasant.
"A-ah, I mean, me and my friends of course. We fought him before so…"
The pressure faded away just as quickly.
"I see, I see, you're concerned if he's here for nefarious purposes. I can safely say that the people he's associated with have been contributing greatly to our society's prosperity. And as he has no outstanding enemies outside of one or two communities, *cough* vampires *cough, that we are aware of we have no reason to refuse his offers to set up shop, so to speak."
It looked like Genshirou's girlfriend was offering her free information that she wouldn't get from anyone else. Then again, if anyone actually bothered to talk to the Youkai at Kyoto, they would have likely been able to confirm whether what Atago was saying was true or not.
From what Momo could tell, Atago was going to provide the information to her, so long as she didn't make it sound like she was entitled to the information just because of her ties with influential Devils (by proxy through the Sitri family). From the information that Sona provided through her many "current affairs" dossiers, that the entire peerage was updated on very frequently, it was quite clear that the Youkai faction felt that they had been exploited by outsiders, especially devils who had a thing for Nekomata and other "cute" Youkai.
From that point of view, Atago's sudden hostility became a lot more understandable, especially when it had to deal with someone that was apparently, providing the Youkai with many benefits, whatever they were.
"So you're 100% sure that Jeanne and Tomoe won't be excessively harmed? I mean, if they do, then Genshirou will be wondering about what happened."
"Ahaha… I'm certain that he won't really hurt them. You worry a lot, Tomoe-chan must be happy to have such a caring friend. Jeanne will be touched too~"
Momo avoided Atago's teasing glance, "That's only because those two are the type of girls to go about their business recklessly…"
"Who's doing something reckless?" A familiar voice responded to her words, the source of it was very close, right next to her ear in fact.
"Kyaa!" She jumped out of her seat in fright!
"Heehee…" Atago had a mischievous smile on her face.
"Something tells me that I shouldn't be watching horror movies with you." Momo turned her glare away from Atago, who had timed the lifting of the sound muffling spell for Genshirou to hear her most recent words after they moved on from the supernatural topics.
Directing her gaze at the tall young man, she scolded him a little, "Gen-kun! It's rude to eavesdrop like that!"
"Sorry, I can't help my busy body habits!" Genshirou clapped his hands in the typical gesture to ask for forgiveness.
"Mmm, whatever. Just don't do that all the time." She wasn't too bothered by it.
"So it's okay to do it sometimes then?"
"That's harassment."
"Fufufu, he really can't help it. Did you know that's how we got to meet in the first place?" Atago said something really interesting to Momo.
"Eh, really? You got to tell me that story sometime!"
"Maybe I'll tell you that in… 10 months' time?
Why is she being oddly specific about the timing?
"Oh right, where's Jeanne and Tomoe?"
"Mountain Biking."
"Ahh, good old biking. I wouldn't do that though, I'm sure Truck-kun will be rotating their Isekai victims to bicycle riders around this time of the year."
"Since when did trucks pick what kind of people they run over? Moreover, why are you considering trucks as sentients? You're gravely mistaken if you consider life is as some kind of Isekai parody story."
"Oh no, my young friend. You will find that it is you who are mistaken. About a great many things."
Momo ended up the "Tsukkomi" to Genshirou's "Boke" in his common attempts to keep everyone engaged and entertained. Suffice to say, it was working on her, as per usual.
"Oh my, both of you seem to be enjoying yourselves."
"Um, I didn't mean to-"
Atago cut Momo's apology short, apparently not considering their conversation as something offensive in the Youkai's capacity as Genshirou's girlfriend.
"-nevermind that. I'm feeling like taking a break today, and from what I can tell, everyone else would like a lazy day too. Why don't both of you go out somewhere… together?"
And that was how Atago arranged a date for both of them.
She became increasingly self-conscious as she spent more time with Genshirou alone while they aimlessly walked around a town picking out any convenient places to visit from his list.
"Did you manage to try that the last time you visited?"
"No. I don't have a clue what that overly fried pastry is."
"Hey, don't diss it. It's basically Okinawa's native version of donuts. Although Mister Donut's glazed donuts are still the best…"
Genshirou bought them some "Sata Andagi", in an effort to not fill themselves up before lunch, he only bought one of each four flavors: Sweet Potato, Red Bean, Brown Sugar and "normal" Sugar.
As Momo began to wonder about how they would all get a taste of all flavors since he only bought one of each, she saw Genshirou biting half of one of the donuts in one go, before holding up the donut with a bright purple interior towards her.
"Here you go, we can take half of each."
She stared at the pastry that Genshirou bit into… wouldn't this be an indirect kiss?
Feeling a bit bold, she went ahead opened her mouth to receive her snack. He moved his hand forward just enough so that she wouldn't have to move her head too much.
The outsides were nice and crisp, while the insides were light and fluffy!
"Mmm! This is good."
"See, what did I tell you?"
"Your pastries are a lot better though."
"I'm not worried about breaking even you know. Everyone else here has to make a living."
Genshirou was about to repeat the process with another of the donuts, but Momo snatched it out of his hand and ate her half first this time around.
"Here, your turn." Momo held up half of the donut towards him.
She had to stuff her mouth a bit, but his pleasantly surprised face was worth the effort.
He did the same thing she did, although, turns out that some degree of hand-eye coordination was needed and Momo simply didn't have enough of it. The crispy outsides of the donut poked at the edge of Genshirou's lip instead of entering his mouth.
"Ah, sorry!"
"Haha, no biggie. Let's do it again."
The second try was a success and they all had a good laugh about it later.
They stopped by a store famous for the "Okinawa Soba", which was pretty unusual than the noodle meals they were used to. Its noodles are more akin to that of the traditional udon while the soup base is much more similar to that of ramen than anything else!
"I can already imagine the confused Sona noises if she tried this." Genshirou knew of Sona's love for Udon and it's "purity" all too well.
"Since when did she have distinct noises? Should I tell her that you're making it sound as if you think of her as a Pokemon?" Momo answered back with a smile.
"I won't mind if you tell her. I'm sure being her "Trainer" will be a fun and challenging experience." If he said it with a different emphasis on the "trainer" word then Momo would have taken it as a lewd remark.
Momo tried not to imagine Genshirou telling Sona to use Water Gun against some random arrogant devil she met in the past. But alas, it was too late.
"Pft! Hahaha!"
"Hey, what's so funny? Don't keep the joke to yourself."
"It's not really haha… that funny… I shouldn't."
"Do it."
"Okay fine, so, imagine our student council president shooting someone with water on your command-"
That summer day went by quickly as they continued to have fun together through all sorts of things. Momo had stopped worrying about the little things, about how she was going to speak to him about her feelings, and simply allowed herself to have fun at his side.
It was easy to get caught up in the "business" of life as both a school student and a devil, it wasn't easy for her to let herself relax and be as comfortable as she was with someone else.
As the sun went down, Momo looked to her right as Genshirou walked alongside her, humming a song as he held on the one end of the plastic shopping bag while she held on to the other.
"What are you humming?"
"The Force Theme, A New Hope."
"I thought it sounded familiar."
"It's a classic."
"From your point of view."
"I actually have no clue on how to respond to that."
"Is the prequel memer losing his touch?"
"Possibly."
"Low effort~"
"Sona-chan has taught you well."
He was on the dot about Sona Sitri being the one that explained Genshirou's memes the most.
Ironic.
While they continued to walk together, Momo wondered to herself about how this all looks like… and came to the conclusion that they really looked like a couple walking back home after a visit to the convenient store.
One day, when she got married, she could imagine doing something like this with her husband and her kids. It would be the image of a happy family that she had missed out on due to unfortunate circumstances.
It wasn't a bad image at all.
And the more she thought about it, the more she realized how comfortable she was with the idea, especially after such a wonderful day.
Walking a bit ahead until she could get in front of him, she reached forward with her right hand that was holding onto her end of the plastic bag, then grabbed onto Genshirou's left hand that held the other end.
"Genshirou-kun."
"Yes, Momo-chan?"
They called each other by their already affectionate nicknames for one another. While they had been doing that for quite some time now, this was the first time Momo had said it with a feeling that was far beyond mere fondness for him.
"I like you, would you be my hus- boyfriend?"
Ah, a slip of the tongue.
"I felt that there were a few steps skipped there-"
"-Ignore it. Please."
She would have almost preferred him to just say "I know" like a proper memer so that she could retort to it instead of living with the embarrassment of screwing up her confession, especially after such a nice mood had been made.
"I will be happy too. I like you too."
Their romance and relationship certainly weren't normal, not by a long shot, all things considered…. but Momo could accept this. She could be happy with this, with him.
Momo leaned in for a kiss, only for him to hold her in place with his firm, strong hands.
"Wait, give me a moment."
"Huh?"
"Momo Hanakai, I like you, will you be my wif- girlfriend?"
"Eh? Eeeeeeh?!"
Was he serious?! That wouldn't be too bad… wait, was he just repeating her mistake to make it repeat, like poetry or something?
"Since you didn't do it perfectly we can pretend that I was the one that confessed first, with a little slip of the tongue. For the record, I meant every word I said."
"… You… you're so unfair. I meant it too…"
"Want to start over again?"
"No. I don't think I will."
As if they had come to an unspoken agreement, both of them quickly kissed each other on the lips before this confession ends up even stranger than it already was.
Level 31B
Level 31B
This discussion had all began after I came to my future wives with a concern of mine, namely, I may have sent Tomoe into a depressive funk after showing her the gap in our abilities a bit too much. As a sort of apology to her, I wanted to make an event that would be lots of fun for her!
"So I have this idea-"
I don't know when was the exact point that Valerie had overridden my input on tomorrow's schedule, but with the wacky stuff that she has been proposing I stopped wondering about the "when" and began focusing on the "what".
"Wait, what was that about making gold? Why do you even need gold?"
Valerie already had plans to "game" my ability to basically recreate any matter that I was familiar with. She has become strong and wise, and I am very proud of her.
"What kind of respectable treasure hunt doesn't have gold in the end? I wrote down some details here so you can get it thematically correct. Now then, Atago, can I borrow this part off the coast of Okinawa? And some custom clothes?"
Atago gave the trademarked Tohsaka "WTF" face as she looked at Valerie's request.
"I suppose so… I can convince a few people I need it for a "play", which is true, from a certain point of view."
"Great. Then we're all set."
"Wait, can you tell me what you're making?"
"It's a surprise."
Since Valerie wanted to surprise me I accepted her decision and worked on the things she wanted me to create. After a while, Valerie came back with Jeanne, having roped her in for her sword creation abilities. She had me disassemble one of her permanent holy swords to create a brand new magic sword that could be used by anyone, before taking the finished product to craft her scenario.
Valerie used one of her Balance Breaker's to get the working force she needed to actually make the area while utilizing its regular functions to populate it.
I can't help but feel that this is going a little too far to show Tomoe a good time. That said…
There is a point where we needed to stop, and we have clearly passed it, but let's keep going and see what happens.
Tomoe Meguri could see why the many exorcist clans and those of the Five Principal Clans would never actually retaliate against devils or other factions in a serious manner after having been attacked and had various things stolen from them over the centuries.
Dealing with the situation within the confines in Japan was completely fine and doable. Taking the fight to the Underworld, some other country or realm, was something utterly suicidal. A decent amount of the enemies they had fought against had their main forces, family, and power back in their homelands.
It was the same with every faction, from the size of an entire society to a single clan.
If she took the example of a supposed devil teaming up with rogue magicians, "rogue" Youkai and various monsters to attack a prominent clan in Japan, any form of retaliation could only be handled in Japan, and if so, they had to be swift as the anti-teleportation measures could only last so long. Once they have retreated to the Underworld, they would be on home ground or could just fake being an upstanding citizen (if they have enough clout) of Devil society so that any accusations against them would be an attack against the entire faction.
Even though Tomoe was a devil now, not being able to resolve matters of honor or striking back righteously against those that wronged the ones she cared about irked her, a lot.
After another fight against Darth Bobby with Jeanne doing most of the work, which resulted in both of them getting beaten down effortlessly and getting healed by their sparring opponent, Tomoe came to realize that it all came to one single thing.
Power.
If humans had the power to take revenge and were willing to do so, then they would have done so. If the devils had the will, direction and power to subjugate every other faction, be it economically or through force, then they would have done so. If any single pantheon could have taken on every other faction without incurring unacceptable losses to become the sole gods of this world then they would have done so.
It was a strangely cynical thought for someone as cheerful and energetic as Tomoe Meguri. But as she stared out into the night sky from her hotel room after being defeated so effortlessly again, she realized that there was really nothing she could do if someone had hurt the ones she loved.
If she couldn't even defeat a Sith Lord that seemed perfectly willing to take on the whole world by himself, as per his own admission, for whatever his goals were, then what chance did she have? And even if she took into account the Power of Friendship, what chance did Sona Sitri's peerage have? And there was her family to think about as well…
"Are you going through your teenage angst phase?"
"Hyaa!"
Tomoe came face to face with Atago's yellow eyes, the girl's face was upside down, it looked like Atago had just climbed her room's roof.
"Ufufu, what a cute reaction! Anime was right, popping up from odd places can be really fun."
"Kaiza-senpai… ! More like it's way overdone…"
"Not for the one actually doing it."
The dog Youkai flipped down onto the balcony's ledge, "So what's going on? I'm only barely adequate in the emotional sensing aspects of Senjutsu, but even I can feel your negative feelings strongly."
"Haa… it's nothing someone as strong as you have to worry about."
"Thank you for the compliment but I'm hardly strong. Someone like your King's older sister is probably stronger than me, and even then, Serafall Leviathan can't even compare to the really powerful beings like the Ouroboros Dragon and the Hindu Pantheon as a whole."
The sense of scale had just increased exponentially!
"That's not really… hmm…" Darth Bobby had "refunded" the energy she spent fighting him with his healing technique that was likely living proof that he discovered the power to cheat death, "I know it's a selfish request, but can you spar with me please?"
"Okay~ Normally I wouldn't do this but since it's my cute junior asking then I won't mind obliging you."
Tomoe knew that she was just saying that to be nice.
From what Momo had told her about what happened earlier in the day, Atago Kaiza wasn't someone that would do something to benefit another faction, especially not the devils. And in this case, someone that stood on par, or even higher than the Youkai leaders in terms of power, likely saw Tomoe as no threat at all and believed that this fight wouldn't benefit her one bit.
Her suspicions were proven right when she was defeated several times effortlessly as well.
"You're overpowered too!"
"I'm not. In fact, I can safely say that you could have given my middle-school self a run for my money."
In other words, Atago had gotten a lot stronger in the span of two years. If it was possible to gain that power then… but just to be sure, she needed to ask a few more questions.
With that in mind, Tomoe hoped that Atago would provide her an answer to her next question, which could be considered a request for confidential information.
"If it isn't too much trouble, and this is only for my personal reference, do you know how you would compare to Darth Bobby, power-wise?"
"I have never won a fight against him, in fact, I get completely destroyed in every fight despite holding a few advantages over him."
Atago hadn't seemed to even pause to think about her answer. It was as if she was stating a fact as natural as breathing to her.
"It's hopeless." She laid down on the rough and coarse sand without any motivation to get up after hearing that.
Ever since she was little, she had inherited the duty to defend Japan from her parents. And now that she had been reborn as a devil, she had to protect both her old family and the interests of Sona Sitri. And from her own free will, she wanted to protect all her friends, which included strong people like Jeanne to normal humans like Genshirou, Aika and Ruruko too.
"Why do you say that? I just said that even this little amount of power was achievable to you."
"Well, I've been trying for a year, and I haven't seemed to improve at all."
"That's not true, Jeanne had plenty to say about how much stronger you've become."
"It's not really enough."
"But why do you chase after strength?"
"Why else? To make sure that everyone I care about is safe. It's pretty much how it is for everyone raised in the exorcism business you know?"
"Oh my, that sounds familiar… I won't do this for free, and my time is already pretty stretched as it is… but how would you like a few lessons here and there?"
Tomoe had all but leaped up back onto her feet, the sand of the beach had scattered all over, much to Atago's visual displeasure.
"Wait, really?!"
"Only if Sona Sitri gives the go-ahead and provides an appropriate payment, along with agreeing to a lot of privacy-related terms."
"So it's a yes then?"
"There's also paperwork-"
"Yippee!"
"Nevermind… oh yes, there's a small little task I have for you to complete first."
"Ah, so it's like one of those job advancement quests?"
"Are you saying that I'm the Job NPC?"
"You're overpowered enough to be one."
"No comment. Anyways, see that island way over there?"
"Yeah!"
"Well, long story short, a long time ago some idiot youkai kids went there and got themselves killed by super weak monsters. Due to reasons unknown, there are some old orders that ban Youkai from going over there, and while I could sort out the paperwork and meet the people of the North Faction in charge over the place, it is a huge hassle. I scouted it out with magic and there shouldn't be many issues in way of enemies. So I want you to take Genshirou out with you tomorrow, kill whatever is there and bring back whatever treasures you find. Which you will get to keep so long as it isn't a Japanese artifact of sorts."
This sounds like a really convenient quest that should have been taken up by other people. Then again, in all sorts of RPG's, the plot explanation for why quests like these aren't taken up can be summed up as "geopolitical issues".
"Hmm, hmm, I get it. Yeah, I can do it- wait, what was that about Genshirou? Why is he even involved?"
"Oh my, I just thought it would be nice to ease him into our world. He's already seen some strange things he couldn't explain, and quite honestly, he couldn't really be bothered since he's too busy with a lot of things. I think fighting the type of enemies you'll find there would just be a small step up his usual shenanigans."
"What do you mean shenanigans?"
"He's punched out some 'weak' stray devil or two targeting his family for a quick meal, fought a serial killer, rescued a couple of kids from a mad scientist laboratory, those kinds of things."
"What is he some kind of anime protagonist?!"
Tomoe could see where Atago was coming from. If he's already had these sorts of experiences and has taken it all in stride, apparently accepting it as a normal part of life, then they would only need to increase his exposure to the supernatural world a little by little.
And more importantly, it was quite clear that for everyone's relationship to work, they would need a full disclosure at some point. Tomoe was sure that Atago would be handling the bulk of it, it is simply the case that she was sharing the responsibility when a good opportunity had come about.
That got Tomoe thinking… did Atago already consider her as part of their group, to a certain extent? It would be nice if that was the case.
"Okay, so here you go."
Atago handed her an old map with a red X that marked the location.
"Isn't this a treasure map!? Woah!"
"Yes, woah. Do prepare some explorer gear~"
"Oh, I have just the thing!"
She did prepare an outfit in case they ever did some cave tours in Okinawa. Although, with how short the skirt she ordered turned out to be… well, she wouldn't mind wearing it if its only Genshirou that would be looking at her.
Spoiler: Tomoe the Explorer
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"So you basically found a treasure map, though it would be a good idea to have an adventure together, rented a boat and now we're traveling to some random island in order to find it. Yeah, sounds legit."
"You don't sound convinced at all!"
"Am I supposed to be convinced?"
"Um… maybe?"
Genshirou had a point, how did Tomoe even get convinced that this was a good idea in the first place? Oh right, training sessions.
Then again, getting some proper training from someone strong would be a lot better than those tutors that Sona got for them, who were often devils that spent anywhere from decades to centuries getting strong.
What Tomoe wanted wasn't some promised strength derived from simply living for a length of time that humans warriors would be lucky to survive uptill. What she wanted was a "correct" yet quick way to gain the power to protect her family and friends.
And the best kind of teacher would be someone that had achieved success in that manner.
Her blonde crush sighed before relaxing into the boat's driver seat, he smiled and laughed at it all, "Ah well! More importantly, how are you feeling about this Tomoe-chan?"
How did she feel? Well, a lot better than last night, at the very least.
And also, getting into an adventure with Genshirou, even if it was under these circumstances feels like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
When she thought about what was expected of her, a lot of it counted on being able to fight in order to do her duty, but this time if she set aside the reward from Atago, then she would be using her ability to fight in order to have a grand adventure by herself and the person she fell in love with.
"I'm excited! I don't think I ever done something so dumb and shady in my life!"
"I guess that's one way to describe treasure hunting, yeah sure, let's go with that!"
"By the way, aren't you wearing a bit too much for this kind of heat?"
While she was wearing light clothing overall, Genshirou seemed to be wearing a heavy survivalist-like outfit.
"You can never be too careful."
He's surprisingly paranoid when he's going on activities that he hadn't planned for.
"Haha! You make me feel underdressed, geez! I hope you don't do that to your girlfriends all the time."
Tomoe started to feel a bit more self-conscious as he eyed her body up and down, she wondered if he figured out her intentions to wear something that would catch his eye… then realized that it was a stupid question in the first place.
She was the only girl in the group that had yet to become his girlfriend on this entire trip. This wasn't a low effort harem anime, a man with a skull denser than a black hole simply didn't exist.
"Oh no, certainly not. They would kill me if I did. That said… no, I don't think you're underdressed, not at all." She followed his eyes, noting that he was most definitely checking out her legs.
"W-well then, that's great to hear! Hey, don't you think you're staring a bit too long?"
"Was I? Then do enlighten me on how much time I'm allotted to stare at your body."
"Just like, um… not more than 10 seconds at one spot?"
Knowing what he has been doing to Reya and Aika, along with everyone else, made her keenly aware of the things that he could make her feel if she allowed him to. She wasn't that kind of "easy" girl, even so, the idea of him planning out all sorts of ways to make her feel good by evaluating her body made her feel hot and bothered.
The rest of the trip was spent making fun conversation while they played a "game" between themselves. Genshirou would take the time to glance at her for 10 seconds, then she would have to call him out at the place where he was staring at, if she got it wrong then it was one point to him, if she got it right then she gained one point.
There would be no real prizes but it was a game that made her feel really good.
They arrived on the island without complications, it looked like the typical small islands that dotted the Japanese map, but… there was a very conspicuous cave in the middle of it.
"Oh, my, gosh! An actual cave that leads to treasure!"
Tomoe almost forgot about the monsters that were supposedly weak enough to only kill a bunch of defenseless kids.
Genshirou took a look at the cave and raised an eyebrow, pointing at the side of it, "Is that a freaking sign with an arrow pointed to the cave?"
Indeed, there was a rotted and faded signboard with a colored arrow pointing to the cave entrance.
"Maybe it's so people won't get lost?"
"I really don't think you can get lost on an island this small. And also, where would a cave-like this even lead to when there's no freaking space around here?"
He seemed more frustrated about the lack of logic and inconsistencies than anything else.
"Eh, lighten up Genshirou-kun! It's an adventure so shut off your brain for a bit!"
"Wait, wait, it's because it's an adventure that we have to keep our brains active? Haven't you watched Goblin Slayer or something?"
"We'll be fine! I have a katana!"
Tomoe had managed to get a replacement katana and brought it along so she should be able to handle any enemy that comes their way.
"Okay, great to know you got my back. Are you going to advise me to not get things killed by you because the sword traps the souls of its victims?"
"That was a terrible movie and you should feel bad about paraphrasing from it. Go back to your Prequel memes."
"Yes, my lord." Genshirou turned on his own flashlight that he had brought on the offchance they would be doing some digging into dark holes.
Tomoe had brought her own too. With a flashlight in one hand and her sword in the other, they shined the light into the interior of the cave and found a latch.
"This is just lazy design. It's like someone mix and matched from the resources given by RPG Maker. And also, we're on an island, how will this even lead to anywhere-"
"Gen-kun, stop being such a critic."
"But… okay, fine."
He lifted the latch and locked it in place so that it wouldn't close on them when they descended what seemed to be a secret facility.
"I'll go down first to, you know, be a man and make sure it's safe."
"Aww! You're so sweet!"
It was only after he went down that she realized one issue!
"Hey, did you just do that so you could look up my skirt!?"
"Whoops? Did I?"
"You're not even trying to hide it, pervert!"
"Are you coming down or what?"
"Mmm… I'll be right there. D-don't think it'll be that easy."
She had learned to climb ropes and ladders with only one hand as part of her training when she was young. She could simply use one hand to pull down her skirt and… oh wait, it wouldn't do anything since her skirt was this short.
Well, if it was him, it wouldn't be all that bad…
By the time she was halfway down, it was apparent that Genshirou had simply moved on to look around the room.
"Hey, where did you go?"
She followed the light and shined it on him, he seemed to be messing with… a giant vault door?
"What? Unless you invited me then I wouldn't peek at your underwear in an underhanded manner. If I was going to do it, I would have asked for your permission."
"That still wouldn't make you less of a pervert."
That said, she didn't mind seeing this side of him at all.
"Since your skirt is so short that you will undoubtedly be flashing your underwear at me at some point, can I get your permission so that you don't strike back at me in your pervert revenge mode?"
"You didn't need to be so upfront about it… well, who am I kidding? I was pretty much asking for it, wearing this, I mean. You basically already had permission. Ah, don't think I will let you do this all the time. It's just that we're on an adventure and I had to wear the only explorer outfit I had on hand."
"So I can ask for permission some other times then? The female school uniform's skirt is quite short…"
"A-anyway, what have you been up to?"
"Unlocking this door. According to this puzzle, the code should be this- aha!"
The Vault Door began to unlock itself and they were treated to the sight of an even larger cave with strange glowing crystals illuminating the place.
"… I want to loot those crystals."
"Uh, Gen, we should like, totally make sure it's safe first."
Not that Tomoe didn't understand what he was thinking, she too, would like to take the pretty crystals back.
"Well then, let's go."
They went in deeper to the cave, then paused, as they heard movement from the corner of the cave that wasn't lit at all. It was something akin to the shambling horrors that she heard in a couple of horror movies she watched with her friends before.
The two of them shined their flashlights in the same direction, revealing the monsters for what they were.
"Zombies? Really?" "Z-ZOMBIES!?"
Genshirou looked utterly unaffected while Tomoe wasn't used to the sight of actual, freaking, zombies!
Demons? Been there, done that. Ghosts? A chore. The garden variety of monsters? Easy money.
But Zombies? This was an entirely new experience to her. She had heard that the Church dealt with zombies on a regular basis but it was one thing hearing about it and another thing to actually see them in the flesh.
They seemed particularly well-dressed for being part of the undead category, however.
"Wait, is that all you have to say?"
"Haa… Tomoe-chan, I've seen some weird shit coming after my parents over the course of my life. Strange mutants in human skin-" So stray devils? "-genetically engineered wild beasts-" Aren't those monsters? "-an actual killer robots made by a mad scientist intending to stuff kids into them as a power source." Atago wasn't kidding at all. "It's not something I tell others since, well, I don't want to bring them into that sort of world."
Tomoe could only manage a wry smile. Oh, if he only knew…
She thought about how she wanted to play this and decided to just do it by ear.
"Ah, I gotcha. Well, I've seen some weird stuff too, like ghosts!"
"Oh, I think I saw one before."
"Then you're not alone. Wait, shouldn't we deal with the zombies?"
The zombies were very far away from them, but they seemed to be picking up speed as they got closer to the both of them.
"… the same from their people who have suffered now." Is the zombie speaking?
"OH FOR FUCKS SAKE!" Genshirou had a very vocal reaction to the zombies words. Tomoe didn't understand why. "Kill them. Kill them now."
Genshirou kicked his foot at a stalagmite, breaking it at the bottom, took it into his hand then threw the sharp rock material at the zombies!
Impaling and killing two zombies in one headshot!
"Holy shit that was awesome! My turn!"
Tomoe dealt with the other two zombies with her blade easily enough, she kept her speed at a level around Genshirou's, which is to say, it was pretty beyond a normal human's speed. That said, somehow, she had the feeling that Genshirou would still beat her out in pure strength at this point.
"Woah! You're pretty good."
"Ehehe, what can I say? I've been studying the way of the sword since I was young."
"Wow! Who knew it would come in handy in giving the dead some well-deserved rest?"
It was kind of her job so yeah, she pretty much knew that her sword skills would be put to good use.
"Hahaha, I guess it is pretty handy. Hmm, it's bothering me a bit, but you seemed very angry at the zombies."
Genshirou gave her a flat look, "Did you hear what they were saying?"
She heard random words like "german devotion", "german joy" and all sorts of things.
"The first zombie pretty much said this in German, "die gleichen nun in ihrem Volk gelitten haben", which translates to "the same from their people who have suffered now."" Tomoe didn't notice it was in German due to the Devil's native "Language" ability, "On its own it doesn't mean much, but if you studied history as much as I did, you'll know that the zombies were outright repeating parts of Hitler's speeches while imitating his voice."
"Wait what!? The Zombies were giving Hitler speeches?"
"Yes… that makes them… Nazi Zombies."
Genshirou spat out the last words with utter disdain.
"A… aah… eeeeehhhHH?!"
"God damnit. I am so tired of Nazi Zombies. It's so overused."
"That's what you're concerned about?"
"Of course not. I hate Nazis on principle. That said, it's annoying seeing them in Call of Duty, Sniper Elite and other games."
They made their way through the passageway from which the Nazi Zombies came from, killing any of them they encountered so that they wouldn't spread to the outside world.
"Huh, you know, it really feels as if I'm doing my duty as a Knight by killing these things."
Genshirou took one look at her attire, and said, "You are oddly attired - for a knight."
"I didn't get that reference at all."
"It's before your time."
"Wait, if it's before my time then it's before yours too!"
At some point, Genshirou managed to find some armed Nazi Zombies and after killing them (because they fumbled on their guns way too long), he looted their weapons after he checked to see if they were still operational.
"You know how to use guns?"
"You know what a cautious fellow I am." He made sure to take all the ammunition too, "You should take one too."
"Eh, I think I will stick with my sword. I'm more likely to hurt myself with that than hurting the enemy."
They killed their way until they found a single minecart at the end of the cave.
"This feels a bit like a lazy Minecraft player's layout…"
"I know it looks suspicious but hey, there's enough place for two people! Hop on!"
Tomoe sat at the back half of the cart while using her sword to keep the minecart in place.
"Very well then." Genshirou got into the cart, it was a tight fit, especially with all the weapons and his thick clothes, but it was doable.
Tomoe sheathed her blade and quickly grabbed onto Genshirou as they were taken on an exciting rollercoaster ride down the dark shaft.
"Weeee!"
This was fun.
"OH FUCK IS THAT LAVA!?"
"OH SHIT!"
Thankfully, there wasn't a random missing part of the tracks that would force them to make a jump to safety. They made it to the other side safe and sound, finding a passageway that led them to a ledge that overlooked what seemed to be a semi-operational laboratory straight out of a horror game.
There were a lot of zombies down there.
"So uh… stealth level?"
"There's no other entrance so I think we have to fight our way through. Speaking of fighting, you should go grab that conveniently placed glowing katana all the way there."
What the hell? There was actually a glowing katana!
But it was all the way past the zombies and near the exit!
"Why would I do that? It could be radioactive?!"
"Unless you start using guns, you aren't going to get much done, especially after you dropped your sword."
"I what? Oh shit!" She must have had way too much fun in the minecart ride.
Oh yeah, she did see something drop into the lava… if she had a personal sword instead of a mass-produced replacement, then she totally wouldn't have dropped it, at all.
"Well, you can wait here, I'll take care of them. Don't worry, I'll protect you."
"No! I should-"
"-you should what? You're unarmed right now. And while I do think you can smack one or two of them dead with your fists I'd rather not risk you catching whatever virus they might be carrying. Even I'm sticking with either my guns or environmental weapons."
This would have been a really good time to have learned some magic to conveniently reveal to Genshirou that she was not defenseless.
Even so, he had a point, the zombies were only moderately fast but their strength was the real deal, as they weren't limited by some of the constraints of being a living being.
As fast as she was, there could be a chance for her to be bitten, unless of course, she flew using her devil wings. But even then, they had encountered some Nazi Zombies clinging onto the roof before and she could be caught off guard by them.
"Okay, fine. But how are we going to do this?"
"Easy, I make a distraction, then you, grab the sword and join me."
"And how are you supposed to do that?"
Genshirou smiled with anticipation and glee, "I've been looking forward to this."
"Oh no."
"Oh yes."
He jumped down and landed.
"Hello There."
The zombies rushed him and he went ham on them with his guns. Tomoe rushed to the sword by going around the zombies that were focused on Genshirou, grabbed it, and wasted no time in using it to cut her way through the Nazi Zombies.
She had known, the moment she picked up the sword, that it was a magic sword. One that suited her better than all the swords that she had ever wielded before. If she had more time to think about it she would have wondered about how contrived it was, but didn't have the time to do so, and continued to cut down zombies until she reached Genshirou.
After that, they defended each other's backs and continued to kill the rest of the mob monsters until they cleared a path.
"Well, that was pretty awesome."
"You idiot! Don't make me worry like that…"
"Sorry, sorry. But I trusted that you would be just fine."
Their adventure continued until they reached the end of the laboratory and fought some kind of super zombie, which was a really big let down since several headshots and a few slices were enough to deal with it.
There was an ornate box at the end, which held several trays of gold in various forms!
"Is this Nazi Gold?"
"It shouldn't be… I mean, this is all supposed to be hidden around Europe."
"Who cares? Bonus pocket money! Woohoo!"
And she got to keep all of it (or half of it when she split it up with Genshirou later on)! She wondered if Atago would be sad about missing out on the gold… then figured that the girl was likely too rich to be bothered.
"Hey… is that an elevator?" Genshirou pointed out at some point.
"At the end of the boss room? If this was an RPG then it would lead straight back to the entrance."
And it did.
They existed from a hidden elevator covered by the back of the cave they first came in from.
"… This is so convenient but I'm too happy by the fact that we got out alright to bother with the small details."
"That's the spirit!"
Tomoe patted Genshirou on the back before they deposited their loot at their boat's cargo area.
They decided to just sit in their boat seats to wind down a bit after all the excitement.
"Well, Tomoe-chan, how do we feel after all that?"
"Hmm, I dunno, all sorts of things but I think I'm really happy that it all turned up to be a fun adventure."
"Remind me to schedule zombie killing into the schedule…"
"Aww, you! Did you like it Gen-kun?"
"I would prefer my peace and quiet, but I'm glad that you enjoyed yourself."
"Hehe! I make a good adventurer, don't I?"
"Yes, yes you do. Especially with that outfit."
"Ah, pervert, you still going on about that?"
"I'm pretty sure you wanted me to talk about it. Why else would you wear something like that? By the way, you make it look really, really good."
"Thanks! Hey, uh… Genshirou?"
"Yes?"
Tomoe gave him a quick kiss on the lips.
"Let's go on more adventures together, okay?"
She hoped that he counted that as a confession.
And also… as she thought about the words she used, she believed that it would be great if she got strong enough to the point where they could have all sorts of fun around the world without worrying so much about their safety.
He grabbed her arms and pulled her in for a much deeper kiss.
She enjoyed it a lot.
"Yeah. I would like that. In fact, let's make our future together one big adventure!"
It would definitely be a huge adventure in itself when he finds out how big the world is. She can't help but giggle at his shocked face when he finds out that devils, angels and all sorts of gods exist in this world.
Finally, it is finished.
She was ready to take revenge and reclaim her honor.
After spending the required time socializing with other nobles and having fun with her sister, she managed to go through an intense training camp with one of the most intelligent magicians and chess masters in the Underworld.
It was intense and harsh, but by the end of it, she was able to win the majority of games against 10 different master-class opponents at once!
By improving not just her chess skills, but multi-tasking ability by learning advanced magician spell-handling techniques, she was able to take her Chess skills to an entirely new level.
And now he would face defeat by her own hands.
Thankfully, by the time she had returned to the human world from the Underworld, Genshirou Saji had also returned from his very long vacation in Okinawa.
The fool had no idea what awaited him.
With Tsubaki and Tsubasa's help, they transformed the currently unused gymnasium into an arena with fifteen chessboards set-up, all so that she could finally defeat him soundly.
"Oh hey, Shitori-chan, how are you doing?"
"Genshirou Saji, I challenge you to a chess duel! Fifteen of them, in fact."
"… You know, I totally thought we were having some sort of rendezvous at school since you invited me all the way here, but I guess I should have expected something like this."
"Fufufu, you didn't think I spent my summer twiddling my thumbs did you? I have been training just to defeat you."
He merely shook his head as if he was looking at a sad sight.
"Don't try it."
The deluded human was still trying to use memes to mask his fear at her new skill level.
"You underestimate my power."
Spoiler: 6 1/2 hours later…
[img: https/vignette.wikia./spongebob/images/5/5a/Hours_later.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20160407232054]
"Noooo! Kaichou!"
"Sona, hey, are you alright?"
Sona Sitri had fallen back in shock after being checkmated in the final three remaining games at the same time. She was currently lying down on the floor after suffering from yet another total defeat.
She had lost all fifteen games that she had played with him simultaneously.
It was hopeless. She didn't feel like getting up at all.
"Dinner has arrived!"
"Thanks, Atago!"
Wait, what was that smell?
Sona could see a bowl being laid in front of her spot on the ground.
"We played all the way uptill dinner time and as I understand correctly, you went overseas to visit your parents? You must have missed your Udon a lot, so I figured that I could get Atago to heat up some of the soup I made a day ago for our dinner."
"…"
"It's going to get cold."
"It can't be helped. I can't let good Udon go uneaten in its optimal temperature."
She had no choice but to respond to Genshirou's thoughtfulness and ate dinner with them.
Turns out that several pots of soup and ingredients had been brought along. But why would they need so many?
"Welcome back Kaichou!" "Hey Sona-chan!" "You're back! Sona-senpai!"
The rest of her peerage had also joined them in the school gymnasium for dinner and to welcome her back to Japan!
She felt a bit bad for taking her rivalry a bit too far, to the point that the first person that she actually greeted was Genshirou rather than her own servants.
She resolved to be a better King later on.
Aside from Atago, a whole lot of other girls had also joined for dinner in the school, normally she would have complained about how it broke all sorts of rules, but since she wasn't operating in her capacity as student council president she decided to let it go this time.
And more than that, upon reflection of her latest defeat, she wasn't at all frustrated by it. Strangely enough, it was more shock rather than the usual negative emotions that accompanied such a loss.
Could it be that she was already expecting to lose? Or had she gotten too used to losing? Either option wasn't supposed to be acceptable to someone like herself.
Ah well, she supposed that she could ponder upon that another time.
After Genshirou and his group of friends had left, Sona stayed with her peerage in order to catch up with them.
She had heard some interesting things about Momo regarding the Youkai community, and about that Sith Lord that was apparently, doing business there.
Tomoe had a bit of information about him as well, having apparently been defeated soundly even with Jeanne battling alongside her (apparently the exorcist was rivals with Kokabiel of all people!? And Jeanne was essentially living in her city?!). She had also requested if she could get some training under who Atago Kaiza, Sona figured that it was a good chance to get a better measure of her, while also helping Tomoe and herself (stronger friends = better future for them both), and so decided to allocate some of her budget to paying the price the Youkai girl wanted.
"Wait, sorry, run that by me again?"
"So Gen and I went treasure hunting and fought Nazi Zombies in a cave-"
"-urrggh" She groaned uncharacteristically, "Not again. I thought I had heard the last of them. They are so overused."
They were exterminated after the end of World War II by pretty much every faction.
Sona remembered how her parents often complained about Nazi Zombies being a nuisance, especially when it was found out that one of the nobles that they were affiliated with had apparently, made an illegal magical contract with Hitler that led to their creation of zombie soldiers and all sorts of horrors.
That said, there were remnants that would pop up here and there. Some of them were even under the control of Nazi cults and magicians that wanted some cheap labor.
Sona stopped visiting an old magician affiliate of their family's after he employed some a Nazi Zombie bouncer. It was so annoying and racist!
"-and uh, I got this magic sword? And some gold too!"
"Okay, great. Wait, what was that about you fighting with Genshirou?"
"Apparently it wasn't the first time he's seen something supernatural, he still doesn't know anything about our world though."
"I knew he was way too calm during our first encounter with Darth Bobby! Well, he seemed like the type to get himself into trouble. I suppose Atago Kaiza is slowly getting him used to the idea…"
She figured that it would happen eventually. From what she could tell by the engagement ring on the girl's finger, it was quite clear that she was committing to a marriage, and thus, would like the truth to be out there before they took the final step.
"Reya, how about you?"
"Eep! What about, I mean, I'm fine. Hehehe…"
Reya was behaving oddly as if she was somehow uncomfortable standing there right now. Her cheeks were also red and she was squirming about.
"You should get some rest. Your face is red and it might just be a fever, if it doesn't subside after a night's rest, come to me immediately, it might be a devil specific disease, one that you might not be familiar with."
"O-okay…"
Momo and Tomoe looked at each other as if they knew something Sona hadn't known but ultimately decided to keep silent on it.
Well, it's been a long day, Sona decided that she could question them on it another day.
The next few months saw rapid progress in all my endeavors.
Most of them were in my own personal power progression. Now that I had nigh-unlimited energy, I managed to break out of orbit and have a good amount of my clones stationed in space, some of them have even left the solar system.
Due to the way we were connected, there wasn't a lag despite the distance, and our connection was still undetectable within the physical and magical realm unless a magician managed to find the specific soul and dimensional frequency I was working on (and even that changes and is improved on frequently).
With a new technique that I created, I could easily swap positions with any of my clones at a thought. Training in the harsh conditions of space, especially under the deadly atmosphere of a star, was doing wonders for my overall being.
All the girls under my tutelage had also made great strides in their training. Jeanne and Teofila managed to get the required mental resistance within a month, surprisingly nearly everyone, hence, could be trusted with much of my knowledge and skills.
At some point, some Youkai politics had eventually reached the upcoming wedding between Atago and I. It took a while to arrange a private platform where only selected Youkai nobles were there to witness me beating down every wannabe suitor and people who opposed Atago marrying me due to my race being listed as human.
As part of the loss conditions, they had to accept a curse that would prevent them from divulging my identity and capabilities (in other words, the fact that Genshirou Saji is capable of fighting). Most guests knew the consequences of betraying the agreements they had signed, and even if the information had gotten out, I was only using Touki during those fights so they wouldn't be able to connect me with my other identities or being anything other than a supremely talented fighter.
Despite all that, my actions had somehow come under the radar of the Shinto gods. Atago and Yasaka had to invite "Vritra" to meet with them as part of their duties. In the end, it was a fruitful and enjoyable visit.
Like a certain few other gods in this world, they were actually quite chill and all-around nice people.
In terms of the business side of things, it turns out that there are some inter-pantheon restrictions around taking overt actions to promote a god's existence, and hence, gain more belief.
While my other persona named after my dragon buddy was worshiped as a god, I most certainly wasn't a god, hence, I could take action without triggering the ancient pact that bound them in their stead.
They were already fine with me starting the whole cult thing as the Japanese weren't very religious in the first place. But now, with the loopholes in the inter-pantheon agreements, coupled with my capabilities to act as in many places at once, we were able to hash out a system that worked for all of us.
Simply put, the Big Three (Amaterasu, Susanoo and Tsukuyomi) would "sponsor" certain actions, benefits and blessings for the people I interacted with. I would provide for their needs with my own power while name dropping the respective god (e.g. This blessing is brought to you by Vritra and Amaterasu), they would evaluate the incoming amount of faith energy, then compensate me for the increase later on.
With my increasing capacity to multi-task and keep watch over the nation, they were more than happy to use me as an intermediary to do the things they were unable to until recently.
Time passed and before I knew it, canon was almost upon us all.
I wondered if the plot would try to stop me from saving Issei from, you know, dying.
I saw Issei rejecting Raynare (Yuuma) in front of the school gate after calling up Irina on his phone for "evaluation" purposes, to which Irina had (on speaker) called her a fake two-faced bitch, and ended with Issei apologizing for Irina's harsh words and saying that he couldn't date someone his girlfriend didn't approve of.
I was planning to intervene for the inevitable retaliation by Raynare, but certain circumstances forced me to rely on my companions to do so, or well… at this point, I think the plot just wants Issei dead.
"Genshirou, buddy, it's terrible! That bitch Jacheongbi actually did it!" Susanoo literally called my phone and complained to me about a crisis.
"What happened this time? Did she sexually harass someone important during a visit again?"
"If it was just that I wouldn't be- hey wait- Hello, sorry, forgive the interruption." Tsukuyomi snatched the phone away from his brother, "To cut a long story short, a certain obsessed goddess just kidnapped our sister. We can't get her back ourselves or that bitch's parting gift will result in some ecological disasters in Japan so-"
"-You need me to go to Korea and rescue Amaterasu. Again. She's going to be a Hikkikomori in her cave for weeks again, isn't she?"
"It can't be helped. There's a barrier that prevents anyone from entering her domain while having a foot in Japan so we certainly can't maintain certain systems if we leave ourselves. Will you do it? We'll be in your debt-"
"Yeah, yeah, no problem."
As expected, the story really wants Issei dead if it's willing to quite literally, create a contrived reason for me to be kicked out (clones included) of Japan for a short duration.
Unfortunately, Amy-chan (Amaterasu's web persona) needed to be rescued from her crazed stalker ASAP. I'm totally getting blacklisted from Korea if they ever found out who I was.
Asia almost sighed when she saw the sight in front of her.
"Ah… help! Anyone, I'm dying…"
Even so, she ran up to him, took out her phone and snapped a picture so that she would have some evidence.
"Huh?"
"Sorry, I record all the injuries I treat! Don't worry, I can save you even if you have been dead for the up to 20 seconds!"
She reassured the devil and smiled at him despite not wanting to.
Asia would pray for forgiveness later on. But for now, she had some appearances to keep.
Level 32
Level 32
"Aren't you supposed to be in Korea?"
The clone was giving me the minimum attention my words deserved as it was occupied with the delicate work it was tasked with.
"Meh. You know how tricky those buggers can be." And even before I knew that I didn't do the stupid thing and fight them directly until I was sure nothing they did could really harm me significantly, "While I'm pretty sure I got them to use most of their techniques last time, it's best to send clones just in case. And besides, the new "Scapegoat" damage soak clone model needs more refinement." I answered one of my independent space-faring clones using sound magic (speech won't translate well in space otherwise), who had received an outdated report from a more connected clone of mine about a day ago.
Said clone was currently occupied with creating matter directly within our shared soul-space storage, building up a few copies of my current body for my clones to inhabit. With all the mishaps that could occur during space travel (getting caught up in a supernova was one of the worst experiences, second to the trip into a black hole…), having extra bodies that could be inhabited and manifested instantly from the location of an untimely death was incredibly convenient.
I have made significant progress in upgrading my clones to have more substance while maintaining the ability to stop existing (and therefore, leave no DNA evidence for annoying cloning blues) on demand ever since I learned to rebuild my body from any sufficient sort of matter.
It also had the benefit of allowing me to "update" my main body selectively by picking out the best "improvements", allowing me to train my base capabilities with my clones while also preventing myself from accidentally getting suicidal upgrades like Burning Godzilla mode.
"Wheeeee!"
Just as I was thinking that, I saw Vritra bursting out of the shadows of my clone, right into the surface of the burning star that we were soaking in for energy.
"AHHHH! IT BURNS!!!"
"Vritra what the fuck!? Get out of there before you give yourself skin cancer!"
I helped Vritra get back to perfect health.
"I thought you said your abilities allowed you to go star bathing?"
"I didn't say that. I said that I could absorb and redistribute the energy fast enough to the point where I wouldn't be hurt! This is what happens when you don't read the patch notes properly you boosted animal!"
"You take that back! I earned my matchmaking ranking the hard way."
"If the hard way means paying another player for their account then well done-"
"Can the two of you go have a space adventure somewhere else? I am busy, doing my fucking job!"
After my clone complained at us I decided to take Vritra on a trip through space properly. My dragon partner never bothered with space until now, when he decided to pay me a surprise visit using the clone network.
"… So… are we going to fight aliens now?"
"No, there aren't any aliens."
"What? But you said there would be aliens!"
"Aliens from another dimension if that asshole devil ever pierces through to another dimension. You need to pay more attention to these things.
"… I can see why my other evil dragon buddies never went to space. There are no fights here… just… space."
"I disagree with that. That's just your dragon blood talking. The universe is a wonderfully large training ground and full of untapped resources."
We landed on a nice barren planet where a couple of my clones were already stationed at. They were practicing lethal and non-lethal techniques on each other while reforming through the energy and efforts of the "gatherer" clones stationed at a faraway star in another galaxy.
It was best to keep the energy providers far away with the rest of the clones in case I fuck up by accident in trying something beyond my limits and causing another star to blow up…
Thankfully, I had been cautious enough to spread my clones all around the star, in such a way my domain created a net around the star, allowing me to capture the majority of all that energy (by producing more and more clones at the same time) and then reform a slightly smaller version of that star nearby.
So in the end, I didn't lose a planet like Master Obi-Wan had.
It just got… smaller, and it was relocated somewhere else.
"Exploring new worlds is overrated."
"It wouldn't be if you weren't in a light novel where the details of the world are hyperfocused on harem shenanigans. Don't worry, once we get strong enough, I'm sure we can go find new worlds without risking immediate death."
While Vritra is taking this whole secrecy stuff well enough, he's still, in the end, a dragon. And dragons need to stretch their wings sometime…
"If you're so bummed about not getting any action, just go fight Crom Cruach or something, so long as he isn't allied with that devil at the moment."
I would be apprehensive it was a dragon with actual skills in magic, or any opponent that could track Vritra down, but if it's a battle maniac then I suppose I could accept the risk.
Issei couldn't believe his luck.
He was waiting at a nearby park for his dates to arrive! Dates! He was going on a date with two girls at the same time!
If only Irina was with him too, then it would be three girls with a plus one (Xenovia would always be the chaperone to keep it "anal only"), but he would be happy with what he had.
Granted, they were only accepting the date with him because of a lost bet, but he would still put his all into showing the captain and vice-captain of the Kendo club a good time!
They certainly deserved that much from him for all the nice views… hehehe…
Issei did a quick count using his hands… damn it, even if he did manage to start a harem with the girls he would go on a date with, he would still be six girls behind his boss, Genshirou Saji.
Well, it all starts with a single step…
While Issei was thinking about all these happy thoughts, a fallen angel hiding up a tree with a vindictive smile on her face was certainly thinking happy thoughts too.
Happy thoughts about killing Issei before he ever went on his date to make sure he dies as unfulfilled as possible.
"Ku… haha… stupid boy. Enjoy your last moments, I want you to look at those girls from the ground as you bleed to death-"
"-and that's enough."
"Eh?"
"Taste the word of God!"
Someone was up there in the tree with her. She looked around just in time to be smacked on the head with the power of an enchanted bible.
Teofila caught the knocked out Fallen Angel before Raynare fell down from the tree, holding her up just until Issei and his two dates had gone out of view, before dragging the Fallen Angel into the park's public toilets, then left her in one of them with a minor barrier to prevent normal people from thinking about using that particular one.
"'Vacate the church you lowly human, oh, you should be grateful that we want to use your home church for our business' blah blah blah… that's for ruining my supper yesterday!" The self-proclaimed pastor did not take very kindly to the fallen angels and their rogue exorcists' cohorts from barging into her church the previous day after missing the memo that it was privately owned.
Naturally, she chased them out with overwhelming firepower (for the scrubs that they all were), and decided to give the ringleader a piece of her mind the next day.
It would also help fulfill Genshirou's request to put in a moderate effort to prevent Issei from getting killed. The keyword being "moderate", as they wouldn't want another "Heydrich" level reaction from the "plot".
Worse comes to worst, Issei could die and simply be revived by Valerie, and if he gets killed again? With the Gremory summoning circle that he picked up and kept in his wallet, it was unlikely that Rias Gremory wouldn't be summoned at some point if things kept up as it was.
"Grrr… that kid, why isn't he dead? What the hell is Raynare even doing? Hiyaaa! Those fucking kids are enjoying their youth I'm so fucking jealous!" Kalawarner was sending the care-free trio death glares from her seat at a cafe she randomly decided to take patronize while Dohnaseek and the rest of the exorcists tried to find some accommodation in Kuoh Town.
It just so happened that Issei and his two dates were passing by when she was looking out from the window.
"Eh, whatever. Raynare will fucking owe me for this."
It's not like she wanted to kill a random human in particular-
-That was a lie! How dare that stupid boy have a healthier dating life than she did?!
She left the cafe without paying and flew up to the roof, checked for any of those pesky familiars and after confirming that there were none, prepared to blast him to the side just enough so that he will hit the road and get rammed by that incoming speeding truck!
"Hey, you! How can you leave without paying?! You're asking for it!"
Huh, what? She used hypnosis on the cafe workers so a normal human shouldn't have followed her, much less get all the way up to the roof within this short amount of time.
The blue-haired fallen angel could do nothing but receive a powerful "Hollywood chop" from the twin-tailed waitress's in a blink of an eye. The part-time waitress caught the knocked out mook-tier fallen angel and proceeded to drop her off the building, down to an alleyway that wouldn't be accessed until the evening, rationalizing that a fall of that level wouldn't kill a supernatural being that easily.
"Whoopsie! I did it again. Ah, I was supposed to increase my feminity levels by taking this job but… well, I'm sure Gen will still praise me ehehehe… !"
Ruruko Nimura had been roped into the supernatural world by Genshirou and Atago after her physical training had reached the point where she unlocked a special power that could be gained by training her body to the limit.
She found it strange at first since her muscles weren't all that visible, but it turned out to be thanks to Valerie's special tampering which helped her keep a cute figure while gaining more power. Ruruko had thanked the dhampir a lot for that!
The young girl didn't like keeping some secrets from the rest of the devil girls in Genshirou's harem as they were really close friends, but reasoned that it would only be for awhile longer… that, and he's been dropping all sorts of hints like crazy, and they were somehow still dismissing him as a normal human! It was mind-boggling!
"Ah well, back to work~ if I save up enough money then I can surprise him with a maid uniform! Eh… nooo! I forgot to take her money to pay for the coffee!"
Ruruko jumped down the building then ruffled through Kalawarner's clothes for the money she needed to pay for the coffee… and a little extra as part of her "battle victory" fee.
Old habits die hard.
"Okay, we've been all across town, and this is the last damn warehouse that should be abandoned… I am never going another mission without getting an updated locations list ever again." Dohnaseek grumbled at the rogue exorcists following him around.
"If only we had a budget that we could use to do whatever we want with."
"Ah, I miss those days… at least the church gives more leeway with how we manage the money."
The two rogue exorcists fondly remembered the times where they could spend other people's money to go about their hobbies (officially missions) in killing monsters.
"Well, we don't do things that way here. After what happened to the "summer camp students", the Grigori has been very tight with where the money has been going." The Fallen Angel continued to illuminate the newbies to the Grigori.
All it takes is one mad scientist to cross the line, well, cross the line to the point where a whole lot of complaints actually get all the way up to Azazel's ears. If it had been any other project that didn't involve Sacred Gears or their users, then it might be possible that there wouldn't have been a policy change at all.
"Aw man… uh, boss. Looks like the place is occupied too."
"They look like some lunatic cult."
"Don't worry, I'll clear them out."
He tried using hypnosis on a wide area, but the few cult members in robes simply stared back at him like he was an idiot.
"Mind tricks don't work on me, only money."
"Listen human, if you know what's good for you then you'll-"
"-Wait, you're one of those fallen angel guys, aren't you?"
"Huh?"
"Oi! Call Hanakai-san's daughter!"
The cult member standing guard over the premises called over some white-haired high school girl who had a brown-haired friend with her.
Dohnaseek identified them both as devils at an instant. His mind did the mental gymnastics needed to come to the conclusion that they were either from the Gremory or Sitri peerage, given that they were clearly well-established in the area and didn't look remotely insane.
"Is there any trouble?" Tomoe Meguri already had a hand on her now-named "Moonlit Blade", having come along with her best friend Momo to keep her company when Momo's dad roped Momo into the cult's proceedings for the day, she had brought her sword along on the off chance that she needed to do some fighting.
If the adventures that she had with Genshirou had taught her anything, is that it was always good to have a sword on hand, just in case.
"… We come in peace."
"… Look, just don't cause trouble. I will report your presence to my King immediately, so long as you don't take action on devil territory then the ceasefire agreements will apply accordingly." Momo Hanakai gave the diplomatic answer to the fallen angel, who saved himself some dignity and acted hammy as he left the premises.
As they left, they spotted the human that Raynare wanted to kill on the basis of being humiliated in front of a lot of high school students, after being called a bitch on speaker.
Not that any of the males of the group disagreed, but that was neither here nor there.
"… How about we kill the kid then stay at his house?"
"Yeah, and his parents too."
"Wait, what?"
Dohnaseek was completely shocked as the two blood-thirsty idiots tried to murder someone Raynare proclaimed to be "kill-on-sight" so recklessly the moment they saw that he was alone!
And then was even more shocked when a couple of holy swords impaled their feet!
"No murder is allowed in the neighborhood! Now then, what are you three… wait a second, Marco? Paolo?"
The blonde girl that saved the boy from getting murdered as he walked home looked shocked to see the two former exorcists under him.
"Jeanne!?" "Saint Jeanne?!"
"Oh fuck!"
Of all people they had to run into, it just had to be the girl that defeated Kokabiel handily to the point where the Cadre level Fallen Angel… just disappeared. That was months ago, and according to rumors, the girl was still getting stronger.
"You! Why the hell aren't you keeping these battle-crazy idiots in-line!"
The three males were promptly introduced to Jeanne's "remedial lessons", that left them beaten and bruised on the outskirts of town.
He had elected to attempt peaceful negotiations for Amaterasu's return before getting forced into a fight when the Korean deities decided to mindlessly bandwagon on the "get out of Korea you Japan lover REEEEEEE-" idea.
Again.
Some things never change.
"Genshirou-kun! Don't die!"
"I'm not dying. Sheesh."
Oh certainly, the sole clone body sent was dying after being affected by a slew of god-class curses, however, it wouldn't really cause any effect in the long run.
The whole point about being a "Scapegoat" clone model was that he could tank all sorts of spells, effects, and powers, without any of them being distributed to the clone network. The only "shared point" between the network and the "Scapegoat" clone was a single puppet body, both bodies had a certain modification to prevent any sympathetic links from being established to the main bodies.
The puppet body that was stationed elsewhere would reflect the injuries and effects that the "Scapegoat" had absorbed, and would be worked on by a series of clones and curse expert Vritra, so that the energies and powers could be identified for further research.
This method was used to great effect. Since the previous trip to Korea, Genshirou had managed to nullify pretty much all the god-class powers used on him through their domains previously, after having sufficiently analyzed them and developed the right countermeasures. On this second trip, he forced them to bring out the rest of their tricks until they were utterly exhausted of secret techniques this time around, when that was done, the clone body did it's job and defeated them all with minimal force.
"No… no… stay with me."
The clone body died and a new one popped right back up next to Amaterasu.
"Okay, so, since he took the brunt of the spell keeping you here with his life, we can just get back to Japan now."
Some magics required sacrifices to break. Thankfully, Genshirou had plenty of resources to sacrifice, especially his own "lives". And after experiencing the magics that had forced him to make such decisions, he would be able to negate them and other similar spells the next time around.
"Eh? Eeeeeeh?! I was just thinking of how to make a national holiday from your sacrifice."
"Just because I died doesn't mean I'm killed you know?"
"That's not the way the world works! Ah, the world is so scary, I don't think I want to face the world again. Hey, that cave looks nice-"
"-If you want to hide in a cave then do it in Japan!"
Issei had a very good day.
Outside of minor hiccups, he thought he managed to turn around the bad impression the girls had, and who knows? He might be actually getting more dates later on!
There were a couple of weird things he noticed that day, however. He could have sworn that he felt like he was about to be killed about… four times throughout the day.
The latest one was when he thought he saw a blonde loli in a gothic lolita dress running up to him only to be run over by a motorcyclist that looked a lot like Valerie in her tight biker outfit… but that was most likely his mind playing tricks on him.
The only problem right now was that he couldn't hold it back in anymore.
He needed to pee now!
Thankfully, on the way home, he happened to pass by the park that he waited at earlier in the day. He could still use public toilets!
"Ah, whew! Made it."
"Uh… what was that…"
One of the toilet doors to his back opened, revealing a really hot girl in BDSM gear with… black wings?
"Eh?"
"Huh…? ISSEI HYOUDOU!!!"
"EHHH!?"
Issei Hyoudou was killed with a light spear to the chest, impaled to the urinal as he was going about his business.
"Fuck, what a shit day. Not even killing him is helping with this headache…"
Raynare completely missed the crimson light as she flew off into the night.
"… And you completely missed the chance because you were plucking out the feathers from your wheels?"
My hands dragged down over my face as I heard Valerie's report by the time I arrived back home.
"I don't want to talk about it."
My fiancee seemed just as flabbergasted as I was at the timing of all things.
"Oh, I think you will. In front of the video camera, while recording Gasper's wedding invitation."
Atago was perfectly fine with getting married as soon as we could in accordance to her family's customs. Valerie wanted her childhood friend to attend her wedding so we needed to wait a bit for the second wedding.
In any case, the Fallen Angel squad and the exorcists seem to have left town after their very bad day.
As no one other than Issei had been killed (and he was resurrected), I see this as an Absolute Win!
I'm guessing that the plot would generate some sort of threat for Issei to unlock the Boosted Gear with.
Ah well, that's his problem.
Atago came back home with a pile of different forms.
"I hate it when she goes to hide in her cave! The number of people I have to assign to make sure all the food is safe and delivered from different suppliers properly so that she isn't bored-"
I rubbed Atago's head as she complained about the bureaucracy arising from Amaterasu's demands for different meals and snacks every day for her "cave retreat". While Atago could manage her workload just fine, it always helped for her to unwind in this manner.
"Oh Genshirou, you won't believe who I just met today! It's the idiots from Romania-" Jeanne came in and started to talk about her day just as Teofila came in with more homemade desserts for us all to share.
We were all slightly surprised at the fact that the place where Teofila placed Raynare ended up being Issei's undoing. But at this point, we were already expecting something as ridiculous as that.
Ruruko came by for her nightly combat lessons later on and talked about how Fallen Angels were really rude customers.
If this is the type of thing that happens when I leave for one day then I don't think I can afford to take any real vacations at this rate.
Interlude: Issei Hyoudou, Rising of the Red Lizard
AN: Next up, an Asia interlude, in which she may be having way too much fun in her career change. This interlude probably had more world-building than it was about Issei's struggles since he's just starting out, but it will help fill the time-skip gaps.
Interlude: Issei Hyoudou, Rising of the Red Lizard
Issei Hyoudou had an eventful weekend, to say the least.
His dates with both his classmates, Murayama and Katase (of the Kendo Club) went very well to the point where even got a kiss on the cheek from both of them, it was something that he could safely classify as a high point in his life (on the lower end of the totem pole) along with every precious moment he spent with Irina and his parents.
It may as well been the last highlight of his life considering that he was murdered and resurrected into a new life, as a Devil. Not that it was all that bad considering that he was now in a club with cute girls ( one handsome bastard) and had a chance to actually get some servants that would be socially and legally obligated to do anything he wanted, if he climbed the societal pyramid quick enough, that is.
"Ironic."
He could already hear the word "Ironic" in the voice of his friend and mentor, Genshirou Saji.
… Wait no, that was actually Gen .
Issei found himself standing at the spot next to his friend's clubroom door, literally next in line to visiting Genshirou's "Democratic Council" club room.
Like every other day, there was a literal line of students waiting to enter in order get their request heard after classes have finished.
Most of the students were single guys and girls trying to find the right partner or wanted some "real" career counseling, and it just so happened that the members of Gen's club were the best matchmakers in both the relationship and career fields in the school (if not the town).
It was thanks to the "Democratic Council" that his two dates even agreed to give him a chance last Saturday. He had still managed to come to some agreement with them to hang out together, but with his new life as a devil keeping him busy at nighttime, he needed some advice on how to handle his time better.
And aside from that, he also wanted to ask Genshirou to train him. It turns out that Devils respect personal power, so if he was going to have his legal slave harem then he was going to need to get a lot stronger, especially since he's "pathetically weak" in demonic power, to even infant devils!
Well, if he can't be some badass magician, then he can at least be a decent Warrior class devil.
And what better person to learn from than the real-life Martial Arts manga protagonist?
The door to the council opened, signaling the departure of the club's latest visitor, and that Issei's turn was coming up next.
"Thank you Saji-kun!" The school's cheerful "blonde loli senpai", a third-year student that he saw around once or twice, waved goodbye cheerfully towards the club members, "I'll be sure to treat my pet extra super well now!"
She walked out of the room, with a younger boy in toll, dragged along by a red leash with his mouth stuffed with panties. The younger boy's face was red with shame and perverted glee, while Issei did not share his junior's enthusiasm, he respected the boy's decision as it was something he clearly wanted.
Issei wanted to cry tears of joy, even now, Genshirou was doing go- a demon lord's work by helping young boys and girls discover their true passions! Issei knew that it wouldn't be long before he would no longer feel alone in talking about the things that one was passionate about!
He went in to the familiar sight of four of the five fancy seats being occupied by Genshirou's club members. The beautiful masochistic senior Atago Kaiza, Issei's classmate Aika Kiryuu and the supposed delinquent Ruruko Nimura (who looked way too cute to be some violent gangster).
All three girls constituted half of Genshirou's "in-campus" girlfriends… well, less than half, as the status of "wife" was obviously a level higher than just being a girlfriend. The ornate wedding ring prominently displayed on both Atago's and Genshirou's ring fingers made it quite obvious that they somehow screwed the laws and got married anyways.
With three girls on the student council also being part of Genshirou's harem of girls, some people have joked that the "real council" was Genshirou's club, rather than Sona Shitori's student council.
And from his own personal meetings with Genshirou's other girlfriends, he knew that there were another three girlfriends that weren't in school.
Issei pushed down the slight jealousy that he felt and focused on the positive! He was well on his way to getting laid even more, and there were many more opportunities open to him now that he had become a devil. Speaking of that… he really needed to tell Irina about that at some point…
"And so your date went perfectly well?" Genshirou asked with an oddly curious look.
Aside from getting killed by a Fallen Angel in BDSM gear, then… "Yeah… I mean, yes, no problem! Murayama-chan and Katase-chan gave me a kiss too!"
"Goooood… a powerful harem protagonist you will become…" Oh no, he was meme'ing again.
No one can escape from the memes.
As part of the "payment" for resolving a student's request, he made most students sit through an organized set of "lectures" consisting of Star Wars (Original and Prequel only, obviously) memes.
"Oh my, are you certain that nothing unusual happened?" Atago looked at him with a knowing look.
She knew.
He knew that she knew.
His new "master" Rias Gremory had all but bashed it into his head that he shouldn't even think of interacting with Atago Kaiza at all, just to minimize his chances of violent injuries being inflicted upon his weak body.
His club president didn't share any more details about why his senior was so dangerous, other than the fact that she was a Youkai and was likely one of the strongest people in the country.
"N-no! I mean, uh-"
"Nothing happened in the public toilet you visited on the way back home?"
"HUH!? EH!? How did you know I used the toilet then!?"
Aika laughed at this point, cutting in, "Ahahaha! Hyoudou-kun, Atago-chan manages security for a living. She's made it her business to know where people are going. Don't worry, there are no cameras inside the toilets. Unfortunately."
Oh whew… wait, what did she mean "unfortunately"?! Issei felt that he was in danger.
"Haha, Atago always knows things that we didn't think she would. It's a lot of fun to be surprised." Genshirou considered this absolutely normal.
"I didn't need to know that my groceries purchase history was in your database though…" Ruruko had a regretful look on her face, "Anyhow! Is that all Hyoudou-senpai? If you're done then you should make way for the next visitor."
"Eh, yeah, I mean, not yet! Boss, I want to become stronger! Please train me!"
All of them looked at each other as if they were communicating silently, or it could just be another meme that they were trying to enact on Genshirou's request. Issei could never really tell.
"Unfortunately, you really should have asked last year, when I actually had the time for you."
"Gah! That is… okay, fine."
That was well deserved. Both of them had a lot more free time in the previous year. Genshirou had way fewer girlfriends to manage and Issei didn't have an irregular schedule with his new devil duties then.
If he hadn't been given up on the training regiments back then, his current situation would have likely been very different.
"Thankfully, Ruruko here wants to get some work experience."
"I always wanted to try teaching people to beat other people up, and get paid for it!"
"Heeh!?"
The younger girl looked really excited about it! Issei was getting more and more uneasy as time went on.
"… And some extra money. She likes to earn her own pocket money." Genshirou continued.
"Fufufu, even though Genshirou spoils us all the time, doing something worthwhile on your own is useful if you don't want to be a career sex pet." Atago remarked and nodded in a sage-like manner.
Wait a minute. How is being a sex pet a legitimate job? Is it possible to find these applicants?
"Even though Gen is taking care of our families we still need to find that something we would be proud of doing. Hey, Hyoudou-kun, why don't you help Ruruko figure that out by coughing out your cash?" Aika seemed to be directing those words at herself as much as her friend Ruruko, although she suddenly switched tracks!
"W-wait a moment, I kinda need some real martial arts stuff real quic-"
Issei got thrown to the ground in an instant! He found himself groaning painfully as he stared up at the council room's ceiling.
"Judge me by my size, do you?" Despite the cute smile on Ruruko Nimura's face, Issei found himself regretting everything he did in the past 30 seconds.
"N-no!"
"Great! Then, I will be taking this!"
"Hey, my wallet!"
"It's my wallet now."
She opened it and took out a few thousand yen bills.
"Here, you can have it back. I've deducted your first lesson's fee."
"This is highway robbery! I will report you to the student council!"
"The student council doesn't exist out here."
It was only after getting bullied by a girl smaller and younger than him that Genshirou told Issei that Ruruko Nimura had been his apprentice in his martial arts for about a year.
And was quite frankly, a genius at it and a monster in combat.
If someone like Genshirou had given the girl such high praise then Issei was inclined to believe him.
That said, Issei still wasn't happy about getting bullied like that, and so went to the student council for help.
A few minutes later, Issei's words were met with unsympathetic shrugs, turns out that they couldn't and wouldn't do anything about it. He thought that Sona Shitori, that always seemed to have that kind of love-hate relationship (hate sex when?) with Genshirou, would have jumped at the chance to get back at him.
Turns out that she had been defeated in chess and all sorts of other games with stakes (backed up by her personal pride) that she would simply let him deal with "unruly" visitors as he wished. Apparently, Issei totally had it coming for being an "idiot" in their books, so they didn't really care about something minor like that.
After heading home, he was ambushed by Ruruko, dragged to a "training ground" (warehouse) that some "friends" allowed them to borrow, and was told that his lessons would begin now.
Issei left the place with a newfound respect for the girl, along with a ton of painful bruises and sore muscles.
"Ow, ow! Devil bodies are superior to human bodies my ass!"
While Issei was grumbling about his painful training session, he felt a cool, soothing breeze pass him by. It was as if his pain was leaving him, he felt that he could walk and move normally again, and he could have swore that his skin coloration was going back to normal.
"Oh dear!" Issei turned around to the voice, and came face-to-face with an angel, "Did you push yourself too hard Mr. Devil?"
The double-shock of seeing a cute blonde beauty addressing him and being identified outright as a devil stunned Issei completely.
"That's no good."
He couldn't even hear the moment she took those steps to move close to him. It was as if she hadn't moved at all, yet she was right in front of him.
"You won't get very strong if you push yourself recklessly."
She tapped his forehead once, and then walked past him before he could even blink.
"Hehe, let's meet again. Come find me at the church."
"Wait, who are-"
She was gone. His ideal blonde girl came and went as if she was but a passing daydream.
"Huh, it doesn't… hurt anymore? Hahaha! Oh yeah!"
All the wounds, pain, soreness… they were all gone.
The mysterious girl had healed him, just like that.
"I need to thank her! Wait, where did she say that I could find… her… oh…"
The church. There was only one church in the town. A church-owned by Teofila Eliade, one of Genshirou's lovers. Did the mysterious girl and Teofila know each other? Was she friends with Jeanne and Genshirou too?
And more importantly, was she seeing someone?
Interlude: Asia Argento, A New Home (Part 1)
Interlude: Asia Argento, A New Home (Part 1)
'I suppose it's a natural thing to only notice something "missing" when you need it.'
Asia had such thoughts as she pondered upon an important matter.
To be specific, she was wondering why there weren't any chairs for visitors or those that brought up matters to the council of Cardinals, Bishops and other authorities of the Church, and felt that it was rather inconsiderate of them to not have any seats prepared.
She wasn't ruminating on such things because her legs were getting tired (her legs were fine, Genshirou had trained her body well) or some other petty reason. Asia was genuinely considering the possibility that the lack of hospitality displayed was deliberate and unbecoming of worshippers of God.
Whether someone came up to them with a request, a message or as the subject of a "trial", they should at least be made to feel welcomed, and not condemned.
'Reminds me of the Jedi High Council Chamber. They never had chairs for non-council members either.' Genshirou's voice responded to her thoughts and feelings on the matter with distaste at the older men sitting on their high chairs and pulpits yelling about all the "heresy" that occurred the previous day.
The one with the loudest voice happened to be the one that received a list of dangerous stray devils within the EU region compiled by everyone's least favorite devil, Diodora Astaroth. That particular Cardinal must be so happy with himself for thinking that he's making a "sacrifice" for the "greater good".
Well, it was no skin off her teeth.
If it weren't for her dear friend then she would have been bored to tears by the obviously "rigged" trial and compassionless zealotry displayed by the church's higher-ups. Unfortunately, zealotry triumphed over righteousness in this flawed world, especially when it came to the Church and Heaven that is afflicted with the same flaw.
So long as someone convinces themselves that they are doing what is "right" for the Church and Heaven then they could commit the most heinous of sins with impunity. With the knowledge that she had of the future, she knew such things were true for some of the men and angels that were supposed to love those that put their faith in the Lord.
'Relax Asia, things will get better one day. And if it doesn't, I will drag everyone kicking and screaming to a happier future, if you ever ask me to do so.' His words comforted her, and his promise assured her that all would be well.
'I know… I know that. Thank you Gen. Hehe, you really will, won't you?' If there was anything Genshirou wasn't short on, it was love, power, capability, and resources. That said, he wasn't high-handed and wouldn't force people to change to suit his liking, he wasn't the type of person that would take over an organization or country despite being capable of doing so unless the right people begged him to do.
Or perhaps just telling him to "do it" would work just as well?
'I have some rough plans of my own, of course, any ideas are subject to improvement and modification with more contributors. Anything you want to add before I get into the real planning?'
'Hmm… Do make sure to spare the younglings if you were to use memes in your plans.' She joked about his casual attempts to insert the "not just the men, but the women and the children too" line in all sorts of conversations.
'Okay, gotcha. Do hesitate and show lots of mercy, as per usual.'
'Actually, I don't believe you really hesitate a lot.'
'We were on the verge of greatness, we were this close.'
The reason why they could speak like this was that she had trusted him with access to her surface thoughts, hearing and sight so that he could help her deal with problematic situations. Thanks to his mental techniques, she was able to create "layers" of thought, for what she wanted to "think aloud" for him to pick up and to keep her inner thoughts to herself.
Even now, her best friend was with her, both physically and spiritually. Although he wasn't here in person, she could feel his presence when no one else could, his power and a portion of his being was already a part of the shadow that she casted no matter where she went.
Asia Argento could walk straight into the darkest prison in the Underworld and feel safe, knowing that her best friend was there with her, that she could trust him to protect her when she needed him.
She found it rather humorous that Genshirou had taken the place of her Lord when it came to the "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you" part of scripture.
Not that she blamed God for being unable to fulfill yet another passage of scripture. Asia wouldn't hold it against him. This world was simply one of the unfortunate worlds where her Father in Heaven was "fated" to sacrifice himself for his children. She could take comfort in the knowledge that God certainly exists in many other worlds.
With his abilities, it was only natural that her mind would be like an open book to him, her thoughts would belong to him if he ever so desired to look into them. But there was no reason to feel fearful of such things. The mutual boundaries they had set together was something that they would uphold out of love and trust for one another.
They both trusted and respected each other greatly, of course, not with every single aspect of their lives or with unreasonable expectations. She wouldn't trust him to not make at least one prequel reference every day and he wouldn't trust her with information that could put them all in danger while her mental defenses were only "half-trained" by his required standards.
"-Asia Argento, what do you have to say in your defense?"
Oh, they were finally done? She had been waiting for the time where her input was required for formality's sake.
And also, with Genshirou's help to make sure the paperwork was filed and the appropriate person was notified, coupled along with the standard procedure to immediately bring up certain documents if it were related to high-profile members (to which she somehow counted among) if a council like this was already in session… she had a few seconds to feel Genshirou's joy whenever he successfully enacted a meme through complicated plots.
Asia smiled beautifully at the prosecution and tapped her forehead, "You can't excommunicate me if I have already left."
Just then, the doors to the chamber opened, "Your Eminences! Our systems just processed Asia Argento's resignation and…" The messenger looked at her, "Oh, uh… yay, she's already here."
"Thank you for having me at the Vatican, I will be going to live with my friends now. Ciao!"
The look on their faces when she tossed her habit off dramatically and left the room in a blink of an eye was worth the wait.
A small application of moving her "healing power" along with her feet only had a marginal difference from using other energies to perform high-speed movements that wouldn't be out of place from one of Genshirou's favorite shounen manga. At least for someone that knew and mastered this one power at the cost of all else.
A dabbler wouldn't be able to have figured out Genshirou's various "flash-step" techniques without going through specialized training. However, someone who only truly mastered one type of power like herself (not that there were many healers to compare to) could pick up his derivative techniques with dedicated tutoring on the "basics" of various ways to manipulate esoteric energies.
Her luggage was already collected by her friend Vritra. Now all she needed to do was to make a quick stop somewhere.
'Hmm, where are you going?'
'Hehe, you'll find out. It'll help, I promise.'
Asia hadn't told Genshirou about her own plans. It was one that would play a role in testing how much influence "fate" had on her, or at least, on those related to the Gremory peerage.
Her dearest friend was stretched to the extreme, it was only natural that he would have his own blind spots, or would be unable to address every "minor thing" or "minor character" no matter how much he tries to.
It was only natural that Asia supported him as much as she could. If she could help the people that Genshirou wouldn't normally reach while also reducing his burdens and worries over her own wellbeing, then she would do so.
Staying true to the path that she had set herself upon against whatever "fate" had in store for her by her own efforts, would help reduce the amount work Genshirou had to do overall to protect her from them.
She had spent weeks planning her route and mapping out the security measures around the sealed area. Her own utilization of power allowed her to neutralize other forms of energies as well, and she used this to great effect to nullify the security of various holy seals.
"There you are." Asia greeted the girl stuck in suspended animation within a barrier of her own making. "Gen, could you please remove this for me?"
'This is… my, my, I hadn't expected this. Very well. This is a simple matter.'
The barrier that had lasted for years was dissipated in a second. Genshirou was able to use his powers through her shadow acting as an extension to his domain.
Asia caught the young malnourished girl in her arms and proceeded to heal her, using the "excess mass" stored in Twilight Healing to rejuvenate the girl along with other methods. Asia took out the prepared note from her pocket and left it at the site.
Sensing that His Eminence Vasco Strada was looking for her above ground, Asia adjusted her escape route to avoid him and proceeded to evacuate the area with the girl in her arms. She didn't feel like speaking with Strada at this time, she didn't want to see his sad look when he would see just how much she wanted to leave the Church, an institution that will never live up to his ideals with the people currently in it.
"Well then, my fellow Italian, we'll be going off to Japan to visit an old friend of yours… Tosca."
"Heh? Eeeh!? Everything is so clean! Is this normal for Japan?" Her young friend was pretty much taken aback by everything she was seeing.
Well, considering that she was an orphan taken in by the Church, just like Asia was herself… it was only natural that she wasn't used to being in this part of the world.
Especially when said orphan was a victim of the Holy Sword Project.
The girl had woken up in shock when they were in the taxi. With the help of a silencing spell from Genshirou, she managed to speak with the girl privately to give an edited account on what was going on. The girl was shocked to hear that so many years had passed since the horrid experiment had taken place, Tosca was still mourning for her dead friends, but Asia promised that they were going to find a fellow survivor in Japan.
She had left out the part of him being a devil. Mostly because it was unnecessary.
"I wouldn't know myself. I haven't been here long enough… ahh, there they are! Those are my friends I talked about. Jeeeaane! Teofila!"
"Asia! I missed you!" Jeanne hugged her immediately, the former exorcist smiled turned scary for a brief moment, "You better watch out, I'm going to get you back for that prank you pulled."
Asia stuck out her tongue, "You fell for it."
"How was I supposed to know he was a Sith Lord?"
"He's been dropping hints like crazy…"
Asia really thought that Jeanne should have taken the memes more seriously.
The silver-haired former nun turned pastor, and fellow former Holy Maiden, Teofila Eliade had also greeted Asia with a smile, "It's good to see you again Asia. It's not the same without you, you know? Oh, and for the record, I knew who he was the moment I saw his eyes."
"Of course, you should. But you weren't sure that he was going to tell you, were you?"
"Well yes, but I figured it wouldn't matter if I would be with him anyway- wait, did you just use a Palpatine line?"
"Adapted. There is no way that you could spend that much alone time with Genshirou and his memes and not make a considerable amount of references yourself."
"Hot Fuzz!"
Asia gasped, Teofila was a cinephile too!
She grasped her friend's hand, "We need to have a movie night!"
"I'll make the popcorn. Genshirou's likes his extra sweet." Teofila nodded.
"Oooh, yes please!" She had popcorn all the time in the dream world whenever they watched movies together. This would be one of the rare times that she would eat it for real.
Worse comes to worst, she could store the excess fat as "mass" within her Sacred Gear.
"Me too. Make that triple." Jeanne interjected.
"What's popcorn?" They all hugged Tosca after she asked such a question. Poor girl.
Asia then introduced Tosca to Jeanne and Teofila, while using Genshirou's network to telepathically inform them both of her own plans to reunite Tosca with Yuuto Kiba.
They wouldn't be bringing Tosca to Genshirou's home even though his family will be more than happy to take Tosca in. Reason being that she didn't want to overwhelm Tosca with too many friendly and caring figures when she is still trying to wrap her head around missing so many years.
In addition to that, she had her own observations to consider… if Asia's predictions were correct, then "fate" might make a move to replace the "canon Asia's" Bishop position in Rias's peerage with Tosca instead, considering that Tosca currently fits into the position of a "must be protected" character.
She doesn't like thinking about people in this kind of manner, however, as such things are tangible forces that shape all the rather depressing pasts that they all had, she would be foolish to discount the practical benefits of understanding the "tropes" and applying them to create a "happy ending" for the people she cared about in a way that was morally acceptable to her.
And even if things don't happen as she expected, then she would put her trust in Genshirou to remedy the situation.
Tosca seemed to be comfortable to be with so many believers who kept their faith while cutting ties with the Vatican. The girl wasn't very trustful of institutions after what had happened to her. Jeanne had scared Tosca even more by telling them all about that horrid "vampire farm" mission, although Jeanne ended on a reconciliatory note by mentioning how Strada purged most of those responsible and many other corrupt higher-ups.
Teofila remarked that there were still a significant number of them there considering that Asia herself had been excommunicated by the efforts of Diodora Astaroth. The two of them hadn't shared the details of what Diodora would do to the women of the faith with Tosca as she was too young to hear of it, especially at this point in time.
They arrived at Teofila's church shortly after entering Kuoh Town, Jeanne and Teofila helped Tosca get comfortable while Asia took a walk around town. She wanted to see Genshirou's family now but decided to wait until Jeanne and Teofila could join in.
Vritra would be coming in as a friend, later on, to take care of Tosca while Jeanne and Teofila return home, as Vritra could be in several places at once, he wouldn't be missing out on the festivities of tonight's "feast" and Tosca would remain protected.
Hmm? Is that… with her passive "diagnosis" sense deployed, Asia could sense anyone that was in need of healing without outright using significant amounts of healing power.
Asia could sense a boy covered in all sorts of injuries, a by-product of training no doubt. She had spent enough time in the exorcist training grounds to tell when a person had gone through strenuous training or if they had hurt themselves out of stupidity. Those couple of attempts by a few admirers in order to get some personal "healing touch" were counted among the latter group too.
She could perceive the draconic energy in an instant after being exposed to Genshirou's power for so long. Asia was marginally impressed that the new devil had put himself through so much so quickly, then recalled her recent chat with Genshirou through their connection, where he talked about how Issei Hyoudou asked for training with the purpose of acquiring strength to get a peerage faster.
She tried not to feel disappointed, but in the end, she couldn't stop herself from feeling the way she did. The "Issei" as of the present was far from the man he could be. And even then, from what she saw of Genshirou's memories, most of the power-ups began to be handed to him outright ever since Issei was reborn with Great Red's and Ophis's flesh.
A far cry from the weakest Boosted Gear user that trained and willed his way towards greater strength through passion (for breasts), courage, and love for his friends. Granted, they all still paid a role for all the future power-ups, but by then, even Asia had to admit it was getting rather contrived and hollow.
That said, she was willing to be friends with him. And even though her heart had already made its decision, she was still going to give him a chance. It would be nice to see if he could come to an insightful realization without someone hurting those he cared about right in front of him.
Asia positioned herself at the end of the street for maximum dramatic effect.
She would never be one for malicious or mean-spirited pranks, that said, roleplaying the position of a "mysterious waif" character was a fun pastime of hers.
Willing a modicum of her healing power towards him in the form of a soothing breeze, Asia called out to him, "Oh dear!"
And waited for him to turn towards her, "Did you push yourself too hard Mr. Devil?"
She used his briefly stunned state to evaluate his progress.
He looked small. A far cry from what a hero should be.
Then again, other than Strada, the only person she knew and considered a real man was Genshirou Saji. And compared to him, the Issei Hyoudou right in front of her looked puny.
Asia kept herself focused and continued her little play, making sure to tap his forehead like how that Itachi character does with his brother as she healed him, then told him to meet her at the church.
She would ask Genshirou for his help in ensuring that Yuuto Kiba either accompanies Issei or stalks him to the church when he comes to visit in order for her plans to proceed.
Moving past Issei Hyoudou swiftly, she made her way back to the church, where Teofila and Jeanne were waiting for her. They walked back to the house together where Genshirou was waiting at the entrance for them.
Asia looked at him, the blonde man that was always by her side, for the first time with her physical eyes in months, and gave him her usual smile.
Even though it wasn't her first time in the country, though she had seen him on a daily basis in the world that belonged to them both, and even if he was always beside her to be her strength… Asia felt that there was something special about finally coming all the way here to their home.
Perhaps she was getting ahead of herself a little, but certainly, she had been looking forward to making her way to the family home after leaving her previous home for good.
"Genshirou, I made it!"
Even without reading her mind, he was ever understanding with her feelings and her reasons. To her surprise, a bit of tears fell from his eyes… even he looked surprised at his own reaction.
"Eh? Ah… I see." He wiped them off his eyes and held out a hand to her, which she took with ahold of instantly, "You made it Asia! Welcome home!"
Interlude: Asia Argento, A New Home (Part 2)
Interlude: Asia Argento, A New Home (Part 2)
She had heard a lot about Genshirou's family through the time they spent together, from his complaints to his praises about them, and the little moments that he felt was meaningful to him. He shared a lot of it with her. She had pretty much formed an image in her mind of the sort of people they would be when she would finally meet them for real.
They were in the same position as herself, as Genshirou had talked a lot about her as one of his dearest friends.
Reality is often disappointing, but the important fact was that this was one of the rare occasions where it wasn't. Asia Argento found her new reality to be a wonderful one.
It was the first time that she entered truly experiences the love and care of a real family, bound together by both blood and love.
Certainly, she had once considered the Church her family in Christ, but as this world lacked the tangible presence of the Lord after the Great War she could safely say that the familial relationships were a lot less developed and faith-based than it should have been in practice… and also, a lot of the family relationships revolved around exorcists growing up together, essentially, it was a collection of various families made out of child soldiers.
Genshirou's parents, Haru and Gotou Saji, were a lovely couple that helped introduce her to their large family.
"These two little ones are Gengo and Kaho, fufu… we were able to have them thanks to our son's many abilities."
Haru talked about her youngest children as everyone else was helping in setting the table. There were plenty of Genshirou clones around to do the job but everyone seemed to take up one specific role.
From what she knew, it had been a family tradition when Genshirou helped his family set the table and prepare the meals as a little child, when asked why he was being so thoughtful, little Genshirou had answered by saying that it was only natural to do so as he was part of the family.
His brother and sister, Gosei and Kouho, who were now middle-schoolers had taken up a few of the dinner setting roles as well. When Atago and Valerie began living with them, Genshirou's lovers also began taking up a role or two to show that they weren't simply guests. Likewise, the tradition continued when Jeanne and Teofila joined the household, and soon it would be Asia's turn to pick a role for herself.
She was personally looking forward to being part of the family even more!
"-I think I got too used to having twins like Gosei and Kouho so I made a special request then, would you like to hold them?"
"I would love to, well, if they will let me-"
The lively two-year-old twins happily grabbed on to her. With her strength, it was quite easy to carry small children around. She played with them a bit under the watchful eye of Genshirou's mother, who looked very happy to see that they were all enjoying themselves.
"Hahaha! You're great with kids. When can we expect some grandchildren, hmm?" Gotou Saji was teasing her!
"Goto- I mean, uh, Father!" Asia corrected herself, after getting a look from both of her best friend's parents, the pair had wanted to be called "mother" and "father" from the very beginning. Not that Asia was against it, she wanted to call them both that way as well.
While she currently felt that she was old enough to not need another parental figure in her life, she knew that her thoughts on the matter might change soon… and also, she was sure that it was nearly an absolute certainty that they would be her parents by the law soon.
"T-that sort of thing should only be expected after a wedding date has been decided." She continued to believe in the importance of being wedded in holy matrimony. If she were to get pregnant then it would not be out of wedlock.
"Asia-nee is really pretty! Are you going to marry big bro too?" Gosei asked her such a question after she placed his younger siblings down.
"Mmm, you should know that Genshirou doesn't choose his brides based on looks alone." Asia wasn't going to deny anything, nor was she going to answer him directly.
"But every big sister that stays with us are super pretty and are gonna marry him! So that means you're going to marry him too!"
"Correlation does not imply causation."
"Ehhh? What are those big words?"
"Oh geez, this is why I'm the smart twin."
It was at this point that his twin sister Kouho joined the conversation.
"Hey!"
"You would know if you didn't fall asleep in his lessons."
"I thought I was learning how to use Lightsabers, not about these fancy statistic things!"
"But he was teaching us about the High Ground! You know, about how just having the high ground does not imply victory. Remember Darth Maul?"
Asia could see that Genshirou's little sister was strong and wise, her family must be very proud.
"Mmhmm, that's right, having the high ground is important but if you don't use it right then you will still get killed." Jeanne joined in at this point, mostly because the topic was relevant to her set of skills and for the fact that she was the resident swordsmanship teacher for the family if Genshirou isn't teaching anything. "You won't believe the amount of vampires, devils, fallen angels that think being in the air would save them from me."
"Oh yeah! Jeanne-sensei can shoot swords like an Archer class Servant! I guess that works like the Darth Vader Anti-high ground Saber Throw technique." Gosei started using his head to make more references. He was dangerously close to becoming just as much of a Reference Lord as Genshirou was.
"Dinner's ready!" Teofila called out to everyone.
Vritra and his dog Daisy popped out from the shadows when the call for dinner came. They didn't stay with the family often since Vritra travelled the world a lot with his enchanted custom motorcycle and his pet. But when they did, Vritra acted as everyone's cool uncle (comes from being very chill and ancient) and Daisy would chat with Sheev about all sorts of things.
The two pets seem to be catching up over some food.
"How's dinner Sheev?" Valerie checked up on her magical familiar.
"Gooooooood." The parrot replied.
"Finally… the parrot's got expensive taste I tell you. He's spoiled rotten." Teofila helped in preparing today's meals as Asia was the guest of honor for the day. Her silver-haired friend was a good cook, but seemed to have trouble preparing a "correct" mix of foods for Sheev's palate.
"What do you expect from someone named after a politician?" Valerie seemed to see nothing wrong about it.
"Curiously enough, some say the name Sheev was taken from that particular Hindu god that I'm always complaining about for all the creation and destruction that entailed." Genshirou referenced Shiva in the naming of Sheev Palpatine.
"Thank you, everyone, for having me here. Mmm, the food is so good!" Asia thanked everyone who cheered and welcomed her even harder.
"Oh my, if this is your reaction to the food now, I wonder what you're going to think when Gen makes a special personalized meal for you." Atago had a strange expression as she seemed to recall a fond… and very lewd memory.
"Just you wait Genshirou, I may be the student now, but one day I will be the master." Teofila seemed eager to surpass Genshirou in cooking. Or at least try to.
"At this rate we'll need to build a second kitchen so you two can have a cook-off." The mother of the household seemed excited about the prospect.
"Shokugeki!" Jeanne called for a cooking contest based off a manga.
"The plot went free-falling after discount Aizen left the stage." Genshirou grumbled and made a face as if he placed a spoon-full of salt directly into his mouth.
"Who's Aizen? Is that an anime character?" Gosei asked his older brother, who had immediately stopped eating abruptly.
"Oh yeah, like, he was this main villain who looked like some nerdy good guy until he swipes his hair back with invisible gel, then suddenly he becomes evil Superman." Jeanne continued eating, oblivious to what she was doing.
Atago, Valerie and Teofila were "subtly" signaling Jeanne to keep her mouth shut.
Genshirou made a mistake by accidentally mentioning it in his reaction towards the post-Azami arcs, after all, Bleach doesn't exist as a manga in this world.
It was a mistake that he could only make in the safety of his home with the people he loved, a place where he was at his most unguarded and relaxed.
"Big bro shared all his manga with us, except for the adult ones. Is Aizen a doujin-tier character?" Kouho asked all of a sudden.
"Nah, classic Shonen Jump villain-"
"-ahaha! Jeanne, I don't think everyone is in the loop about Vritra's manga project."
Asia quickly interrupted Jeanne and directed the question to Vritra, who quickly got the message and improvised accordingly.
"Oh, yeah, I have this like… big, big manga project. It has loads of cool characters, awesome arts, epic moments and deep lore. It's still-in-progress, I'm thinking of releasing it in one shot so the whole world can binge read it. My partner and your big sisters are helping me out with putting it on paper."
Genshirou sent a silent thank-you to Vritra before smiling brightly at Asia for her quick thinking.
Her heart rate jumped up just like all the times when they held hands and locked their fingers together… as friends. Despite all the training she had went through, her hands started to fidget all about as if she was that clumsy little girl all over again.
"That sounds cool. Where will you be publishing it? On the net? Or straight to hardcover?" Gotou was enthusiastic about the business parts of it considering that business and entrepreneurship has always been a matter of concern to him.
Genshirou's father had began his career as a school teacher until he came to the conclusion that school's weren't teaching the right subjects (economics and money management) and quit the education industry out of spite. He moved on to the finance industry for a little while before he settled down in a different company, until Valerie came into the picture.
With all the money being brought it to the household, he could afford to pursue his passion in the education sector again and became an increasingly popular online tutor. Somehow, his main audience were young women, who found a man of his type of looks to be rather attractive.
Genshirou phrased it as 'DILF', but he didn't want to explain it to Asia, saying that it would have unfortunate implications and mainly suited "naughty" Christian girls.
Asia was inclined not to follow up. Let it not be said that she didn't learn from the tale of Adam and Eve. Some knowledge was just not meant to be consumed before the appropriate time.
She understood that much after reflecting upon how she would have reacted to Genshirou's "truths from a certain point of view", had she not grown over the time they spent together.
"Kouho-chan~ Where did you hear about doujins?" Haru looked genuinely concerned and worried about her daughter knowing something that wasn't age appropriate.
"Kanna-chan mentioned that her older brother got scolded by his mother for having them…"
"Oh, that's fine then."
Asia spotted Genshirou and Vritra sitting back down on their seats, apparently, they were getting ready to "confront" anyone that had "taught" Kouho such words, only to realize it was a false alarm and that the eldest daughter didn't really know what those words meant.
When dinner was over, Atago came in with several cups of Matcha ice cream, apparently, she was given some Youkai specialty green tea powder from one of her aunts, and decided to give ice cream making a try.
"Double scoop for Asia-chan!"
"Ah, thank you!"
"You're welcome. Do provide your honest feedback after you try it."
Atago left a tablet with an electronic feedback form displayed on-screen.
Genshirou sighed and commented, "Atago, this isn't your department, we can give feedback directly you know."
"Ah, I forgot. Gaaaah! This stupid digitalization campaign is infecting me!!!"
The dog-eared Youkai whined and jumped at Genshirou so that she could be comforted.
"Weren't you the one that planned it to begin with?" Valerie helped keep track of Atago's workload and various activities, hence, it wasn't unusual for the dhampir to make remarks over her friend's work life.
"Waaaah! Geeeen! Help me forget about work~"
Atago was promptly lifted up by a clone and carried up the stairs leading to the bedrooms.
Asia had been so distracted by Genshirou's swift request management capabilities that she forgot to eat her ice cream, and had to quickly chow down on it before it melted.
"Mmmmnh! Eek!"
Brain freeze! Never again!
As Asia was recovering, she heard Valerie talking to Genshirou about making some ice cream together.
"Ah, Genshirou, what about we try making some blood ice cream?" Valerie inquired of Genshirou.
"You mean blood orange ice cream?" He tried to clarify the details.
"I meant what I said."
Wait what?
"I really shouldn't."
"Do it.
Genshirou threw his hands up and headed straight for the kitchen, "You know what, anything can work! I will try."
Asia wasn't even surprised that he would go ahead with it just because someone used one of his favorite memes.
"Squawk! Don't try it!" Sheev went against his master's desires and got flicked off the couch by a shadow finger that extended from Valerie.
"Is it just me, or is Sheev deliberately suicidal sometimes?" Teofila was always the critic when it came to the parrot when Irina wasn't around to be assaulted, in which case, the Romanian self-proclaimed pastor was more than happy to take Sheev's side.
It was Asia's belief that her friend supported Sheev in his attacks as a form of "justice" for Irina's sexual immorality (arising from self-delusion via wrong theology). In her personal opinion, Asia thought that Teofila, at worst, wasn't taking Genshirou up to task for encouraging such a thing, or at least not "punishing" him for any significant amount of time before the silver-haired girl gave in and made up with him.
"Arf!" Daisy barked and licked Sheev who was lying on the ground.
"I'm too weak."
"He's just wants to meme more." Asia didn't know how else to respond.
"You get used to it." Jeanne shrugged, then got closer to Asia and placed her hands upon Asia's shoulders, "Well then, why don't I help you unpack your things to your new awesome room!"
"Please don't. I want to actually live in it."
"Gah!"
"Oh no! Jeanne died!"
Asia had unintentionally stabbed Jeanne's heart with her sharp words. She tried to heal her with Twilight Healing, but the wounds of the heart (emotional) could not be healed by such things.
That was something Asia couldn't accept! Asia didn't intend to just stop at physical healing, but she also wanted to emotionally heal others too. She thought back to the world's propensity to give people terrible pasts and no therapists, remembering her own goals to make the world a brighter place by-
Teofila tapped Asia's head, stopping Asia from getting way ahead of herself in an earnest, but rather silly manner.
"It's fine. She deserves it. For a self-proclaimed "older sister of the household," she really doesn't set a good example by being as messy as she is." Teofila reassured Asia that Jeanne would be fine.
"It's not really a matter of whether she deserves it or not…"
"I tried entering her room and slipped on her used pair of panties."
Asia reluctantly abandoned Jeanne to be picked up by Genshirou later on. Sure enough, a clone popped by and took Jeanne somewhere else.
They were as efficient as the Felynes from Monster Hunter!
Asia followed one of Genshirou's clones to his secret facility while telling him about her request for tomorrow. He didn't seem to have any problems with helping get Yuuto Kiba to the right place at the right time.
"Before you go to bed, I think it's a good time to give you a gift I just made for you."
"What is it?"
"You'll find out. It'll help, I promise."
He repeated the words she used after springing the Tosca surprise on him. They both shared a laugh about it, "I guess it will be interesting then."
"Depends on your definition of interesting."
"Anything you make tends to be… interesting. For better or for worse."
"I sure hope most of it was on the "better" side."
"It is, it is… hehe, don't look so worried." The clone faded away as she said those words, Asia continued on to the room that she was being led to, and found herself in a large room filled with all sorts of weapons.
Genshirou was there along with Jeanne who…
Spoiler: Jeanne
[img: https/i./TrQ15Fu.jpg]
… was wearing little else other than some "French maid" accessories, a white bikini and a waist apron.
"Fwueh!"
"Surprised?"
"T-this is… this isn't really the surprise is it?"
"Of course not. Jeanne here is my side-show for the day."
Her friend looked unexpectedly meek and embarrassed at what she was wearing. "H-how long do I have to wear this for? It's um, rather revealing?"
"Oh, just about a week."
"EH?!"
"Within training grounds only. Besides, shouldn't you be thanking your Fiancé for starting you off easy by only showing you off to Asia? You know she won't judge."
As much as Asia might have hoped otherwise, it was honestly near impossible to not get suckered into Genshirou's perverted acts so long as one had a romantic relationship with him. He will give plenty of space and time for those that would rather keep themselves pure, but when he's given an opportunity to "punish" them, his sadistic side rises to the occasion rather strongly.
This was likely Jeanne's punishment for going on and on about things his blood-related family shouldn't know at this point.
"I-I don't mind this too much but… can you get to the point?" Asia was already closing her eyes so that her friend wouldn't be too embarrassed by it.
"My lovely assistant, if you will."
"Y-yes."
Asia felt Jeanne moving to pull over the sheets over an object that… felt heavy. It felt heavier than any of the objects she could sense with her sensory abilities derived through Genshirou's spatial awareness and adapted to her personal use.
Her "inert" healing power was spread across a large area and wouldn't actually be used unless she willed it, or had subconsciously desired it to be used up when it detected an injured life form. When it was spread all about, she would be able to sense her surroundings and act accordingly, in combat, she could react faster to incoming attacks by sensing them coming a good distance away from where she stood.
It also allowed her to "sense" various things like the weight of an object or a person. And from what she could perceive, the object in front of her was very, very heavy.
Asia opened her eyes and saw a shield, with patterns that made it look as if several "petals" of stones had been fused together to form the shape of a round shield.
It almost looked like a flower.
"You ripped this off Unlimited Blade Works, didn't you?" Asia had to ask that question first.
Genshirou shrugged, "You got me. Rho Aias: Uru Edition."
"Uru?"
"Well, Proto-Uru. I made it after analyzing the atomic makeup of the True Longinus and various other god-tier weapons I've encountered here and there. It's a recent creation of mine based off the Marvel comics. It can store all sorts of energies, it's strength increases with higher quality enchantments woven into it's make, highly resistant to damage, non-sparking and is a highly immalleable metal to the point where I had to forge and enchant it within the core of a Star under various heat multiplication spells and techniques. I dare say in terms of durability alone, as it is now, it should be able to withstand a few attacks from the True Longinus and God-class weapons… if they aren't wielded by people like Indra or Shiva. Hopefully, maybe. I sure hope so. Or else the plan to line my house with Proto-Uru will have to be scrapped."
Genshirou continued to geek about the various properties and ways it could be used.
Jeanne walked up to Asia and whispered to her with a grin etched on her face, "You know, you got the first prototype. He didn't even think of making something for himself, and Atago and I, until he finished the shield."
"Hawawa! Me? Why me?"
"Ah, I'm a little jealous you know. You're so precious to him."
"That's… I knew that…"
She had to have known that much. Wasn't she the one that considered Genshirou to be her replacement for the ever-present Lord when it turned out that God wasn't among the living anymore? She knew that he was the type to give "good gifts" to those he cared about, but when she heard Jeanne's words, there was a part of her that was surprised by the fact that she was prioritized over everyone else.
"-and since it has an affinity to magic and special powers, all you need to do is assimilate this into Twilight Healing just like you did with the Lightsaber as a tool of protection, then you should be able to defend others by using your healing power to remotely control the individual petals while also healing those that are protected by the projected force field. Granted, it will take some time to get used to multi-tasking like me, and it will cut your combat capability if you don't practice enough-"
Even though Genshirou knew that her attention was split between Jeanne's helpful "teasing" and his explanation of all the features, he continued to be considerate of her feelings and allowed her to think things through as she absorbed the information at her own pace.
She followed the motions and integrated the customized shield into Twilight Healing, feeling it taking up most of the "space" within her soul. Like the lightsaber, it will take some time for it to integrate properly, and when it does, it will be as if it took up no "space" at all.
With the shield, she will certainly be able to achieve her goals.
Asia Argento could say that she had a grand ambition, yet, she knew her own limitations and how far she was willing to go as well. So rather than ambition, it was better to say that she had a wish in mind, that she wouldn't mind working towards with little expectation of it being made into reality, as simply the process would be sufficient for her to feel content.
She wished for a world where her healing power wouldn't be needed anymore.
Of course, such a dream won't come true, not in a single lifetime nor in an eternity barring a huge rewrite of reality and the multiverse altogether.
She wasn't capable of creating such a world in the first place.
That was why she would simply support the people that she knew would ultimately, be attempting to create such a world in the first place, even if it wasn't their intention or ambition to do so.
If the friend that she loved so dearly was able to achieve enough power to protect his "world", made out of the people he loved, then eventually some of that protection and love would overflow to the "world" around the people he loved, and they would be protected from harm as well.
And so on, and so forth, with power being the decisive factor to how many people would be protected to an "adequate" extent.
Asia Argento's path became clear, all she needed to do was keep being herself, keep being Genshirou Saji's best friend and support him through his journey. She would be lying to herself if she said that she could live with just supporting him as just a friend, or as someone that "belonged" to some other faction like the devils or God-forbid, someone else's wife.
She could never be content with just that.
Such thoughts were hidden deep in her mind, even from Genshirou's reach, at least, it would be if he never seriously attempted to wring those thoughts out of her in an act of great betrayal.
Not that such a thing would be necessary.
Asia gave a wide and bright smile, or rather, such a smile appeared naturally on her face when she made her decision.
She would have liked to think that Genshirou was caught off-guard by her actions. It certainly would have been more dramatic that way.
Then again, it was one of those questions that she didn't want to know the answers to.
"I love you."
She would just let herself be happy with the fact that she could walk up to him and surprise him with a kiss and a declaration of love just like that.
"I know."
She woke up hugging a really soft and fluffy pillow, in a new bed, looking up at an unfamiliar ceiling. For some reason, thinking about the ceiling made her want to groan, as if she was going over something seriously overused.
Spoiler: Asia
[img: https/i./Wis8EXp.jpg]
Asia woke up noticing that something was missing, then finally noticed that she left half of her pajamas elsewhere.
Jeanne must never find out. Or she would never hear the end of it.
Putting aside the minor set-back, Asia began her new day in her new home with an abundance of joy in her heart. How could she not be happy when she finally had a home to return to, with people that loved her as a family, and with several romantic dates lined up for the week?
Oh right. She still had some plans to finish up for the day.
Suddenly, she wasn't feeling so excited about it, if only because she could now acknowledge that spending time with Genshirou was a lot more fun than trying to help him out by her own efforts.
It was a lot more fun to do things together rather than to do things apart. Honestly, she could have carried out her plans with Genshirou, instead of doing it by herself (for the most part).
But she was a bit of a stubborn girl when it came down to it. At the very least, she wanted to handle this by herself before she could kiss any overly complicated plans on her part goodbye for good.
There were a lot more enjoyable things than role-playing the "mystery girl"… or perhaps that was just the afterglow of getting tucked into bed by the man she loved?
"Heeeeee! I don't know what to do!"
She really didn't know what to do with herself anymore. Well, she probably would, after she calmed down, that is.
Asia helped to clean the dining table in the morning, relieving one of Genshirou's "setting the table" roles, and taking her place as part of the family. Jeanne came in through the backdoor after apparently, training with her "Proto-Uru Blade Template" enhanced Balance Breaker overnight… and then walked into the house while still wearing the seemingly indestructible skimpy "French Maid" outfit.
Haru Saji almost screamed her lungs out after seeing Jeanne walk in the house in such a state and hurried the dead-tired girl back up to her room to get changed.
Jeanne looked no worse for wear later on, apparently having gotten an energy refill from Genshirou.
Asia's afternoon plans went off without a hitch, as Issei and Yuuto arrived on-time outside her church, where she was able to "innocently" introduce Tosca to both of the "good devils".
She managed to explain her actions off as a concerned maiden who heard about Yuuyo Kiba through Xenovia, put the pieces together with some gossip she overheard at the church and some help from Jeanne and Teofila, in order to find Tosca who was kept alive by her own Sacred Gear.
The Knight of Gremory had bowed in a traditional Japanese manner and vowed to repay his "debt" no matter how much Asia tried to protest. The pair of long lost friends went on their way to catch up and share things that only both of them would share with each other.
Which left Issei and Asia in front of Teofila's church, until Teofila decided to get playful and began to threaten Issei with "holy water" balloons.
"Get off my church grounds devil! REEEEEEE!"
"Oi! Oi! Why are you laughing like this is a prank!"
"Hahaha! Die devil!"
Teofila weakly threw one of the balloons, it bounced once then rolled slowly all the way to Issei's feet without popping. It was clear that she wasn't serious at all.
"Ahaha… now go, you… haha… vile fiend!"
"I think Buchou is overexaggerating the whole "Church" equals enemies things…"
Asia corrected him at this moment, "Your boss really isn't. It's just that us Christians that live here are generally fine with devils, so long as you don't do anything overly unethical… or are an arrogant dirtbag. Or evil. Like this guy."
She showed him a selfie of her and the (obviously faking) injured Diorora.
"See this devil, that is a devil notorious for getting Teofila and I excommunicated, I heard that he's done terrible things to many holy maidens… like in those H-doujins."
"That bastard!"
Issei immediately jumped to the conclusion that she wanted. She reassured him that Jeanne's devil acquaintances (Sona and her sister) was working on it so he shouldn't have to worry so much for her.
Deciding to complete her plan of getting a good measure of him, she asked if he would like to show her around town as someone that has been here since he was born. Issei happily obliged and showed her all sorts of local places, speaking about the history of some old shops and locations that even Genshirou never told her about (mostly because he never had too much history with the place, having came from Tokyo…).
Asia was willing to admit that he had a good handle on being a gentleman and a good boyfriend, when she told him as such, he blushed and stammered considerably.
They stopped by a nice family restaurant where they could get some snacks before it was time to go home for dinner.
That was probably when it began to fall apart a little, if only because it was clear that her suspicions were quite accurate, namely… despite the changes in his life, he had yet to take his life seriously at this point. It seemed as though he was the type of person that required a crisis to help him reach a revelation or to reflect upon his life.
Asia decided to play it by ear and asked him some things to get to know each other better.
"How about this, let's talk about what makes a good government."
"Eh?! I mean, uh, I think Japan is fine."
"Really?"
"… Okay, maybe not. I guess there's a lot of problems too. Ah, I can't think of anything. How about you, Asia?"
"Hmm, well Ise-san, I don't think any of the present governments are a good example. So I think it comes down to ideology."
"Ideology… so it's about belief?"
Eh, close enough. Asia waited for him to take a sip of his drink and timed her response.
"I'm a fascist."
Issei spat his drink at her in shock, but she was ready and dodged by shifting to the other side of the long seats.
"What?! Oh shit, sorry, Asia, I didn't mean to-"
"Hehe, relax, I'm fine. It's not your fault, besides, I may have phrased it wrongly a teensy bit."
She stuck out her tongue to indicate that she was joking, Issei patted his chest as if telling his heart to calm down.
"Oh whew, I almost thought-"
"It's better to say that I believe in Autocracy."
"… This is another thing related to Dictatorships, isn't it?"
"Well, if you think about it, as a Christian, I am basically advocating for our Lord and Saviour to be the head of an Autocratic system."
"Um… I think I can see that."
"See, you get it!"
"I guess I do, but I'm not brave enough for politics really…"
"You should get used to it though. That's what being a high-class devil is all about."
"Heh?!"
"You didn't think it was all that easy, did you? It's a good idea to know what you are working towards and why you are pursuing such a goal so that you don't mess up or burn out in the process."
"Um…"
"Why are you trying to get a harem?"
"That's…"
"You can be honest with me, I won't judge too much, hehe!"
"That's unfair Asia…"
"You seem to have no trouble telling everyone in school about it."
"So Genshirou did talk about it! No wonder you knew a lot about me!"
"Busted~"
They were able to speak more freely after that, and Asia continued to patiently explain why she felt politics was important for Issei's goals and how he should be taking his new life more seriously by asking for more information if he really wanted to work towards a peerage in a proper way.
He seemed thankful, although he continued to dodge around the question about why he wanted a harem, as if he were unsure of his own answer.
Then again, this tied back to his self-esteem and insecurities, didn't it?
"You should speak to your parents about it."
"About what?"
"About being a devil."
"Hey, hey, that might be rushing things. I mean, they don't really need to know yet. Besides, they have plenty of things on their mind, they're going to end up worrying about me or get a heart attack when they find out. And also… wouldn't it be normal to be afraid of devils?"
Surprisingly, he was able to get to the heart of the matter.
"You are afraid that they would reject you."
He flinched, and Asia continued to smile reassuringly, as gently as she could.
"Issei Hyoudou. Your parents love you. You are their one and only son. You could turn into a dragon right in front of them and they would still recognize you, run up to you, hug you and tell the world that this is their son, who they love."
"Y-you don't know that… are you trying to get me kicked out of the house or what, hahaha…" He attempted to laugh it off.
"No! I would never… well, unless there was a zombie virus inside your house and I needed to stop you from going back in to save your… treasures." Asia decided to back off and make a joke to lighten the mood.
"What kind of things is Genshirou writing to his overseas pen pal…" Issei's porn stash, for one…
"Heehee… a lot of good things. You know, he cared about you too, that's why he writes about you a lot." Issei looked really thoughtful after she said those words.
Technically, Genshirou didn't write much about Issei, but he did talk about the boy at a decent length.
"… Urgh, he's probably a better friend than my Matsuda and Motohama, isn't he? I mean, he was my wingman for Irina… argh! What the hell am I even doing with myself?"
Asia left him to his thoughts as she went ahead and paid for the meal with the money Genshirou given her before Issei could think about it. He grumbled a bit about it, until she mentioned that it was technically Genshirou's money, which led to him joking about how it was a "refund" for when he was "robbed" by Ruruko.
Asia was starting to wonder if the younger girl was some modern day "bandit" character from an RPG, and then she realized that the girl was most likely a standard "player character", as even in the Pokemon games, the winner would take a share of the money from the loser of a battle.
That said, Asia would definitely have a talk with Genshirou over handling his girlfriend's money issues.
… She felt two people were suddenly harmed greatly at a distance.
'Asia, Issei's home, sudden teleportation circle. Alpha Bitch and Rapist Asshole. Intercept?'
'I'll handle it!'
Genshirou's words were enough summary for her to realize what was happening. She didn't want to get him too involved at this point as the Gremory peerage shouldn't interact with Darth Bobby at this point in time or some other of Genshirou's identities.
And also, this was Issei's moment, and if she didn't let it happen, something even worse might occur.
"Issei! Someone's hurt. I need to go!"
"Wait, I'll go with you."
"Okay! Don't throw up."
"Hu-uUUHH!?"
She grabbed his arm and moved at super high speeds to the destination.
Asia stopped right outside Issei's home.
"Why are we her-"
The screams shut him up before he could finish his sentence.
"-NO!"
He ran forth with all his might to save his parents. Asia quickly rushed to his side.
As expected, Raynare was being particularly spiteful, and decided to teleport right into his home to kill his parents. Apparently, the surveillance mission and her personal plan to murder Issei included stalking him to the point of leaving surveillance and teleportation circles in his home, which she was now using to get into Kuoh undetected.
And she brought Freed Sellzen with him, who had just torn off Mrs. Hyoudou's shirt.
Asia cut off his right hand with her lightsaber before he could touch her mother-in-law in another timeline again before she sent her healing power towards Issei's father, who was still alive, but badly hurt.
Freed said some vulgar things but Asia really didn't give him the time of day and simply stood guard over Issei's parents while supporting him in the fight. Even in this kind of situation, she wasn't the type to go on the offensive, and she would rather focus her efforts on healing and protecting them on the off-chance that the two villains of the day had some other back-up plans.
Issei hadn't managed to win his fight, although both of the villains retreated when the Gremory peerage teleported in. Asia had managed to retract and store her lightsaber just in time before they managed to see it.
She didn't speak much and simply let Issei do the talking. Her actions would speak louder than words, and with Yuuto Kiba supporting her after reuniting him with Tosca, Rias Gremory eventually thanked her for her help and went on to help Issei with his distraught parents.
By wiping their memories of the incident immediately.
Asia didn't know why she found herself so surprised. Of course such a thing would happen! Even though they were having a touching moment just a minute ago, any progress was simply stalled just like that by memory manipulation magic.
She could see why Genshirou hated hypnosis and brainwashing techniques with a passion when it went pass "prank-level" mind-tricks.
Asia wasn't sure if Issei was just hypnotized by Rias's figure or had ceased thinking altogether when Rias was explaining about the "rules" for the supernatural world and how such memory techniques were made to keep the existence of the supernatural and normal people "safe".
Whether it was the best choice or not, Asia would not pass judgment on such things. This could very well not be the right time for Issei's parents to handle such revelations, or it could have been, she wouldn't know.
All she knew was that when Genshirou found himself in a similar position, he didn't even think about taking away the memories of his family without permission. Even if Issei wasn't the one that performed the act today, he agreed with his Master when she asked if he was fine with it.
Asia decided to let the matter go, slipped out of the house and went home for dinner.
Genshirou stayed the night with her to help her through the disturbing things she saw.
The next day, the situation was resolved when the Gremory peerage attacked the Fallen Angel group that had foolishly lingered on the edge of Kuoh Town, Issei managed to unlock his Boosted Gear, Tosca had stupidly gone along with Yuuto and was killed for her trouble, then subsequently revived as Rias's Bishop.
The Fallen Angels were the only ones that got out alive out of the mess, if only because Jeanne had gone ahead to call Azazel to explain the situation Asia found herself in (being counted as Jeanne's friend was worth something to Azazel at the very least) due to the acts of his subordinates. Azazel pretty much diffused the issue just after Issei managed to find mercy in his heart to ask Rias to spare Raynare.
"So… all according to Keikaku?"
Asia looked up to Genshirou, who tried to sound optimistic about the whole thing.
It may have been a messy day, but in the end, Issei's story felt like a side story to her. Ultimately, she was where she belonged and was happy and content about that.
"Hmm… close enough I guess. I know it's a bit selfish but…"
"But…?"
"I worked hard right?"
"Yes you did."
"So that makes me a good girl right?"
"Yes, it does make you a good girl."
"And good girls get kisses right?"
"Haha… Yes they do."
Level 33
Level 33
I chewed on the oddly radioactive rocks that formed the surface of the planet I crashed into out of curiosity, before finally decomposing it into pure energy in order to safeguard my continual wellbeing and for a quick pick-me-up.
"I guess that's another reason why the bad guys don't build bases in space. Ow…"
It seems that even my shadow form can take a bit of physical damage from being launched out of the Dimension Gap at speeds that sent me halfway across a galaxy within a second.
I had thankfully, managed to stop myself from going any further, by reacting just quick enough to anchor myself to a planetary body my form had penetrated before I left its gravitational field.
Shifting my thoughts to the environment around me, I reconstruct a large area around me by rearranging the physical world, making a temporary survivable environment (sustained by a magic barrier) for a normal human being like myself, then shifted out of my shadow form into my flesh and blood body.
"Right then bois! Quick calcs!" I clapped my hands and got made some semi-sapient clones help in coming out with several ideas on what just happened.
In the end, we all came to the conclusion that there was a reason why most supernatural forces that worked with the Dimension Gap as a means of travel were confined to Earth, even if they had artificial dimensions of their own, those would also be confined to Earth and many of the other realms connected to it.
To put it simply, the concept of "nothingness" that made out the Dimension Gap was attracted (I dare say attached) to the variety and dense concepts that were focused on Earth as a location in the universe and as a cornerstone of "fate" (or plot). My home planet was acting as some sort of centre of the Dimension Gap where the further you were apart from it, the stronger the "pull" within the point of entry to the Dimension Gap would be, until you reached the point in the "void world" where Earth was located.
The pull was so strong that my immediate exit out of the Dimension Gap a few galaxies away would have brought me back to Earth's "zone" in less than a minute.
Apparently, the pull lessens considerably when you're in the solar system, and lessens to a crawl when your starting point is from the moon. As my clones stationed in the sun, moon and other planets have attested to.
As for why I was experimenting with the Dimension Gap, well, now that I've gotten a hang of feeding off the power of Concepts like "Life" (Valerie was a major help in this) and "Nothingness" (from reaching out into the Dimension Gap through tendrils), I figured that I could try exploring it to find some exotic materials, after my search for aliens across hundreds of galaxies have turned out to be an utter let down.
Guess this isn't some stealth Star Wars and To Love-Ru crossover after all. Gosh, darn it!
I had a few clones work on anchoring myself to a point in the Dimension Gap this time around, then using the spatial relocation part of teleportation circles in order to "move across" within the world of "nothingness" rather than in and out of it. With a bit of tweaking, I managed to remove the effect of the "pulling" force upon me entirely and could explore the far reaches of the Dimension Gap without problems.
Some of my clones were already on it and would be able to sustain themselves just fine by feeding on the Dimension Gap's "nothingness".
As always, I had gone back to my roots of digging through everyone's trash in order to fuel my abilities. In this case, the Dimension Gap is everyone's dumpster that they have to pass through to work, and where they occasionally hideout and throw their junk in when they want someone dead.
"I'm the universe's best recycler. Heh…"
"Boss, the planet is about to blow in 5 minutes."
One of my partially independent clones reminded me that the damage caused by my penetration into this planet at galaxy crossing speeds had indeed destabilized it.
"You mean 5 minutes exactly? Or do you mean-" I held out the palm of my hand in front of me, "-Five more minutes?"
My clones all got into a fighting position, it was time for an extra round of training.
"Five minutes will be plenty." The other "me" replied and proceeded to power up in an overly long manner. I made a few clones along to scavenge this planet on the off-chance that I could get some decent material to work on while I battled it out with the rest of my clones at full power.
We accidentally destroyed a few faraway planets by getting too ahead of ourselves in that "five minutes", thankfully, I managed to contain the damage by making a couple of smaller replacements from the aftermath.
All in all, it was a pretty decent way to spend my morning.
I swapped back with the body I was using to help my mother prepare the bento lunches for my siblings and my father, the split-second it took to swap positions almost made me mess up the Darth Maul "artwork" on my younger brother's food, but thankfully, I was good at improvising.
All I had to do was "paint-on" Maul's lower half a bit farther down, finishing up the food art that was common fare in lovingly prepared boxed lunches.
"Whew, almost messed up with the sauce."
"Oh! Gen! Did you just swap in?" My mother noticed that I replaced the clone given my state of attire. I only had some tattered "shadow" cloth covering my body after the recent training battle.
One of my clones took the radioactive material that made up the planet and went all Godzilla Atomic Breath on me by combining it with my cursed flames. The composition had surprising compatibility compared with all my other Atomic Breath rip-offs, and I had added that move to my repertoire.
That said, I do have a bit of internal damage that will take a while to heal. It would be easy to just reconstruct my body, but healing from this type of damage would increase my resistance to my own curses by a great deal.
I already had replicated the damage on some "scapegoat" clones to make sure there were no real long-lasting effects, once I determined that I would only benefit from healing naturally, I decided to let the minor injury run its course. It would be healed up by the end of the day anyways.
"Yeah, figured this would be the best place to jump right in."
My mother looked at my Gosei's lunch bento, "It looks like you jumped right over Maul here. Poor thing."
"It looks fine to me."
Another of my clones came in through the door with everyone else's lunches, cooked in a separate kitchen due to the strong smell and noise it would cause if it would be cooked at home during this hour, and levitated in little "bubbles" of suspended animation.
"Ooh! That's new! So soon? Didn't you just make us all those rings?"
Even my mother was astonished at how quickly I came up with a new ability when I had just outfitted everyone in the know with an Uru ring enchanted with a more advanced version of my "anti-precog" spell.
"Well, I get the feeling that troublesome things will start happening in this town, it's best that I start kicking myself into high gear."
"You weren't in high gear already?" My mother sighed, then smiled, "Well, you were always saying that limits were meant to be broken. I guess yesterday's "high gear" is today's cruise mode."
"I wish that were the case. If my results were that great then I wouldn't have so much trouble keeping everyone safe."
"Hehe, my Gen is still such a sweet child." Oh no, my mother is reminiscing about the time she took away my Level 1 weapon, in one of my many attempts to gank anyone trying break into our house.
While I didn't regret my actions, my mother's image of "little Gen" hiding in various parts of the house as if it were a police stake-out kind of painted me in a hilariously non-threatening light.
In any case, my current "keep the food fresh" bubble was a little application of an ability I derived from Tosca's Sacred Gear.
After using the Grigori's and Hero Faction's understanding of Sacred Gears along with my own in-depth knowledge in the field, I managed to break down and assimilate the core of my Sacred Gear, find out what makes it tick, so to speak.
Sacred Gears were miraculous creations that managed to derive abilities based on the power of creatures, weapons or various artifacts sealed within them along with reflecting parts of the wielder's soul. Once I managed to piece together Azazel's Artificial Sacred Gear project, I took it in another direction by simulating the "core" sets of powers that allowed Sacred Gears that evolving abilities.
All I had to do was use my ability to manipulate all forms of "power" to recreate the effects of other Sacred Gears with all the data I have gathered. As I hadn't yet mastered that combination of energies and concepts, the results weren't all that impressive.
Compared to when I adapted the information of other Sacred Gears onto my own at a painfully slow pace, my new method was able to replicate and augment my abilities without spending ages assimilating data to my Sacred Gear. Granted, the results were only a third as effective as the previous method, but in time, I'm sure that it would be a more reliable and quicker method of developing even more powers for myself.
Right now, only Twilight Healing and other defensive Sacred Gears seem to work the best with my new method.
I suppose it's because it suited me more than the other gimmicky types of effects.
I mean, what sort of Sacred Gear gives a person the ability to swim in any body of liquid quickly with increased lung capacity? Then there was the Sacred Gear that allowed the user to see farther while lowering their heart rate… I think that guy's Sacred Gear must have been used by soldiers before to give them Sniper Elite character skills.
It's good that I could break those effects down to "environmental traversing" and "advanced body control" abilities, even so, they were strangely specific and I didn't really feel like thinking about which successful people in the world actually had Sacred Gears that let them do their jobs better.
Unless of course, someone has a "Charisma" type of Sacred Gear, those types of guys need to be hunted down ASAP before they get into a significant leadership position. I don't want to get any hilariously evil governments and organizations on the level of Marvel comics anytime soon.
Sometimes it was the "traditional" settings that added a good amount of flavor to sex.
Pulling back my woman's head so that she was facing up to receive my kiss, I also pulled her voluptuous body onto me by grabbing and pushing one of her ass cheeks towards my direction.
"Mm~ Nnh!"
She didn't resist at all and was happily deepening the kiss as she pressed her barely covered large breasts up against my bare chest.
Within the secluded area that was the sports equipment storeroom, I was already finished with Atago, Ruruko, Tomoe, Aika and Reya. Atago and Ruruko had left a little earlier to get washed up, Reya was having too much fun being suspended by ropes, Tomoe and Aika both had been fucked into unconsciousness.
I left Momo Hanakai for the last since I wanted to give her some "alone time". I made it a habit to balance the experiences for all the girls in my school that had to manage with only a single body of mine to keep them company.
Releasing my hold over her body, I let the silver-haired beauty catch her breath a bit as I remarked on her expression. Brushing some of her hair to the side after it got a bit messy, I used my other hand to press a finger into her mouth.
Her tongue started to lick it instinctively, at this point, she couldn't do anything but enjoy the whole thing. Her saliva had already covered my finger and she gave me a disappointed look when I withdrew it from her mouth.
"Ah, delicious. There aren't many girls that can be both beautiful and cute like you at the same time, Momo-chan."
"Ah!"
I grabbed both her breasts, her cute nipples were only being covered by the micro bikini that she wore under her uniform since the start of the day. Since we were placed in the same class this year, I got to enjoy the sight of her attempting to hide just how hard and wet she had been, knowing that I was going to bring everyone in for an orgy within school premises since last night and prepared according.
"With these huge tits…" "Hah… they're…"
I moved my hands down to her ass and groped them to my heart's content.
"And this nice, plump butt."
"Nnn! Please…"
Answering her pleas, I took a step back and motioned for her to get on the floor. She complied immediately and got on all fours. Momo looked amazingly alluring as she looked up at my cock, trembling with excitement, her big breasts swaying left and right as she made her way towards it.
"Is this what you were looking for Momo-chan?"
She gulped and nodded, slowly lifting her head up so that she could give my erect cock a kiss on the tip. I knew that I had kept her on the edge the whole day with some touches, I just didn't think it would be this effective.
"Look at you, you are practically crying tears of joy. You just couldn't wait huh?"
"Nnh~" She could only mew like an animal as she agreed with my words.
Momo began to suck my cock like a woman possessed, she seemed to get turned on even more as I began to grab some of her hair and pulled it towards me like a set of reins.
"Haha, you're leagues better than when you first started Momo-chan. Not just the lips, but even your tongue has improved a lot, I think you will make a fine cocksleeve."
"Mmh… don't be… so mean."
"It's only mean if you're hurt. But you like being talked to that way, don't you? Just look how wet you are."
"That's not true…"
"Don't deny it. Here, let me give you your favorite treat."
After cumming into her mouth, I turned her around and told her to tell me what she wanted.
"P-please use this hole until you can use it no more." Momo parted her bikini to the side to show her twitching pussy, opening it up for my uses.
"That's better. Just for that, I think I'll give you the best fuck-down in your life. Of course, you can expect better when we get into the real baby-making."
"Y-yes!"
I fucked her until I pumped twelve loads into her, she wasn't able to handle more yet, since she wasn't as fit as Tomoe or wasn't as well trained as Reya and Aika were. Momo had been one of the "slower" girls to join in the debauchery, it was only natural that she would get worn out quicker than the more experienced girls.
When I was done with Momo, I went on to let Reya cum a few times before getting her to help her friends cover up enough to make it to the showers. The third-year girl was already getting off my faked "dismissive" tone, how hopeless. She should be eternally grateful that I would be the one to take care of her.
Exiting the school storeroom, I looked up and noticed a familiar figure up the roof.
Heading to the school cafeteria's kitchen to retrieve my stored drinks in the fridge, I went up to the rooftop where Sona Sitri stood, her face buried into her hands that were resting on the safety rails.
She seemed to be resting and unaware of my presence even though I wasn't even trying that hard to hide.
Walking up to her, I pressed the cold can of Boss Cafe Au Lait on the back of her neck.
"AAAH!"
"Wakey wakey!"
She jumped at where she stood, then quickly turned around while rubbing the back of her neck. Sona glared at me with those eyes filled with indignation despite the odd sense of happiness I was getting from her.
"Gen! You… !"
"Got your favorite cheap "low class" iced coffee for you Sona-chan."
I smiled and held up the canned drink to her, which she looked at for a second to confirm my words, then quickly swiped it from me. With a quick sequence of maneuvers that only took just over a second to complete, the can was already open and it's contents were already finding it's way into her mouth.
"Ahh! Um… don't tell anyone… I mean, you know how it is, don't you dare say a word about this to everyone." She went from a strangely muted reaction to her usual stern response in a second. I'm starting to think that she's becoming a low-key tsundere.
At any rate, Sona was rather persistent in not wanting others to know about her "forbidden love" with cheap sugar-filled canned coffee. Guess she thinks that people would look down of her for having such cheap tastes.
"I know, I know. I won't say a word. So, what's got you down?"
It had been a few days after I healed from my wounds and powered up even further. Right now, Sona went ahead and confirmed that Volume 2 had kickstarted when she openly grumbled to me about how Rias (and the ORC) leaving for a trip meant that she had to put in a little extra work to make a copy of notes for her friend.
Of course, I also knew that Sona had to pick up the slack for when Rias left town, managing some of the peerage's clients in addition to extra patrols and investigations into various shenanigans that just had to crop up when the gang left for their training trip.
"You could just record the lessons and make her listen to it. You know, to teach her the value of focusing on her studies."
"While I entertained such an idea, no one would actually do something that spiteful to their friends. Besides, like I said, making a copy doesn't take too long at all."
"Yeah, it would be a dick move to do it like that. Anything else bothering you?"
"Oh, I don't know, maybe the fact that Momo seems a bit reluctant to talk about her father nowadays."
More like, she doesn't want Sona to get involved with all the cult stuff when she's so busy at this time. Of course, the devil noble didn't see it that way and was more worried about Momo's family life rather than anything else.
"I don't think it's anything too serious."
"Of course. Of all people, you would know that. You are sleeping with her, after all…" Sona looked to the side with a flush on her cheeks. I guess she's just feeling embarrassed for bringing up our sex life in a conversation.
I feel a sense of yearning from her, hmm, well from what Momo had told me about Sona's efforts to make sure they were all friends… perhaps Sona was worried about not being close enough to Momo?
"You two are great friends you know, I get the feeling that it should be me getting worried about the type of things you girls don't tell me."
"Hahaha… maybe~"
She was likely thinking about their double life as a devil.
I'm glad that Sona has learned how to relax around me. I could tell that her average happiness has increased by being more "chill" overall.
"Then you'll ask her?"
"Huh?"
"It's a very Japanese thing to keep one's personal troubles and thoughts to themselves. Sometimes you just have to confront them on it, even if it makes you look like the devil, in order to get them to open up. While I doubt it's anything serious, I think you should just ask Momo about it the next time you see her."
"Hmm, I guess I will. Somehow I think she will be fine with me playing the role of a devil."
I slotted in that little "devil" comment just to let her think she had one up over me by knowing something I didn't. It's best to let her have her share of fun.
"With how you are at school, I can't see how she wouldn't be at least, eh…. somewhat used to it."
"Are you calling me a tyrant?"
"Oh no, I'm not brave enough for politics."
She rolled her eyes and started to open up about some of her other troubles.
"I've got an um… a bureaucratic situation I have to resolve in Kyoto, in order to help get a scholarship student transferred here. Tsubaki and I would be needed there but well, I also have school to consider."
In other words, Atago's Aunt Sophie was drowning Sona in the paperwork, so that she wouldn't be able to recruit that eager human-turned vampire I rescued from Romania for her peerage that easily.
Honestly, no one actually had a problem with her recruiting a vampire to her peerage, seeing as Atago and Sona had a good relationship overall. The Youkai were just being pedantic about things and wanted to see her squirm a little.
The only real "hold-up" was the slight information black-out I had to impose on the "Darth Bobby" rescue incident through a cursed seal that would only release itself in around two month's time, for when the Kokabiel and Peace Conference incidents would be over and done with. The vampires were more than willing to accept something like that since they owed me.
Anyways, with how overworked Sona is, I guess I will try to help things along.
"Hmm… Atago said her family knew some people in the Kyoto government, perhaps they could give some advice? I'll go talk to her to call you and see if we can help with anything."
"Really? I would appreciate that a lot! Although, I get the feeling that I would still have to miss out on school a little…"
"If you're worried about the paperwork, both the paper ones and the digitalized ones, I can help you with them if you don't mind."
"You would do that for me?"
"Of course I would."
"Should it come to that, then… you will be given an appropriate reward later. Anyways, logistics, if you're unsure with anything then do defer it for my review-"
Later on, Atago spoke with Sona later after I asked if she could ease up on the girl a bit. Atago was fine with it, although she wanted to meet Sona and Tsubaki in Kyoto so that they could discuss some things on why information on what is happening among the Youkai is so restrictive nowadays.
There are some pending "restructuring" projects and they would be announced later on.
Anyways, I was currently sitting at Sona's desk after school, when she did in fact, leave for Kyoto.
"UNLIMITED POWER!"
Tomoe was recording all of it, chuckling as she did so.
"I knew this would happen."
Level 34
AN: Each section was individually longer than I expected, as per usual. I still have the Sona Tsubaki new friends part to write, along with the Valerie Gasper, Atago, Teofila sections to go through before moving on. Do let me know what you think and enjoyed in this update.
Level 34
Visiting the main Grigori office in the Underworld started off as an annoying HR requirement, nowadays, such visits were outright uncomfortable.
From the artificial night sky above, the grayish-white ceiling high overhead of the facility, down to the internal decoration purposefully designed to showcase a blend of artificiality and gaudiness for both its research and governing offices, it was difficult to say that there was anything natural about the environment of the place.
With what Jeanne knew about what Heaven looked like from Genshirou's acquired memories, the entire facility made the Fallen Angel's longing for what they had lost all the more apparent.
Yet that was no concern to her. She had been around their number long enough to know that the majority, ultimately, found their current way of life acceptable.
She was more uncomfortable about the place as Genshirou's vast knowledge and skills imparted to her allowed her to see through the -lies of the Fallen Angels- sensory illusions put in place by a mix of technological and magical means, enabling her to perceive the unnatural hellscape that made up the Underworld.
Sometimes having too high of an Insight score was a detriment to her daily life.
In any case, this was a place that Jeanne would never willingly enter if she could help it, let alone live in for any prolonged period of time.
Thankfully, this would probably be the last time she had to be here.
"You're leaving? Oi, oi, you do know that even as a part-timer you've got all these benefits of being under our umbrella so to speak, right?"
Jeanne sliced the book he was reading in half.
"Gah! That was the first print of our internal newsletter!" Azazel complained, looking at the left and right halves of the book as if he had lost an old acquaintance.
"If you're going to talk with someone at least put down your porn magazine." Jeanne was well-aware that their internal "newsletters" were really just printed nude photographs of each other. Typical Fallen Angel fare.
"My porn… it was innocent…"
"There was nothing innocent about it."
"Shush. I must grieve."
She rolled her eyes, knowing that he was stalling in order to quickly come up with a solution, "Anyways, I'm done. It's been a good run but I'm moving on to the next stage of my life."
"Are you having your mid-life crisis already?"
"Hardly. I haven't even gotten past my Chuuni phase. Unlike you, Blazer Shining Aura Darkness-"
"-HOW DID YOU KNOW THAT?!"
Having some embarrassing material on hand to use against plot-relevant characters is another perk of having a reincarnator from another world as a fiancé.
"Oh, you know, people gossip."
"I thought I purged all those records… Hey, is that an engagement ring?" Azazel noted the engagement ring and had seemingly not noticed the Uru enchanted ring that Genshirou had given her, which could mean that the anti-detection measures were working alongside with the anti-precognition effect rather seamlessly.
Just then, the door to Azezel's office was busted wide open, the Chief Secretary of the Grigori had a look of absolute excitement on her face.
"Did I hear "engagement ring"? You're getting married? Let me meet this dashing young man who caught your heart!" Penemue wasn't even trying to hide her intentions.
"I would normally threaten to turn you into a pincushion if you went anywhere near him, but then again, Atago would probably just cut you into pieces."
"Hey, I've been your award-winning boss for about a year now, don't I get an invite? I feel so proud that an ex-employee is on her way to becoming a housewife." Azazel was looking at her in a new and creepy light.
"You are already on the blacklist, blame your trash NTR and married women fetish."
The two perverts tried to explain the joys of seducing committed partners but all Jeanne could hear was murder, death and kill. Genshirou's Anti-NTR subliminal messaging training was doing God's work right about now.
After beating the two up a little, they finished the rest of the annoying paperwork in order to finalize her exit. Penemue went back to her desk and she continued to speak with Azazel on a couple more things. He seemed skeptical and worried that she had no plans to join the Youkai faction, nor any faction, but said that he didn't have the right to make a fuss about someone else's decisions.
At this point, she would need to be at Kuoh full-time on the off-chance that Kokabiel carried some personal vendetta against her, that way, she would be able to work as a target of his ire and draw fire away from the (unfortunately weak) devil heiresses.
She was also sick and tired of the Grigori's environment, the working conditions were just not for her, not to mention that the co-workers ranged from "pretty nice but insane" down to condescending racist.
"One last thing, what happened to Koka-puff?"
"Oh, him. The usual. No trace of him at all, other than the fact that he stole some Excaliburs."
"That was yesterday's news."
"It can't be helped. The guy knows how to be subtle when he wants to. I really should have remembered how sneaky he could be, would have saved a lot of trouble, especially when he broke out Satanael those couple of months ago."
Jeanne remembered that Fallen Angel's name from the time it came up with her chats with Tobio and Genshirou's notes on how Satanael got some technology from the Nebiros clan.
That was one of the "enemies" that Genshirou had designated for instant disintegration the moment he caught a whiff of them. Turns out that he was especially wary for anyone that could "pull out magi-tech out of their ass as the plot demands".
"It's going to be troublesome, isn't it?"
"I can already visualize the paperwork in front of me."
"Aww, poor Azy-chan."
"Oh yes, please pamper me. How about a lap pillow Mrs. Jeanne?"
This guy's fetish for other people's wives is getting a bit out of hand.
"The only pillow you're getting is one stuffed with holy swords."
"Ouch."
She left his office soon after and made her way to the main teleportation room. On the way, she caught sight of one of Genshirou's clones posing as harmless human research, who graduated from Nephelem Academy and chose the researcher career path instead of the field agent one.
Sosuke Katagiri "tripped" while carrying several files of research documents, falling flat on the ground in a mess of paper.
Jeanne went to help him up, seeing as he must have fallen on purpose.
The brown-haired, mild-mannered glasses-wearing young man called her "Jeanne-sensei" like the times where she "taught" him at the academy, thanking her for helping him, before he finally dropped his voice and whispered quietly to her.
"Help. Kill me. Kill me now."
"Nope~!"
She denied him immediately.
"Oniiiiiiii-chan~ Ah, Jeanne-sensei! You're here too!"
"Hina-chan! Yeah, not for long though, I've quit my job. Just got to help your clumsy older brother pick these up."
"I'll help!"
'Sosuke' quickly dropped his pleading look and quickly embraced the role of a big brother to his little sister. Genshirou's many plots to 'kill' Sosuke's body, again, so that the girl could move on with her life instead of thinking that he was her brother now that she was in a healthier state of mind had backfired, over and over again.
Turns out that the traumatic "Summer camp" incident had made her bad-luck Sacred Gear evolve to function subtly. The many times Genshirou had tried to arrange his clone's death had resulted in things fucking up to the point where he was forced to choose between maintaining his cover at the cost of 'surviving' and escaping while breaking his cover, which would reveal the truth in a rather bad way.
He chose to stay as he didn't want to show his hand this early into the plot. Which also meant that he had to continue being Hina Katagiri's older brother, for the time being.
That said, he seemed to have become fond of her, along with his other classmates. At this point, he had given up his more zany plots, in exchange for figuring out when would be the best time to reveal the truth to them.
Not that it stopped him from trying to get Jeanne to 'kill' him in 'training accidents'.
"Onii-chan, what's this? 'Prison Matrix something… '"
"Hina, give me that. That's classified."
"Ehehe, no secrets from your sister! It's fine, I won't tell anyone. So what is it about?"
"Urgh, fine. Not that information doesn't leak out of here like an old… nevermind. Jeanne-sensei, you may as well hear this too."
"Okay!"
"Listen up. We're building a tracking device to find the stolen "Prison Matrix Origin" for Cocytus. While we're not quite sure who took it, evidence suggests that those sympathetic to Kokabiel's… views, had left the Grigori after taking it, and other technologies with them."
He explained that the many levels of hell were originally created with various "binding" spells and curses at some point after God went on a little trip to the Underworld to purge it of demons a long time ago. During that time, there were many dangerous creatures around that would have made further exploration by his children, the angels, rather difficult, so he used the "Prison Matrix Origin" to essentially terraform a portion of the Underworld into several "layers" that drew in the creatures before binding them to the location.
These days, other Pantheons (especially gods like Hades), the fallen angels and the devils had all taken different levels and portions of these areas and changed them to their liking while still maintaining the useful parts of God's work for security purposes. Some areas still maintained their function as prison areas.
What Kokabiel's sympathizers had stolen was the "source code" to the layer of Cocytus, that had been snatched from Heaven by the Grigori when they fell. The matrix had been "exchanged" (stolen) by many pantheons before the Fallen Angels finally reclaimed it.
It was in high demand as the bindings were especially comprehensive for that level, and could be used as a base for all sorts of other restraining spells and magical artifacts in mythology like Gleipnir and the chains that bound Andromeda. Apparently, the latter was an all-purpose anti-female binding artifact, that was about as sexist as Cao Cao's Balance Breaker.
Jeanne eventually got out of Genshirou's lecture, leaving him to his fate of being hugged by his non-blood related "sister".
Issei had called her some time ago to help him out with something, and knowing what it was about, she decided to run all the way to the training mountain that they were at. It probably surprised them that she would come all the way "on foot" just a few minutes after Issei called, as they expected to arrange some sort of teleportation circle.
While Asia was already willing to provide some healing to them so that they could train as hard as they did in the "canon" timeline, she wasn't obligated to do it for free. Especially since the Gremory group were clearly not destitute or unable to pay for such a service, in comparison to a significant amount of people that she had healed, who would have found themselves in greater difficulty if they had to pay for medical care otherwise.
It was only fair that those who could afford to pay for supernatural healing be made to do so.
"… What is this?" Rias Gremory stared at the detailed sheet filled with words and numbers that Genshirou had keyed into a spreadsheet, that was printed out for her just so that she could make a point.
"My quotation." Asia answered the devil heiress plainly, the pleasant smile never leaving her face despite her own feelings.
"EEEH!? Why are there so many zeroes?!" Issei seemed unfamiliar with deals of that size, which showed the depth of his knowledge on the value of money.
"I'm sympathetic to your plight, to a point. And while I do want to help you in some manner staying here as an on-call healer is a really, really bad use of my time when I have been averaging around five hundred healings a day." She answered his question, pausing for a moment to gather her thoughts and to give him time to try to understand where she was coming from.
At that rate, she wouldn't even cover the total amount of people impoverished by out-of-pocket health care spending, even if she spent the next 100 years healing that many people every single day without fail.
Not that she expected to. All she wanted to do was to do some 'good' every day, the amount of 'good' done didn't really matter in the long run.
She wasn't so foolish as to burn herself out and cause pain to those that cared about her.
Especially when the current state of the world meant that people would always be in need of healing, be it through mundane or supernatural means. She wasn't under any obligation to be a mindless healbot on a futile self-assigned mission to heal every single person in the world, nor did she intend to somehow create a miracle to solve the world's problems and advance civilization into some post-scarcity sci-fi world.
If Genshirou stumbled onto the solution by accident then it would be a pleasant surprise, but she would be content with just supporting him for the rest of her life.
No matter how long that life will last.
She didn't doubt that he would ever let arbitrary limitations like "life span" ever stop him from keeping her by his side forever and ever. An everlasting love would be worth any amount of obedience and sacrifice from her end.
It wouldn't be too different from the love of God that she, and all other believers, had believed in from the beginning considering the circumstances of this world.
"Payment for your services is agreeable to me, although, Ise-kun here seems to be confused, could you explain it to him?" Ever the business woman, Rias Gremory was able to request for more information through the pretense of explaining basic economics to yet another Japanese youth that was a victim of the rather lacking curriculum.
Asia briefly explained how healing was a rare power and the amount of effort most healers put in, from within the Church, to those in other factions like Youkai with an affinity for the healing aspects of Senjutsu (she would thank Atago for providing the information to her later) and various magicians from the association.
After going through the average costs of healing, she explained how she cost her services to them personally, and was just about wrapping it up.
"-Putting a monetary cost is the least I can do to make sure no one is taking healing for granted, besides, I've excluded additional costs like the value of your time saved by being able to recover quicker. Which, in your circumstances, should be quite high." She reminded them of the deadline they were working on before they had to face Riser Phenex in a Rating Game.
They all had to concede that point given their position.
Asia reassured Rias that she wasn't expecting payment now or at any unreasonable period of time. She would count on Rias's own pride in making sure that her debts were paid, and the fact that the money would be used for good causes, be it for social ventures and donations, would essentially act as a bonus for the devil heiress and the rest of her peerage that did care for other humans (In this case, it was probably just Issei and Tosca).
In the end, they settled for a single session of healing at the end of every two hour from 6 am to 6 pm every day, excluding the last day of rest.
"… I didn't think the church's education system had gone this far." Yuuto Kiba mumbled darkly to himself.
"It really didn't. I had to learn everything on the side through my associates." Asia told him that he didn't really miss out on anything.
"Oh, great. Hahaha! In that case, I can keep the lack of decent education from the Church on my list of grudges then. Ouch!" He was poked at the side by Tosca, who frowned and had a scolding look on her face.
"It's bad for your health to even have a list of grudges in the first place." Tosca pouted at him, forcing him to laugh awkwardly and attempt to appease his long lost friend.
"Hehehe, I'm glad that you're all getting along." Asia found herself relieved that Tosca was fine with the present circumstances, especially now that the girl was mostly at peace with being a devil.
"Y-yes. Everyone has been very good to me, Asia!"
Tosca spoke a bit on how Akeno helped her learn how to manage devil clients, on how Koneko got her settled into the middle-school division of Kuoh Academy, and more. The girl would have gotten into more detail if they didn't have a limited amount of time to get some training done.
"Just a tip, Tosca. The abilities of your Sacred Gear can grow and change in accordance to your desires and your understanding of it's abilities. Tell me, what is the function of a barrier to you?" Asia asked the young girl, who answered quickly without much thought.
"A barrier is a shield that protects the people I care about from harm."
The answer was simply unsatisfactory to Asia, thankfully, she had plenty of patience and continued to smile as she helped Tosca understand more of her potential. After spending so much time with Genshirou, she could safely say that her imagination was far from lacking, especially when it came to Sacred Gear abilities.
"Is that what you really think a barrier is for?" She challenged Tosca, then turned to Akeno who had been keeping back the tea set that had been used when she had arrived to speak with them, "Himejima-san, what is the barrier around the Occult Research Club used for?"
"Hmm? Oh, that would be for keeping people from snooping around. You won't believe the amount of young boys trying to sneak a peek before we placed that barrier~" Akeno helped to remind Tosca of that type of barrier that she didn't think to consider.
"That's right. Barriers can be used to keep things out, rather than just keep the people on one side of it safe. I'll just speed things up a bit. The key word here is 'separation'."
"Separation?"
"New Testament. The veil was torn."
"Oh I get i- Ouchie Ouch!"
"I'm healing your headache now. Don't think about it too hard. Point is, barriers are meant to separate things. When you were trapped in the barrier of your own making, you were separated things that could harm you. But what were you not separated from? You were not set completely apart from the world, people could still interact with the barrier, they could move you from place to place. They could see you." She emphasized the last words, waiting for Tosca to come to the realization that Asia had wished for.
"Light! I learned this from science class! You wouldn't be able to see me if light didn't go through!"
"Exactly. Now, if light energy could go right through your barrier, what's to say that you can't selectively allow or prevent things from passing through? Perhaps, with the help of the right spell, you could make a barrier that allowed air out of it, but not into it, then take all the air out of the area. I mean, that would really put a damper on anyone trying to start a fire, wouldn't it?"
Asia left the mountain lodge just as Rias had her Eureka moment and began talking about all sorts of ideas with Tosca. That should be hopefully keep Rias from doing something stupid like accepting a "1v1 me" challenge from Riser.
Somewhere down the line, Asia would heard something about Issei working on his "secret technique" with Akeno. She would only shake her head at the kind of thoughts that went through the sadist/masochist of the group's head as Akeno helped him out in creating his trademarked technique.
The student council members were pleasantly surprised that, aside from a few harmless re-enactments of prequel scenes within the room, Genshirou took his job with utmost seriousness with full intention of making Sona's life as easy as possible.
A bit too serious.
"Is this kind of multi-tasking even possible?" Momo was seeing Genshirou working seriously for the first time, outside of the already serious study sessions that he had with many of them.
"This is unreal." Tomoe echoed her best friend's thoughts as she watched Genshirou's right hand alternate between typing information into a computer and moving documents around, while his left hand was writing all sorts of things simultaneously.
At the same time, his eyes were moving around like crazy, reading and checking everything on the desk as he continued to work.
"Is he even human?" Tsubasa Yura, the only one in the room who was not one of Genshirou's girlfriends, simply marveled at the sight.
"Tsubasa-chan, that's a little mean, don't you think? We already knew Gen is the smartest person in school." Reya was the only student council member taking things in stride, as she simply saw the high speed calculative abilities of Genshirou as yet another sign that he would be a talented magician. "Hmm, all these summaries are correct and succinct too…" She continued to check all of Genshirou's processed documents, and only found that there were no mistakes in any of them despite the insane pace he worked at.
The members of Genshirou's club were sitting in the student council room as well, helping out in little things here and there, although their main reason for doing so was to stay close with Genshirou.
"The numbers are fine too." Ruruko answered as she made sure the club budgets and claims were all in-line. "I guess that's to be expected of the boss!"
The girl was very good with numbers as she had to manage her household finances in her absent parents and younger siblings stead.
"Boss? Gah, now I remember. I have to write the hot boss route too!" Aika slapped her forehead just after she finished handing out drinks that she just bought from the vending machines in the cafeteria for everyone.
"Route?" Tomoe questioned the only person in the room that was unaware of the supernatural world, not that she actually knew that for a fact.
"I'm writing the scenarios for a surprisingly high-budget R-18 dating sim strategy RPG game. Valerie has way too much money to spend on these things. Not that I'm complaining." Aika shrugged and started up her laptop in order to get to work. She enjoyed writing sex scenes that people 'enjoyed' while getting paid for it, as it filled her with a sense of pride and accomplishment.
Working such a job had helped her mature, as she learned the responsibilities of an adult, how to manage money and work with other people.
This all began when Genshirou had helped Aika discover her talent for writing a couple of months ago, nurtured it, then recommended her to Valerie who was always looking for capable employees.
With the help of some other talented writers, Valerie got them all into a team to write the plot and "routes" for a 'high quality explicit game', with most of the art and graphics assets being made by a team of disguised Genshirou clones.
"Will people even pay for that?" Momo looked utterly skeptical of the existence of such a game.
"I would." Reya chimed in with enthusiasm, surprising Tsubasa who had known her as a rather quiet and supportive friend rather than a perverted one.
"I would never have guessed… are muscular guys included?" Tsubasa asked Aika, who pointed at Genshirou, directing her to field the question to him rather than herself.
"Working on it." Genshirou answered quickly before he continued to work in silence.
"There you have it. That means the boss, Valerie, also wants them inside. Shit, this means we have to add even more characters… thank god the main plot isn't entirely character driven or this will be a huge clusterfuck." Aika was also informing her co-workers on the workplace platform they were using to collaborate their work on about Genshirou's new update.
Ever since Valerie gained ownership of a game company, she began to use it as a vehicle for her personal entertainment projects (that would also turn a profit). She had gotten Genshirou's clones (cheap labor) to work on the coding and assets, knowing that his ability to manipulate information directly would let him do a years worth of work within a day.
Thanks to this, she had managed to churn out some surprisingly generous Gacha games at a quick pace in order to make a profit, along with creating seasons worth of animation for series that she enjoyed.
Only those that were "in-the-know" had known the secret to that company's success.
A few minutes later, Genshirou rested his hands on the desk and exclaimed, "Done. Whew, that was an intense 30 minutes work session."
"Normally we would take two hours to finish up that amount of work." Momo supplied the average time, making Genshirou realize that he finished it all about 4 times faster than their group effort.
"Well, to be fair, this doesn't include handling all the disputes and making key decisions that our beloved student council presidents does all the time."
"I think the only reason why you don't have to handle disputes is because everyone is too scared to try something when Sona-kaichou isn't here to stop you." Tomoe jumped straight to her own conclusion that his presence was some sort of deterrent.
"You make me sound like a violent maniac. I have never used unwarranted violence against another student." He laughed and started to take things out of his bag.
First he covered Sona's desk chair with some thick cloth to make himself more comfortable, then he began to "decorate" her desk with a new Sith red lightsaber styled desk lamp and some Star Wars themed stationery. After that, he placed a scale model of the Death Star at the side of the table, then fiddled with Sona's work computer to change the wallpaper to the red Death Star schematics seen in the movie just before Palpatine revealed himself to Anakin.
"You do know that she's going to remove that when she gets back, right?" Tsubasa pointed out.
"Oh, I'm well aware that she would. However, she wouldn't throw it away outright either. She's the type that keeps gifts out of courtesy if it isn't an insult to her pride."
The student council members could only nod at that, as they had to help her move a large pile of gifts to a storehouse at least once a year.
"Why the whole Sith theme though?" Tomoe gave Genshirou her usual curious look that he found cute, getting him to smile at her as he explained.
"I always thought that her office is rather grand for a student council president, so I thought, hey, why don't I give it the gravitas it deserves by making it a desk fitting for a hidden Sith Lord pretending to be a mere Prequel Trilogy fan to sit behind?"
Genshirou adjusted his seating a little, then relaxed into Sona's chair.
"Even if you do all that she's never going to leap out from her chair in a 920 degrees spinning jump." The swords-woman sounded a bit disappointed when she said all that, secretly looking forward to seeing such a scene one day.
No one tried to fight the implication that they considered Sona to be a prequel fan too, after everything that has happened.
That said, the man currently seated behind the desk was smiling for an entirely different reason.
"Of course, I wouldn't expect her to. Spinning is a good trick that only few can master."
They relaxed and chatted on a couple of general topics so that Tsubasa could be included as well, there was a slight derail into having some office related role-play sex, but Genshirou vehemently refused to do so as this was a friend's office, which he intended to steward well even if it was just for two days.
"Hey Saji-kun, friends of yours?" Tsubasa looked out of the window and pointed at the large mob of delinquents outside the school gates.
"I can see a few familiar faces, but they really shouldn't be there, I schedule the usual time to assert my dominance on Fridays so that they could recover over the weekend. "
Suddenly a teacher came running into the student council room with a panicked and worried expression, saying that one of those punks had stolen his motorcycle. Genshirou assured him that he would help resolve the issue and suddenly the teacher said that he was just going to run over to the faculty office to get all the other teachers to watch.
The usual spectacle of him "defending himself" against a large mob was apparently interesting to see, even for teachers.
"Let's beat them up. Ouch!" Tomoe jumped out of her seat and immediately regretted her decision. She still had a few bruises from Atago's lessons before she departed to Kyoto for 'family reasons' (to maintain the facade that she only had one body available to Sona).
"Tomoe, I know you're comfortable with defending school property, but I think you should sit this one out." Genshirou chided her, then glanced over to Momo and Reya, who both nodded in understanding.
"We'll make sure she doesn't leave." "Hey!" Momo reassured him that she would keep Tomoe out of the action.
"Hmm, maybe Tomoe and I could help out Aika in her work." Reya suggested a way for Tomoe to keep herself occupied.
"Oh, please do, I have a lot of lines that would be very stimulating to the imagination that I want to test out~"
"So it's me and Yura-senpai then!" Ruruko looked ready to get in some minor exercise.
"Heh, now that's what I'm talking about!" Tsubasa was just as eager as she was.
"Excellent." Genshirou reached to his back and flipped the cloth he laid on the chair over his body, as if covering himself with a black blanket, "We must move quickly. The delinquents are relentless; if they are not all subdued, it will be chaos throughout the school area."
"Okay! Let's go!"
"Ruruko, it's a crime to steal from another fellow member of the human race."
"Gah!"
Genshirou knew what Ruruko was thinking of and put a stop to it immediately.
His words also caused the girls in the room to remember the incident with Issei, with a good amount of them thinking about how ironic that statement was, not knowing what Genshirou truly meant.
When Ruruko finally cottoned on to what he was saying, and the odd looks the devil girls were giving, she found herself satisfied with the insider joke that Genshirou just played on all of them.
Genshirou stood up from his seat, revealing that the cloth he placed over the chair was actually a black robe that he had just worn over his body.
"In any case, there's quite a lot of them… well, since they deviated from the agreed schedule I suppose it would be alright to show them the consequences of their actions." Turning to Ruruko and Tsubasa, he said, "First, I want you to take the back entrance out of the school before circling around to face them. We will catch them off balance. Do what must be done, Ruruko, Yura-san. Do not hesitate. Show no mercy. Only then we will make sure that none escape Kuoh Academy's justice."
He tells them all this while he pulls over the black hood that was part of the robe over head.
The rest of the girls could only shake their head and played along to his antics, finding that they enjoyed going along with the flow rather than pointing out the obvious.
Underneath the robe, Genshirou didn't know whether to be happy about being trusted to the point of being above suspicion, or somewhat disappointed that the huge amount of hints he dropped were utterly missed.
In the end, he shrugged, and focused on the task at hand. The sooner he dealt with this crisis, the sooner the school grounds will be cleared for Gasper to move through when Valerie and he arranged their reunion this evening.
Interlude: Azazel and Himuro Kaiza
AN: I've decided to put Michael's interlude on hold for now and keep it to later, when he and the Shinto faction would become slightly more relevant later on. I originally was going to have Himuro run into Sona where she would identify him as the person in "The Tragedy of Heydrich Himuro Kaizer the Man Slut" much to his horror, but felt that it would be too contrived and wouldn't fit with the mood of most of the chapter. Also, he would have gotten beaten up for being too blunt about his desires. This should cover some of the background activity involving Azazel and Issei, along with the Youkai faction's position in the supernatural world.
Interlude: Azazel and Himuro Kaiza
"And so, what did you give as a 'freebie' this time?"
"Heh, just some of my old 'treasures', the kid is pretty easy to please."
"If the Red Dragon Emperor turned Devil ends up being seduced by your European porn collection then I will eat my shoe."
"We still making those types of bets? Instead of eating your shoe, why not you borrow some of Barakiel's equipment, put them on and eat out your wife?"
"Our sex life is perfectly wholesome and I will not have you perverting it, especially with Barakiel's old S getup."
Azazel continued to work on a few Artificial Sacred Gear designs as his best friend Shemhazai filled in the paperwork that, by right, the Governor-General of the Fallen Angels should have been doing himself.
As per usual, the other Fallen was getting the updates straight from Azazel, while the latter constantly derailed the conversation with references to Shemhazai's devil wife.
There was no real rhyme or reason as to why Azazel would always try to divert the topic to Shemhazai's life. He had gotten over his jealousy for his best friend's ability to actually keep a long, lasting and loving relationship unlike so many of their fallen brethren ages ago.
If anything, this was just another one of Azazel's weekly whims.
His best friend signed off a report and set it aside, "So to sum it up. You met with the devil boy as a client again discreetly, just before he left for his training trip to fight that pompous Phenex brat because his spoiled master wants out of the arranged marriage, a duty that many devil heiresses have no issue with… and stuffed a freaking Holy Sword into his Sacred Gear without him noticing."
It was a simple matter to win over Issei to his way of thinking. Some pornographic videos of Raynare in a degrading maid costume apologizing to "Master Issei", making a disgusted face while showing her carefully selected set of panties, and a whole bunch of other goodies was more than enough to convince Issei to not report their friendly relationship to his "master" Rias Gremory.
They had been speaking and hanging out together secretly ever since.
"Meh, what can I say? He's a boy after my own heart. I can't help but root for him. Besides… Father knows what that arrogant flaming chicken might have in mind if the Gremory girl had lost!"
Somehow, Azazel could imagine the makings of an NTR doujin.
It was simple enough to create a spell that would prevent the holy properties of one of Jeanne's blades from spilling over to affect Issei's devil body.
He used another spell created from his projects, to discreetly stuff the sword into the Boosted Gear's main jewel without Issei noticing, once he had successfully goaded the boy into trying to use his "Boosts" to beat Azazel in a video game.
For the record, Azazel trashed the kid in Mortal Kombat. Hah, what a filthy casual!
At any rate, he figured that Issei, like so many Sacred Gear possessors, would find a way to use the sword at the right time when he needed it the most like some Shounen protagonist.
"Well, at least this generation's Boosted Gear possessor's opinion of the Grigori wasn't shot to hell completely. Fucking Raynare."
Shemhazai's name drop made Azazel groan.
"Dumb bitch. There's such a thing as knowing when to give up."
"It's pretty hypocritical to say that, all things considered."
"… Point."
Azazel had to concede that point, they were Fallen Angels that threw away all they had without restraint in order to get whatever their hearts desired at some point in their lives, so they really shouldn't be throwing stones for that sort of behaviour.
What they could do, instead, is simply bitch about their brethren choosing the wrong types of fights to go full retard in. Raynare was simply the latest one of the Grigori to make a series of horrendously bad decisions.
Decisions that cost the Grigori a Longinus possessor that could have easily been swayed to their side with the promise of pussy.
"Why do I get the feeling that Kokabiel is going to be the next one to fuck up everything? How goes our tracking device project again?"
"We're on track. Everyone's favorite lab assistant has accelerated our progress yet again."
"Huh? Who?"
"You really need to keep up with the gossip Azazel. Sosuke Katagiri, you know, model Nephelem student turned Grigori lab assistant."
"Oh yeah, the kid that was nearly killed and turned the entire year group into Star Wars nerds." If Azazel had to hear more Prequel quotes being referenced within his vicinity then it would be too soon.
Azazel met the kid once or twice as the boy's Sacred Gear underwent some changes after surviving the forced extraction of yet another unethical experiment ran by an idiot brethren of his.
If Tamariel had the intellectual capacity to actually get results while preventing the knowledge from leaking out, the mecha freak would probably get some pats on the backs from everyone else, but since the plans to have a Sacred Gear user powered Gundam got revealed to all levels of the Grigori, Azazel had to work overtime to put down the utter disaster they had faced once the humans under their umbrella almost revolted en masse out of outrage.
"He's a good kid. He's helped me and my wife out with our private projects too."
"Which one?"
"The Piranha plant one. She discovered Mario recently."
"T-minus 10 days before you discover your vore fetish."
Shemhazai went into another tirade about how Azazel should stay away from the topic of the guy's marriage. He had the feeling that his friend didn't trust him at all!
Then again, considering his track record with married women… yeah. He could see why no one would trust him with talking about their wives either.
Even that sheltered former church girl Jeanne didn't trust him one bit the moment he found out she was going to get married. He had gotten blacklisted from wedding ceremonies for worse, but he was starting to feel really left out these days… perhaps he should run a PR campaign about how he's a changed man and all that jazz?
If it worked with the other Pantheons in their negotiations then he didn't see why it wouldn't work for this case either.
"Wait, I just realize something."
"What?"
"That kid only started meme'ing after getting healed by the cosplaying Sith Lord wannabe."
"You mean Darth Bobby."
"Pft."
"Don't laugh. I heard that the naming scheme is a deliberate attempt to make others drop their guard before he jumps and spins at his enemies while screeching like Darth Sidious! I'm not going to be responsible if our leadership laughs and gets himself sliced in half by a real life lightsaber."
"Hahaha, thanks for looking out for me. Back on topic, isn't it curious that the people he interacts with somehow gets interested in Star Wars?"
"You mean like how the Church had a couple of movie marathons?"
"Exactly! What if… his Sacred Gear is actually a healing type Sacred Gear, he trained all his other powers to compensate for naturally weaker offensive abilities… but then he's fanaticism for Star Wars memes is somehow transferred through his healing powers?"
Shemhazai stood up and started rummaging through Azazel's desk!
"Hey! What gives?!"
"I'm looking for the drugs you are clearly high on!"
"I'm not high! It makes sense! Remember Metal Gear?! Memes, the DNA of the Soul! Sacred Gears are part of the Soul so he's clearly using his to infect other people with prequel memes!"
"Take a seat Azazel. I'll call the medics and get you to the sickbay."
"I'm not crazy!" Well, not crazier than usual… "This is a real theory of mine. I think Memes are actually one of the core foundations of Sacred Gears."
While they could certainly make all sorts of Sacred Gears, they didn't actually understand the "core" of the Sacred Gear, only replicate it's base then add on other things to give them specific abilities.
As such, Azazel couldn't say that he was satisfied with just leaving it like that. Anything that gives Azazel an idea of the "core" of how a Sacred Gear is powered and how the abilities are developed sends him into a creator's craze.
"Don't you wonder how so many new Sacred Gears are somehow adapting modern appearances? Think of the eye-sight improving one that manifested as a sniper scope, or the telepathic communications one that appeared as a mobile phone! Clearly, Sacred Gears are actually influenced and even powered by the collective thoughts and knowledge of-"
Unfortunately, no one else really shared his level of passion in the field, and he was promptly sedated and forced to rest until he could make a rational research plan without going off like a madman.
That caused a slight delay, but nothing would keep him from his research!
"-and this is why I think that Project M.E.M.E.S. will be the way forward!"
Barakiel, who he had roped in to help with his research project, looked outright confused at Azazel's easy-to-remember project name. How ungrateful! The man should be glad that Azazel was such a benevolent boss, helping out his dear brother in arms by keeping the emo masochist Fallen Angel from moping about his lost wife and estranged daughter.
"Can't you give this project a more… descriptive name?"
"Well, yes, but Memes is a lot catchier and shorter to use. We could even use a different acronym to make it sound cool."
"Like the time where you used a random alphabet of the letter, added an "X", then repeated the first alphabet for one of your project names? If you say so… Blazer Shi-"
"-SHUT UP! Just you wait, I will be vindicated!" Mumbling under his breath, he continued, "Mark my words, one day, there's going to be a couple of kids gullible enough to think names like "ExE" or "CxC" makes a cool title for their super special techniques."
"… You just admitted that they had to be gullible to even consider the usual naming schemes you propose-"
"-LOOK AT THE SKY, IT'S RESEARCH HOUR!"
Thankfully, the stern looking muscle-head had dropped the topic, and they could finally get to perform some real "science"!
"Hah? Where's the hair dye I bought?"
"Himuro-sama, your parents issued a ban from you ever coming into contact with any sort of hair coloring material, including bleach."
"The hell? That sounds random as hell."
"Apparently, they don't want anything to remind them of the incident a few years ago…"
"I'm not going to turn into some chuuni dickhead by just dyeing my hair. Pretty sure I've outgrown that stage…"
Himuro muttered dispassionately, there was no real heat in his replies. Something of this scale was only a mild surprise to him with how lively his household had been, and how fast things had changed in his home.
A lot of things had played a role in building up his nerves and capability to take control of circumstances rather than simply reacting like a young child, as he had once done so. Dealing with his parent's shenanigans, his brother-in-law's endless supply of memes (at one point, he almost thought he was going crazy when Genshirou was just popping out of the shadows everywhere to drop a quote), his older sister's complaints about the wackiness she had to deal with since taking up her new job and his friend's antics made up the bulk of colorful events he faced.
"We have a supply of wigs for undercover operations for you to use, if you would like, Himuro-sama."
His clan's servant suggested an alternative to him, Himuro smiled and nodded, "I would like that very much. Any suggestions?"
"A brightly colored one, perhaps blonde, like the hair dye that we had confiscated?"
"That will do."
"I will retrieve it immediately, along with the money you used to purchase the dye. We are sorry for not informing you of the ban sooner, we didn't think you wouldn't have been informed."
"No worries. I didn't waste much time buying it anyway so it's no skin off my back. Besides, with everything that has been going on, and with how full of energy my little sisters have been… I guess everyone has been kept pretty busy huh?"
It was easy to forget and assume things when a whole lot of things are happening at once. Perhaps he would have snapped impatiently if he was younger, but after all these years, patience was certainly one of the things he liked to say he had learned.
That said, he had almost overreacted when his parents delivered the verdict. Thankfully, he calmed himself before he made a scene, and managed to listen to them calmly.
Atago wasn't going to be the next clan head anymore. It wasn't due to any fault of hers, in fact, she has done an exemplary job in whatever she had put in effort to.
The fact of the matter was that his mother managed to discover just how much work his sister had actually been doing in order to keep up with the expectations placed on her. It was quite a recent thing, and they had a big talk about it last night, and his family finally managed to resolve some long standing misunderstandings with each other thanks to a real heart-to-heart talk.
Suffice to say, Himuro and his father, Raiga, had been pretty mortified at the amount of work Atago had been putting in with Genshirou's help.
Having two workaholics with abnormal standards of what constitutes a "normal" amount of effort and having extremely supportive tendencies married to one another… resulted in a nigh endless escalation of work and responsibilities being taken up.
And a lot of sexual activities that he didn't really want to hear about. He wouldn't be able to react to those vile remarks by those that hated his sister the same way again, at least, not the ones that called her a "bitch".
Oh, if they only knew…
In any case, Himuro was going to be the clan heir, and with that, he had to learn about the responsibilities and duties that was to be expected of him. Simply put, Atago should only be putting in the effort for a job only she could do, which was the position she was appointed to by the leaders of the Youkai factions.
It was only right that her family support her by taking on all the other roles that could be done by others. In which case, the position of clan heir could simply be passed on to him.
While his parents may have lacked faith in his capabilities years ago, after seeing how hard he trained in order to protect his cute little sisters and in growing up to be a more responsible person after the "incident", they didn't seem to have any problems with naming him the new heir so that Atago would have less work to do.
Now that they knew she didn't take any pride in things like titles, positions, honor and really only wanted their love, and especially Genshirou's love (an understatement), the best thing they could do as a family was to support her all the way.
In order to help his sister, Himuro had decided to take his new duties seriously from the get go.
He put on his blonde wig, suppressed his presence and exited his family home.
"Okay, my disguise is perfect."
Now he could blend in with ordinary citizens to learn more about the people he was supposed to protect and the state of Youkai society without people acting differently! Ever since Atago had taken up her governmental position, people had been looking at the Kaiza clan differently, and Himuro found it hard to get the unvarnished truth from the mouths of the people.
With this disguise on, he would be able to walk around without causing others to change their behavior or keep their guard up!
"Himuro-kun! Wow, you look good in casual clothes and blonde hair!" His "cousin" Maple found him out instantly!
"Shh, not so loud. I'm undercover."
"Oh goodness, my apologies."
"It's fine, just uh, call me Homura for now."
"That sounds like a very anime-like name for a protagonist or rival character."
Although she often introduces herself as his "cousin", they weren't related by blood at all. Maple Araki was his Aunt Sophie's daughter and they pretty much grew up together, aside from his family, his childhood friend was hit the hardest by his "disappearance".
Like her mother, she was a Nekomata with the blood of a vampire, although with how much the blood of the latter species had thinned over time, she wasn't capable of using a vampire's shadow powers but in return, had stronger abilities when it came to absorbing power from the blood of others.
Maple had orange, back-length wavy hair, with curled ears and a matching fluffy cat tail of the same color. Like Genshirou's newest pretty girlfriend, his childhood friend had dark green eyes.
Himuro honestly thought that she was cute and too good for him, although lately, after speaking with brother-in-law his thoughts on his closest friend had changed quite a bit.
"Don't I know it… anyways, I'm trying to blend in to get the opinions of normal people. I have to know that stuff now that I'm going to be the clan heir."
"You're what?! Did something happen Hi-I mean, Homura-kun?"
"Don't tell anyone until the official announcement, but my sister doesn't really want the position, and considering her workload ever since she had been given her government position… well, I was more than happy to step up if I could help."
"So that's it… well, I'm glad that you're so enthusiastic about it."
Maple grabbed hold of his hand and started pulling him in another direction.
"Hm?"
"Ohohoho! Luckily for you, your cousin knows some of the most popular places visited by commoners!"
"Hold on, this won't work considering you don't have a disguise."
"Why do I need a disguise?"
She seemed genuinely confused, Himuro couldn't help but think that look on her was cute too.
"Maple-chan… you look way too glamorous to pass off as a commoner like me."
"E-eh? I-I don't think so… it's not like I look any different from the other Nekomata, most of them are more mature and prettier too."
Maple had a strange lack of self confidence at times.
"I disagree completely. I look like a stereotypical delinquent by default, so just putting on a wig works for me. On the other hand, there's no way anyone can mistaken you for anything but a beautiful and refined girl."
"T-that's not true… I mean, you've seen me covered in mud when we were kids, I think there was a time where you thought I was a boy for years."
"If I could go back in time the first thing I would do is hit myself for ever being so stupid. I'm sorry if I ever hurt your feelings, for well, making you feel you weren't pretty enough."
She seemed quite taken aback. Himuro really wanted to slap some sense to his younger self now since the evidence suggested that he must have been a real stupid piece of shit back then.
He owed her a lot for caring for him in spite of his attitude.
"W-well, apology accepted. A-anyhow! This should do it!"
She snapped her fingers and changed her hair color to a plain black using Youjutsu.
How convenient! Himuro briefly regretted not putting enough time to learn some utility spells, then he remembered that he didn't have shadow clones, and made peace with himself for following the path of MUSCLES!
"Wait, I think we're forgetting something."
"What is it?"
Himuro looked up Maple up close, feeling as if there was something they both forgot to do.
"D-don't stare so much… not in public."
"So I can stare at you all I want when we're alone?"
"I-idiot!"
She was cute when she was mad too.
"Ah, there it is. You forgot to change your eye color. Your cute cat-like eyes are way too eye-catching."
"Cute… hehe…"
"It also gives you away instantly, not a lot of Youkai have green eyes like that."
"Mmm… so will this do then?"
Now that both of them looked like pretty normal human students, they were able to visit a local restaurant and simply play off being a couple of spiritually aware humans that were aligned to a prominent Youkai clan.
The first thing Himuro noted was that a lot of Youkai were on their phone, when he "innocently" asked them about it, it turned out that a couple of Youkai that went to the same university started a technology company together after being inspired by his clan's modernization of security solutions. Since then, they've started co-opting human technologies, used a form of magical coding to create improved graphics, visualization formats and began popularizing various products through their social circles.
Mobile gaming especially, was becoming rather popular now that it wasn't just a "human" thing, but a Japanese thing as a whole.
It doesn't help that it was an anime-esque fighting game with a magical holographic display, with tons of "waifus" that people would splurge on.
Once he moved past the flashy technology, he noticed that there were a lot of families carrying young babies, turns out that the baby boom that Genshirou helped create was having a very visible effect.
"Ah, this is quite good! I thought the spicy curry Katsu-don was just a gimmick but this is actually pretty spicy for Japanese standards." Genshirou had made sure that his entire extended family understood what "real curry" was, and they had to adapt accordingly, and their tolerance for spicy food had gone through the roof. Himuro was surprised that he managed to get some rather authentic sweat-inducing spicy ramen that didn't rely on just Szechuan pepper to simply numb the tongue.
"Hah! That's because I got some good stuff from Indonesia. Whew, those guys are crazy about their spicy stuff." The chef talked with Himuro about how new businesses are cropping up, and that one of them imported all sorts of food stuffs from overseas, giving Youkai like him more opportunities to expand their menu and quality of food.
"I wouldn't be able to get this stuff on my own. It's always dangerous to travel outside the country, especially to religious ones where you'll never know when some exorcist equivalent would try to jump you, so having a government that can actually show some teeth to those sorts of humans and other factions helps a lot in creating more trade and business. What the people need is confidence! In the government, in security, and all that! I never thought I would see the day we Youkai get to see some respect hahaha!"
The restaurant owner went on and on about how a strong, tough and stable government that had the power to retaliate against outside forces was necessary for an economy to thrive.
Many of the customers (most of which were couples) had also agreed with the restaurant owner, talking about how people were spending more money despite the stricter governance around travel, that there were actually more legitimate visitors willing to spend money in purchasing local goods now that their country's security wasn't a complete joke.
They also complained a bit on how long it took for the gods to start taking more action, some even wondered if the gods had abandoned the Youkai as followers because they weren't strong enough and weren't able to solve their own problems, until now.
While Himuro knew a little bit more about the situation with the gods thanks to Genshirou and Atago's close working relationship with them, he didn't know the full picture and kept silent about that, not wanting to accidentally start any rumors on that topic.
"Um, if you don't mind me asking, what's with everyone being tight-lipped whenever it's about the Kaiza clan? Are they that scary?" Himuro asked the question that weighed heavily on him, he would rather the clan be loved and respected, rather than just feared and respected.
"I mean, if I had to be honest, the princess is a bit scary…"
"Terrifying even…"
"I heard she defeated the leaders of every Youkai faction with just the back of her sword, and in one hit!"
"If she fought seriously then Kyoto might get buried by the aftereffects…"
"She's a tyrant!"
Himuro's face met the counter, his meal was right next to his head. So the people really were terrified of them!
"A-ah, Homura-kun… are you okay?" Maple checked if he was alright, she was holding on his shoulders and started to shake him. He could smell her scent even more keenly when they were this close.
"Uuuu… I'm okay… especially when you're pampering me like this. Ah, I would like to be taken care of by you for the rest of my life~ This feels so nice~"
"W-what are you saying! Don't joke around like this."
"I'm not joking though."
Before he could follow up with his embarrassed childhood friend, one person seemed to add on to their previous statement, and the rest soon followed with similar sentiments.
"Ah! But the Kaiza clan as a whole are great!"
"Yeah, those guys take the "loyal dog" thing to a whole new level. No offence."
"The Kaiza clan are selfless, they only care about others."
"That's a bit too much, but I get what you mean, they aren't corrupt like the other faction's police force… I would know, I used to get shaken down by the North Faction's so called "homeland security"."
"They started solving a bunch of cold cases since they've hired that mysterious "associate" of theirs, managed to prove my friend's innocence, got him out of jail and arrested the real culprit!"
The people started to sing praises about his family and their loyal clansmen. Himuro had never felt so proud, other than the time he was holding his five younger sisters in his large muscular arms.
After leaving the restaurant with Maple, they went off to visit other places, and managed to get similar feedback on how people felt about the recent changes. It left Himuro elated that his clan wasn't hated, and he also felt like he learned something too.
They ran into a bit of trouble on the way back, but thankfully, the idiot was even weaker than Himuro was. It only took an underhanded hit to bring him down and pass the guy back to his patrolling clansmen.
"That was kind of a bit mean."
"How so?"
"I mean, you ran up to him like you're about to punch him then you used a low kick…"
"Fighting like an idiot doesn't make me feel good. Winning does."
"But still…"
Right, Maple was pretty prideful, and had some attachments to some honorable behaviors.
"Look, Maple-chan, I'm not that strong on my own."
"That's not true! You're plenty strong!"
He would like to think that he was, but honestly, all things considered Himuro was pretty weak.
The only thing "badass" about him was that one scar on his body, that was leftover from Genshirou's battle against the thing that used his body. His brother-in-law fixed the damage, but the magical "radiation" effect left a burn scar on his chest, and while he could have gotten it fixed Himuro chose to keep it instead.
It wasn't as if there was any radiation left in his body anyways, so leaving the scar for aesthetic purposes wouldn't cause any trouble. More importantly, it serves as a pleasant reminder to him. That a foe with superior firepower can be beaten with a combination of luck, good planning and versatile skill, most of which can be achieved by hard work.
Himuro had taken the defeat of the entity that used his body to heart. Since then, he had trained his body up with great effort and with the help of his family, friends and his brother-in-law.
"No, I'm not. It's just that a good amount of the supernatural population is weaker than me, but that doesn't mean I'm off the hook. I only have one life, so I can't take any chances with these sort of fights. By coming at the guy like I'm some idiotic delinquent that can't throw a correct punch, I trick him into thinking that I'm weak and that he wasn't in any danger, before launching a real attack that he doesn't expected when lured into a false sense of security. That's the bare minimum of what's needed to keep the people I care about, and myself, safe from harm in a real fight."
"Um… I think I get it… so long as it works then Himuro-kun would try it huh…?"
"Hahaha… sorry, my brother-in-law kind of beat that sort of thing into my head. Literally, even."
"What sort of monster is he? Is he even human?"
Himuro could only place his hand on Maple's shoulder and give her a sympathetic look, "I wonder that myself sometimes. But you'll get used to it."
"I don't think I even want to meet him now!"
"That works too. He's got a harem you know. If you got into his vicinity then I would start feeling worried about the possibility of you falling for him."
"I'm not that easy of a girl! Besides… there's someone I like already…"
Who?! How did he not notice!?
Himuro let the words he was about to react strongly with die in his throat, he calmed down and used the breathing techniques he had been taught to relax.
He thought things through, remembered Genshirou's own advice, examined the evidence and pushed away his fear of being rejected.
He wasn't someone that was good at understanding the feelings of others, if he was, he would have noticed his sister's true feelings about her work a lot earlier. As a little brother, he felt as if he had failed by not being able to connect closely enough with his sister to perceive her true thoughts, as such, he had already resolved himself to do things differently with his five younger siblings.
The teenager however, could at least acknowledge his own feelings, that he felt jealous at the thought of his childhood friend being with someone else.
His closest friend that cried for him when she thought she wouldn't see him again, that was always helped him even if he never asked for help (just like today…), that spent time with him even though he did little to deserve it, who believed in him and complimented him when his family (somewhat rightfully) hadn't done so.
"I see… Maple, I could be wrong but… is that lucky "someone" me?"
"H-hiii!!! W-what are you saying, I mean, when I said I "liked" someone I mean it a-as in…"
Was he wrong? Did he just ruin his relationship with her?
For some reason, he could hear his brother-in-law telling him to just "dew it!" Himuro silently cursed at the memes infecting his head before he realized that it helped him clear his head of the fearful thoughts.
Disregarding the worst possibilities that their words could be misunderstood for, he focused on the fact that she was a bit of a textbook Tsundere and gambled on it!
"So rather than "like" it's actually "love" right?"
Her face went red. His first reaction was to consider that an angry red like the occasional times when he was yelled at by his family, but he remembered his brother-in-law's advice and decided that he could regret his mistake after he had made them!
"I'm going to kiss you now, if you love someone else then please punch me before I do so!"
His confidence grew as he took his time in moving his lips closer to hers without retaliation. By the time his lips were just over hers to the point where he could feel her breath overlapping with his own, he could see that she had closed her eyes and puckered her lips.
Himuro Kaiza would give his brother-in-law a thank-you gift after this!
That was his last rational thought until he kissed her, dragged her to a remote place and mated like animals.
To their mutual horror, they ended up being brought home by his big sister Atago, where both their parents were already waiting with a marriage agreement in place. Himuro remembered that his parents did the same with Atago and Genshirou too. Somehow, he felt as if he understood his brother-in-law even more now.
Level 35
Level 35
He could barely concentrate on his stream, how could he be wasting his time away like this when Rias, Koneko and everyone else was training to fight a battle without him? If he could only control his Sacred Gear then he wouldn't be so useless!
Gasper didn't think that he was some sort of Shounen manga character that could suddenly resolve his slew of issues within a day and joining the main cast just in time for the training arc. After all, what sort of devil was scared of even leaving his room?
Not that he could. Ever since returning back to the human world, his powers had caused all sorts of problems to the students, and he needed to be sealed into this room to prevent things from happening.
It had been pretty lonely lately. Not many people remember to visit him these days, they all seemed so busy ever since his master resurrected the two new servants. The only person that drops by semi-regularly was Koneko, and now that she was off training, he was feeling more alone than ever.
Just then, he got a strange email from the company where he bought his "universal translation software" from. It was weird how a supposedly human company would be capable of creating a technology that worked just as good as a Devil's "Language" skill, but in speech and text too, for all languages… it helped him a lot in replying his viewers, who spoke many different languages.
In any case, Gasper hadn't thought much about the company's history, and had used his considerable allowance and streaming revenue to purchase the Enterprise version of the software when he was fortunate enough to receive a promotional discount directly via email.
He decided to take his mind off things by seeing what sort of new products they came up with. He had tried a couple of the games made by the company's gaming division, got addicted for a bit, and quit after realizing he was sinking all his time into it. That said, he never stopped looking out for anything interesting from the company.
"Congratulations! The CEO would like to invite you to… is this a scam mail? I'm not that stupid."
He moved it to the recycling bin.
Immediately after that, he got another email from the company, titled [It's not a scam! Why are you deleting my emails stupid Gasper!]
"Huh, what? How do they know my name… wait, stupid question, I needed to put in my details… but what kind of company calls their customer's "stupid"?"
Considering that he had nothing better to do, other than potentially risking his entire computer system to some virus, Gasper opened up the email and saw that the only content within it was a video file.
"Here goes…"
It was a slideshow with pictures and… a voice-over?
"Hellooooo! Gasper, you're watching this in your room right?"
"What…"
This voice, he recognized it.
"It's me, your friend Valerie! Are you well? Are you still wearing cute dresses? Ah, I've tried a lot of good dresses since a certain someone got me out… here! That's the dress I wore with my boyfriend to-"
It was Valerie Tepes, his first friend, the girl that was like a big sister to him. The person that helped him escape from his vile home, at the cost of her own chance of freedom.
After the first video had ended, he started to receive more emails with more videos, this time around, they were video logs of Valerie speaking directly to him. The date and times for each of them took place years ago, and with the narration in each of them, he could tell that she recorded her new life as a free woman for his sake, saving those videos until she could find him.
It occurred to him that Valerie was apparently the boss of the technology company that he was a customer of, but he didn't really think about how she got into the position, so much as he thought about how happy she was with her life now.
She even fell in love and was living with her boyfriend, well… fiancee, now that they were engaged.
Gasper had seen her smiling more genuinely, no longer putting up a strong front for his sake, her kindness and fascination for cute things seemed just as it was, if not even stronger than before. The way she spoke with her lover, the man in the video, showed how much they respected each other. It seemed that he was used to bearing the brunt of Valerie's willfulness, Gasper would always remember how Valerie chose her fights, used the right words to defy the other vampires, to protect him by drawing their attention away many times.
At the same time, he could also see how devoted she was to her fiancee, she was beaming with happiness just by being by his side.
Looking past the similarities, he could see that she gained new interests with the way her eyes lit up when she started talking animatedly about finances, travelling, all sorts of foods… and yet, despite how she had changed, he was able to recognize her as the same old Valerie that was like a big sister to him.
"Hmm, this video is different…"
"Yes, oh, I'm so sorry Gasper, I shouldn't be ignoring you. I'm still getting used to this. Um, what's the next part again?"
Valerie looked away from the camera before returning her gaze towards it, towards him, then reiterated the point about her future marriage. It left him a bit disappointed, about, well… how he may have missed it at the rate things are going.
"Oh, yes. Gasper, I will be marrying Genshirou Saji, he's the man that I am very much in love with. As I have mentioned before, and um… today, I will be…"
He saw the man, Genshirou, smiling kindly in a genuine way that reminded him of Yuuto Kiba, and lifted Valerie up to put her on his lap. Valerie looked really cute and pretty like that!
"I think it's best that we start from the beginning so Gasper doesn't get lost. Don't you agree, dear?"
"Yes, that's a great idea darling!"
"Haha… well then."
"Ahh… !"
"What?"
What was he watching? Why is Valerie's breasts… they're being touched! She's being groped, she was letting herself be groped! And now she was being undressed!
"Is this real life?"
Gasper rubbed his eyes as if he was trying to clear the fog away to reach out for the truth.
"Go on."
"O-okay… my name is V-valerie Tepes…"
"How old are you?"
"I-I'm twenty, now… nh!"
"Keep eye contact with the camera Valerie, at least for now, you can look at me however much you want later."
"Y-yes!"
"What are we going to do now?"
But as her shirt was thrown to the side and her bra was unbuttoned to reveal her bare breasts, Gasper realized there was no fog of lies, this was the reality of what he was watching.
He couldn't believe what he was seeing. What is this? What the hell is this?
"Y-you will be taking my virginity. T-this will all be recorded, to-to commemorate the milestone!"
How could she be smiling at doing something so shameful?! Why is he making her do it?
"G-gasper, your big sister is going to become a woman!"
"What… the…"
The next minute was but a blur, when he was fully cognizant again, he could clearly see Valerie enjoying herself even after being deflowered in such a rough manner.
"Ah~ This is wonderful! If I knew it would having your semen inside me would feel this good I would have begged you to fuck me raw sooner… Fufufu, Gasper, are you shocked to see your big sister like this?
It was only right that she would have changed for the better after being freed from the Tepes stronghold. But this… this display… a show of a man and a woman deep in the throes of passion… he could scarcely recognize the blonde woman in the video.
"Nmghhhh!"
"You moan quite convincingly!"
"Haa~ How could I not…"
"Then you won't mind me getting a bit rougher than! Let's try from behind!"
Gasper watched with eyes wide open as Valerie got on all fours like an animal without further prompting.
How often have they done this?
He wasn't able to tear his eyes away from the way his beautiful friend's big breasts shook in many directions as he fucked her hard! It was obscene, he wanted to respect his friend by not watching any further-
"Looks like those boobs aren't the only thing that you can shake!"
"Ohhhh! Yes, more! More!"
-but… he didn't. He couldn't. This was what she wanted… right? She was getting off being fucked in front of the camera, in front of Gasper! It didn't end there, she had surrendered all control over to the man she loved, and allowed him to shower her with love and pleasure that only a woman would be able to know.
"Valerie…? What happened to you…"
The Valerie he knew wouldn't have just let herself be used like that, he could remember the defiance she showed towards her nasty brother, and the rest of their accursed family.
After a life of captivity, Gasper reasoned that there was no way Valerie would just let herself be used in anyway, at least, that would be how it would be like in a manga. That kind of character development is pretty typical.
It really seemed that way with how lovely and strong she's become ever since she escaped from the castle!
"Ah… what am I doing… no, this is… correct? Haha… hahaha… this is clearly exhibitionist play, or was it a filming one… either way, I'm supposed to be doing it this way… right Valerie?"
In spite of that, she was so beautiful, he couldn't stop himself. It was only after the deed was done that he realized he had just masturbated to his friend being fucked by a man he only knew from videos!
Now that he took a closer look at him, he remembered that he had actually seen Genshirou Saji before, he was that famous Japanese human that was basically a real life martial arts manga protagonist.
Valerie was going to be married to that man? No wonder she seemed so happy.
Why was he bothered by this? Is it because she may have just gotten married and… moved on with her life? She lived in the human world now while he was a devil, a devil that couldn't even leave his room. He didn't even look for her or hoped that she managed to get away, while Valerie herself believed in Gasper and sought him out!
Another email came… he hesitated to click it, until another email arrived a minute later with the title [Fucking click the email I just sent you Gasper!]
It's official. His computer had been hacked, and he couldn't care less.
The email contained nothing but a simple message.
"I will be waiting at this park for you. Don't take too long."
He ran out of his room without a second thought. If he had taken a moment to think things through, he would have noticed that the sealed door hadn't accomplished it's function at all, as if it had been sabotaged by an outside party. There was no resistance, there was no alarm being sounded, he was out of the sealed room and was running like a madman to the park.
Gasper saw her standing there right in the centre of the empty park, her fiancee was sitting on a bench and noticed him first, Genshirou Saji looked at him and gestured with his finger to Valerie's direction, as if giving him permission to "get on with it".
Well, he didn't need to be told twice.
"Valerie!"
"Gasper! So you did come, hehe!"
"I-I couldn't just… sit there and do nothing! Valerie, it's really you isn't it?"
"Of course it's me, old friend. Fufu… you've gotten brave haven't you?"
"Not at all…"
"But you came! And that's what matters!"
Gasper felt a brief tinge of shame at those words, for two entirely different reasons…
She hugged him tightly, and he could only cry out of joy. He was so happy to see her again, for real this time.
"You should get out more often. Look at you, you're as pale as a vampire."
"Valerie! That's not funny at all!"
"It is! Hey Genshirou~ It was funny right?"
The man spoke for the first time Gasper saw him tonight, "It's about as funny as an over-exaggerated Romanian accent on a cartoon iteration of Dracula."
"There! Gen agrees with me."
He didn't!!!!
Gasper let the retort die in this throat before he voiced his disagreements.
"A..ahahaha…"
"Oh stop that Gasper. You sound like a pretty boy trying to say something polite but could only give an awkward laugh, you should really leave that to Kiba, it's his thing not yours."
"I guess… wait, how do you know Kiba-senpai?"
"I know a lot of things. Anyways, more importantly, now that you're finally here I can give you this!" Valerie handed him a lavishly designed envelope
"You are cordially invited to attend our wedding, if you're willing, you can dress up and be the flower girl too."
"Um, Valerie, this takes place in a church… won't we both die or be in pain if we set foot in there?"
Valerie still had vampire blood, after all, while Gasper was a devil.
"Did you think I would have it there if I didn't have a plan?"
"Um… guess not… wait, you want me to be there?"
"Why wouldn't I? You're my first friend, right?"
"Y-yes! Thank you Valerie!"
They ended up spending a long night hanging out in town, Genshirou was really cool and introduced him to all sorts of places with good food. Gasper didn't know that local food could taste so good, although Valerie insisted that Genshirou's home cooked meals were out of this world, and that his blood was to die for.
"I-is his blood really that tasty?"
"I'm not sharing~"
"I uh… don't really need it. I usually get mind from blood bank donations. W-what's it like though? Drinking from someone else?"
Gasper hadn't actually fed off another living creature directly, so he was quite curious on how Valerie felt about it.
The face she made as she pondered on the topic was one that Gasper wasn't going to forget anytime soon, her voice as she described the sensation made him feel a static-like tingling sensation on his neck and down his back.
And then she started saying really, really embarrassing things to the point where Gasper wanted to bury his head into the ground. Just as he was about to do so, it turned out that Genshirou had beaten him to the punch, and already had his head buried down as if he were an ostrich!
Valerie Tepes couldn't live without Genshirou Saji.
That was the best way Gasper could sum it up without remembering the whole wall of text that made him seriously consider reading Twilight instead.
After that, Valerie encouraged him to have more faith in his friends, and exchanged numbers with him so that they could communicate more frequently. He was able to get some decent rest after that, his worries about what would happen to Rias, Koneko and everyone else faded away as he started to feel more optimistic about everything.
Everything would work out just fine.
[Blonde bitch gets tied up and fucked silly!]
That said… he had mixed feelings about Valerie getting him to "review" their "homemade videos".
Level 36a
Level 36a
After sitting through hours of introductions, paperwork, Jojo poses and a tour of all the territory owned by the Araki family, the head of the household Sophie Araki had finally completed the proceedings in relinquishing the vampire recruit Sona had sought out.
Tsubaki had left earlier to get Adela used to her new accommodations in Kuoh, Sona had decided to stay in Kyoto for a while since she was already here… and that she wouldn't be able to visit again without going through a frustrating Visa application process.
With that in mind, it would be a waste if she didn't take her time to enjoy the supernatural side of Kyoto.
A few minutes of walking later, she felt like a tourist all over again.
Although she had visited Kyoto as a child once, mostly due to Rias's pestering and her older sister's diplomatic meet happening to coincide with her friend's schedule, Sona Sitri found it easy to point out the many differences in the streets she and Tsubaki traversed during their free time.
The Youkai side of Kyoto, whose structures were said to have not changed for half a thousand years, had familiar technological infrastructure integrated everywhere, that reminded her of the refurbishments done to old buildings in London. The aesthetics and legacy of the buildings were maintained on the outside, while there were many changes within the buildings itself.
Speaking with the locals helped put the modernization into context, apparently, most of the changes took place across two to three years, although the economy only really saw a huge upturn a year ago when Atago began "reorganizing" the various factions.
Something smacked right into her face. Sona blinked and used her hand to remove the offending material, discovering that it seemed to be a poster of some sort.
"Oh no! I'm so terribly sorry!" A young kitsune apologized to her for letting the poster slip out of her hand and into the wind.
"It's alright. You know, from a certain point of view, having my face in the correct position to catch the flying poster at the right time could be considered a good stroke of luck." Sona teased the girl a bit, now that she was alone in a place where no one really gave a damn about her position, she didn't need to worry about anyone catching her joking around.
"N-no way! I'm really really clumsy! If I had someone catching everything that slipped out of my fingers then a lot of people would be in the hospital now!"
"Did you ever drop knives or something?"
"… Errr…"
Sona wasn't sure if she just dodged death by bad luck or not… lately, when she looked at her friend Rias, Sona couldn't help but wonder if she was born relatively unlucky in comparison.
Adjusting her glasses, she 'coughed' into her first to change the topic, "Ahem! So… what do you do around here?"
"Oh! I hand out campaign posters for our clan's candidate!"
"Candidate?"
"For the lieutenant governors! The four Youkai faction leaders find themselves overwhelmed with work and so they decided to have two regional governors each to deal with civilian concerns while they make the strategic decisions."
The devil heiress looked at the poster in her hand, it featured a kitsune wearing a loose kimono who exposed significant amounts of skin, with a suggestive look on her face.
"What kind of campaign poster is this!?"
The kitsune girl she was speaking to replied back enthusiastically, "In order to encourage the embrace of democratic processes, the regulations regarding campaigning are quite lax… unless you have a criminal record, in which case, you're out of luck. A friend of mine from the electoral office said that it was about preventing a 'President Luthor' scenario. Whatever that means!"
Keeping megalomaniacs out of office was one thing, but putting seductresses with huge assets into office was another!
"I… I see…"
This wouldn't slide in devil society at all… and then Sona remembered her sister.
Oh right, anything goes when you have sufficient amount of power, be it personal or political.
Upon tearing her gaze away from the kitsune's body, she glanced up to read the candidate's political manifesto.
[Peace, Freedom, Justice and Security in our time!]
"… thank you for your time. Have a nice day."
It's hopeless. There is no escape from the memes.
This had to be the work of Genshirou Saji!
Somehow… he must be infecting the political views of his wife, and then Atago would use the accumulated influence to propose a framework for a fascist state under the illusion of a "free and democratic" system!
"Well, at least I have something interesting to tell my sister… hmm, a magic gun shop?"
The heiress had never heard of "magic guns" outside of the cheap, mass produced, moderately effective light guns of the exorcists and a couple of custom enchanted ones made for "enthusiasts", aka Gun Otakus.
She took a closer look and saw an ornate musket on display.
Recalling that Serafall had ended up complaining and praising a show called "something something Madoka Magica", and that there was a magical girl that used lots and lots of guns, Sona decided that getting a magic gun would make a good gift for her sister.
Upon entering the shop, the first thing that captured Sona's attention was the vast variety of guns that were imbued with powerful auras, she could tell they were far beyond ordinary enchanted firearms.
Her decision was looking better and better with every passing second.
"Welcome to Jhansi's Armaments." The owner greeted her, whose appearance bore a strange resemblance to someone she knew.
Spoiler
[img: https/i./TVwgpD3.jpg]
It was taking Sona awhile to figure out who exactly was that person…
"Oh, a devil, let me guess, you watched too much anime and want to use a gun to fire variants of demonic energy bullets. The volatile energy attuned guns are at that corner."
"Jeanne!?"
"No, and if you're looking for her, go to Kuoh. Her location is on her FB account, it's public and you have no excuse."
The young woman's reaction sounded tired and rehearsed!
"I knew that. I mean… my apologies, I was taken aback by your resemblance."
"It's alright, you're not the first person this month to call me that… at least, by accident."
"… You're acquainted with Jeanne, and she walks in and calls you Jeanne of India or something, doesn't she?"
"I see, so you too are a victim of that French troll."
Sona recognized the human shop owner as a comrade immediately.
"Then you must be… Sona Sitri, correct? Jeanne talks about you a lot."
"Quite so. And I don't believe we have been introduced?"
"Ah, sorry! I completely forgot! Lakshmi Bai, pleasure to meet you."
They spent a few minutes talking about their mutual friend before Sona remembered what she came here for. After providing Lakshmi some information, the human Sacred Gear possessor went and customized some of the permanently manifested armaments (after tripping over herself a few times due to "bad luck") to fit the "magical girl" aesthetic.
"That will be 12.5 million yen."
"Do you take this card?"
Sona took out her Devil Credit Card. She never left the Underworld without it.
"Uh… I'm afraid my machine doesn't support that. Can you use these payment gateways? Oh, but you can pay by cheque as well, you seem pretty honorable so I'm sure you will put in the money by the deadline."
"I can write the cheque now."
"Are all pillar devils so frivolous with their money?"
"You have seen nothing yet."
As the payment was being settled, Sona felt a tiny tap on her ankle, looking down, she could see that it was a result of a small red ball hitting her feet. A cute small child was toddling along, chasing after the ball.
The little girl grabbed the ball and walked up to Lakshmi, "Mama!"
"Jani, hey, you caught the ball. Did you have fun?" The mother of the child only got giggles in response.
"Aww…" Sona couldn't help herself, "How old is she?"
"A year old." Lakshmi took up Jani in her arms, carrying her as she spoke with Sona, "Due to my husband's shenanigans, we had to move to Japan so that we could live a peaceful life."
Right, humans with awakened Sacred Gear's rarely have any luck in leading normal lives.
"I'm sorry. Um, your husband-"
"Oh, he's alive. But well, he just has to be the big hero and is undercover right now, waiting for the right time to take down an unethical organization whose name that I will not speak about."
It didn't seem like she was the type to just give that kind of information away. Was this some sort of test? Well, it was one that she could certainly answer honestly.
"Wasn't asking. Unless it's strategically relevant, I have no good reason to pursue this line of inquiry. And whilst information would be useful, I doubt you will provide any supporting evidence to back up those statements, should I ever take it to my sister or anyone else in exchange for something else. Besides, I have enough on my plate as it is."
"Haha, you do look like a busy girl. Hmm… other devils wouldn't just leave it at that."
Somehow, Sona got the impression that those "other devils" never returned.
"Oh yes, we devils are like sharks that smell blood when it comes to information we can bargain with. However, it doesn't mean we can't overcome our base selfish desires… to walk a path of fulfilling our selfish desires while seeming benevolent instead."
"I expected a more flattering description of your race from you of all people."
"I learnt to tell it like it is after spending over a year of my school life with a frank, direct and goodhearted young man that spouts prequel memes every day."
"It's Genshirou Saji, isn't it?"
"How… Oh yes, you know Jeanne. Of course she would have talked about that stupid, genius, maddening yet reliable guy. Honestly, if he would just stop reciting the Tragedy of you-know-who for just a day, it would be possible for him to actually seduce a larger amount of the school's population. Not that I'm not ungrateful for the fact he doesn't… wait, that sounds a bit like I'm permitting him to recite prequel memes on school grounds. It's not illegal, but it really should be-"
She went on and on for a few minutes and eventually apologized to Lakshmi, who listened patiently to her rant about him. The young woman seemed unaffected, saying that motherhood had taught the young mother much patience.
"Come to think of it, you and Jeanne share some things in common, despite the different worlds you grew up in."
"Pray tell, what are these commonalities?"
"Hmm… Jeanne can't stop talking about her boyfriend!"
"He's not my boyfriend!"
"Waaah!"
Sona had to apologize for raising her voice after making little Jani cry, as an 'apology' (Lakshmi wasn't too mad), Sona helped to carry the child while Lakshmi fetched some milk for Jani at the pantry of the store.
"So… I wasn't exactly implying that he was your boyfriend~"
"T-that doesn't count. I simply misheard you. A-anyways, your daughter, she can drink whole milk already?"
Thankfully, Lakshmi accepted the change of topic graciously, "Not yet. I still have to wean her off."
"Wean her off… huh?"
The high-class devil blushed as Lakshmi took off her shirt in order to mix some breast milk into the mug filled with whole milk. Sona looked down in order to avoid looking, only to notice something different.
"Are you pregnant?"
"Yeah, it's been four months. My husband was very enthusiastic in mastering the ability to…" Lakshmi turned to look at Sona slowly, with a flat look on her face, "… create life."
Sona Sitri gaped in horror, "Et tu?"
The Indian woman nodded her head sadly, "It's all Koji Sato's fault. He was our trainer, and as you might have guessed, he's had his hooks into my husband like Palpatine with Anakin."
"That sounds like a gross exaggeration."
"Koji, quite literally, corrupted my husband into using prequel memes unknowingly and turned him against the organization we were in… rightfully so considering the horrible things going on secretly, but nevertheless, my husband has literally told Koji that he "will do whatever you ask.""
Sona took a seat.
She helped herself to some tea after passing Jani back to her mother.
"This is going to get worse… isn't it?"
"He said all that after meeting Koji… at an Opera House."
"There is a point where we needed to stop and we have clearly passed it but let's keep going and see what happens."
She resigned herself for the inevitable, wanting to show an act of solidarity to her suffering "sister" in prequel memes.
"Where he told him the Triumph of Master Cannoli the Wise."
Sona's face met the pantry table.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaa….!"
"I felt that too. Several months ago."
"Does it ever get better?"
"No."
"… So this is how sanity dies, with endless memes."
"Yes… That's how it starts. The quotes, the references, the feeling of frustration that turns normal people… into memers."
By the end of the long day, Sona Sitri exchanged numbers with her newfound sister-in-arms against prequel memes, despite knowing deep down in her heart that the battle has already been lost.
Thankfully, she returned to a Kuoh Academy where nothing was on fire, the students weren't indoctrinated to some "new order" like in that one experiment, there were no strange new rules and all the work she had left was completed to such a standard that Sona was able to finish it all off within half an hour!
All things considered, her Kyoto trip was a much needed mini-vacation, that resulted in a stress-free seamless return to her school life.
Sona Sitri sat in her chair and took another careful look at her "refurbished" Sith themed desk that reminded her of Palpatine's desk during the part where he revealed himself to be the Sith Lord they had been looking for.
"… I'm sorry, what did he say again? Give me exact words."
"Hold on… ummm… he said, 'I always thought that her office is rather grand for a student council president, so I thought, hey, why don't I give it the gravitas it deserves by making it a desk fitting for a hidden Sith Lord pretending to be a mere Prequel Trilogy fan to sit behind?'"
Reya Kusaka repeated Genshirou's words perfectly. Reya's background as a magician gave her a massive advantage when it comes to memorizing large amounts of information, a skill that Sona could rely on when she needed someone to regurgitate information back to her.
She pondered on Genshirou's words and bristled at the idea of being a Sith Lord, much less a Prequel Trilogy fan… then realized there was some truth to it, from a certain point of view.
"That sounds like something Genshirou would say, well, time to order a Sith robe."
"Huh?"
"A pleasant surprise is the least I can do to honor a job well done."
Sona could already see him gushing with joy over such a simple act, it was sounding like a better idea by the second, after all… wasn't it only natural to thank him for showing that her trust in him (for not messing around and helping her out a lot) was not misplaced!
Yes, this was all about repaying him. It's not like she was doing it to see his happy face or anything, it was just a display of gratitude!
"Um… Kaichou, you're nodding and smiling to yourself."
"N-no I wasn't… you saw nothing."
"My lips are sealed."
She dismissed Reya and relaxed into her seat, and placed an order for a chair that could rotate to pull off an accurate impression. Considering the lengths that he went just to pull off a meme after all the work was done and he had to deal with the delinquents outside the school, she had to do at least this much to honor his efforts.
… There was something bugging her, however. Sona Sitri had a bad feeling about this. A nagging feeling that she was missing something very obvious.
"… a hidden Sith Lord pretending to be a mere Prequel Trilogy fan, pft, I bet that's what Genshirou wishes he was. If he were a secret Sith Lord, he would have been smugly relishing in our ignorance all the… time…?"
Somehow, she found herself thinking back to all the times where Sona and the rest of her peerage laughed to themselves, about how Genshirou would unknowingly use the word 'devil' in contexts that they found 'ironic'… and wondered if there was more to that?
"No… no way. It's probably because Jeanne told him to do it to get under our skin or just to mess with him."
Yes, that made a lot more sense… Genshirou hasn't been told about the supernatural just yet, there was no way he would have known that they were devils and had been pretending to be ignorant this whole time… right?
Level 36b
AN: The part I had intended to do with Atago, Teofila and everyone else was pretty much delayed thanks to my family holiday. Not that I'm complaining, haven't been on a holiday for ages! I will be off to Indonesia for a week, time to try out all the awesome foods. Just putting this out to here to wrap up Issei's side of things, enjoy!
Level 36b
It was surprisingly easy to get back into the swing of it. Normal school life, that is.
Issei blinked a couple of times as he waved goodbye to his two "trial" girlfriends, Katase and Murayama, after arranging some "make-up dates" as compensation for all but disappearing for a week without saying a word.
"I can't believe that turned out well."
Genshirou had thankfully, warned him of their impending anger before he entered the school grounds, and advised him on how to properly apologize (aka beg for mercy) to them along with some suggestions on how to get the two girls to forgive him.
"Right, presents… think Issei think!"
"Perhaps you should focus your thoughts on your surroundings first?"
"Eh?"
He turned to the side and found his friend Asia leaning against the school entrance wall. She had her arms crossed and her eyes closed, until she opened a single eye to give him a quick look.
"You're standing in the middle of the school gate while making odd gestures."
"Ah, got it. Sorry everyone!" Issei apologized to the rest of the students who were looking at him oddly, some of the boys were jealous of the fact that he hadn't been beaten up for his "playboy" antics.
He still didn't think he deserved such a title yet. Even now, Issei was far from that level, he had a long way to go in even reaching "playboy" status before he could even think of reaching the "harem king" dream!
Going over to Asia while keeping a respectful distance so that Genshirou wouldn't have a reason to beat him up. Oddly enough, defeating a Phenex still wasn't enough for him to shake off the feeling of fear when it came to Genshirou's capabilities.
Whilst he felt a lot more confident about his capabilities, his dragonic arm tingled with anxiety when he saw Genshirou this morning, and when he asked Ddraig about it in the privacy of the bathroom, his dragon partner had agreed with Issei that he would probably have been beaten up like a pinata by Genshirou even after boosting himself to the max.
And to think that he just blew up a small mountain a couple of days ago…
"You're waiting for Gen?"
"Yes! And Atago, Aika, Ruruko and well, everyone! We're going to the game center together!"
For a girl that pulled off disappearing acts, gave out cryptic remarks and advice like it was her hobby, she sure sounded like a normal high-school girl!
If being another girlfriend in someone else's harem counts as normal…
"You don't usually wait outside the school though…"
"Heehee, were you looking out for me?"
"Grrkh… how, I mean, not exactly?"
"It's fine. I decided to pop by to make sure you're all healed up."
Now that he thought about it, the fatigue from using the Scale Mail and that mysterious holy sword stuffed inside the Boosted Gear seemed to have subsided.
She's way too good of a healer!
"Wooooah! Thanks Asia-san!"
"You're welcome. Soo… how did it go?"
"I kicked his ass."
He gave her a thumbs up and his winning smile. They almost won the Rating Game with the hints Asia gave them but they let their guard down, and Riser managed to take them down until only he and Rias were left standing.
After getting beaten down with Rias surrendering to spare him from a further beating, Issei woke up to meet Ddraig in his dreams, found that Asia had stopped by his home to heal him right after (she hadn't stayed around and he discovered she was there via a note she left), was teleported to the Underworld by a letter Grayfia gave him, beat up Riser (thanks mysterious sword), rode off into the skies on a Griffon where Rias gave him her first kiss out of gratitude.
That was really sweet of her.
All in all, a pretty awesome deal for the price a single arm.
"Of course you did. Although, I do hope that you learn to win a fight without signing your arm away."
"W-what!?"
Is she a mind reader?!
Asia smiled and continued on, "Oh right! Remember to thank Azazel the next time you see him. The poor yet sadly misguided man could use some gratitude now and again."
"Eh…? EH!? H-how do you, uh, know I was seeing him? And what did you mean by that?!"
Did Asia meet him before? Is she actually pitying a fallen angel? Then again, she was a former holy maiden with the largest amount of people healed during her "tenure" at the Church, so her kind nature didn't really surprise him.
On the other hand, Issei didn't really think the guy deserved a that much gratitude, considering that Azazel's subordinate Raynare had killed him after "misinterpreting" organizational policy… a policy that regards Sacred Gear possessors as dangers that were likely interpreted in a fashion that involved the death of normal people like him 9 out of 10 times!
Perhaps he was just letting the Fallen Angel that almost murdered his parents just to get back at him for "insulting" her color his impressions, but all in all, he didn't think any of the factions were particularly sympathetic all things considered. But he was the servant of a beautiful devil, so that was already a huge plus to the devils in his books if they can make good Oppai girls with less murderous tendencies.
… He just remembered Viser, and decided to half that mental score in his head.
"You will find that I know a great many things~ In any case, did you really think you would be able to use one of Jeanne's holy swords like that without getting hurt without outside help? How would such a blade even find its way into your Sacred Gear without an expert sneaking it in?"
"… Damn it! I feel so out of the loop. Is it me or does everyone, literally everyone, know more about what's going on than me?"
"Have you ever considered, hmm… trying to find out more on your own initiative?"
"Buchou said I didn't have to worry about it and I would get it in time."
Asia simply looked at him with a perplexed, yet very cute expression.
"… and people say religion is the opium of the masses."
Just as she said that, she went and joined the group that just walked out, turns out that it was Genshirou's group.
Issei got the impression that Asia timed it just to have the last word.
Oddly enough, his club president walked out from the gate right after they left.
Rias turned to look at Issei, and quietly asked, "Is she gone now?"
"Who?"
"Atago."
"Why is everyone acting like Kaiza-senpai is going to murder all of us again?"
"One of the mountains you blew up was ehm… technically just outside the territory my family bought?"
It was the first time he had ever seen Rias look so… sheepish.
Issei was happy to say he could add another cute moment to his mental library of precious memories, unfortunately, the circumstances brought him out of his happy place.
"I'm sorry Buchou!"
"Ufufu, it's not your fault. I told you to shoot it that way, after all. It's not that bad anyways, I just didn't want to get handed the bill personally."
Rias winked as if she was telling him that it was a secret just between the two of them.
Spoiler
[img: https/i./U7JGFj6l.jpg]
"Buchou… you make it sound like you're getting pulled over for a speeding ticket."
"These things happen."
"It does!? So if I see a mountain disappear then everyone is actually going "oh whoops, now I have to get fined"!?"
"You worry too much Ise. Those kinds of things happen far away from major human civilizations."
"It still happens! Ahhh, I don't care anymore!"
Issei gave up and started heading in the direction of the shopping districts.
"Ise-kun, do you have any plans for today?"
"I'm going to do some shopping for gifts."
"Is that so? For who?"
"Um, well, for my girlfriend in particular…"
"Oh my, what do you have in mind?"
"Well, Irina likes cute hair accessories and…"
Irina could drop by for a surprise visit, after all, and he didn't want to get caught without a gift for her.
"Eh?"
"Buchou, did I say something wrong?"
"Um… Irina?"
"She's my girlfriend and childhood friend. Did I forget to mention that? Oh man, I totally forgot! Perhaps I internalized Gen's advice on not talking about other women around other girls the wrong way, pretty sure the advice went something closer to-"
"-hold up! So when you were talking about your girlfriend you meant this… Irina?"
"Yeah, who else would I… oh yeah, I'm getting gifts for Katase and Murayama, they're sort of on a trial run with me. They're pretty mad at me too, for not telling them that I would be busy on… eh, Buchou, you there?"
Issei had never seen Rias Gremory with such a strange look.
Spoiler
[img: https/i./EfJFRXtl.jpg]
Suddenly, she turned around and began walking in the other direction… then started running away!
"… Huh, she must have forgotten something."
Level 36c
Level 36c
The family-wide celebration for her newfound 'freedom' concluded within the Saji household yesterday. Gen's parents initially found it perplexing, as they couldn't fathom why someone would be happy about giving away one's birthright… after she explained herself, the faces they made bore touching similarities to the expressions her parents had.
Ah, how liberating it was!
Atago's heart had been set free of a significant number of worries once she finally showed her family how she acted as Genshirou's dumb slut / pathetic sow / love slave~
Oh, yes, she was finally freed herself from the crushing (mostly self-inflicted) expectations that she believed she needed to meet to satisfy her family. That was supposed to be the important.
She should have known better by now, but it was just so easy to lose sight of what was important whenever she had Genshirou's dick in her pussy!
"Ah! Yes, oh gods! Getting your dick stuffed in me feels so fucking good~!"
Her body was completely loose as she allowed herself to get fucked atop their love room's bed, Genshirou stood on the bed with his hands firmly gripping on to her thighs.
He was pulling her up and towards his body, timing his thrusts at just the right time to achieve maximum effect, filling her body with utmost pain and pleasure.
"You've stopped minding your language, huh?"
"Hah… ! Yes! Hehe… you noticed right away… now that I'm not the heiress I can afford to be… Ah, yes! More… lax!"
"That's one job down, guess I need fuck you so harder then! Can't let you hold a job outside this house now, can we!!!"
"Heek!"
Genshirou started to handle her a lot more roughly after that! She loved it. She loved every single moment with him, ah, she was being turned into a "proper housewife" just like in those doujinshi!
"Give up on your job. I'll make you a fine doghouse in my bedroom!"
It felt good. It felt right. She could just stop thinking and let her body do all the work. The body that was already owned by Genshirou, the man who had trained and toyed with it until he knew every little secret he needed to use it as he pleased.
Atago's body may as well have been a puppet to him, whose strings could only be pulled by her dear puppeteer as and when he wanted to see her "dance" to his tunes.
Yet another flood of pleasure brought her mind all the way around the sane-crazy train track until she managed to regain a bit of clarity.
W-wait, was she supposed to let him do this? Being his sex slave was one thing, but he wanted her to live a life outside of it as well… yes, this was just a bit of roleplay.
He didn't really want to housebreak her.
Not yet. Not this early into his plans.
She could feel that he was still holding himself back from taking things too far. Atago knew that he had 'other means' to break and rebuild her from their previous consensual sessions. The fact that he wasn't using it meant that what had transpired was according to his design.
If he wanted her to feel and to think the way she did right now, then she could only imagine a few scenarios that she wanted to go for from here!
Mustering up a bit of her feeble willpower, she 'protested' against him, saying that she didn't want to be his dog.
All lies of course. She was already his bitch.
But both of them knew that, so it was alright, this was for the sake of fun and pleasure.
He turned her around and began to fuck her like the dog she was!
"Gh! Gen-sama, uheeek-"
He didn't hesitate to spank her ass and squeeze her tits whenever he felt like it, without ever dropping the pace of his thrusts.
"Are you saying a cock addicted, semen guzzling bitch like you has pride?!"
"Aaarf! Arf! Atago has pride~"
"What a bad girl! I guess you're not in the mood to listen eh… guess I'll settle for making you cum harder!"
Genshirou continued to push into her faster and harder, his hand was now holding on to her shoulder, and the other hand was pulling her hair harshly, forcing her womb to receive his dick at a greater intensity!
It didn't take long for her brain's higher thought functions to halt in favor of carnal pleasures.
"Uu… aa… creampies are really good too…"
She felt his gentle, loving hand on her head as he rubbed her head and ears.
"Haha, glad you think so. Are you planning to let it all go to waste?" He had an indulgent smile on his face, it was one of her favorite smiles, for many reasons, although her most selfish reason was that the specific smile often resulted in her being spoiled rotten.
Dragging herself up, she smiled and reached for his lips, he had already sensed her intentions and took the initiative to kiss her.
After a lot of kissing, Atago made sure to complete her duties and meticulously licked up every single drop of cum left in the room. After all, it was a dog's job to clean up after their master.
"Good girl."
She snuggled next to him in bed as he continued to pet her head for a job well done!
Spoiler: Atago
[img: https/i./jzkdtWO.png]
"Is there anything else Gen? Fufu, could I interest you in a pleasant dream? I've learnt some interesting spells lately~" She asked as she returned the favor by tracing circles and lines across his bare muscular chest.
While he denied the request (rather typical of him to not indulge in sleep related activities himself), he thanked her and began to praise her. She felt warm and elated as he began to speak his mind about how cute and beautiful she was!
Atago kept her focus on Genshirou, although she was slightly distracted with the idea of playing with his hair. It was a bit of a habit of hers lately. Atago didn't dare to glance up too high as she looked into his eyes. She didn't want him to find out that she intended to try her luck at some point.
He would let her play with it whenever she gave him a lap pillow, but he was often petulant and fiercely defensive about his hair (mostly his skull) in any other scenario. Atago first discovered his odd preferences when he was rather put off by her attempts to do so several years back when they were just best friends.
"Mmm…" Genshirou laid on his front, his chin was resting on the pillot they shared, for Atago, it conjured the image of a beached whale in her mind.
"Atago my darling wife! I want to try creating a few special sex techniques, as in I'm ripping off some common tropes to create the technique then I'll master it alongside connecting it to the relevant concepts. Do you want to be the guinea pig or should I get someone else?"
Atago was very interested, even so, she knew better than to agree so quickly.
"What is it about?"
He sat upright and said, "Sex Breathing."
Atago got up from the bed, and gave him a flat "What?"
She was introduced to a manga that was considered contraband among certain Youkai clans due to their "demons" being depicted in a way that resembled a few Youkai species'. After speed-reading a couple of chapters, she could safely say that it was a cut above standard Shounen fare, at the very least.
"So you see, the demon slayers use breathing technique and there's this girl with a breathing style called "Breath of Love". While I did optimized my breathing I had never really taken it to the really absurd level, and I haven't even attached some magic, spiritual and conceptual effects to increase my ability stacking even further! If it weren't for the Ufotable adaptation then this opportunity would have went unnoticed for months. Ah, God bless Ufotable." Genshirou liked the series so much he had actually uttered a short prayer for the studio!
"It can't be that good."
The series had just started airing, and she had to admit, it was pretty damn good so far.
"I still don't see it being absolutely amazing as you say it will."
"It will! I have been practicing Divination magic, and every single result I've gotten tells me that this will be a fucking huge success. And wait, what number is my spinning top landing on-"
"-What kind of half-assed divination method is this!? Why are you using Beyblades and a D20!?"
"Ooooh! OH! I see it! It's Episode 19, it will be the Episode of the Year! Nooooo, it's so… many… months away…"
Genshirou was now huddled all up under the blanket. She got the feeling that he was sulking as he muttered something about inventing time travel just to watch anime faster.
"Hmm? I just realized something…"
"What?"
"Now that I don't have my family's expectations to worry so much about, I have more time to spend with everyone, play games, hopefully finish Sekiro, watch anime, take homemade sex drugs-"
"-We discussed the last point. Nice try."
"Aww…"
"Mmm, Atago, before we go take a bath together, I'm just going to nag you a bit to make sure you remember that the group training session has been moved to next week on account of everything that happened with your family."
"YES!"
"It's been combined with next week's training session so everyone gets to train in a scenario that's at least twice at hard! Yay!"
"NOOOOOOOOO!!! What have I done?"
Atago felt a great disturbance in the house, as if over a handful of voices suddenly cried out in terror… just like her.
With her ability to hear past the soundproofing barriers, it was clear that Genshirou timed it and broke the news to Valerie, Jeanne, Asia, Teofila and Ruruko (who brought her siblings over for a group sleepover) at the same time.
Genshirou's individual training sessions with each of them were tough, but he was always kind and patient with them. When it came to group training, however, they were expected to survive complete a scenario on the assumption that he wouldn't be able to provide any significant support to them!
Atago was, of course, presently among the living.
But Genshirou had gotten so good at keeping the ones he cared about from dying, that she started to believe everyone had been killed at least twice during the group training sessions, only to not remember it because he kept them all alive every single time.
"If you really don't want to do it then it's fine. I keep telling everyone it's optional but apparently you're all masochists for participating anyways." He shrugged and grinned.
"It's not like that and you know it!" She glared at him.
He laughed, "Yeah, I know, I know. I'm just saying that it can look like that… fr-"
"-From a certain point of view, I get it, I get it."
He gave her a double-thumbs up then took the lead in getting them cleaned up.
It was during the time where he pampered her and catered to her whims that she managed to spare some time to think on a number of matters.
One of the things she thought about were the reasons why her future sister-wives had never turned down the group training, only to realize that it was a silly thought, as they ultimately shared the same reasons (with one or two personal reasons ones) did so out of love.
After all, if they refused the opportunity to grow stronger, not just in power but in the friendship and love that bound them together, then it would be a deficiency that their enemies (fate included) could exploit.
Genshirou would never hate them if they didn't get results or if they didn't try hard enough. He would still love them, and adjust accordingly. Unfortunately, his way of "adjusting" for it, was to work even harder to make up for any weak points.
If they were weak, then he would have to be stronger. If they weren't able to trust or rely on each other, he would have to make himself even more trustworthy and reliable.
Not a single one of them doubted that he was working like a madman for their sake. They all wanted to carry their own cross so that he wouldn't be all alone in doing so.
"Urgh…"
"What?"
"I just used a Christian sounding analogy in my head. I'm such a bad example to Youkai everywhere. I blame Teo-chan! Oh, and Asia-chan too!"
"… How about Jeanne?"
"Her theology is at Level Minus 50."
"Ouch. Anyways… was that all you were thinking about?"
"Mmm, ah! I was also thinking that it's kinda ironic."
"Did someone say 'Ironic'?"
"Calm down you-! As I was saying, I thought it's a bit ironic that well… I had always tried to meet the expectations of others, and while I'm still doing so in public, though my parents and brother had relieved me of some of expectations I held myself to…"
Atago flipped around to embrace Genshirou in the bathtub, she thought it would be a good idea to speak about serious matters when she was naked under various scenarios, to make it more memorable for her husband.
"I immediately decided to celebrate and assign my more time to meet my darling's expectations instead. Guess I haven't changed much, hahaha…"
"Well, I can't say that I don't understand. After all, I'm finding myself stretched thin to keep up with you all."
She wanted to be everything that he loved about her and she couldn't see herself not working towards what he expected of her. Genshirou was similar to her, as he was also doing his best to meet the expectations of his loved ones, always keeping himself to a standard that they would be proud off and love.
The key differences between the two of them laid in the fact that Atago cared a bit more about the needs of the masses (mostly Youkai, but she's almost got Humans down too) than Genshirou did… and that Genshirou loved his wife, lovers, family and friends to a much, much larger degree than anything else.
"Liar~ You're doing fine."
"Define 'fine'."
"I'm not getting into an argument over such parameters… it's going to end up like the Ophis-scale thing."
"Point. We never really got anywhere in that. Once again, I bow to the wisdom of my lovely wife. I love you so much~"
"H-hey, what are you, s-stop tickling me - hahaha! That's not my fetish!"
"At least I tried. Okay then, what do you suggest?"
Oh… he walked right into that one.
"What do you think? Isn't it about time you breed me? I think I'm ready for you to plow me and impregnate me with your seed."