"Le Fay, do you really need to follow me all the way to Kuoh town?"
Kuroka asks me, looking back with an annoyed expression, I answer with a shrug
"These were Vali's instructions, he doesn't want you or any of us wandering around on our own, we are still wanted terrorists after all"
She throws her arms behind her head
"Nya~ He worries too much, besides..."
Kuroka looks back at me with an impish smile
"I know that you are tagging along because you might get the chance to see the Seikiryuutei-kun, right?"
"O-of course not! Me being a fan of the Chichiryuutei has nothing to do with it"
It would be nice if I could finally meet the Oppai dragon in person too, b-but that has nothing to do with it!
"Uhm? Is that so?" - The smile on Kuroka's face turns from impish to an outright smug expression
"S-shut up!"
I say to her trying to dismiss the subject and she starts laughing
"Nyahahaha~, you're so obvious! It's not like anything would happen if you didn't came anyway, we are in the redhead's territory, nothing bad is going to happen to us here"
My nekomata friend says in a very carefree manner, but before I can scold her for being careless, a glimpse of red catches my attention, making me turn my head to the side, towards the exit of a train station.
"Red..."
I say looking to the colour that caught my attention
"Yeah, Rias Gremory, the redhead Switch-hime, have you forg-"
Kuroka cuts herself midsentence as she notices my attention is focused somewhere else
"Not Rias, that redhead"
I point to the girl with short red hair and tanned skin who is carrying bags like a tourist, she's wearing a blue jacket and looked around as if she was lost or looking for something
"Nya~? What is up with her?"
Kuroka asks curiously and I shake my head. It was only by chance that I had noticed her, the girl gave off no offensive aura or a feeling of any kind, if it was not by her hair colour, I probably wouldn't have noticed her.
"Nothing, her hair just caught my-"
Interrupting my response, what happened next caught me and Kuroka completely off guard.
The girl who was looking around trying to find herself also turned her head as if she was imitating the movement I had made a while ago
And she... looked at us
Not at our direction, at us
A moment after my eyes meet hers, the girl's cute appearance drastically changed
First her eyes went wide in surprise and then, just as fast, they turned sharp, a threatning look of someone who was about to attack us emerging on her face
For a brief instant, I could feel the girl's killing intent oozing from her body, I quickly grasped my staff and Kuroka jumped back
The air around got hotter, as if a gust of wind from hell was blown against us
"Guh!"
"N-nyah! What is is this?!"
We had our instances ready, waiting for an incoming attack
However, the offensive never came
Instead, the redhead closes her eyes and seems to think for a while before quickly turning around and walking away as if nothing had happened
"W-what?"
Me and Kuroka are left bewildered, staring at the girl's back getting smaller as she walks further and further away from us
"W-who was that girl?"
I ask her with my voice cracking due to the scare we just had
"I... don't know... but she saw through my senjutsu, she can't be normal"
To walk on the streets like this, me and Kuroka need to hide ourselves from the public with her senjutsu, that girl shouldn't have been able to see us
"Are you sure? Maybe you made a mistake this time"
Kuroka furrowed her eyebrows annoyed at my suspicion
"I don't make mistakes! Look!"
Kuroka strolled towards a group of working men who were chatting as they walked through the streets
"Hey~ Do any of you hotties want to have fun with onee-san here?"
She saiys flashing her cleavage to the group who just passed by as if she wasn't there, then she turns back to me
"See?"
"You didn't had to test it like this!"
I yell at her, but Kuroka answers as if she didn't heard me
"That girl isn't normal..."
She looks at the direction where the redhead was with a serious look in her eyes
"Could she be a devil? Related to Rias perhaps?"
Kuroka promptly denies my suggestion
"No, I don't know what she was, but she smelled like human, this much I can tell"
Human... so she's not related to Gremory, I could have just let this slide and talk to Vali once we got back, but what just happened got me really worried
"I think I'm going to follow her"
"Eh? You sure?"
I nod
"Yes, you felt that aura too, right?"
Kuroka makes a nervous expression, if I felt such great impression from that girl, then a nekomata surely must have felt even more
"I never heard about someone like her in the Khaos Brigade, but she doesn't seem like an ally either, letting her walk freely around Kuoh town doesn't seem like a wise thing to do"
Kuroka agrees with me, but still has concern in her eyes
"Should I go with you?"
"No, I think you should stay in case we need to contact Vali or someone else. I'm not planning to fight her either, but if I run into trouble I'll send you a sign"
She nods
"Alright, be careful then"
I float up with my broom and go in the direction where the girl had disappeared into, finding her one street ahead
She doesn't seem to be giving off any dangerous aura, but I float higher to be safe
"Where are you going?"
Wondering to myself, I keep following the redhead as she makes several twists and turns in streets that seemingly are leading to nowhere in particular, what is she trying to do?
It finally ends in an alley of a street that seems to be empty
She stops by there and looks around as if waiting for something or... someone?
"Another person?"
I start to consider that she might be an agent from the Khaos Brigade after all, I've never seen her even though I'm part of the organization, but it wouldn't be a surprise if there were agents among the terrorists that even we at the Vali team don't know of.
But before I could ponder any further, a sudden blast of light throws me off, almost pushing me out of my broom
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMM
A huge ball of fire comes from the streets bellow me, forcing me to dodge and diverge my attention. When I look back down, a thick wall of smoke and fire had emerged, making it impossible to see anything down there
"T-that girl... did she do this?"
I mentally curse myself for not realizing she had noticed me and falling for a distraction maneuver like this
That's why she went to this unhabited area, so she could use this fire as she wanted, damnit!
A hot feeling on my back suddenly takes me away from my self loathing
"What is- WOOAAAAHHH!"
I shout as the hot feeling intensifies to a burning sensation and I am propeled towards the ground by a burst of flames that appeared behind me
"WHAT THE HEEEEEELLLLL!"
Screaming, I lift a hand and my broom descends, saving me from hitting the ground just moments before the impact
"Cough cough"
Despite being safe for now, I still fell deep, deep enough to be surrounded by an inferno that had gathered in the street
Surrounded by fire, scorching heat from everywhere, I create several magic circles while realizing my initial mistake, the blast of fire was not a distraction for her to run...
Water, ice and wind magic help clear things at my immediate proximity, making it easier to breath and look around, these flames are the same ones that just attacked me
It was a settup to attack me without interference from outside!
I try to fly away back to the sky, but a curtain of flames is shot towards me, forcing me back down
"Shit!"
She's trying to keep me down here! This isn't good, from the heat of these flames I'll be in trouble if they even just graze my skin, seriously, even with my magic it's like an oven!
"Just extinguish this already!"
Having enough of it, I create several water and ice spells to shoot directly at them, but the result is that the flames charge ahead like they were alive and burn through my attacks as if eating them
"I-It can counter magic?!"
She isn't using any fire spells I know, seriously, who the hell is this girl?!
The flames also seem to move by themselves, is she even here?
"Who are you and why are you following me?"
As if answering my question, I hear a female voice through the fire, I can't see clearly amidst the flames, but her silloute slowly emerges from them.
"Answer me now and this will be much easier for both of us"
The sea of fire opens a path for her and she walks towards me like a mighty existence, even though I'm sweating from the heat, not even a hint of discomfort comes across her face, even with the flames all around her.
"Who are you?"
I ask and the only reply I receive is a fireball passing close to hitting my face
"Ugh!"
I yelp from the heat alone
"You're not the one making the questions here, I am"
Her intense eyes shine with the brightness of the flames and the look on her face shows no signs of playing around
"I-I'm Le Fay Pendragon, a wizard"
I answer, not wanting to piss her off any more than I already did.
But to my surprise, the girl's eyes grow and an expression of amazement crosses her face
"R-r-really?"
I'm taken aback by this reaction
"Y-yes... is it that strange?"
The girl shakes her head and the flames around us start to diminish untill they reach a tolerable temperature
"N-no, not at all! I'm Ayumu, an esper, have you heard about us?"
She says with a somewhat excited expression
"Sorry for attacking you, but I didn't understand why you were following me around so, hehehe..."
The redhead rubs the back of head nervously, is she... happy?
"An... esper?"
I remember hearing about them at my magician association, something about a truce between us because we are humans and espers are on a quest against the supernatural creatures
I take my time looking at the girl from top to bottom
"Uh, what's wrong?"
She calls my attention and I panic for a moment
"Ah, sorry! There's nothing wrong, is... it's just my first time seeing an esper"
And to be honest, I thought they would look very different
The strength and her fiecerfulness are what I expected, but her appearance... she's too pretty, cute even!
When rumours went around about a secret occult organization of psychics that dedicated their lifes to expand their abilities, develop technology and wage war against the otherworld, I totally imagined something like a bunch of mean looking guys with gangster eyes, aura seeping from their bodies and scars across their faces, so it's a shock to me that someone like her could be dedicated to such an agenda!
The redhead tilts her head in reply and gives a laugh
"Hahaha! That's funny, it's the first I interact with a magician as well!"
Her flames have calmed down quite a bit and the atmosphere has calmed down a lot since we started talking. I guess they really are serious about that treaty after all!
However, just as I'm thinking that, the girl's eyes turn sharp and she shoots me a question that sends a shiver down my spine
"But... what about that nekomata that was with you?"
The girl's speech changed, yes it was clear to me even if I'm a magician, I'm still human, therefore not a enemy, but Kuroka is a youkai, she must be a different matter
A rush of thoughts crosses my head as I try to think of a way to get out of this situation, I can't expect the same treatment for both of us, I have to choose my words carefully if I want her to leave us alone.
But again, the girl takes me off guard with another question
"She's the black nekoshou, isn't she?"
I freeze at her words and my eyes wide, she knows! This girl, she's even more dangerous than I thought
No, it's the espers. If they are as dangerous and powerful as the rumours say, then it's not unusual for them to know such a thing
"C-correct, so you know about that too..."
I don't try to cover or mask the truth, doing so would probably make this situation much worse
She seems to be thinking for a while before answering
"By the face you just made I assume you know that she's wanted, right? And with a very high reward on top of that, are you two friends somehow?"
I hesitate before answering
"K-Kuroka did nothing wrong! As her friend and companion I assure you that what they told about her wasn't the truth"
The girl gives me a cold stare, the cheerful atmosphere from when she introduced herself having vanished completely
"So you're admiting the two of you are friends and that you will protect her... no matter what?"
I hold onto my staff, preparing for incoming fire as she continues talking
"I was told that magicians had friendly relations with the supernatural, after all, your powers were created by copying demonic power, but to associate even with criminal youkais like that..."
She's looking down on magic users! But doing this shows she knows about a magicians power a lot more than I know about an espers powers, as I thought, I can't take her lightly
"I cannot forgive it..."
She's definitely a trained warrior, I don't know how many battles she's been through, but the way she's able to shift between friendly and ready to strike all of a sudden shows how much she must have been through.
"I wouldn't underestimate magicians if I were you, we are not simply copying anyone, we can do things you can't even imagine"
But I am Le Fay Pendragon, descendant of a Great Witch, I'll not fall so easily!
However, despite my ground standing, the girls eyes turn bored at my reply and she shrugs
"Huh, is that so?"
She looks at me for a moment
"Well, this will have to wait for another day, because I'm not going to fight you"
"Uhm?"
I reply puzzled and she waves at me
"Aside from the treaty that forbides us to fight magicians, which means we can't battle anyway, I also made a promise to a friend that I wouldn't fight anyone when I got into this town, so don't worry, I won't hurt you nor the nekomata"
I get more confused than I already was, what about those flames from before?! She nearly busted my head off!
But... thinking about it, I realize...
My back!
When I reach for it, the place where she hit me to push me down to the ground wasn't burned!
"You were just defending yourself..."
She did turn her back and left after we noticed each other outside the train station, so that's what she was trying to do!
So that means she was... holding back?
She noticed Kuroka was a nekoshou, but she still decided to leave, she wasn't trying to hurt either of us.
But as recomforting as it may sound, it's actually really bad.
The girl stretches her shoulder and answers
"Uhm? Of course, you were coming after me, I thought you were going to attack, that's why I had to take you to the ground somehow"
"I-I see..."
My feelings for this girl become mixed, I couldn't even put a scratch on her when she was determined to not hurt me, I can only imagine what would happen to me if she had her mind set on fighting. What does she want after all?
"Is your friend from Rias Gremorys peerage?"
She tilts her head slightly
"Rias... Gremory? Who's that?"
She doesn't know who Rias is? What is going on? So she's not here because of the devils?
*Ring ring*
"Ah, wait a minute!"
The girl reaches into her pocket for a cellphone and starts panicking
"Ah, damnit! It's Tachan! He's probably already at the station waiting for me!"
Tachan?
She picks up the call with her back turned away from me, did this battle ended or not?!
"T-Tachan! Where are you? A-already there? Sorry!"
She says whilst bowing, but it's in a phonecall, so of course the other person can't see it!
"I ran into something unexpected! H-hey, it's actually your fault, you know? What the hell is up with this-"
*Kach Kach*
Two white flaming rings come flying forward, interrupting the conversation
"Humf!"
The redhead quickly waves her hand and the white kashas are destroyed by her red flames
"Le Fay! Are you alright?"
"Kuroka!"
I yell out my friends name, of course, I contacted her, so she must think we were fighting!
"You..."
A threatning atmosphere rose up one more time, the flames around us started once again, making escape impossible
"N-no, wait! She didn't meant to-"
"To think you'd attack me while I was talking with Tachan... nekomatas sure are tricky"
Kuroka makes a nervous expression putting on a fighting stance
"Who are you and what do you want here?"
The girl furrows her eyebrows and a tick mark appears on her forehead
"I'm done talking! I have a place to be at!"
Flames accumulate through her body and she shoots them towards us
"Take cover!"
I shout creating several spells to protect us from the flames, however, they are all destroyed and we are pushed backwards into the ground
"Shit! What the hell is this girl?"
Kuroka says trying to pick herself up as I support myself on my staff
"Said she's an esper, but isn't trying to hurt us, she was just suspicious since I was following her"
Kuroka puts on a serious expression and snirks
"Esper, huh? So they exist, well, I guess it's too late for peace talks now, nyahaha~"
She gives a wry smile taking a battle instance and creating several Kashas
I put my hand forward in an attempt to stop her
"No! We have to find a way to get out of here, she's too strong, Kuroka!"
Despite my exclamation and the clear difference in power, Kuroka smiles
"I know, I'm just buying time for him"
"H-him?"
I look around but no one seems to be coming
"W-wait, there's no need to call anyone! She's going to leave already, she said she didn't come here to fight!"
Kuroka keeps her smile and shows no signs of backing down
"Sorry Le Fay, you know how that guy is, when I said there was a new strong opponent here in Kuoh he was right on his merry way. Besides..."
Kuroka jumps straight ahead and says
"I have no intention to let someone this dangerous wandering around in my little sister's town, nyah~"
The Kashas fly towards the red haired girl, who quickly destroys them with her flames
"You are pissing me off!"
The red fire moves around rhytmically, I create a barrier to protect me and Kuroka, but it's broken and we are entangled by the flames, which surpringly do not hurt us despite the heat
"I decided not to burn both of you, but since the nekomata decide to show her face, I'll leave you a little gift"
The redhead pulls out a seal from her belongings and throws towards Kuroka
"I knew this technique would come in handy!"
"Ughhh! Ahhhhh!"
Kuroka screams when the seal hits her and the flames that were holding her turn into red chains
With a triumphant smile, the girl declares
"This is a sealing technique, [Red Binding Chains], now you cannot use Senjutsu or Youjutsu without being turned into ashes"
The tone of her voice does not give out a single shred of mercy
"K-Kuroka!"
The flames entangling me are released and I rush to my friend
"Ouch!"
When I touch the chains binding her, they are scorching hot!
"Ahhh!" - Kuroka, who is now down on the ground, screams too, as if the chains had also burned her!
Watching me, the girl shakes her head
"Tsk, tsk, you can't do that, anyone other than me who touches these chains will be burned along the with the person binded by them"
Sealing techniques?! I didn't knew espers could do such a thing and to a level of this degree!
I create a magic seal of my own in order to try and undo it, but the redhead speaks up again
"I wouldn't do that if I were you. See, I never tried using magic on it, but my chains are programed to burn the person attached to it if they try to take it off using supernatural powers, so maybe you should think twice about that"
She says smiling again!
"What is up with you? I thought you said you weren't trying to hurt us!"
She puts her hand against her forehead and says
"I'm not, but I can't let a wanted youkai wander around freely either, consider this a middle ground. Well, goodbye!"
She says waving and preparing to take off, however, at this very moment, something stops her on her tracks
A gust of strong wind followed by a very familiar voice
[Half Dimension!]
The flames around us shrink in size enough for the heat to become bearable, however, it barely lasts a moment as they come to full life once again
"Guh! You took your damn time..."
Kuroka says trying to muster a smile despite the pain that the seal caused on her
With a death glare, the redhead stares at the person that just arrived
"You... who the hell are you?"
Unlike the way she looked at me and Kuroka, she looks at him with eyes who can only be described as dead serious.
As expected, if she could tell that I was tracking her, she can definitely sense how big is the difference between me, Kuroka and him in terms of power
Folding his arms, the handsome white-haired boy declares
"I am Vali Lucifer! Descendant of the original Lucifer household and bearer of the Hakuryuukou! And who the one that just attacked my friends would be?"
Vali is here! Kuroka really called this guy to help us in battle!
The redhead quickly annalyzes him from head to toe and sighs
"Luci...fer? I have no idea what the hell you mean by that, but by Hakuryuukou I assume you mean the Vanishing Dragon? Tenryuu Albion? Is this why your wings are different from normal devils? I thought that the legendary Hakuryuukou's host would look more... impressive"
It's clear that she's not believing anything that Vali says, of course not! Unless you are on par with the situation, the things he's saying sound like chuunibyou delusions!
"H-hey, Vali... maybe you should-"
I try to talk with Vali, but I'm interrupted by the girl who answers him confused
"I don't really care what you are, but you are pretty powerful for a devil and this aura of yours isn't half-bad either..."
Is she taking Vali lightly?!
Vali gives an angry smile
"Pretty powerful? Hahaha, you got some guts, girl!"
He answers clearly amused by the response
Vali is standing between us and the girl as I hold Kuroka in my arms trying as best as I can not to touch the red chains
I slowly help her up and look at Vali's back, noticing something that makes my eyes almost pop out of my skull
"V-Vali, your back..."
His back, the dragon wings with their blue energy feathers...
They were burned! She managed to get a hit on Vali? W-when? Even when he was dividing the flames?
"That's nothing, it was just a scratch, it actually got me even more pumped to fight her"
It's not just a scratch! She just damaged the Light Wings of the Hakuryuukou! That's not something that even a normal magician would be able to do!
I stare in shock as the redhead clicks her fingers, creating a ring of flames in front of her from which several spears of fire emerge, the intensity of them can be felt from here! This thing could devastate the neighborhood if she uses them!
"I wish we could solve things peacefully for me to walk away, but I don't think that's an option anymore, right?"
Sensing the clear danger of this situation, I plead with Vali
"Wait, Vali! This is Rias's territory, you can't just start a fight on it!"
These two are way too powerful to be fighting in the middle of the day like this!
However, the leader of our group shows a fearless smile with no signs of stepping back
"Sorry Le Fay, but when I see a strong opponent, I just have to fight them. Also, these chains were made by her, right? So, if we wanna get Kuroka rid of it, I think we'll have to fight on"
He says this, but there's gotta be a way to remove them without fighting!
"Go back and have Bikou and Arthur see what they can do, meanwhile I'll try to extract some info from our new guest"
All of the words he spoke to me were said without taking the eyes of the girl for even a moment, he is dead set on fighting her, saying that he wants to free Kuroka is just an excuse!
"You talk big even for a devil, let's see what you got in there then!"
And she's just feeding his fire! Please stop it! Didn't you say you didn't want to fight?!
"Le Fay, please cast a barrier around this area so commoners won't be attracted here"
I try to come up with a protest, however I swallow it. It's useless trying to argue here, he's determined to fight, even more after being mocked
"A-alright, but be careful, Vali"
He shows a fearless with his eyes still locked on the redhead
"I am not the one who has to be careful"
I sigh at his cockiness and cast a barrier around the area while grabbing Kuroka and casting a teleportation seal
"Don't worry Kuroka, we'll find a way to remove this"
As we leave, the two stare at each other, the redhead now also seems completely oblivious to our presence, focusing entirely on Vali
"So, you still have not told me your name, don't you know it's impolite to not introduce yourself?"
The light from my magic envelops us and I hear a bold declaration from the redhead as we depart
"There's no need to give my name to an inhuman"
Afterword: Thank you all for the reviews and feedback! I love seeing comments and how many new followers and favorites I'm receiving
Now onto answering some readers questions
About the lenght of the story until the Kyoto arc: Taking into account that the Kyoto arc starts with Issei and Sairaorg having a mock fight in the Gremory underworld residence, I assume it'll take 7 or 8 chapters from here untill there. I'll just go ahead and say that Rias and Sairaorg will have a big surprise when that happens.
However, I must really ask, are you not enjoying the chapters so far? Even if they are introducing the story, they are still crucial to it and I tried to make them as best as I could, Tatseyo and the others are not replacing the original cast, so many times they'll not be doing the same things that happened in the original story, there'll be times they could be in the same place but doing entirely different things, as it should be obvious, but I hope you'll all enjoy it.
Regarding the similarities between Mayumi and Akeno: I assure this was made on purpose, the teasing Onee-san trope is fairly used in anime so I knew that she and Akeno would seem very alike at the start, but all the characters have a backstory that I started developing along with their design. None of the new cast has been fully stablished or developed so far, not even Tatseyo. This fic will be a long story, so every character will have their time to shine and show who they are and, perhaps, what they have been hiding?
Regarding the similarities between Ayumu and Irina: I honestly have no clue where that came from, is it because they are both childhood friends with the protagonist or because they serve a greater organization? I could understand if she was compared with Xenovia, seeing as they are both built as 'tomboys', but Irina is the cute cheerful type that easily gets carried away and has an undying faith, I honestly don't know why you would see both as similar. Maybe I didn't pass the message correctly in her two chapters, but regardless of that, as I said before, none of the characters have show even a half of the character I plan to build for them, all I can ask is for you to be patient and wait for it, things haven't even got close to get heavy yet, these chapters, as you correctly stated, were mostly used to build the universe and introduce the characters. However, I do appreciate any feedback and will do my best to tend to the expectations of my story.
Tatseyo 'helping the devils for free': I assume the person that wrote this must not have paid much attention to the chapters where Tatseyo's motivation were clearly outlined, I suggested that person to re-read chapters from "Revelations and Considerations" untill "Analysis" where I believe I made them clear. The person did not answer, but anyone who still has doubts can feel free to message me and help improve my writing.
About Tatseyo and Issei: I do not and never did planed to make Tatseyo and Issei similar characters, I do not know if they ever felt similar to anyone but I'm always trying to make them clearly different. I like Issei as a character, he's one of the reasons I like DxD, but from the very beginning I assumed I made clear how different they were, not only that, but I also do plan on using their differences in a way to give more depth to their interactions.
About Tatseyo becoming a devil: That has been asked for a long time, whether through inbox messages or comments, but seriously, either denying it or affirming it would be a huge spoiler, so I'm not touching that subject, if you think that because of the story's title, you should keep reading to find it out.
Thank you all for reading and look forward to the next chapters!