Chapter 40: Canicular 3
Koneko
I carried a large cardboard box with me as I walked through the old school building. I just finished hanging out with Gasper, and was now on my way to the club room after having packed away all the cosplay outfits we had tried on, including Naruto-kun's discarded Fate costume.
He didn't really care about keeping the clothes after he got his use out of them, so I decided to hold on to them for myself, wig and all.
I felt my face warm a little when I thought back to the rooftop.
At some point just before I'd caught up to him, it slipped my mind that the shake I'd been holding was his, and I ended up drinking it absently to the point of finishing it. If it were just that, I'd have ignored any embarrassment I felt, shrugged, and said 'finders, keepers.'
Instead, for some fucking reason, I'd all but dared him to stick his hand down my shirt to get my phone! Even knowing that I was safe because he wouldn't dare try something like that, I could have just teleported it away instead.
It was one thing after another, starting with my friend being dressed like a cute girl and ending with him stripping in front of me, all combining to make a bunch of small things have a bigger effect that constantly kept dragging my thoughts back to the small embarrassments.
I couldn't even look at Gasper in his Kuoh uniform today without finding myself trying to picture what Naruto-kun would look like in a girls uniform of his own.
I mentally shook off the image as I reached the clubroom, taking a calming breath and stilling my expression while shifting the box over to balance on one hand, like a waiter holding a tray of food. The fact that it was big enough for me to comfortably fit in meant nothing for balance with my chakra.
I opened the door with my other hand and walked in, the light conversation of multiple people pausing for a moment to acknowledge my entrance with a couple stares.
After getting over with all the usual hellos to everyone else from our peerage, I nodded in greeting to Sona, Tsubaki, and Meguri; though the latter didn't seem to notice, because she already went back to talking Kiba's ear off about the supremacy of katanas once again, as was usual when she was in the same room as him.
As is normally the case when one of our peerages comes across something potentially involving the state of the town, the other peerage's [King] also needed to be kept aware of any details, which was why Sona was with us for this meeting. It was usually a fifty-fifty whether she brought Tsubaki along to these sorts of things for a second opinion or left her behind to take the lead of the others in her stead, but in this case, she'd brought both Tsubaki and Meguri, because they were the two members of her peerage most knowledgeable on one of the topics tonight, both being former members of exorcist clans, even if Meguri's clan wasn't on the level of the Five Principals.
Saji was here with them too, for whatever reason.
He was busy arguing with Issei about ass versus tits though, so I ignored the two perverted idiots.
I made my way to one of the few unclaimed seats left, the couch that the Tengu twins were sitting on, and settled my butt in the open spot in between a couple of weirdo crows.
That is, I sat between Akatsuki and Akeno, who was also sitting here.
Yoru was on the other side of the female Tengu, meditating.
'Actually…' I kept my suspicion to myself as I bent forward, setting the box I brought with me down onto the floor in front of my feet. Once I'd straightened and gotten comfortable, I closed my eyes and focused, brows furrowing in careful effort to open up my senses without leaving myself exposed.
I felt Akeno perk up beside me as she felt the traces of my aura expanding slightly around me, but I ignored the feeling of knowing she was smiling my way without seeing her, instead letting the natural chakra of the world– or just this room really– trickle through me. In with one breath and out with another, telling me what I wanted to know about Yoru's aura.
I ignored the box at my feet, too.
'Yep.' My eyes opened, my curiosity sated. I ignored Akatsuki's curious glance from the corner of her eyes.
The fake-cultivator, hovering cross-legged a few inches above the couch cushion in a serene meditation pose, was just taking a nap.
'These two dumbasses really do go all in on the 'cool and mysterious sages' aesthetic, huh?'
"It seems we're all here now," Sona noted from where she and Rias sat at their usual chess table after having just finished a game, getting the room's attention. "It's a couple minutes early, but we might as well begin if we're ready. Rias?"
My master shook her head, though she did stand, Sona joining her as she moved towards her desk. "Not quite, we're waiting on one more person." Rias glanced my way as she sat at her desk, Sona standing next to her with arms folded.
I took the hint and pulled out my phone, looking at the notification screen to confirm I hadn't gotten any messages saying he'd be late.
Saji, who had broken himself out of his argument the moment Sona spoke up, piped up with a question. "What, did you guys get another new recruit already or something?"
My tail flickered with an inexplicable feeling of anticipation for something, and I felt rather than saw the exact moment Yoru's eyes snapped open, his aura waking up.
"'Or something' sounds about right."
All eyes turned towards Rias, who rolled her chair out of the way with a hint of surprise to reveal the window behind her desk, and the blond ninja lazily lounging on the sill like he belonged there. The orange light of the setting sun behind him shined through untamed hair, making his golden locks seem to glow softly.
Yoru stood up, stern-faced.
"What's up, whiskered dude? Been a while!" He called out brightly, expression unchanged.
"Yo." Naruto-kun gave a two-fingered military-style salute with a grin. "Good to see you, bird guy!"
The blond host of Vritra made a strangled noise in his throat. "You!"
"Me?" The whiskered teen blinked, before squinting at the newest student-council member. What was effectively a large and warmly lit room to us devils and youkai was a deep, dark, chamber cast in long shadows to his human eyes, so a blonde student in a school uniform was probably harder to recognize than the fake cultivator. "Wait, you're that guy! The one from-" He said with widened eyes, before he turned sheepish, glancing nervously at Sona. "-uh, that one incident that I totally had nothing to do with…"
"Smooth, Uzumaki-kun," I commented blandly, suppressing a smirk. Akeno giggled.
Ever since that first time Saji had tried to flex the Council's authority over Naruto-kun in the school halls and failed in front of everyone who witnessed it, they had clashed at practically every opportunity, each trying to make trouble– or catch the other making trouble– for each other whenever they crossed paths.
And Naruto-kun still hadn't remembered his name.
"What's a tattooed delinquent like you doing here?!" Saji demanded angrily through grit teeth, a vein throbbing on his forehead.
"They're not tattoos!" Naruto-kun shot back just as aggressively, offended. "They're birthmarks! Birthmarks!"
"That… seems unlikely, biologically speaking," Tsubaki commented, seemingly without realizing she muttered that out loud.
"I know," he deadpanned, getting a sheepish cough into her fist from the [Queen]. "Tell that to my mother, who got pregnant with me while there was a nine-tailed fox sealed inside of her." He shrugged after dropping that bomb on the others, like it wasn't kind of an absurd thing to say out loud. I hadn't heard that exact detail before and it was interesting to know he wasn't the first in his family, but it really wasn't all that high, not even near the middle of the list of 'Most Absurd Things Uzumaki Naruto Has Said Out Loud.'
"She hated the furball and the feeling was mutual on his end, so I figure he might have had a hand in my whiskers as a way to try messing with her or something." He shrugged again. "It would make sense, since my friends have mentioned my marks grew and darkened whenever I tapped into his power, back in the day."
Rias opened her mouth, eyes shining, but pouted when Sona cut her off.
"As interesting as this all is, we should move on to the intended topic of tonight's meeting." The student council president adjusted her glasses.
Rias turned serious and nodded. "The Grigori and the Five Principals."
"The five what-now?" He asked, scratching his head.
Saji scoffed in derision despite the fact that he himself probably only learned of them in the past month or two, but before he could make a snarky comment, Akeno answered our friend in a fake-cheerful voice.
"The Five Principal clans are a group of Shinto exorcist families run by decrepit old men high off their inherited power, who despise and try to kill anything and anyone who they don't consider pure, based on lineage and religious dogma."
Despite the tone and close-eyed smile, her words gave away the cold, furious hatred she felt.
The others not in the know seemed curious what brought this reaction on, but Buchou, Sona, and Tsubaki all sent sympathetic looks her way. I scooted closer until my shoulder touched her arm, showing my support, and I could tell some of the tension left her with the way she leaned into me slightly.
"So, a buncha uptight jackasses making things worse for people for no reason, excusing it with dumb traditions. Got it." Naruto-kun shrugged. "Wouldn't be the first time I've come across people like that."
"While not an entirely inaccurate summary of the Principal Clans, and at least partially relevant to the discussion," Sona took back control of the conversation, "the real issue at the moment isn't the clans themselves, but the Grigori's motives with their recent actions, and any potential clashes between the Fallen Angels and the clans."
Rias nodded. "As Akatsuki-san and Yoru-san have so kindly informed us during their extended stay, there are quite a few factions interested in the phenomenon currently affecting Kuoh. We are currently aware of at least four of those factions, with three of those being tentatively confirmed as wishing to either help solve the mystery, help contain potential fallout, or both, with the fourth faction's intentions being unknown."
"Uhh," Issei raised his hand like we were in a classroom. "What phenomenon are we talking about, Buchou?"
"Natural life energy was disappearing for months," I acted fast, cutting off whatever dumb jelly-donut explanation was about to come out of one of the tengus mouths. "The town's ambient chakra is basically gone, and remnants started gathering and condensing somewhere between the school and the residential district." Issei's hand lowered.
No need to go into detail and confuse him with specifics he hasn't learned, making this meeting take longer. He was a teenage boy who played videogames and read manga. 'Ambient energy disappearing mysteriously' was more than generic enough of a plot hook for him to get the gist and why it might be bad.
"Our mistress Lady Yasaka, her rival in the East, and those clan sorcerers, all think it's possible a new Daiyoukai might be trying to form," Akatsuki added with a careless shrug that didn't match her elegant looks, ignorant of the suddenly-pale faces of Saji and Issei. The two Japanese boys were probably just reminded that the folk-tales and myths they'd grown up on of devastatingly powerful youkai were real and relevant. "The Amatsukami that the Five Principals worship tasked them with handling any containment and sealing needed if that happens, to allow us and our mistress to focus our efforts on investigation and prevention," she finished.
I pointedly didn't glance at Naruto-kun, and the tengu twins didn't either.
The two were weird, and everyone here knew that at this point. It wasn't a surprise that they wouldn't show that much alarm at the thought of a daiyoukai forming, their body language was all over the place as a default.
I could still feel both of their auras though, they didn't tend to try hiding them. Both of them were basically completely relaxed on the topic, the same as every other time I'd come across them goofing off when they were supposed to be "focusing their efforts" on investigation, all but confirming a thought I'd had once or twice.
They probably came to the same conclusion as me.
"Going back to what we were saying, the Grigori have a history of hostility with the Five Principal clans, as do many other non-human factions that have had run-ins with them, so both of them being present in Kuoh after the Grigori's already made a mess of things here without our permission, is a recipe for disaster," Rias explained. "On top of that, much like the Five Principals, the Grigori isn't a singular monolithic organization. Both groups are made up of smaller internal power blocks that have their own goals and are willing to act on their own, regardless of the greater organization's stance."
"The fact that they are willing to intrude on our territory so soon after causing a previous diplomatic incident, sending one of the Fallen involved in the previous incident too, no less, is cause for concern," Sona took the lead once more, after gesturing for Naruto-kun to come in and join us properly. "There are a few possibilities here for why, such as this being an attempt to bait the clans into starting an incident themselves, or simply trying to draw our eyes in the clans' direction with this overt action."
With Meguri and Kiba sitting on the other couch with Issei and Asia, and Tsubaki and Sanji sitting in the two armchairs, there weren't any seats left in the central area of the room, so Naruto-kun just made his way over to stand next to Akeno's armrest with his arms folded across his chest.
"So, with all that in mind…" Sona pushed her glasses up again, the lenses flashing unnaturally because Sona is a closet weeb. A pale-blue magic circle lit up the floor next to her, and a standing whiteboard rose out of it. "Let's discuss what we know of both groups, and their potential mindsets and motives."
Naruto-kun immediately lifted a hand up.
"Would you like to start, Uzumaki-san?" Sona asked, lips quirking upwards approvingly at his proactiveness.
He put his hand on his chin and squinted.
"Do you always have that specifically prepped to summon at any given time, just in case?" He asked, head tilted. "How often would an emergency white-board even come in handy?"
…
"Pfft-!" Rias clapped a hand over her mouth.
Sona flushed. "A-anyway, would anyone else like to start?"
'Heh.'
As expected, it took only a single comment from him to get the always-serious student council president off balance.
Rias and Sona wasted no time grilling Naruto-kun for any detail he could remember from his encounter with Kalawarner. He admitted that he sucked pretty badly at interrogation and didn't really know how to effectively question people for intel, but he was pretty damn good at understanding when people were telling the full truth or not.
He could confirm three things from his talk with her.
One: One of her higher-ups removed her from punishment duty and sent her to Kuoh.
Two: The task her mission handler gave her was to "keep an eye on things happening in the town" and report back any incidents, with an emphasis on observing the Five Principal clans actions.
Three: She didn't want to be here, doing this mission.
Everything else he got from her, like Fallen numbers present, overall mission goals, the name of the Fallen who ordered it, all of them were unreliable, all being potentially partial truths or even outright lies.
After that was done, we moved on to talking as a group about anything relevant we could think of that could be useful.
Ten minutes of discussion later, the whiteboard was covered in columns of bullet points, listing things like known individuals involved with each relevant faction, potential third parties, known incidents between factions, and known activity in the area.
There was a section at the bottom reserved for writing down ideas for potential goals, motives, and responses to overt action, which was mostly filled with contributions from the five girls in the room who'd actually had direct dealings with the Grigori and/or inter-clan politics.
"We know there are Fallen willing to go against orders- even within their own factions- if they think their actions will help their leaders in the end, as we saw with Raynare," Rias began giving her thoughts. "I think it's safe to say, whether Kalawarner's presence in town is tied to a splinter Grigori faction or not isn't all that relevant. She doesn't want to be here, as Uzumaki-kun said, and she isn't supposed to be here officially since we haven't signed off on her presence, so someone with authority is going against the Grigori's overall wishes to send her here for their own purposes. We should be in the clear, diplomatically speaking, to handle that side of the equation in whatever way we see fit."
"That's assuming the Grigori doesn't know about this," Kiba warned. "This could easily be a deniable asset mission, where they can lay all the blame on Kalawarner and her handler while coming off only looking incompetent instead of actively malicious, just like they tried with Raynare's mission to kill Issei-kun." A dark expression flickered across his face for a moment. "Just like…" He trailed off, his fingers tensing subtly in his lap as if to grip the hilt of a sword that didn't exist yet.
Issei stilled at the mention of his ex, and I heard his breath subtly hitch for a split second.
"That's true." Sona nodded in acknowledgment. "However, the likelihood of that being the case is much lower. Sending Kalawarner is barely a step down from if it were Raynare herself in how blatantly insulting it would be to us."
She took a moment, seemingly to order her thoughts if the crossed arms and tapping of her finger on her bicep were anything to go by.
"Either the Grigori itself is trying to hamfistedly cause tension between our factions with this mission of hers for non-obvious reasons, or an individual or splinter group is trying to accomplish an unknown goal while attempting to undermine the credibility of the leading Grigori faction," Sona reasoned. "The latter is more likely by far, and if it were the former, then it was done obviously enough that the result is the same regardless of how we treat it; either they intend to cause tension and we call them out on it, which they deny and point out how obvious a setup it is, or they have a rogue actor and the same occurs anyway."
When Kiba nodded in acceptance of that logic, she moved on, pointing to a section on the whiteboard.
"We know thanks to our youkai guests-" she nodded towards said tengu twins, who gave simultaneous thumbs-ups back, "-that the Himejima are the ones heading the Five Principals' current operation, and that the old clan head has recently stepped down and been replaced by Himejima Suzaku, who is reportedly much more respectful and accepting of non-humans than previous heads. How likely do we think it is that the other clans will cause an incident in a bid for status, while the Himejima's have their hands full?"
Tsubaki and Meguri glanced at each other seriously for a split-second, nodding.
Tsubaki opened her mouth. "There will probably be some troublemakers, but with the orders from the patron kami-"
"It is a guarantee," Akeno said with a calm certainty, grabbing everyone's attention. "The rotten ideals they hold aren't concentrated at the top of their leadership, they permeate the clans as a whole. Whether or not an incident will happen isn't the question, it's whether it will be planned and organized by the whole, or done spontaneously on a whim by individuals. That, and the scale of the incident."
Tsubaki frowned, tapping her fingers on her chair's armrest in thought. "Isn't that too strong of an assumption? They may have hostility for non-humans, but they have shown a willingness in the past to make deals with, and at least back down from unnecessary confrontations with other factions outside their own territory, even without the intervention of their deities. If I recall, wasn't there an incident years ago in this town where they negotiated with Devils?"
Akeno's aura darkened and her hands smoothed out her skirt as she rose from the couch. I felt something uncomfortable in my chest watching her, and almost reached out to grab her sleeve and stop her, but I stiffened when a warm palm landed gently on my shoulder. I turned my head and traced it back to Naruto-kun, who was now standing behind me with a serious expression aimed at the clearly agitated girl. As much as I wanted to comfort our friend, I decided to trust his judgement and sit back.
Akeno stepped towards the open space next to the couch as she spoke. "The Principal clans and their members are, above all else, obsessed with their own image of purity. Tradition, religion, race, affiliation, if you do not conform with them to all of the above you are exiled or killed. Friend and foe are not the most at risk from them-"
She released her wings, both sets.
"-Family is." A twisted smile appeared on her lips. "You were lucky enough to be allowed to leave the Shinra willingly. That incident from years ago that you heard of? That was Lord Lucifer's Bishop cowing my grand-uncle and his band of murderers right before they could kill me like they killed my mother, despite her loyal worship of the kami above. Lord Agrippa forced them into a deal that they could do nothing but accept, or be made to look worse than the beings they hunt."
It wasn't a secret anymore that she was a half-Fallen, but it also wasn't something our friends in Sona's peerage had any real reason to think about unless it was brought up. This was a reminder.
The newest three devils present were understandably horrified, and even Tsubaki and Meguri seemed disturbed, but the rest of us were either already aware of that fact, or had been faced with equally horrific situations, so we only had grim and sympathetic expressions showing.
The only ones who were unaffected were the twins, but that was pretty much expected. The way their minds seemed to work was almost alien on the best days, even to a fellow youkai like me.
"Make no mistake," Akeno shook her head, her wings folding away and disappearing. "The clans can only be trusted to act in a way that maintains their self image, even to the detriment of their own members. My cousin may be trying to change that, and she may eventually succeed, but she will have made many enemies by now who'd wish nothing less than for her to be ousted, by any method. Those rotten fools will try something, even if only to make things harder for her politically, that much is certain."
"If," Rias emphasized. "They will try something if they can find a reasonable excuse, one that they can spin to make them seem in the right, such as the Grigori poking around where they're not invited." Rias offered her [Queen] a reassuring look. "As long as we can deal with the Grigori issue quickly and quietly, give the clans no opening to cause a mess, all they'll be able to do is grumble and follow Takamagahara's orders."
Naruto-kun pulled away from me.
"You don't know that," Akeno argued with pursed lips and furrowed brows, crossing her arms under her bust. "The Fallen aren't the only group with members that would love to take the opportunity to bait the Principal clans into conflict. The Eastern Youkai have eyes on the region too, remember? The clans are still the most volatile variable here!"
"And if anything sets them off-" Naruto-kun stepped up behind Akeno, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder this time. "-then we'll just have to deal with that when it comes to it." Akeno snapped around with a retort on her lips as she turned on him, but she was cut off when he continued, staring her in the eyes. "All we can do is the best we can." He grinned up at the slightly taller girl. "Until then, there ain't any use worrying about things we can't control or account for, ya'know?"
After a few tense seconds of looking into his eyes, she glanced at me for some reason. A moment later, she backed down.
Akeno's own eyes slid shut and she took a deep, calming breath, before letting it out with a nod.
"You're right." She turned towards our master and bowed deferentially. "I'm sorry for my outburst. I let my emotions get the better of me when you were just trying to help."
"Apology denied," Rias refused with a scolding tone that was at odds with her smile. "I don't ever want a friend of mine to say sorry for feeling strongly about something, you silly girl."
"Honestly…" Akeno scoffed with a shake of her head as she straightened. "What kind of [King] allows their servants to raise their voices at them? Sometimes I even wonder if I would have been better off with Sona as a master."
I let out a breath I had held unconsciously, the knot in my chest loosening. Despite the words, the teasing voice they were said in was much closer to her usual lighthearted tone than moments ago.
"Only sometimes, I hope?" Rias's smile turned into an amused smirk while Sona rolled her eyes with a dry look, not-quite suppressing the upwards twitch of her own lips.
"Of course." She confirmed with a close-eyed smile. "I couldn't bear to serve eternally under that stick in the mud."
Saji and Meguri naturally took offense to this and began causing a ruckus, but Tsubaki sighed in resignation while Sona simply scoffed, turning her head to hide her amusement.
Akeno allowed Naruto-kun to steer her back to her seat next to me, and as she sat down and the discussion got back on track, I felt the warm sensation of her soft palm ghosting over the back of my hand between us. I looked up at her, just to see her looking down at me with a gentle smile as her fingers laced through mine with a light squeeze.
A light and airy feeling of appreciation hummed through her aura.
I relaxed as the last bit of tension within both of us drained away.
"Oh man, so much of that political stuff went way over my he-"
I stopped listening to Issei's conversation with Kiba as the door shut behind me. I could still hear what he was saying if I wanted to, but placing a barrier like a shut door between my ears and peoples' voices made it really easy to tune out and ignore any random chatter.
I could also just transform away my ears to make things like that a non-issue, but I really didn't want to. I liked not having to hide my features around my friends.
"So, what's with the giant box you're carrying?" The blond doofus walking next to me asked curiously as he glanced down at me with his usual idiotic grin, his hands clasped behind his head. "I didn't really think to ask about it until now."
"It's Gaspy's favorite box," I said plainly, definitely without any hidden amusement. "I'm bringing him back to his room before we leave."
In the end, it was decided that until the new Fallen situation was handled, any one member of our peerages not busy with doing contracts would spend their nights in pairs patrolling the town, on the lookout for any suspicious supernatural activity, with a focus on making sure any obvious members of the Principal clans don't interact with other supernaturals. They were technically here to help, but Akeno was right, we couldn't exactly trust them to not cause trouble anyway.
Naruto-kun volunteered to help out, and since he'd already had contact with Kalawarner that ended amicably, and I have the best tracking abilities out of all our allies, the two of us were paired together with the task of finding and retrieving Kalawarner for a more thorough questioning. Akeno and Rias would be making a visit to Mittelt's current lodgings, and be placing her under house arrest for now, if only to keep her out of trouble.
No one who'd interacted with her since her initial capture thought that weirdo was involved in the current troubles.
"'Bringing him back'? Don't you mean 'it'?" Naruto-kun raised an eyebrow. "What, did Gasper give the box a name and gender like it's some famous sword? The legendary demonic 'Muraboxa', rolls right off the tongue, heheh!" He snickered at his own joke.
"Aauuw…"
Naruto-kun's head snapped to the box at the muffled sound of a pitiful whine.
"Yes, no, and yes." I answered his questions in order with a tiny smirk. "Uzumaki-kun, say hello to Gasper, and his favorite hiding place, Boxamaru." I paused for dramatic effect, and gave the box a little shake. "He's a scaredy-cat weakling who can't control his Sacred Gear, so he has to stay in the box when he's not being a shut-in. He wanted to be with everyone at the meeting, but he's too shy to talk to so many new people, so he never got the nerve to say anything."
"W-waahh!? Please don't shake meeee!" Gya-kun squealed girlishly. "A-and you didn't need to say all that, Koneko-chan…"
Naruto-kun just slowed while staring at the crossdressing-dhampir-containing box in my hands, so I smacked his arm with my tail as I continued past him down the hall.
That seemed to snap him out of it, and he caught back up within a second.
"Eh, alright." Naruto-kun shrugged it off. "Heya Gasper. Koneko-chan's mentioned you a few times before, so it's nice to finally meet you. "
"Ah, that's right!" Gya-kun's voice noticeably brightened despite the muffling. "I'm also glad to meet you, Naruto-san. Koneko-chan's told me so much about you too, I'm happy she found a great friend like you!"
We continued talking– really just the two boys, I mostly just listened– as we walked the rest of the way to Gaspy's sealing room, with schoolwork and hobbies being the primary topics. After Naruto-kun mentioned what club he was in, Gaspy asked if he knew a student named "Tatsu-senpai", who I think I remember being that gyaruo we met on the day he signed up.
"Yeah, he's a really cool dude!" Naruto-kun replied with a grin, even though there was a box blocking them from seeing each other. "He helped me out when I was stuck on a project a couple months ago, got me into contact with one of the guys he knows through the school messenger tool and everything."
"You use Kuoh Academy Online too?" Gaspy asked hopefully. "The others don't really use it, so it would be nice to have someone to talk to on it that isn't for contract work…"
Naruto-kun shrugged, again, not that Gaspy could see it. "What's your username? I'll add you."
Gaspy told him.
Naruto-kun paused again, and this time, I stopped to glance back too.
"... Huh. What are the odds?" He scratched the back of his head. "Good news; you're already on my friends list."
"Eh?"
It was a little interesting to learn that two of my best friends had already 'met' each other online through the school's student network, but soon enough we reached Gaspy's room, and it was time to say goodbye for now. I would leave him and his box in his room, then step out and close the door, reactivating the seals that kept his [Forbidden Balor View] suppressed within the room before he left his box.
"It was fun talking with you face to– er, box," Naruto-kun commented a little awkwardly.
"Um!" Gaspy hummed cheerfully, "Maybe Koneko-chan can bring you next time she comes to hang out, and we can all play videogames, and cosplay."
My tail twitched as the mental picture of the two blonds standing next to each other in matching girls' uniforms flashed through my head.
"Yeah, sure. Sounds fun," The whiskered boy agreed easily as I stepped into the room to set the box down with warm cheeks. "See ya next time, Gasper."
"Um. See you!" The crossdresser called back as I backed out of his room and began closing the door.
Naruto-kun called out one more time with a cheeky grin. "See you too, Boxamaru!"
"W-waaah-!?" Gaspy's wail of embarrassed despair was cut off by the door closing, blocking all sound.
Naruto-kun turned to me, his grin smoothing out into a smile. "Well, should we get going now? Kalawarner probably isn't going to just make herself easy to find, so let's put your skills to the test."
I nodded. "Yep."
Time to get to work.
Chapter 41: Canicular 4
Naruto
(Nighttime, Downtown Kuoh)
Rooftop-running was a basic skill for any ninja worth their forehead protector back home, and something that even most academy students had no trouble with. With chakra, any seasoned genin could climb any vertical height, stick to any solid– or even liquid– surface. Even without the tree-walking training to just walk up a building, only the most physically unfit ninja would struggle to overcome a two-story height difference, or jump across entire streets.
Back home, just a little bit of physical training and having your chakra running through your body were enough to open up an entirely new dimension of movement options.
Roof running in Kuoh was a bit different from back home, and that was only partially because I don't have my chakra anymore.
Konoha had plenty of wooded areas, and most of the buildings were within one to four stories tall, and most streets were only just wide enough for merchants to pull their carts through, making it generally very easy to cross distances and move up and down buildings without losing speed and momentum. In Kuoh on the other hand, the layout of the streets and buildings changed a lot more depending on where you were.
The north side of town had a bunch of parks and open spaces, separated by woods and hilly areas, as well as a few rural communities. Tree running was alright over there, but the trees and their branches were much smaller than in Konoha, so it was more like tree parkouring than actual 'running'. To the west, it was mostly residential with narrow streets, densely packed homes and apartment buildings, with many of them being similar in height. In a lot of ways, this was the area most like Konoha for quick movement. The south side, where the academy and our favorite karaoke place was, was about an even mix between the north and west in terms of the buildings-to-woods ratio.
But downtown Kuoh in the center, full of wide streets and seven-story mall complexes next to single-story convenience stores? The business district to the east, with all the squat factories and warehouses and parking lots sitting next to gleaming-glass office buildings that jutted up twenty or more floors into the sky?
Trying to travel across the rooftops in these parts of town fucking sucked without chakra, especially when you had to keep 'supernatural' capabilities secret from the public, unlike my home world where everyone knew about ninjas.
"Quit squirming," Koneko-chan 'requested' while she scanned the area with her senses, taking slow steps across the rooftop while her head turned this way and that way. "It's distracting."
We'd started out our search by heading back towards the area we'd last seen Kalawarner, moving north from the south side of town where the academy sat. The goal was to then go to the clocktower at the center of town, to see if Koneko-chan could pick up a scent trail or something, and if we didn't find any leads there, move towards the east where there were plenty of mostly empty buildings for a Fallen to hide out in at night. The fact that it also held the red-light district just made it an even more attractive hiding place for a Fallen Angel laying low in a town run by high schoolers.
"I'm not squirming!" I said as I very carefully stilled.
I was absolutely squirming.
To be fair, I was pretty distracted myself, at the moment.
Without chakra or wings of my own to help me keep up with her, she'd decided after I'd fallen behind the first time that the best solution that kept her arms free, was to carry me with a piggyback ride as she ran at speeds and jumped heights that I couldn't match with just my physique.
So here I was, arms and legs slung over her shoulders and around her waist like an oversized backpack, my body awkwardly glued to hers with chakra so that I wouldn't bounce around whenever she moved.
"And let me down now, will you?!"
Sure, it wasn't as humiliating as a princess carry, but… I'm a guy. Going through puberty for a second time was already rough, but pressed up against a girl I like, physically unable to pull my lower half away to make some needed space? It was fine when the adrenaline of speeding across downtown without my own input kept my mind occupied, but the slow, plodding movements on this rooftop were dangerous. If she noticed the result of my hormones screwing me over, I wouldn't be able to live through the embarrassment.
Koneko-chan froze mid-step.
"..."
'Uh-oh. I'm dead,' I thought– probably overdramatically– while going limp, resigned to my fate. 'It's all over for me.'
I almost missed it when she said something under her breath, only coming out of my mental spiral in time because she turned us to face the nearby clock tower directly.
'Wait, did she not notice? Safe!'
"One… no, two…? And a barrier…" She mumbled, before nodding to herself. "Uzumaki-k–"
She froze again.
"Oof!"
Completely unprepared to actually tighten my grip on her again, I abruptly fell on my ass when Koneko-chan let go of her chakra's hold on me. I looked up to see her step to my side and wordlessly offer a hand to help me stand, though her head was still turned towards the tower in a way that prevented me from seeing her face.
I took her hand and was standing at her side within a second, both of us looking at Kuoh's central landmark.
"... Sorry. I didn't think you would fall."
"Ehh, don't worry about it." I waved it off, before moving on to business. "Is she in there?"
"Nn." She shook her head in the negative. "There are two humans. One's really weak, but I think they're from the Principal clans."
"And they aren't supposed to be within city limits, right? Though, you did mention a barrier..." I scratched my cheek, trying to think of what that could mean before shrugging. "Wanna bet it's something to do with the reason they're in Kuoh? The clocktower's in the center of town, so if their job is to contain a disaster, maybe they're using it as an inner anchor point for a giant barrier?"
I was talking out of my ass. I have no clue how things like barriers and fuinjutsu worked, but it was the kind of explanation an anime would use; vague and plausible-sounding.
"Hm," she made a sound of acknowledgement. "... Should we take a look, or just report it to Buchou?"
"I don't know about you, but I wouldn't know the first thing about barriers or seals." I scratched my head. "We could go in and investigate, but I don't know what we'd get other than just talking to them, and I don't really know the politics of what's going on other than what was mentioned earlier." I shrugged again. "It's up to you to make this call."
Her head tilted in thought for a moment, before she hummed.
"I'll text Kaichou later, after we grab the crow." She nodded decisively. "Buchou might bring the cow with her, which might cause a mess."
"Did you just call Akeno a cow?" I asked with a raised eyebrow. The [Queen] was most definitely not fat, and had almost as small of a waist as Koneko did despite the size difference between them. 'N-not that I've been looking, of course!'
I coughed into a hand. "Why a cow? I think she acts more like a snake..." I paused for a moment as a thought occurred, and I compared her to Orochimaru.
Yeah, no. Nothing alike aside from the sadism, and even that was a stretch. "... if that snake was actually a fox disguised as a snake."
She was a mischievous trickster that pretended to be venomous, so my comparison is perfect. No, you're the idiot. Shut up.
Koneko-chan turned her head slightly to glance up at me from the corner of her eye. "Two big reasons," she said, holding both her hands up so the palms were cupped towards her, almost a foot away from her chest. "Her big fat udders."
She mimed squeezing.
I facepalmed. "... Did you really need to do the hand thing?" The problem wasn't the pervy gesture itself. That sort of thing was way less creepy when it wasn't a grown-ass man doing it.
"Yep." I saw Koneko-chan turn to face me through my fingers, but her eyes were blocked from my sight.
The real problem was that she really went and put that image of our friend in my head, and right after I'd 'calmed down' too.
She turned her back to me a moment later and crouched to a knee as I let my hand drop. "Let's go. Still have to find the crow."
And now I'd have to try enduring another piggyback of shame.
I shifted awkwardly, subtly adjusting myself out of her sight. "... Right."
Joy.
We were bounding across town soon enough, modern and inviting looking shopfronts being replaced by structures that looked more cheap and utilitarian. Bright paint turned into gray stone and metal, and business front signs made with real creativity became big blocky letters and harshly glowing neon. It made me vow internally, that if fixing my chakra network turned out to be a bust, that I would never wind up as a nine-to-five salaryman if this was what awaited me.
The only desk job I'd willingly take was the Hokage's.
We only stopped once near a seedy looking bar where Koneko-chan caught the smell of our target, though it was a couple hours old by now, and she only caught it because of the unique scent of tainted Holy power that humans couldn't smell.
According to her, very few species could actually sense different powers through smell the way a nekoshou could, and there weren't really words to describe the scent of Fallen Light, other than by saying it was like 'if moonlight could mildew.'
Either way, it gave us our lead, and we were quickly on our way to tracking the Fallen towards a run-down industrial zone near the edge of town.
It happened just after Koneko jumped high, launching us off of a warehouse up and across towards the roof of an office building to use as a vantage point.
Her head snapped to the side as we rose through the air, and she swung her arm out and down with her fingers curled like claws.
Blue-white strings of chakra sliced out from each of her fingers to intercept the three blood-red Light spears flying our way, redirecting them to pass below us towards the empty street.
We landed on the roof a second later, the echo of the asphalt shattering below us reaching up here like an explosive tag going off.
I hopped off her back the moment she let up on her chakra hold, a pair of kunai already held at the ready in reverse grips before my feet hit the ground. Koneko had more chakra strings extended from the fingers of both hands, fluttering around us like the butler from that vampire anime as she glared in the direction the spears came from.
After watching that one with her, I'd made a comment about how it reminded me of puppeteers back home, and she'd immediately decided she wanted to try learning the technique after knowing it was possible.
Her version was a lot different from the standard Puppet Strings in a couple ways, being more flexible in how they could be directly used at the tradeoff of using enough chakra to be visible most of the time, but they also couldn't really puppet things with any precision as far as we were aware. She could control the threads themselves really well, and use them to roughly pull things in one direction or another, but in computer terms, they didn't really "transmit data" at all. She wouldn't be pulling a Kankuro or Sasori anytime soon, if ever.
"You see anything?" I asked with my back to her, keeping an eye out for any sudden lights in the other direction. I was basically running blind at this time of night for trying to spot anyone flying against the night sky, but I'd catch a flash of light heading our way immediately.
"Nn," She denied, before sniffing the air for a few seconds. She finally grunted, reeling the protective net of strings back into her chakra reserves. "... They left. Probably teleported."
I clicked my tongue in annoyance, sliding my knives back into my sleeves and turning to face her. "How the hell does a fight ever finish if all you guys can just teleport away before it even really starts?"
"Arrogance," Koneko shrugged. "Speed. Both, probably. Most factions think theirs is the best, and teleporting takes a couple seconds."
"Yeah," I sighed, remembering that guy that Red had erased, and how confident he was that he could defeat a High-class Devil and her [Queen] just because they were teenage girls. How he was gone before he could even react. "That makes a lot of sense, actually."
We– just Koneko-chan, really– spent a few minutes near the edge of the ten-story building, looking out at a particular warehouse that still had its lights on, despite it being just past midnight at this point.
I walked up beside her, stretching out my arms and legs as I walked to limber up in case our ambushers decided to try their luck again after a fake retreat.
"Think that's where they've been hiding out?" I asked idly.
I squinted at the building several blocks away, trying semi-seriously to see anything of use. Of course, her eyes were so much better that it was basically impossible for me to catch something she'd miss, but I basically hadn't done anything yet other than get carried around. I was itching for something!
While there was light shining through the visible windows, the actual parking lot and work area spotlights outside the building were darkened for the night. There were a couple other warehouses around it, all sharing the same giant concrete lot, but none of them had any lights on or signs of activity.
On the front side of the building was the main lot, mostly empty and flat aside from a few groups of stacked pallets and small shipping containers. To either side of it was wide empty space, acting as buffers between it and two other warehouses, both leading towards the rear of the building. While there was a decent amount of space behind the line of warehouses, it didn't extend far, the property closed off by a fairly tall brick wall, blocking off the forested area behind the complex.
"Mm." Koneko-chan nodded. "Not sure if anyone's still there, or if they all left a few minutes ago. Not seeing any movement, but that doesn't mean much based on the old church." She tilted her head. "But it reeks of Light, sort of. It's weird. Can't feel it, not really, but I know it's there."
"Strange," I hummed in agreement. "The lights are still on. What are the odds they were just in a hurry to leave and don't care about the electric bill, compared to them having a welcome party prepped just for when people like us come snooping around?"
"Twenty five percent for one, twenty five for the other, fifty for both," She said matter-of-factly.
"And can't Angels see in the dark like Devils anyway?" Koneko-chan nodded in an affirmative to my question. "So either way, it seems like high odds they had the lights on for a reason." I grinned and rubbed my hands together. "Sounds to me like it's time to do some sneaking!"
"Yep."
I had a brief moment of surprise as one of Koneko-chan's arms suddenly slipped around my waist and hugged me close to her side. "Uh-?"
And then she stepped over the ledge, pulling me with her.
"Bwah?!"
Off the ten-story building.
Now, I'd gotten back some of my strength and speed over the past couple months, but I was still a human without chakra. That is a long fall without chakra.
I may have screamed just a little at first.
We weren't in free fall for long though, because halfway down the building we actually started slowing down. Koneko-chan was holding her other arm up, and in her grip was an extra thick blue-white chakra cable, stretching all the way back up to the roof.
As our descent continued to slow, the cable stretched thinner and thinner, until Koneko released it from the building when we were only about a story and a half above the sidewalk, a height that was child's play to land safely.
Even as I calmed the pounding in my chest and wordlessly pulled my arms from where they'd wrapped around Koneko-chan reflexively, reminding myself that she could have pulled out her wings to slow us at any time, I caught her muttering something like 'properties of both rubber and gum' to herself under her breath with a tiny smile.
I shrugged mentally, my mind turning to how we would approach without being seen, since the building was surrounded by open space.
Technically it would be easiest to stay out of sight coming from the sides, if only because I could climb one of the other warehouses and jump across the gap between buildings since people, even people who can fly, don't tend to look up.
The issue with that, was that it assumed there was no one still around staying hidden, and that anyone still around wasn't on the lookout from a different building to get better sightlines. Coming from the side in that case, while keeping me hidden from the target, would make me obvious to almost any other angle for a decent chunk of time while on the approach.
That really only left the front or the back, which were the most stereotypically obvious ways to approach an enemy stronghold.
I went back and forth with Koneko-chan on all this while we walked the remaining blocks to the industrial compound, passing by cracked sidewalks and run-down mechanic shops and delis.
"So we'll do both." She nodded her head like it was already decided. "I'll walk up to the front door, and if anyone's home, I'll get all their attention while you sneak in from the forest."
"I– Ugh, fine." I deflated at how simple it was, and the fact that it was the best option we really had on short notice. I never was the best at coming up with great plans outside of combat, and Koneko-chan usually preferred taking the most straightforward path available. It would have been fine for snooping at the clocktower, but that was a different circumstance and a different faction involved.
We were just down the street from one of the compound's main entrance gates, standing beside an alley that led to a different side-street, when we decided to finally split up so that I could circle around and approach from the back. Before we actually did though, I remembered something.
"Oh, hey, do you mind teleporting to my house real quick to get my sword, just in case I need a stronger blade?" I asked sheepishly.
"So unprepared," Koneko-chan said with a sigh and a shake of her head, clearly teasing me. "So much for a professional ninja."
"I still have one of your circles on me, so I can summon you back here if you text me when you have it!" I rushed to explain with pleading eyes, playing along. "It'll be in and out, I promise! I'll even make it up to you with a portion of my bento at-"
"Deal." She cut me off with a smile, disappearing in a flash of red.
"-school." I stood there for a moment. "...Huh. That was fast."
I walked over to lean against the wall of the alley and wait, when something else occurred and I face-palmed, pulling out my phone. I had forgotten to tell Koneko-chan where my sword was, so I quickly pulled up her contact and texted her, before settling back to wait.
After a few minutes of waiting with no response, I checked my phone again with a frown, debating if I should send another text just yet.
Right as I made the choice and began typing out a message, I snapped my head up when a distant clang of metal dropping onto concrete rang out from the direction of the warehouses, grabbing my attention with narrowed eyes.
Leaning just a little bit out of the alley to look through the bars of the entrance gate didn't show me anything, especially with the light of the streetlamp above it washing out the sight of anything past it, so I made the snap decision to move up and get a closer look.
It took just a couple seconds for me to dash down the rest of the block and reach an unlit part of the wall for me to climb. I hopped up and caught on to the ledge with my fingers, pulling myself up just enough to peer over the edge without making a big silhouette for anyone on the other side to spot.
Quickly finding the warehouse we'd had our eyes on, I didn't immediately notice anything off about it, like newly opened front doors or garage shutters. It took a few seconds of scanning the area, before I caught a glimpse of a dark shape shifting around at the back of the gap between buildings. It was hard to tell at this distance with the lack of light inside the compound grounds, especially since the moon was barely a sliver in the sky right now, but if I squinted hard enough, it almost looked like…
'There!'
A second, definitely human-shaped figure dropped down from the rear wall before moving to the side and disappearing behind the building.
"Shit," I muttered under my breath. Either another group was here first, or this wasn't even the Fallen's hideout to begin with. 'And what's taking Koneko-'
My pocket vibrated and I instantly let myself drop to the sidewalk to pull out my phone. By the time I unlocked the screen, it vibrated two more times.
Today 12:19 AM
Koneko1123: sorry, issue came up
Koneko1123: tell u l8r
Koneko1123: ready now
I fished out the contract leaflet and bit through the loose skin of my right thumb's knuckle to draw blood, immediately smearing it on Koneko-chan's summoning circle, before tossing the paper away.
Biting the tip of the thumb made it annoyingly uncomfortable to keep a firm grip or tight fist for the few minutes it took me to heal, and was really just the least-worst spot someone with a summon-clan contract could use for the Kuchiyose no Jutsu, since the technique needed the blood to make contact with the summon shiki you slam onto the ground. It wasn't something I'd ever really thought about before, until I met Koneko and started using her circle. I was so used to just doing it the way Ero-sennin originally taught me, that I never bothered wondering why it was done that way.
The disposable summon paper dissolved into particles of red magic midair, expanding into the Gremory magic circle and depositing Koneko-chan on the sidewalk in front of me, my cane-sword held with one hand, and in the other-
I blinked.
"... Why is Kuro with you?"
-was the jet black stray cat I'd adopted off the street months ago, looking like she was particularly annoyed and sulking limply in Koneko's arm for some reason.
I shook my head. "Nevermind that for now, we have a bigger problem right now."
"Mm, she's safer with us right now. I'll tell you later," Koneko picked up on the urgency quickly, holding out my weapon. "What's the situation?"
'Gee, that's not concerning at all,' I mentally snarked at the first statement.
I accepted my sword and held it by the sheath in my off hand near the hip, briefly considering the doability of crafting a belt clasp to clip it in place at my side in the future.
"I heard something about a minute ago and came closer to get a better look, and I just saw a couple figures coming down the back wall and moving towards the building," I relayed quickly. "Whoever it was, something tells me they weren't with the Angels. Doubt it's a couple civilians messing around either, since they came from the woods."
"Got it," Koneko-chan nodded. "Give me a second, I'll check it out."
She lifted her free hand in a half-ram seal and closed her eyes, her cat ears perking up as she focused.
Even without a chakra network of her own, Koneko had insisted on learning about the hand seals I knew and how they worked, so I'd made diagrams and explained how they affected chakra in order to help her understand how to mould her chakra better through her own efforts, and she had taken to using the Ram seal or a half-Ram as a mnemonic device to use her chakra better. It didn't actually do anything by itself, but it helped get her into a mindset to focus her chakra more efficiently, increasing her control, channeling intensity, and sensory range.
"Nn. Hard to see through the building," She muttered. "There's four, I think? Four human sorcerers for sure, and a bunch of others that are too weak to do anything, but not normals. Can't get a feel for accurate numbers. Metal, Earth and… Wood?" Koneko nodded to herself a moment later, opening her eyes.
"One Shinra, one Nakiri, and two Kushihashi sorcerers; the rest are fodder mobs. They're from the Five Principal clans."
"Skipping the clocktower was one thing, but this is the second time we've come across them in town…" I brought a hand up to rub my chin in thought. "On the one hand, it's entirely possible the Fallen baited us here to spark a confrontation between our two groups. On the other hand…" It could also just be a matter of bad timing for the Fallen, caught between two hostile groups while retreating from the warehouse.
I decided.
"You should text Sona about the clocktower now," I told Koneko. "In the meantime, let's go take a look at what's going on, directly. If they're friendly, it wouldn't be a good first meeting to have me sneaking around. If they're not, then nothing's stopping us from giving their asses a beating, or retreating and letting Red handle the diplomacy."
"Mm."
She pulled out her phone and began typing up her text as we jumped over the wall and started casually strolling across the open lot.
"They noticed us." Koneko-chan commented when we had crossed about half the distance, still tapping away at her phone in a back and forth with the Student Council president. She'd started using both hands to text at this point, having placed Kuro on top of her head between her own cat ears to have both her arms free. The black cat remained almost entirely limp aside from her flicking tail, front paws draping over Koneko's forehead like a noodle.
"Huh, I haven't noticed anything," I commented idly with my hands behind my head in a relaxed position, grinning at the cute sight. "What gave them away?"
"The sorcerers are moving to the front now. We probably tripped a perimeter barrier that I'm not good enough to notice yet."
A swirl of flower petals kicked up a dozen meters in front of us out of nowhere, and an older man stepped out of the gust a moment later, wearing blue traditional robes that wouldn't look out of place in a daimyo's council chamber despite the clearly toned arms barely hidden in his billowing sleeves. With gray hair in a traditional topknot and narrow yellow eyes set in a stern and wrinkled face, he looked like the intimidating kind of old guy who'd usually be in charge of a town's security, escorting Team 7 to whichever important client hired us for the job whenever we arrived on location.
"You two, unknown youkai!" The man called out gruffly. "You are intruding on the property of the Five Principal Clans! State your business and vacate the premises immediately, or we will remove you with force."
Almost as if to punctuate his statement, the other three sorcerers appeared around us in a semi-circle. One guy rose up through the ground like it was water, the other guy appeared using the same flower petal Shunshin-thing the elder guy did, and a young woman dropped down from one of the multiple unlit lampposts through the lot, with her being the furthest to our side.
Earth-dude was tall and middle-aged, bulky as hell with a plain face and hair, and his massive hairy forearms were crossed over his chest. The other flower-dude was a young adult probably in his twenties, a smug-looking bastard with hair just as silver as his elder, but slicked back in a comb over. The chick had one side of her head shaved and a scar from her nose to her ear under one of her gray eyes, her straight black hair combed so that it fell down next to the scar. Sticking out horizontally from her back was a sheathed tanto, her hand resting on the handle.
Despite looking the youngest of the bunch, probably still a teenager, she was the most obviously dangerous of the bunch, and probably the actual most dangerous combatant too at that, being the only one not wearing robes of some kind, holding a weapon, and just the look in her eyes in general compared to the others.
I didn't doubt that they could all fight, but when it came down to it, she seemed like the one of the bunch whose only role was as a fighter.
I saw Koneko reach the same conclusion out of my peripheral vision, turning her head just a tiny bit to glance at the woman, though her head was still down in her phone.
"Oh, I'm not a youkai, I'm human. These are just birthmarks I got for reasons involving a nine-tails." I corrected with an easy smile, planting my cane on the ground to lean on casually. Top-knot guy didn't immediately attack despite me taking my time with answering, which was a good sign, but his scowl didn't let up at all, so not a very good one. "I'm Uzumaki Naruto, a student of Kuoh Academy, and my friend here is Toujou Koneko, the [Rook] of Rias Gremory."
They all tensed at that last part, even though she was the size of a middle-schooler and had a cat on top of her head.
They weren't wrong to consider her more of a threat, but it was still kinda funny, especially since we're just standing here casually.
I continued with a shrug. "We were tracking a Fallen Angel in the area and were led here, before they escaped with a teleport spell. Koneko-chan here sensed them leaving from that warehouse over there, so we thought it was their hideout and came over to check it out." I straightened up with an apologetic grin, lightly twirling my sword up to rest on my shoulder. "I suppose we were wrong about that though, huh? You mind me asking what's the deal with them being here?"
Top-knot guy's frown deepened the tiniest bit and the heavily muscled earth-dude shifted, but any reluctance was pushed through and the older man answered professionally, much to the frustration of Smug-Comb-Over guy judging by the dude's sour expression. "This is a supply depot partially owned by the True Elements Construction company in association with the Five Principals. Twenty minutes ago, their security was tripped and warehouse five was broken into, so the four of us were called in to support operations in case the intruder came back while the workers catalogue the damages. As of yet, we've found no sign of the intruder's true motive."
"Nothing at all?" I rolled that around in my head. "That doesn't really give us much to work with, ya'know? If you let us take a closer look, we could help each other out."
"Impossible," Comb-over bastard suddenly spoke up with an amused shake of his head. "You've been given more than enough of our courtesy already, heretic."
Top-knot guy's face twitched at the interruption, but didn't tell off his younger clansmen or say he disagreed.
"Haahh?" I squinted at the younger guy, already understanding he was gonna be a jackass about things. "What's the issue? We both want to get to the bottom of this, and the sooner we can track down and stop the Fallen, the sooner we can go back to ignoring each other."
He scoffed. "As if the Five Principals need assistance from a filthy Devil and a feeble heretic."
"Don't insult my friend," I said, starting to get seriously irritated with the asshole. "We're literally just talking, there's no need to be a prick about it."
"You-!"
"That's enough!" Top-knot guy's gravelly voice cut through the outburst, pinning the younger man with a stare. He turned to me. "While I will not excuse my nephew's rudeness, his intent is correct. We do not need nor want help from outsiders in the matter."
"That's just stupid," I told him bluntly. "You guys are the outsiders here in Kuoh." I planted my cane back on the ground with both hands, before shrugging. "But fine, we were just in the area to capture a Fallen. If you want to be idiots about this and turn down free help because of your dumb pride, go for it. It's not our problem."
The elder's eyes narrowed, but the younger man audibly grit his teeth.
"You brat!" I saw the elder close his eyes and shake his head as the nephew got loud. "The Gremory name can only shield so much insolence! Be gone!"
"It seems your time is up," Earth-dude rumbled his first words of the confrontation with a chuckle, uncrossing his arms and taking steps forward while cracking his knuckles. "Guess we'll be using force after all."
I sighed.
Scarred-chick lowered her stance, laser focused on my hands.
Comb-over's hands slipped into his robe sleeves.
There was a loud crack.
"Make a move, and I'll smash you all back into the dirt he came out of." Koneko's monotone voice rang out, her head turned enough to glance at the massive man from the corner of her eye, phone still in hand.
Despite outmassing her three or four times over and the adorable sight of a housecat on top of her head, he stopped dead at the look, actually taking a half-step back in shock. The talismans that appeared in comb-over's hands stopped glowing, his face pale, and even the silent scarred chick– who'd been ready to throw down and unsheathed her tanto a moment ago– seemed to hesitate, glancing at her allies' reactions to judge her next move.
The only one who maintained their composure was Top-knot guy, who probably silently understood from the moment I mentioned the Gremory name, just what type of fight they would be getting into if it came to it. Even then, his expression was grimly tense in the light.
It probably had something to do with the violent blaze of blue-white chakra burning around Koneko-chan, and the fact that the concrete she was standing on had cracks radiating outwards from her feet without having tensed a single muscle.
She cut the aura off a moment later, slowly nodding once and putting her phone away when it was obvious they weren't going to push the attack.
"You own the property, but it's in our territory." Koneko reminded them plainly, with no room for argument. "We'll leave now since our target's the Fallen, but cause us any issues and I'll get angry." She turned to me and tilted her head back the way we came, careful not to shake Kuro around too much.
"Lead the way," I gestured with a grin while twirling my cane around like a baton, before we both turned our backs on the exorcists and walked away. I hadn't ended up using it this time, but it had been a close thing.
They four stayed silent, watching us as we walked away. They probably didn't want Koneko-chan to overhear Top-knot scolding them, but at the same time refused to turn their backs on us before we'd left the property, so they were just left standing there in the middle of the dark lot awkwardly.
I turned and gave a cheeky wave back after we'd jumped on top of the border wall, just in case they were still looking, before dropping back down to the sidewalk next to my favorite two troublesome cats.
"Well that was a waste." I commented, idly reaching over to snag Kuro for myself, cradling her in my free arm.
"Not really." Koneko shrugged as we walked. "None of the Fallen from the Church Incident had red colored Light. The Light in the warehouse was white. At least two or more Fallen we didn't know about are making moves."
I nodded, hooking my sword on my elbow to free my other hand and pet Kuro's silky fur. "Fair enough," I said. "But what do we do now?"
The thing about trying to track people who use teleport magic, as it was explained to me, is that unless you're an expert that can see and decipher a teleport circle on the spot, most teleportation magic doesn't leave any sort of trail to trace. So if someone teleports back to their base and you don't know where that is, or don't have the luck or resources in place to actively detect the matching surge of magic across the town, they're effectively gone until they come out of hiding.
She shrugged again, glancing up at me. "Go to my apartment and watch anime?"
"It's past midnight already," I deadpanned.
"No school tomorrow," she countered.
I thought about it.
"Just one or two episodes," Koneko promised. "...maybe three."
"Fine, fine," I rolled my eyes with a tiny grin, "we can watch anime at your place for a little while. Today's been a long day, some time to wind down will be nice."
"Mm." Koneko-chan smiled, slowing her walk to fall behind by two steps. "Hold on tight, Kuro-chan."
My expression shifted into a deadpan again when Koneko swept me off my feet.
Damn princess carry.
Chapter 42: Koneko Kidnaps a Kitty
Koneko Kidnaps a Kitty
"Neighborly Heights" Apartment Complex
(Shortly past midnight, July 14th)
"Hnnnng… nyaaaa~" The young woman stretched upwards with a groaning purr, before letting her arms fall to her sides from above her head.
'Today was a great day to have a spa night~' Kuroka thought with a lazy smile as she languidly walked down the stairs in nothing but a fluffy pink bath robe. 'My Shirone still can't teleport other people with her, so I should have plenty of time left to sit back and watch something with a nice drink.'
Her "landlord" was with her sister after all, and they were about as far away from her current home as they could get while still being in Kuoh; the complete opposite end of town entirely. Even returning at their quickest, her Shirone would have to carry Nyaruto back home physically, giving her plenty of time to notice and clean up after herself.
Kuroka hummed as she padded into the kitchen barefoot, opening the fridge while wondering what she should have.
'Nyaruto doesn't stock it, so Booze is out; I'd have to go grab one of my stashes. Pass.'
Her eyes landed on a carton with a picture of a cow on it, and she grinned. "Purrfect!"
Pulling out the milk, she grabbed a mug from one of the cabinets, and poured a glass of the sweet liquid while moving towards the microwave.
The pleasant hum of the appliance filled the kitchen as she waited for her drink to warm up, putting away the milk carton and cleaning up her water dish in the meantime. While she didn't mind it much while she was in cat form, because she was a cat, looking at the bowl full of her own backwash-water while in human form was kinda gross.
When the microwave timer went off and beeped its completion, Kuroka pulled out the mug with both hands and took a deep breath through her nose, savoring the nostalgic smell of the steaming sugary drink.
Just as she was about to take a sip however, Kuroka stiffened.
'Why now?!'
The teleportation circle Shirone had set up in the apartment's living room had sparked to life, 'spinning up' so-to-speak in her magical senses, and sure enough, Kuroka could feel her sister's demonic power start connecting to the circle from across town.
In the fraction of a fraction of a second it took her to react and consider her options, her newly-cleaned bowl popped into her mind.
'Purrfect!'
Koneko always found it a bit of a weird feeling to suddenly be somewhere else in an instant.
Unlike her friends, whose senses were "only" enhanced compared to a human's due to their Devil biology, her sense of hearing and smell was magnitudes stronger than the rest of them, even a high-class pureblood like Rias. Even when her cat ears were hidden.
Going from literally anywhere outside– whether in a city or the wilderness– straight to indoors with a teleport, was always a bit jarring. Scents popped out of existence for new ones to fill her nose, and the ever-present sounds of life and civilization stopped instantly, replaced by the groaning of water pipes and near-silent hum of electricity in the walls.
Which was why she snapped to attention the moment the familiar smell of freshly warmed milk and the sound of a cat's tongue greedily lapping up liquid reached her.
Someone had been here.
Koneko's eyes narrowed as she rushed towards the kitchen, her mind conjuring hypothetical images of the mysterious senjutsu user she was certain had been keeping her Naruto-kun alive.
When she entered the room, her eyes locked onto Kuro, the black cat pausing in her drink to glance back at her. Unknown to Koneko, understanding dawned in "Kuro's" eyes; She had, in her hubris, forgotten one small detail that was only relevant because Koneko saw her as "just a regular cat".
There was a moment of silence before they both moved.
Kuro practically dunked her head into the bowl of milk, desperate for a few more gulps, before Koneko snatched her up by the scruff, one hand under her armpits to support the now-limp fully grown cat's weight more comfortably.
"Nn, stupid mysterious sage…" Koneko muttered with a frown while moving over to the sink.
Just because she could stomach them keeping themselves hidden if it meant her friend kept receiving a steady supply of life-force, that didn't mean she wasn't going to be annoyed if they pulled stuff like this.
Most adult cats are lactose intolerant. And even the ones that don't have issues with lactose itself, still have trouble processing the other proteins, especially when it comes to cows milk.
The point is that despite what cartoons would have you believe, milk wasn't good for cats!
Koneko eyed the mug that was obviously used to microwave the milk while she turned on the water, and proceeded to gently clean the pathetically mewling cat's muzzle even as Kuro attempted to lick up what remained on her face.
'If I just leave her here, they might come back and give her more,' Koneko thought when she finished drying the feline. 'Hmm…'
In the end, she decided to take Kuro with her when she finally looked at the text Naruto had sent her after emptying and cleaning out the cat bowl.
After all, while she couldn't yet teleport other people, small normal animals weren't much of an issue.
Koneko nodded to herself and marched the two of them upstairs to grab the cane-sword from his room. When she finally had it in hand, she stuffed it under her armpit to text him that she was ready. A few seconds after she sent the last message and put her phone away, she felt Naruto summon her back; sword in one hand, depressively whining cat in the other.
Kuroka sulked, even as she secretly assisted her baby sister with teleporting the "normal" cat that she currently looked like.
And she'd been having such a nice night until then, too...