POV: Haruki
Let me preface this with something very important: Uno is not just a game. Uno is war. Uno is the psychological battleground where relationships die, alliances crumble, and chaos reigns supreme. Uno is the ultimate test of character, morals, and how far you're willing to go to not draw sixteen cursed cards.
"You can't put a +2 card on a +4 card. That goes against the rules," Rias said, arms crossed and that smug Gremory pout activated. Her nails tapped against her arm rhythmically, a subtle sign of how deeply she was committed to winning this stupid match - which was, I should clarify, ontologically precluded. Rias Gremory is not winning this game, not while I draw breath.
"What rules? There are no actual rules in Uno," I replied, spreading my hands like a prophet delivering truth to the masses. "It's cultural anarchy. The cards are just vibes. Of course you can stack a +2 on a +4. That's basic Uno escalation logic. I didn't make the rules, nature did."
We were playing "family bonding time," aka Rias's idea of quality peerage interaction, which is apparently playing Uno. It sounds harmless until you realize teenagers are inherently competitive and also have a flair for melodrama. Add that to our emotional baggage and general need to prove dominance, and you've basically weaponized Mattel.
Anyway, I was about to win. Two cards left. Then boom, out of nowhere: Akeno, Issei, Koneko, and Kiba - traitors, all - stacked +4s like they were building the Tower of Babel, leaving me to draw 16 cards. Or I would've, if I hadn't pulled out a glorious +2 like Excalibur from the stone. And now Rias was trying to gaslight me with non-existent Uno law because she would be the one to draw 18 cards if it went through.
And so let me reiterate, Uno is a test of how long you can stay friends with someone before threatening them with a fireball. And I can see how close Rias was to doing exactly that.
"You can't just make up rules because you're about to lose!" Rias snapped, entering full redhead-rage mode, which was admittedly very cute. Unfortunately for her, my judgment was impervious to feminine allure, certainly nowhere near susceptible enough to grant her special dispensation on the strength of a few biological trivium.
"You're literally inventing rules right now. This isn't Yu-Gi-Oh. We don't need a judge. Just let me stack!" I said, slamming the +2 card down with the flair of someone who took great joy in being insufferable.
Kiba, the human embodiment of a truce flag, chimed in. "Guys, it's really not that serious. We can just agree on rules and restart the game."
"It is that serious," Rias and I said in unison, locking eyes like duelists about to activate our trap cards. This was getting personal now.
Uno a psychological warfare simulator, a stress test for friendships, and a detailed personality analysis tool. It exposes your true self. Apparently, mine is that of a petty tyrant with no shame, and Rias's is... the same but with better hair and glorious tits.
Issei and Akeno were the real villains here, sitting back like popcorn-guzzling Reddit mods watching a flame war unfold. I expected this from Akeno, she's sadistic, but Issei too? Turns out the guy is a chaos goblin. And he was clearly enjoying the way Rias's breasts jiggled every time she yelled. Understandable, really. Horny, but understandable.
"I'm so sick of you making up rules when you're losing!" Rias yelled, now mocking my voice like we were in a schoolyard. Her hands flailed mid-air as she mimicked me. "'Well actually, you have to say Uno before your last card...' Like shut up, nerd!"
"That's literally the actual rule." I threw my hands up, because sometimes justice demands jazz hands. "It's called Uno because you say Uno when you have one card. That's not a house rule, that's branding."
"Just because you're a spoiled brat who always gets his way doesn't mean you're always right," Rias snapped, jabbing a finger at me.
"Isn't that like the pot calling the kettle black?" whispered Issei to Akeno. Akeno giggled. Of course she did. She feeds off this like a fly on spoiled milk.
"Hey, I heard that!" I said, glaring at him. "Don't you dare compare me to a spoiled heiress who's never been told no in her life. I'm actually in the right here. I'm not throwing a tantrum just because things aren't going my way!"
Ragebaiting the cute redhead was becoming far more satisfying than I cared to admit, especially when every little provocation made the color rise in her cheeks and brought out that adorable pout. Rias was wonderfully expressive when irritated, and there was something dangerously appealing about watching her composure unravel because of me. I found myself wanting to see exactly how far I could push her.
Rias stood up, flipping the table. "You wanna take this outside, you bastard?"
"Bring it on, bitch," I replied with a shit-eating grin. My posture was already halfway into a shounen battle stance.
Kiba and Issei held me back, while Koneko and Akeno restrained Rias. Honestly, it looked like a WWE standoff.
"Time out, time out," Akeno said, laughing as though we hadn't just declared card-based blood war.
Eventually, the committee of Reasonable People (read: Kiba) called for a truce and suggested we play something less likely to trigger nuclear escalation: Truth or Dare. The ultimate peacekeeping tool of hormonal teens. You'd think that would be safer. It wasn't.
At first, things were pretty chill. Kiba asked Koneko how many kids she wanted (zero, obviously). Issei dared Akeno to do a tango with a broom, which she absolutely did while making sultry eye contact with literally everyone. I may have discovered a new kink somewhere during that performance, though further experimentation would be required before reaching any scientifically defensible conclusions.
Then Rias, still salty about the Uno war, asked, "Truth or dare, Haruki?"
"Dare," I said instantly.
I'm not a coward. I leaned back, arms behind my head, smirking like someone who had nothing to lose and everything to flex.
"Strip," Rias said with a sadistic grin. "Everything except your pants."
Everyone paused. There had been a few mildly sexual dares already, certainly, but this was the first full-scale offensive, and naturally it had been launched by the supposed King of the peerage, the one person who should have had enough dignity to rise above petty revenge. Rias looked unbearably triumphant, wearing the expression of a general who had finally discovered the fatal weakness of a longtime enemy and fully intended to exploit it.
She thought I'd hesitate. She assumed I had shame.
She assumed wrong.
I stripped down to my pants, revealing a toned body built through years of relentless training, unhealthy coping mechanisms, and a complete disregard for sleep. Then, because modesty had never been among one of my virtues, I made a point of meeting each member of my audience's eyes while they took in the view. I was in the prime of my life, damn it, and what was the point of spending all those hours at the gym if I couldn't show off a little in front of a couple of beautiful girls?
"Ara ara~ Aren't you a naughty boy?" Akeno teased, fingers suggestively in her mouth.
"Damn, bro. You work out?" Issei said, eyes wide.
"Of course," I said, channeling peak Greek gym bro. "No man has the right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training. It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which he is capable."
"Hegel speaks of this," Issei said smugly, doing the fake anime glasses push.
"No, he doesn't. Did you even read any of his books?"
"No. Did you?"
"No."
Evidently Issei was a man of culture. Which loser reads Hegel anyway?
Rias looked annoyed that I took her dare without blinking. She expected to fluster me, but I am unflusterable. Mostly because I have the social grace of a reality TV villain. Also, shame is for people without abs.
"Truth or dare?" I asked Rias, voice serious. I crossed my arms now, standing tall like an executioner about to pass judgment.
"Dare," she said, prideful and reckless. Her tone was defiant, but I could see the micro-twitch in her eye. She wasn't expecting mercy. Nor will she receive it.
"I commend your bravery. The hardest choices require the strongest wills," I said solemnly, quoting Thanos. Not that they'd get it. Avengers isn't even a thing here yet.
"I dare you ...to give a three-minute stand-up comedy routine."
Shock. Confusion. Betrayal.
Everyone expected me to retaliate with horny energy. But I'm not a basic anime protagonist who fumbles every time a girl gets naked. Okay, I am that, but I've got a strategy. That wasn't the dare anyone expected. Certainly not Rias, who was already mentally preparing to strip in retaliation. But I don't just do petty. I do tactical petty.
Rias is a shameless nudist. Daring her to strip would be like daring a fish to swim. No, what she hates is looking uncool. Looking unfunny? That's her nightmare.
"Bro, you blew your chance. You were supposed to be the chosen one," Issei moaned, like I'd just left him burning on Mustafar.
You don't understand, Issei. She thought she could out-petty me. I was born in the petty. Molded by it.
"You thought you were the player? Well, nice to meet you. I'm the coach," I told her, basking in my own smugness.
Cringe? Maybe. But I felt like the main character. And that's what matters.
"That was so cringe, dude," said Issei.
"Yeah? Well, fuck you too," I replied.
Rias tried to protest, but she followed through. And her jokes? They weren't funny. Like, at all. Think open-mic night in hell. Kiba smiled politely because he's Kiba. Issei laughed way too hard because he's Issei. Doing anything to hit. I respect the commitment.
Rias finished her comedy set. No one clapped. She glared at me with a look that promised vengeance, and dear God, thank you for making me intelligent enough to appreciate art when I saw it. The expression on that red-haired femme fatale's face was magnificent. Asking a beautiful devil to get naked would have been nothing beyond a horny lapse in judgment, offering me a few moments of crude satisfaction and little else.
I aspired to higher things. What I sought was art, and few artistic endeavors could rival placing a gorgeous redhead with a notorious temper in increasingly ridiculous situations just to watch what happened. There was an aesthetic purity to it that I treasured immensely. Uno might have ended, but the war certainly had not. Rias would plot her revenge, I would inevitably provoke her again, and I wouldn't have had it any other way.
…
[Two Hours Later]
Everyone had gone home, and all things considered, the evening had been surprisingly fun. Despite my best efforts to the contrary, I was finding it increasingly difficult to dislike Rias or her peerage on any personal level. I finished sorting the Monopoly cards back into their proper places and noticed that the others had already cleared away the empty wrappers, bottles, and assorted remains of our snacks before leaving.
I was halfway to ghosting out of the clubroom when I noticed Rias hadn't moved. She stood there, arms loosely crossed, not looking at me per se but clearly thinking at me. You know that look people get when they're clearly thinking about something but pretending to admire the view? Yeah. That.
So I sat down. And please don't misunderstand me, I'm not doing this because I'm emotionally available or whatever, It's just my gut said this wasn't over. And because bailing on your boss mid-existential crisis is technically an HR violation. Probably.
"You didn't leave with the others," Rias said, without turning around.
"You looked like you had something to say," I said with a shrug. "Figured it'd be rude to Irish goodbye after the whole table-flipping incident."
She cracked a smile, barely. "You read the room better than you let on."
"Not my first dysfunctional game night." I slouched further into the couch, arms behind my head. "I've been through Monopoly sessions that ended in blood feuds."
There was an awkward pause at that. Just long enough to imply something heavy was loading in the background.
"Can I ask you something?" she said finally.
"I mean, you resurrected me. Pretty sure that comes with a lifetime Q&A pass."
She turned, her expression unreadable. "...Do you hate me?"
The question came out far more directly than I expected. There was no playfulness in her voice, no smug little smile to suggest she was joking. I considered her question and glanced thoughtfully around the room. Anime figurines crowded the shelves alongside framed illustrations, character pillows, themed rugs, and enough assorted merchandise to make her particular obsession rather obvious. More interesting were several classical paintings depicting distinctly occult subjects, though beyond those peculiarities, the room could easily have belonged to an ordinary girl, albeit one with an unusually generous budget for her hobbies and an enthusiastic collector's instinct.
"No," I said, flatly. "You're annoying sometimes, but you're not hateable."
She smiled a little, like that answer satisfied her but also confirmed something she'd already known. Or hoped.
She finally looked at me. "Then why do you act like being here is a prison sentence?"
She was finally addressing the devil-shaped elephant in the room. I had to respect her for confronting me so directly and simply saying what was on her mind. I always had a thing for honest people.
"It's not about you," I said, which was, admittedly, what people say right before making it about you. "It's the whole 'slave-by-reincarnation' thing. I don't do well with… servitude. Or authority. Or hierarchies built on soul-binding magical chess pieces."
The beast may be born beneath the yoke, yet man was born with his face toward heaven, and no hand beneath heaven was ordained to own him.
My freedom belonged to me and me alone, and neither death, resurrection, gratitude, nor all the laws of Hell could make me regard its surrender as anything less than sacrilege.
"You say I act like it is a prison sentence," I sighed, running a hand through my hair. "Well…..because it kind of is. I didn't exactly apply for this gig. I died helping you fight a cyclops. Next thing I know, I've got wings and a job title I never asked for. You're nice, unnaturally nice, for a devil, but that doesn't change the fact that I'm bound to you…to be your property, Whether I wanted it or not."
She crossed her arms. "You're not a slave," she said, a faint defensiveness creeping into her voice.
"Semantics," I replied flatly. "I signed no contract and gave no consent. You resurrected me without so much as a conversation, and if I decided to leave you tomorrow, I'd be hunted down like a rabid dog without anything resembling due process. Consent kind of died with me, Rias."
Her mouth tightened. She clearly wanted to argue, though for once she seemed unable to find a loophole in my reasoning.
"I couldn't just let you die," she said. "You threw yourself in front of that Cyclops to protect me, Haruki. You barely knew me, and somehow neither that nor the sight of a monster straight out of a nightmare stopped you from jumping in to help me. What kind of person would I be if I simply stood there afterward and let you die?"
Dumbest decision of my life. And yet, I don't regret it. In hindsight, sure, I could say Rias was powerful enough to survive the last cyclops. Probably. But I didn't know that. For Big G's sake, the only thing I remembered from the anime was that she was hot. I skipped half the damn plot. I had no clue how peerages worked. I vaguely recalled her vaporizing that fallen angel girl, but that told me nothing about how she'd handle giant mythological murder-beasts. I'm pretty sure cyclopes weren't even in the show. Then again, past-me was too busy skipping scenes to get to the jiggle physics, so what do I know?
At that moment, I didn't know if she'd survive. She fell into a trap. She could've died. And what was I supposed to do? Just stand there or run and let a classmate get crushed?
What would I even say to my conscience?
Sorry, virtue wasn't convenient today?
No. I jumped.
"I know. And I don't blame you. Reckless stupidity is kind of my thing," I said, shrugging. "But I don't regret helping. I just didn't think the price would be… this. Waking up and realizing I'm technically property now? That's a different kind of death."
"Why don't you hate me, then?" Rias asked.
"Why would I hate you?" I replied. "I could no more hate you for resurrecting me than I could hate myself for jumping to an almost certain death to help you. We both did what we believed was right at the time."
"I may have stolen eternity from you," she said softly, her voice barely above a whisper. "I saw the cross around your neck when I resurrected you, though the attack had broken it into pieces. You're a Christian, aren't you?" She continued after my nod. "Then you must understand by now that devils live for perhaps ten thousand years, and afterward we return to what we came from. Ex nihilo venimus. The Morning Star fashioned our race from nothing, and when our lives end, we simply cease to exist. There is no afterlife waiting for us."
"A fascinating piece of information, but I'm not entirely sure what your point is," I said, despite knowing exactly where she was going.
"Isn't it obvious?" Rias lowered her gaze, her fingers tightening slightly against her arms. "I stole your eternity because I wanted to repay a debt. A human soul endures beyond death, and yours could have gone to Paradise, to stand before your Creator and join the hymns of Heaven forever. I took that possibility from you without ever asking what you wanted, all because I couldn't bear the thought of owing my life to someone I had allowed to die."
I was genuinely stunned by this development. A devil, of all creatures, was apologizing for saving my life because she could not bear the thought of allowing me to die for her sake, and somehow she had also managed to feel guilty for robbing me of Paradise in the process. What a divine comedy this entire situation had become. The absurdity finally overwhelmed me, and I burst into hysterical laughter until my sides began to hurt.
Rias Gremory, you have thoroughly stunned me~
"D-did I say something funny?" Rias asked once my laughter finally subsided. She looked terribly nervous and seemed reluctant to meet my eyes.
"Don't you see the irony?" I asked, still grinning. "A devil apologizing to a former human for depriving him of his chance to enter Heaven? Oh, the sincerity of it all." I shook my head, unable to suppress another laugh. "You needn't worry about that, though. My faith in God is something of an evaporated sentiment these days. The cross was simply a gift from my sister."
"Oh," Rias said, apparently uncertain how she was supposed to respond to that.
"Oh, indeed," I replied, amused.
"But you didn't know any of this was real before," she insisted. "Now you know He truly exists, and so do Heaven and eternal life. Don't you feel even a little angry that I took that chance away from you?"
"My lack of faith has very little to do with the availability of proof for His existence," I said, and left it at that.
Rias didn't respond immediately. Instead, she shifted her weight to one foot, conversational vulnerability unlocked, and said, "You're insanely talented. Maybe more than anyone I've seen. You pick up magic like it's instinct. And yet you always look like you're waiting to escape."
"Because I am," I said, admitting what might be considered treason, but unless I horrifically misjudged Rias's character then she wont really try to harm me. "Even if there's nowhere to go. Because it's not about the place nor about you. It's about the principle of the matter. About being mine - there can be no one to push a claim on my person."
That earned me long silence. She wasn't angry silence, that much I could tell. She was just processing what I had just said.
"...So you hate the peerage system."
"Obviously. I'm a shonen protagonist, Rias. I have to be allergic to authority. It's in the contract."
She laughed quietly at that, but her expression didn't really soften. She was thinking. That kind of intense, Gremory-brand contemplation that usually led to bad things for other people and great drama for her.
"But you don't hate me."
"I said that twice already."
"So what do you want, Haruki? You want me to release you?"
"Would you?"
She did not answer immediately, falling quiet as her expression grew contemplative. Then a mischievous smile slowly returned to her lips, though a faint trace of melancholy still lingered beneath it.
"Alright then," she said suddenly. "Let's make a deal."
My internal alarms pinged. Whenever devils offer deals, you either get scammed, seduced, or sent to another dimension.
"Devils making deals?" I raised my eyebrow. "What an original concept."
"You'll stay in my peerage," she continued, ignoring my sarcasm. "but with an open mind. I won't force you to do contracts. I won't ask you to raise your status or play politics. I'll respect your boundaries. But for six months, you try. You learn. You live with us. If at the end of that, you still feel like you don't belong, like this isn't freedom, I'll release you. I'll even make sure you're not declared a stray."
"Why go that far?" I said, narrowing my eyes. "You didn't have to offer me a choice. I'm technically bound to you already. What's the angle?"
She looked away, then back at me, almost shy. Shy. From Rias Gremory. Unheard of.
"Because I see my peerage as family. Not property. I don't want to force anyone to be here who doesn't want to be." Her voice softened more than I thought possible. "And… because you risked your life to protect me. I won't repay that by taking away your freedom. Even if it's to my advantage."
…Okay, emotionally disarming me had definitely not been part of the game plan. How dare she have the audacity to prove she wasn't some vile demon I could conveniently hate and plot against with a clean conscience?
"Damn. That's the most un-devil-like thing a devil's ever said to me." I sat down slowly.
She rolled her eyes, but the smile was back. "Take it or leave it."
"...Alright. Deal," I said. "But you better keep your word. No shady fine print or surprise clauses where I end up sold to the Sitri clan or something."
"Cross my heart," she said, doing the gesture. "And besides it is a formal deal. So I can't go back on my word" she added.
A formal deal was something very serious, it had catastrophic consequences if broken. There was a long comfortable pause for once.
"Can I ask something?" I said. "Why were you that hyped about my magic potential?"
Her expression faltered for a second. "Because," she said, "I thought you might be able to help me."
I raised an eyebrow. "Help you… how?"
"I'm betrothed." She exhaled, sitting beside me. "To someone I don't want to marry. My family made the deal years ago. I have time until I graduate university before the pressure starts. But if I can build a powerful enough peerage of strong and loyal devils who stand with me. I plan to challenge it. Break it and win my freedom."
I blinked. "Wow. So we're both prisoners, just in different flavors. That's almost poetic. Should we start a club?"
That explaind why Issei barged into the engagement party. If I had paid attention to the anime, I wouldn't have to worry about how I'm going to escape this servitude. I could have used that knowledge to make a better plan, but oh well.
She gave a tired laugh. "Exactly. That's why I understand your desire to be free. I'd be a hypocrite not to. I would've hated me too, if I were in your shoes. I also want the freedom to choose. To marry someone I love and who loves me back. Not someone who sees me as a status upgrade."
I raised an eyebrow. "So you were hoping I'd be your secret weapon?"
"Kind of."
I laughed. "Man, we really are in an anime. 'Beautiful noble lady coerced into marriage enlists the help of her rebellious underling to win her freedom.'"
"I hate that you're not wrong."
"Does this make me the brooding antihero or the shonen comic relief?"
"You're both. With abs." said Rias looking at my body.
"Damn right."
"Is your fiancé really that bad?" I asked, cracking a grin.
She laughed again, this time with more warmth. "As far as devils go, he's not awful. Arrogant and entitled, maybe. But not evil. Just… not someone I feel anything for. Not someone I want."
"...Yeah, I get that." I nodded slowly.
And I really did. More than I wanted to admit.
"Well," I said, holding out my hand. "Six months. No orders. No manipulation. Just… mutual agreement."
She took my hand and shook it.
"Deal."
And for the first time since I got reincarnated into this nonsense, it almost felt like I chose to be here