[Third Person POV]
After spending nearly eight percent of his soul energy creating homies, Hajime went to bed early, drained from the costs.
When he woke up the next morning, he stretched before climbing out of bed while processing the memories of his shadow clones who dispelled themselves a few hours after heading to sleep.
Feeling his soul with his Devil Fruit, he sensed a slight recovery, but at the current rate, it would take several months, unless he found a way to speed it up.
While Hajime finished getting ready for the day, he sent clones to gather his summons for a conversation.
Preparing the vegetables he promised Bunnicula as payment for accidentally dousing him in holy energy, Hajime thought about his plans for later.
When breakfast was done, Hajime returned to the training field, greeted by his summons and clones.
"Yesterday I told you all what I expected from you," Hajime began. "My clones will teach you what you need to learn, but that doesn't mean you won't have a choice in specializations."
Pam, now noticeably calmer, raised her hand. Nodding at her, she spoke, "You said you'd teach us magic, right?"
"Yes."
"As- interesting, as that might be, is it really necessary? I can't imagine that learning magic is a quick thing. Besides, didn't you say you brought me here to do paperwork? Why would I need to fight?"
"I might not have explained it properly, but this world is very dangerous. Magic is the only way to survive, and the only way to guarantee your safety is to know how to use it. You could probably survive even without it, but the guarantee of your survival diminishes.
The strongest individuals in this world can annihilate an entire country at their strongest. If you aren't strong enough, then you could die simply by being exposed to their unrestrained aura.
What's worse in your case, Pam, there are thousands of criminals across the dozens of factions, and each of them would kill any random person if they could. You should be thankful that you get to learn to defend yourself since there are an uncountable number of people who've died not knowing what happened."
That silenced Pam.
"I don't say this to discourage or scare you, but to have you realize things are different.
Pam, in your world, someone like the Scranton Strangler was considered a threat that could dominate the news for months. Here? He wouldn't even be a footnote in history.
The supernatural world, although separate from the human world, drives the world forward. Politicians, businesspeople, celebrities, and numerous other prominent figures are all involved with the supernatural. Depending on their strength, a single supernatural criminal could kill thousands before anything is done; that is the danger I need you to understand.
Aside from you, everyone else comes from a world filled with danger. I understand that you still need to adapt to everything, but trying to act like nothing has changed won't help."
Pam, though clearly upset hearing that, nodded.
"Then, is there any art magic I can learn? I always wanted to be an artist, but I never completed art school or my mural."
"That won't be a problem. I'm not sure of the art magic from my world, but I know Jenny's world has something that you might like."
Pam's lips barely curled up hearing that.
"Anyone else?"
"I just wish to improve my blacksmithing." Hajime nodded in understanding at Welf.
"I wouldn't mind learning some magic that complements my fighting style," Blake said.
"That's doable. I'd probably suggest shadow magic, or I could try teaching you some ninjutsu if possible."
"I don't really have any magic I want to learn, though I wouldn't mind something cool that works with my Takeover magic."
"Then you should probably choose something like lightning or metal magic since it might be able to enhance your abilities."
"I'll take whatever you're willing to teach me, Hajime-sama."
"Then we'll work on improving your Haki first, Monet. Haki is the strongest ability in your world, and it is the reason Garp, Roger, and Shanks are all so formidable."
Once he had all their magic preferences. Hajime dismissed them, providing them with a clone to help with their training.
While his clones focused on teaching his newest recruits, Hajime had already set out to hunt for a couple of strays.
-----
Now several dozen miles from the outskirts of Kyoto, Hajime had reached the first stray needed for his plans.
There were a few things he planned to test today, none of which he wanted a witness for.
The first thing he was doing was strengthening Yatsufusa. It could originally hold a maximum of eight puppets, each of which would obey the user.
With the changes after it became a homie, Hajime instinctively knew what it could do, now containing a piece of his soul.
Yatsufusa, which was at the beginner stage of mid-class, was able to hold ten puppets that could now be given pre-programmed commands. He could give commands like 'fire' so they'd all attack at once, as well as instructions on who to hit.
That's when he arrived at the stray's location.
With all his sensing abilities, it was effortless to track it once he got close.
Busting the door down, he quickly blitzed the rogue mage, knocking them down and tying them up with some string before they could even cast a spell.
The rogue was extremely weak, barely even an intermediate-stage low-class.
That didn't matter, though; he just needed a test subject.
With a swing of Yatsufusa, the blade plunged into his heart, ending his life.
Yatsufusa then glowed, causing the corpse to glow too. When a small black orb appeared from the corpse and flew to Yatsufusa, Hajime knew it was done.
The corpse, as soon as the orb touched the blade, turned into dust.
Willing Yatsufusa to summon its puppet, it complied. Hajime then saw a human, nearly identical to the one he had killed, burst out of the ground like a zombie, which they were.
Although physically identical, magically, Hajime could tell that the corpse was different. The magic they now had felt stagnant and rotten, like dirty water. The puppet would never learn new magic or increase its reserves, meaning Hajime needed to kill more powerful rogues, preferably of different races.
Hajime could obtain devils' imagination magic, fallen holy magic, yokai senjutsu, and youjutsu, as well as humans with sacred gears and dragons' conceptual magic, through Yatsufusa.
Though dragons rarely became rogues, there were evil dragons like Crom Cruach that were fair game if he was strong enough.
Meanwhile, there were plenty of rogues from all other races scattered around the world.
Ironically, that meant that the people he wanted to meet most were lower-ranked people from the Khaos Brigade. It would be hitting two birds with one stone, weakening a dangerous enemy while strengthening himself.
After giving some basic commands to the corpse, which it follows, Hajime wills it to disappear for now, causing it to turn to dust like before.
Pulling the compass homie, which Hajime named Anemoi, from his pocket, he had it bring him to the closest rogue with something unique about them.
Dragging him north, Hajime found himself in the middle of an abandoned warehouse district.
As he entered, he could feel the surroundings shift, gaining a more corrupted feel.
Hajime realized he had entered a warded location. The corrupted feel likely meant the wards were powered by darker magic, possibly draining lifeforce to use it.
Moving toward where the corrupted energy was spiking, Hajime entered a warehouse, finding three people standing next to each other.
The first was a grotesque mangling of flesh. As if a human wanted to become a hydra but stopped midway through. The neck was large and elongated, split into seven different throats, yet only one head connected them all. His body was bloated, with a teal and purple coloring visible from all sides. Four large arms, twice the length of a regular person, stuck out from him. A large pair of tails stuck out from behind, though the tails were fused halfway up their lengths.
The entire head itself was twice the size it should've been, while their face was extremely ugly. Large teeth stuck out of his mouth like an anglerfish, scraping the flesh around his mouth. His eyes glowed a sickly green, as if already displaying his poisonous abilities.
The magic aura that the thing released told him why they were so deformed; it was a stray devil.
With the separation from their master, their magic altered their body, turning them into this misshapen freak.
The other two were much more normal, dressed in robes of some kind. One wore blue robes, and the other black, but there was nothing to identify their previous affiliation.
A few feet away from them was a ritual circle, something they were clearly preparing to use soon.
How did Hajime know they were using it soon?
Along the wall behind them were several large dog cages stacked on top of each other. Inside those cages were people. In total, there were twenty people, all kidnapped and prepared for whatever ritual these guys were preparing.
Judging the three enemies, each was surprisingly a high class fighter. Something that greatly concerned Hajime even more was the stray devil, who was at peak high class.
That made things much clearer. The ritual was an attempt to force him into ultimate class. From there, two things might happen. Either the stray kills the two mages or protects them, using their brains to his brawn.
Hajime couldn't let them succeed, not just because a rogue ultimate class was dangerous for the nearby area, but because he had no idea what else the ritual might do.
For all he knew, it might restore the mind of the stray, allowing him to use his enhanced abilities more effectively.
Even though he was a peak ultimate class himself, that didn't mean fighting another ultimate class would be easy. Hajime didn't know what kind of magic any of these guys had learned, so they could easily be greater threats than he could tell.
Targetting the stray devil first, Hajime leapt out, enhancing his speed with lightning magic, only for his fist to be caught by the devil.
"Well, well, it seems a child thinks he can stop me." The devil smugly taunted. "Think again!" The devil grunted as he threw Hajime into a wall. "Hurry with the ritual!" He told the two mages.
The stray charged at Hajime, his large body showing none of the slowness you'd anticipate, moving as fast as a horse.
Slamming two fists into the wall, Hajime jumped to the side, avoiding the stray's fists, which punched through the stone that was one foot thick.
The stray ripped his hands from the wall, which caused the holes in it to grow larger. Swinging his tails at Hajime, Hajime ducked below one and jumped over the other, doing his best to avoid getting hit.
The stray, though peak high class, was as strong as an ultimate class devil, likely only needing a boost in magic reserves. In fact, the stray was about as strong as a beginner stage ultimate class, implying just how low his magic reserves were in comparison, possibly only barely high class.
Though not as extreme, this stray was similar to Sairaorg, focusing on raw strength as opposed to magic.
As Hajime used his string abilities to pull himself away, the stray opened his mouth and projectile vomited a large amount of poison from the seven throats.
Hajime shuddered in disgust at the attack, but didn't let his guard down.
As he was about to attack, a fireball came from one of the mages, while the other was headed toward the cages, clearly ready to start the ritual.
Using his string powers, Hajime pulled himself up to the ceiling and fell toward the other mage, something his two co-conspirators tried to stop.
Landing on the mage's back, Hajime leapt off him before turning and standing in front of the cages.
Creating a clone, he activated his barrier quirk to protect the civilians, while Hajime was planning on dealing with the rogues himself.
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Author's Note:
Thanks for reading; I'll see you next time!