"...Naruto-sempai. May I ask you a question?"
The shinobi turned to face Koneko with a nod, she seemed to be struggling to ask him something.
After a moment of gathering her wits about her, she asked her question.
"...Are you sure that this person's energy was demonic? Absolutely sure?" Koneko asked seriously, her eyes intense.
Rias and Akeno glanced at one another uneasily, knowing where this line of question was going.
Naruto frowned and thought about it.
"Nope. It was definitely demonic energy. Do you have an idea of who this masked guy could be, Koneko-san?"
Koneko bit her lip for a second, contemplating on the situation. Hiding energy sources sounded like something that a proficient senjutsu user could utilize...
Was it possible for her big sister to be involved in this...?
She shook her head, Naruto himself said that he sensed demonic energy...senjutsu shifted the ki flow inside the body to make it extremely difficult for people to sense them properly. So her big sister couldn't have been involved in this incident.
The young silverlette let out a sigh of relief at that.
Naruto stared at her for a little while longer, wondering what the deal was, before leaving her to her thoughts.
He had to address something else.
"Rias-san. Is it possible that you could call that maid here again? I'd like to send those women to your brother so that they can get treatment and maybe find out who led them." the shinobi asked, giving her a slightly apologetic look.
He knew damn well that Rias probably didn't want to see any of her family members right not. For obvious reasons, but this still had to be done.
Rias sighed and rubbed her brow in her stress, she also knew that this needed to be done. Leaving emotionally damaged women on the couch was something that needed to be dealt with and she wasn't anywhere near heartless enough to leave them without getting some help.
Something that her 'onii-sama' could very well have.
"Naruto-san, perhaps this discussion should continue after we get some rest? We are all quite exhausted after all." Yuuto said quietly, his eyelids were closing by themselves due to his exhaustion.
Koneko was also beginning to nod off.
The only ones who were seemingly fine at the moment was Rias and Akeno...but the red-head was obviously looking more 'tired' than usual.
Naruto sighed, the knight was right. He didn't mean to talk about more than what happened. The Gremory team obviously needed some rest.
"Alright then, we'll talk about this tomorrow. Get some rest, everyone." Naruto declared.
Rias gave the blond a grateful smile, everyone really needed some rest.
So as one, everyone filed out of the room in order to do just that.
But before everyone left, he felt a dainty hand place itself on his shoulder and squeeze.
His eyes glanced at the owner and watched as she gave him a smile and mouthed something to him silently.
'Thank you.'
For even Akeno-san to be worried...Rias-san must have had a rough day huh?
He sent a grin her way and gave her a thumbs up.
Akeno giggled slightly and began her own trek towards her room.
As he was left alone in the spare room where they held the discussion, he sighed and realized that he pushed another issue onto the red-headed devil at a time when she already had a lot on her plate.
He wasn't wrong in telling her about it...he just could've had better timing.
Ah well...not like he could have dealt with the issue at another time. It was that masked bastard that had the bad timing.
Just another thing to take him down for.
Naruto quickly checked outside, wondering whether he should get back to bed or not.
It was still night.
Well, back to bed it was.
He quickly went back to the futon in the living room in order to switch back to with his clone.
A quick kawarimi later and he was back to his original position.
The blond closed his eyes and tried to get some more sleep...
Uzumaki Naruto was beginning to hate magic circles.
Like the last time he sensed one, he immediately jolted awake. Aware that yesterday's experience made him hyper-aware of any and all demonic energy used in his close vicinity.
But like last time, it was a false alarm.
He knew this demonic energy.
That maid was back.
He blearily looked away from Mio's red hair for a moment in order to check a window and determine what time it was...
...
Dawn maybe? The sun looked like it was just beginning to peek over the horizon...also the night wasn't entirely gone yet.
His internal clock must be pretty messed up right now.
After that, he pushed his face back down to the futon, trying to get some more sleep and trying to ignore the shuffling movements of the maid. She was obviously here to pick up the Peerage members of that masked guy.
Did that mean that Rias-san was awake too? Or did she alert Grayfia-san before she headed to bed?
Either way, after a couple of minutes of rustling clothes, he felt another magic circle form and whisk the powerful energy signal of the maid away.
Well...at least that issue was taken care of.
Since the unconscious women were taken by the maid; Grayfia, it allowed for her energy signature to disappear, and for another to become more prominent.
Well, it turned out that Rias-san was awake.
He figured that since his adrenaline was coursing through his veins...again...that he may as well wake up for good this time around.
A good chance to talk to the Gremory heiress now that she was awake.
So just like before, he made a clone and allowed for the clone to use a kawarimi to replace the two.
He followed the source of demonic energy to one of the many balconies of the Gremory-owned mansion.
Naruto stared at the slightly older girl, who was obviously going through some...issues.
He knew because she had an aura of demonic energy surrounding her form; the Power of Destruction.
He walked up to her and fearlessly placed his hand on her shoulder.
"Rias-san."
That knocked her out of her trance.
"N-Naruto? You're awake?" the high-devil asked, her shock caused her eyes to widen in surprise.
Her Power of Destruction petered out like so much hot air, whatever emotion that caused her power to leak disappeared from her facial features.
But Naruto wasn't convinced that she was alright.
"...You ok, Rias-san?" the shinobi asked quietly, his eyes revealing just how concerned he was.
Rias turned away from the blond, her eyes staring up to the sunrise.
It was a beautiful scene.
"Can I ask you a question? Naruto?"
The blond blinked at her, unsure of where this was coming from.
He decided to answer. "Sure, ask away."
Rias finally turned to the blond, with a confused expression on her face.
"Is it selfish of me to do everything I can to get out of my arranged marriage? My family made a promise with Phenex clan, where the heir and heiress of the clans would marry for the good of their families...and for all devils. So...is it selfish of me to defy their wishes?" Rias asked finally, her eyes downcast as she considered her own question.
Naruto looked up, considering the question seriously.
He remembered when the red-headed devil explained how the devils of the Underworld lost a lot of their powerful clans...how endangered the 'pure' devils were.
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