Honestly, right after I told her the names of those two dragon boys, I half-expected Rias to simply sprint out of the room with how excitedly she was fidgeting. So the fact that she didn't, and instead still somehow managed to finish her conversation with me, was commendable.
What wasn't though, was the fact that she completely dropped her guard. I mean, come on, I could have been lying about everything for crying out loud, and she would have fallen for it face first. This whole charade could have been just a disguised attempt at an assassination, kidnapping, or what have you.
Should I scam her just for the sake of it? She is the perfect victim, you know? Naive, weak, and she comes from a wealthy family. It would be so easy too, but I am going to graciously stay my hand, since I'd rather not have to deal with pissed off Satan or Satans, thank you very much. The way Red described the devils, they were like bedbugs that you can never fully rid yourself of. He uh— ranted quite a bit actually. With him being the Dragon of Dreams and all that jazz, he knew plenty about pretty much everything.
Literally the only person watching me with scrutiny was Kiba. The boy had moved slightly behind me, a place where my blind spot was, for the whole duration of the conversation. It was an easy way to stab me if I tried anything. Not that it would do much, but it's the thought that counts.
Still, not like I can blame her that much, I would be careless too if I had that guy for a brother.
Aaand~ maybe I'm ranting a bit too much, but a life like mine makes you extremely paranoid about potential dangers.
"So, are you satisfied with your interrogation, Rias?" I asked after they finished speaking to each other, and I was done with my internal musings.
"For now, yes, but you are a mystery I'd like to uncover, sensei." She said with a slightly seductive tone, but there was no heart in it since my gaydar did not start tingling.
"Pft! Please, save that tone for one of the dragon boys. On them, it might even work." I rolled my eyes.
"Mou~" She pouted childishly.
"Also, if you want to convince them to join you, you might want to do it fast. The fallen angel at school is already circling both of them." I said as an afterthought.
4x "WHAT?!!" They shouted out in exactly the same way as last time. They had to have practiced that, right? The vocal coordination was immaculate, and even their facial expressions mirrored each other.
"*sigh* Are you sure you're really in charge? You seem utterly clueless." At that, Rias shot me a look of indignation and then rubbed her eyes in frustration. Akeno, on the other hand, had a look of utter rage painted on her face. A fallen who hates the fallen? Yeah, not touching that one, for sure.
"Who?" Akeno asked through gritted teeth.
"Yuuma…something. Black hair, purple eyes. I taught her today, she's in the second year."
"Thank you, Akabane sensei, you've given me a lot to think about."
"What's there to think about? You have an enemy in your territory. There are not many ways to handle that." Something I knew very well, given, you know, the fact that I used to have a turf of my own.
"Don't tell me how to run my territory."
"Sure~ Sure~ I'm just saying, geez. I guess we're done then, right?"
"*sigh* Yes, I think we should end it for today. Have a good rest of the day, sensei." This was going to evolve into a shitstorm, no doubt about that. There was no way that the fallen was here alone. I mean, she could be, sure, if she were a honeytrap, but my gut was telling me otherwise. No, no, there was a fight on the horizon, and I won't miss it.
"Kay~. Bye-bye~" I bid them farewell, and just as I was passing by Kiba, I patted him on the shoulder.
"You did a good job, just a bit more to the right, and you would have been hidden in my blind spot completely." I smiled at him, like I did at my boys when they did a good job. He just stood there, face still impassive, but I saw the tiniest twitch of his lips, and an almost imperceptible nod of acknowledgment.
With a final look into the room, I took in the bewildered expressions of the others and left the devils to their own devices. I already memorized how their energy felt, because I was so going to spy on them later. It's a free cinema playing the genre I like: Action.
Plus, with me there, playing the unseen nanny, nothing serious would happen to anybody, safe, maybe the fallen angels, but who knows how that will turn out.
With my kinda-sorta plan in mind, I swung by the pachinko parlor on the way home.
I won two hundred yen. Yaay~
—
The silence in the Student Council room was deafening. The things Rias learned from Akabane were not something she could have kept to herself.
An unknown dragon, a fallen angel inside their territory, the Boosted Gear, and the Absorption Line all appeared at the same time, and the less said about her impending marriage, the better.
Maybe if she had found out only about the Sacred Gears, she would not have said anything to Sona. With everything else thrown into the mix, the situation quickly turned into a powder keg, and somebody else was holding the lit match.
"You do realize that our knowing what kind of Sacred Gear Hyoudou possesses changes the situation completely, correct?"
"How can you say that, Sona?! You know I need all the help I can get." Rias all but shouted in frustration.
"That's the Red Dragon Emperor we're talking about, not the mere Twice Critical we thought it was. Do you think I don't want that kind of servant? However, I am still your friend… You owe me for this, Rias." Sona said, while looking at her with pity. A look that Rias hated, but she knew that she had to swallow her pride and accept.
"*sigh* Fine." Rias reluctantly nodded, and oh boy, did it grate on her.
"Now then, The Fallen. I suggest that we go together, scout the town, and verify the authenticity of the information you received. Both of us have been lax, it seems." Sona moved on from the topic quickly and laid out her plan. The faint hint of distaste when she lumped herself in with Rias showed itself on her face for a split second, and thankfully, Rias didn't catch it.
"Yeah… and we have to do it tonight or else we might lose the chance completely, if Akabane sensei is to be trusted."
"That's another thing. Can she be trusted? She looks like a criminal, and the little of her background I managed to dig up supports it."
"You looked into her? What did you dig up?" Rias asked, and her eyes widened a bit. Sona shuffled around some papers until she pulled out one and started reading.
"Takumi Akabane, twenty-six years old, orphaned from the age of eleven. Led a pretty successful street gang in Ikebukuro until she got stabbed in the neck, during a gang war she started, might I add, at the age of twenty. She survived, turned her life around, finished school, attended university, and came to teach here." Sona finished reciting the information before coming for a breath.
"*sigh* Well, this certainly sheds some light on our mysterious resident dragon. But I still think that since my brother hired her personally, she should not pose a threat to us, despite her violent background. Plus, neither I nor anybody else present caught even a whiff of a lie during that whole chat."
"I sure hope so." Sona said skeptically.
"Because no matter how confident you are, I know that we are no match against any dragon capable of assuming human form. We'd need to call our… our siblings for that." She continued with heavy emphasis and a pointed look that promised vengeance should the dragon situation spiral out of control. If it did, they would either be dead or forever locked inside their bedrooms, depending on how fast their siblings could act.
"Y–Yeah… Anyway! Back to the Fallen. Do you have any idea where she could be hiding?"
"I have a few ideas. The outskirts of Kuoh are filled with warehouses. Then there is that abandoned church. Even if it's a bit on the nose, that place is closer to the school, and is, as I said, abandoned." Sona said after running through the options in her head.
"And if she's not at either of those places? What if she has an apartment or lives in a hotel?"
"Then we must take drastic measures tomorrow. Neither of those Sacred Gears should be allowed to fall into the Fallen's hands. They are teenage boys, I'm sure our womanly c–charms will work wonders." While Sona was saying that, her eyes briefly fell to Rias' cleavage before she caught herself and looked back up at the now smugly smiling woman.
"Not. A. Word!" She ground out before Rias could start teasing her.
"Maybe one of them is into that? You never know." She said comfortingly to Sona while trying to suppress a giggle.
"Rias?"
"Hm?"
"Shut up."
Right after their strategizing was concluded, each Heiress went to inform their peerage of today's plans. They decided to start at the abandoned church, then fan out with each peerage taking one side of the outskirts. Neither of them wanted to risk their servants by splitting them up, even if it would considerably speed up the whole process.
As soon as the sun went down, both peerages met at the clubhouse, and what assembled was quite a formidable force. Sona and Rias were both High-Class devils, and their peerages were somewhere on the spectrum of Middle-Class. The only thing they lacked was any real experience, because fighting mindless strays was more akin to hunting a wild rabid animal than it was to battle.
Once they got close enough to the Church to see its front door, Sona suddenly stopped everyone.
"Stop! There's a barrier over the whole church. Let's not come closer for now. It will alert them."
"At least we know that something is here, but a barrier is a bit overkill for one Fallen. There has to be more." Rias said thoughtfully.
"Yes, we should pro—" But Sona was cut off by a male voice coming from the now-opening doors.
"Well, well, well, what do we have here? The two resident bitches and their loyal dogs. How nice of you to serve yourself up on a platter. I will thoroughly enjoy carving you up." The man said with a smile that threatened to rip his face open, and instantly shot forward straight at Rias, only for him to be intercepted by Kiba before he had any chance of reaching her.
Meanwhile, other figures started to emerge from the church.
—
Woow~ Look at Kiba! That was like something out of a movie. The only thing missing was a cheesy one-liner. Something like: Your opponent is me!
As for where I was watching this whole thing unfold? Hehe~. I climbed a tree and hid myself with my awesome dragon powers. Pretty good view if I do say so myself. Shame I have not brought any popcorn though.
Also, all of the devils missed a sensing array that was carved into the trees on the opposite side of the street. That's why this fight started prematurely. Come on! That's rule number one: Always check for cameras, so the enemy doesn't get the drop on you.
It was honestly a pretty underwhelming fight, all things considered. The devils held a significant advantage power-wise, and they quickly realised it too. The idiot who came charging out of the church got stabbed in the stomach after a few quick exchanges with Kiba and fell. Pipsqueak Koneko was punching one priest after another, and they stood no chance.
Rias pulled up with the same power her brother had, just a lot weaker and more restrained, but it did its job well enough, and she obliterated two Fallen in one single hit.
That leaves just Raynare and the old guy. And those two look pretty much half dead from their fight against Sona and her group.
I couldn't help but idly wonder about who was going to clean up all those bodies.
"Why are you in Kuoh?" Sona asked the guy coldly. He just looked at her, his bloodied face twisted with disgust and anger. He didn't reply. Instead of that, he made a lightspear and whirled himself at Sona, who simply sidestepped and finished him off with a blade made out of water.
Raynare watched as her last subordinate unceremoniously fell to the ground with a dull thud.
Like he, her face was marred by the same expression, but I saw a flicker of something else there too: Self-Preservation. She was going to talk.
"Fuck! I'll talk, I'll talk, just don't kill me, okay?!" She yelled out in desperation.
"Then what are you waiting for? Speak."
"Lord Azazel's orders. We were supposed to watch and possibly eliminate Issei Hyoudou." Well, wasn't that a surprise? Like, I get watching him, since Ddraig is powerful, but eliminating? That I don't get. Why not recruit him? From what Red told me, it takes a while until Sacred Gear manifests again.
"You're telling me that the Grigori was willing to let Boosted Gear slip away from their grasp?" Sona asked and conjured another water blade. Seems like she picked up on the same thing I did.
"STOP! There— There is a machine in the church's basement! It can extract Sacred Gears! I swear!" Raynare pleaded while she tried to back away from Sona.
"There is what?!" Rias butted into the interrogation with a wide-eyed expression.
"I–I already told you! A Sacred Gear extraction machine. Lord Azazel made it." She looked fearfully at Rias.
"*sigh* This is bad, Rias. Very bad. Us killing the Fallen is one thing, but if that machine is legitimate… That's not something we are capable of dealing with."
"Sona? You don't mean…?"
"Unfortunately, yes. I'm going to have to call my sister for this." She said in a defeated tone.