The whole week has been rather boring, except for Monday, when I almost strangled Red.
Now, don't get me wrong, I wasn't mad that he took Asia drifting or anything like that. No, what made me angry was the fact that my idiot of an older brother had the great idea to try to run away from cops. Well, it wasn't even really that; it was the fact that Asia was with him.
You see, they were drifting down the mountain for the whole morning, and finally, some bored busybody called the cops on them. I mean, come on… It's just a bit of drifting.
And with Red being Red, he just saw it as a challenge and proceeded to race them down the mountain.
Before they even got to the valley, that whole thing turned into such a shitshow that a news helicopter was hovering above the long serpentine road and broadcasting the wild chase.
The only saving grace… well, two actually, were that the car had heavily tinted windows, and that he ended up teleporting with Asia back home before the cops had finished building a barricade at the foot of the mountain.
As for how I found out? Asia. The poor girl felt so guilty for having fun while doing something mildly illegal that she spilled the beans the moment Red left my house. She sobbed and babbled incomprehensibly for quite a while before I managed to decipher what she was trying to tell me.
So there you have it. I let Red babysit for one day, and now there is an active search warrant out for him.
You wanna know what's the worst thing? They left me out of it! I would have ditched school in a heartbeat had they told me. But no, Takumi has a big-girl job now, so let's not bother.
But I won't let Red out do me like that, and I immediately began plotting how to one-up him. That, though, had to be put on a back burner for now. Since I still had to train the little devils, and all.
And don't get me started on them… It was honestly a pretty mixed bag.
Akeno was still vehemently refusing to use holy light. To such a degree that whenever I even mentioned that, the girl would just straight up ignore me, which was rather rude, and Koneko was still dragging her feet about using Senjutsu. With her, I at least saw that she was mentally preparing herself to give it a try.
The others, however, were doing great. Rias was gaining better and better control over her power of destruction day by day. Kiba was starting to add more thrusts into his swordplay, though it was still a challenge for him to undo all that previous training.
And Issei… well, he was doing great technically, and if I put his growth on a chart, the line would be at a sharp incline, but if his strength at the beginning was like a pebble, now he was more like a fist-sized rock.
But! He could finally use boost! That has to count for something, right?! Right.
Other than that, the only thing of note this week was Asia 'transferring' to Kuoh Academy. The event caused quite a stir among the student body, and she was immediately accepted into the collective due to her gentle personality.
And I'm glad they did, because I think people would notice if a giant crater suddenly appeared exactly where a school stood just a day prior.
To the surprise of nobody, Asia was immediately invited to join the ORC. At least Rias had the decency to run it by me first, and since I couldn't deny Asia the chance to find friends, I allowed it under the condition that she wouldn't try to recruit her into her peerage. Somehow, I could see Asia becoming one if it meant that she could get friends.
Then Saturday finally came, and with it our trip to the familiar forest. Since we would all be teleporting there directly from school, we agreed to meet up in front of the clubhouse.
Unfortunately, we had to wait for Sona to arrive as she still had some council stuff to do, or so she told Rias, because the girl was still not looking me in the eye even after she had a whole week to get over seeing a bit of bush. She's eighteen, for fucks sake.
They arrived precisely on time. You'd think they were waiting behind a corned to do that, but no, Sona was just that punctual. It was a quality I despised, because if you arrive on time, you're already late. Just for comparison, I was there with Asia twenty minutes early.
"Is everyone ready?" She asked as if she had not just seen all of us being ready and waiting for her.
"You ready to go to hell, Asia?" I asked her with a grin, and for what it's worth, she did not look nervous at all.
"Yup!" She said along with others. With that, Sona activated a special teleportation circle, this one was meant for a large number of people, and we were gone from Earth.
Not to rain on the devil's parade, but their teleportation was atrocious compared to what Red and I used. Firstly, ours was instantaneous, and secondly, it was as smooth as butter. Theirs, on the other hand?
I'd say the best comparison would be you dousing yourself in baby oil and going on a particularly bumpy water slide. Without the water.
Thankfully, we appeared inside, what I assumed was the familiar forest, because I saw just a bunch of trees as far as my eyes could see.
"Welcome, Welcome! Old and New, enjoy the view. The Familiar Forest in your sight, a world full of delight." A man, who must have been the Familiar Master, said. Did that guy just speak in rhymes? The hell?
"Hello to you too, Mr. Zatouji." The devils greeted him, and I chose to ignore their conversation. Instead, I was trying to locate just where Tiamat might be.
That took almost no time at all, since there was only one strong draconic presence in the whole of the forest, and the woman was pretty far away from where we appeared. Probably around thirty kilometres to the North, if I gauged the distance properly.
"Let's go and pick our familiars with glee, like a joyful dance by the sea."
"...O–kay, you guys go do that, I'm gonna go look for Tiamat. And be careful, Asia, understand?" I held the girl by her shoulders.
"I will be. Don't worry." She said, patting my hand.
"Right… Though if anything happens, anything, shout for me, okay?" I added just to make sure she understood.
"Y–Yes." She nodded, her face slightly embarrassed, and I heard snickering coming from the devils.
"Something funny? HUH?!"
"N–NO! NOTHING! We should go, right, Asia? haha…" I hear the nervous laughter of Issei.
"We should. You be careful too, Takumi." She said and joined them in their big group.
I was too stunned to speak. It must have been close to ten years since anybody told me to be careful. Hell, maybe it was even longer than that. I was both touched and on the verge of laughter. Literally nothing but Red and Ophis had the necessary strength to harm me in any meaningful way.
"Don't worry, kiddo. I'll be careful." I still replied with a smile.
With that said, they left in the opposite direction from where I was heading. Looks like the Familiar Master must know what areas to avoid to not run into Tiamat. Even if she, from what I gathered, seemed not hostile, and even friendly to some devils, it would still be a bad idea to just waltz into her territory willy-nilly.
Anyway, I waltzed straight into her territory while suppressing my power completely. Just for now, though, as I would unleash some of it once I was roughly in the middle of it as a greeting.
And as I walked through the forest, something stood out the deeper I got. This place was more lively, more vibrant, and with more potential familiars. In some ways, it kinda reminded me of those large posh gardens you might see on TV. You know the ones, peacocks, fountains, trimmed hedges, the occasional maze, and all that jazz. Obviously, this place had none of those, but the vibe was still the same.
Ten minutes of fast walking, I found a great spot to meet Tiamat. It was an open field roughly the size of a large parking lot. That should make dodging easier when she attacks me, because make no mistake, she is going to do that. I am kinda invading her territory.
Plus, what I'm about to do definitely won't help.
"TIAMAT!" What? Her energy was pretty potent and covered almost everything. I wasn't about to waste time by carefully triangulating her position. I'm not a satellite, you know?
But those are just excuses. I know it would take me maybe a minute or two to do it.
I just wanted to start our meeting in a fun way. With a little fight.
I unleashed my power across the area, toppling a few of the nearest trees in the process. It created a symphony of gold and black, of two forces that, despite their diametrically opposing natures, never truly clashed.
No, they were in a perfect and deadly harmony.
After my little show, deathly silence permeated the forest. It got so quiet that I swear I heard a squirrel fart far in the distance.
I heard the fireball first. The deep rumbling, the windlike roaring, and the sharp pops of trees being turned into charcoal in a fraction of a second. It was an unmistakable sound, and it was coming straight at me.
Followed by an angry and slightly confused roar.
"WHO DARES?!"
"ME!" I yelled back after sidestepping the giant ball of flame and letting it continue to wreak havoc somewhere behind me. I thought about tanking the hit, but I got the feeling that if it exploded all around me, it would make the damage even worse than it was already going to be.
Then I saw her, barreling toward the field where I was, and boy, oh boy, did she look pissed. Which, okay, my fault.
I teleported directly in front of her, a punch already in mid swing before she even had the chance to comprehend what happened.
"HI TIAMAT!" I yelled right as my fist connected with her lower jaw, making her fly backwards. Now, I was obviously holding back, or that would have simply killed her. I was using roughly the same amount of strength that she had.
"HUH?" She just looked at me with great confusion, not moving an inch.
"Oh, please don't tell me I already gave you a concussion." I muttered and moved closer to where she was to look at her, only for her tail to snap at me like a whip. I caught it and used the momentum to spin and fling her behind me.
"SNEAKY! I like that." I grinned and sprang into action right as Tiamat managed to stabilize herself in the air. She flew backwards, spitting one fireball after another, all of which I deftly dodged, and soon I was directly under her.
"Who are you, woman?! Why are you in my territory?" She flew out of the way when she saw me jumping directly at her exposed belly. Good for her, that one would have hurt quite a bit.
"HI!I'm Takumi, and I just wanted to meet a fellow dragon."
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Starting next week, I'm finally having a summer vacation, so for the next two weeks, there should be more chapters released.