LP CH 21: SECOND INVITATION (1)

[Occult Research club]

“Akeno, do you think he will be coming soon?”

Standing behind her peerage master, Rias, Akeno showed a wry smile upon hearing that particular question for the umpteenth time. Still, she planned to respond the same way she did all the other times and simply nodded.

“Once again, yes. They should only have their homeroom left. Koneko and Maria will be guiding him to the clubroom. You don’t need to worry.”

Rias just sighed as she slumped on her chair, feeling antsy and anxious, as she waited for Basara’s arrival. It was only in front of her friends and family that she could afford to look so loosened up rather than the prim and proper appearance she was obligated to show as the heiress of the Gremory Clan.

“*Sigh* I feel like I am stressing too much these days. I can’t help it, you know….Riser is pushing for the engagement and I feel like we are still not ready to face him.”

She groaned uneasily and covered her face with her hands, the pressure slowly gnawing on her psyche. One could say that this whole fiasco was her fault in the first place.

Every time, she berated herself for her being useless, for not using her time more efficiently. She should have trained more. She should have been more serious. So many things she could have done better but wasn’t able to accomplish because of her incompetence.

Even though the Phenex family possessed an incredible power of regeneration, to the level where they were even said to be immortals, if her skills in handling the power of destruction were at a higher level she was sure that she could make him yield easily. Yet, her incompetent self held her back from attaining that power.

Akeno gently patted the back of her dear friend and peerage master as she comforted her with some consoling words.

“Don’t be hard on yourself, please. We are also at fault for our situation. Aside from Kiba who is training almost regularly the rest of us were chained down by our own traumas and had selfishly put the weight of our sadness and burdens on your shoulders to handle. You just didn’t want to make us think that we were your weapons. And we all are grateful to you for that, so please, I beg you, don’t think of yourself like that.”

She tried to console her with roundabout words. However, no matter how she tried to sugar-coat their circumstances, the reality was that entering a peerage for a low-level devil or a reincarnated devil meant entering a master-servant relationship with their peerage master [1]. This was in truth no different than a slave contract, and that was the cruel actuality.

Currently, all the members of Rias’ peerage were people who, despite their incredibly young ages, had seen the worst the world had to offer. And those encounters had broken them down and shattered most of the whimsical beliefs they held for life.

Akeno herself had to run away from her home after her mother was assassinated. She then went on to live as a street urchin for more than a year before she was caught and nearly executed by her own family member, specifically her maternal uncle, the previous leader of the Himejima House.

She was only 11 years old when that incident happened. Nothing needed to be said about what would’ve happened to a child’s mentality that went through a nightmarish event like that.

If Rias hadn’t intervened back then and taken her under her care, Akeno would have surely died on that day, there wasn’t a single shred of doubt about that. The others had been in similar situations or even worse since Kiba and Gasper actually died before they were found and resurrected as devils by Rias. 

For them, Rias’ peerage was their last chance, the only haven that could protect them and the only place on earth left for them to call ‘home’.

With the amount of power she had over them and their life, it would have been easy for Rias to abuse them as she pleased. But she never did do anything like that and always tried her level best to care for them in her own way.

Anyways, Rias was a little comforted hearing the words of her best friend, however, her worried expression didn’t seem to have any intention of budging from her beautiful face. Her wrinkled solemn expression made her look very pitiful.

The time to fight Riser was coming close ever so slightly and she still didn’t think she was ready to face him and his peerage. After all, not only did Riser have experience in rating games, he also had a complete peerage with strong and well-coordinated members who knew what they were doing. For a newbie team like them, it was nigh impossible to win with those odds.

“*Sigh* I give up. No use in worrying. I will just take a shower while waiting for him.”

Standing up from her chair, Rias began to slowly disrobe herself one article after another until all that was left was a pair of panties, while her large, now exposed, boobs seemed to say that gravity should go fuck itself as they stood proud and straight without the slightest bit of sag, showing off their youthful shape.

Raising and measuring her breasts with a quizzical expression, she looked at Akeno.

“Do you think they grew again? My bra has been a little tight lately.”

“Ara? Should we visit a lingerie store later? I believe that I have the same problem.”

“Good idea…Do you think we should invite Koneko?”

Rias asked innocently, but Akeno chortled a little before shaking her head, an amused expression plastered on her flawless face.

“Let’s not.”

Standing in the corner of the room, with his back turned to them and his eyes trained on the wall of the room, Kiba who had stayed silent all this while couldn’t help but show a bitter smile as he heard their discussion.

‘Thankfully, Koneko isn’t here yet. I don’t believe her heart could have taken that blow.’

He chuckled a little while hearing the sound of the running shower, his cue that he could turn around once again.

Taking a seat on the comfortable sofa, Kiba sighed as he thought of the younger man that he met this morning.

Basara Toujou, an ex-exorcist, and son of Jin Toujou— The War God. 

Even though Kiba felt extreme hatred for the church in general, he knew that most of the members of the church didn’t even know about the experiments he and his friends suffered in the past.

This was even more so for a hero like Jin Toujou. Because of this, Kiba harbored no hostility towards Basara. 

Though, he was really curious about how strong he was. He hadn’t been able to make sure this morning, but Kiba was at least certain that Basara was not one to rely simply on his natural talent. He oozed the aura of a man that accomplished all he wielded through his own hard work. That was a dangerous man in his books, which made him more excited to learn the limits of his power.

*Knock* *Knock* *Knock*

“Oh. Seems like our guest is here. You guys can enter.”

Kiba stopped his train of thoughts and focused on Basara and Koneko.  If Basara accepted Rias’ proposal tonight, he would surely be able to see his skills and satiate his growing curiosity.

———

[1]: This is very important but peerages aren’t just about one high-level devil as king and a bunch of low-level devils as slaves. Sometimes for rating games, you can have a team composed of high-level devils (by high level, I am talking about their social rankings, not a power one.) For example, when Issei became king, he had Ravel Phenex as a member of his peerage, before that, she was in her mother’s peerage after leaving Riser’s peerage. You also have Grayfia who is in the peerage of her husband. Basically, you can consider King as manager and pieces as professional players. Managers can exchange pieces between them or Pieces (high-level ones) can request to be transferred to other teams. The ones who are treated as slaves are low-level devils or reincarnated devils.

Also, now that I mentioned Grayfia. Let’s just cut any questions that you may have in the bud. No, I will not cuck Sirzechs. In my fic, Sirzechs isn’t a woman, nor is he gay, or an evil bastard or a pervert siscon nor did he marry Grayfia for political reasons nor does he abuse her nor is he into NTR. Like damn. XD; it’s pretty funny how many different reasons authors find to take away Grayfia from Sirzechs without making their mc appear like a total bastard, which in most cases they tend to be. Man, like I admit she is pretty hot, but there are many hot women like her in DxD. Even more since I added Shinmai.

PATREON

KO-FI

LP CH 20: HOW WILL IT END? 

LP CH 22: SECOND INVITATION (2)