Scarlet 43

Scarlet 43

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Commissioned by Sivantic

Wordcount: 2500

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Knowing your limits is important, but I’d say that knowing what you can do within those limits is even more important.

“Looks like I’m going to need heavier weights.” I was using the gym at Rias’ mansion. Though she lived with me now, the rest of her peerage lived in it. As far as I knew, though, only Koneko and I used the gym and we had different times. She preferred to stay up late, while I preferred to wake up early. She might also think you smell bad. Don’t hurt my feelings, Ddraig. “What did you do to work out?”

Fight, mostly. This has its advantages, especially since you can track your progress, but truly growing strong means defeating powerful opponents for Dragons. You should challenge Devils to sparring matches, at least.

I’ll do that after I figure out how to hold back.

They’re Devils. They can heal.

I ignored Ddraig and focused on my hand.

On the surface, it looked like a normal hand for a regular young man, if that regular young man was a regular at a gym and had a strict diet. I was leaning towards the gymnastic male body, which was appealing in my opinion, but my insides were different. I’d worked with Ddraig extensively to take his power for my own and refine my body into a better vessel. We started slowly and carefully, working on bones and organs first, but now that most of that was finished we were working on the musculoskeletal system.

In other words, even without invoking a single Boost, my strength was as already ludicrous.

How ludicrous?

500 kilograms barely felt like anything the moment I put in any effort.

In fact, I was afraid that pushing too hard against it would send it flying into the ceiling.

No muscle pain either.

Yeah, that was another thing. Endurance, stamina, and just about everything else about my body’s innerworkings was changing. My appetite was skyrocketing, and I could only feel full after eating enough meat for a whole family. It’ll be almost impossible to eat my fill off of grains and vegetables, and sugar was starting to become too sweet.

Sugar is delicious!

I agree, but there wasn’t exactly any knowledge on how sugar interacted with draconic bodies, so I kept it as a rare treat.

To feel fuller faster, though, I was doing my best to add more fat to my diet.

A few pigs or two cows would fill me up for a day. Maybe you should investigate bacon or steaks? American breakfasts? Or, you can have a whole fish or two.

Mhmm, fish sounded good. I’d developed a liking to it with my new life in Japan. Sushi, for example, was great. Huh, I could eat whole trays of it myself now.

Do it!

Later.

Yeesss!

Sometimes, Ddraig acts like a cat.

Or, maybe, cats act like dragons?

I’ll ruminate on that in another time and focus on figuring out my current abilities.

…

A week after the beach retreat, and a few days after I got a firm understanding of my current situation, I was heading to Kyoto via train. Sona wanted things to be handled before the conference between the Three Factions occurred. Having a possible violent confrontation occur in a nearby city before or during a peace conference was inopportune, so I was being sent in as an independent contractor to clear things up.

I’d planned on going alone.

Instead, Asia had asked to come and I didn’t have the heart to tell her no, and there wasn’t a reason to do so. Her excommunication severed her ties with the Church, but she was still a practicing believer. If the Youkai accused me of being in league with the Devils, I could point out the fact that I basically worked with anyone who was decent and had no plans of causing mayhem.

Not that Asia could cause any mayhem, but that’s beside the point.

If you told a female Dragon you don’t think she can cause trouble, you’ll be lucky to be alive. If you aren’t me, of course.

I ignored Ddraig, and watched the landscape of forest and trees roll by, while Asia sat next to the window with wide eyes. The bullet train was fast, but we hardly felt it move, and we elected against getting lunch for the trip because we’d reach Kyoto even before it was time for lunch.

I thought about bringing something along to pass the time, but Asia was being very cute, so the magazine was unnecessary.

For you, yes. For me, it is. Open it up already, dammit!

I ignored Ddraig.

“Japan is so pretty. I never realized there was so much nature here.”

“There wasn’t much where you came from?”

“Oh, there was plenty, but I didn’t get to go anywhere very often.” Asia admitted with a slight, sad smile. Most of her life had been spent under the watchful eye of the Church. I suppose going on cross-country train trips was out of the question. “If we needed to go somewhere, it would be by plane. A private one, if we could not get a seat. The skies are very pretty, but I’ve always wanted to visit a forest and see the animals that live there.”

“We can take trips to Nara and other wildlife reserves later. Maybe a zoo.” I offered, and Asia beamed at me. I spent every day with her, but the past month had been hectic. I’d thought immortals with centuries-long lives would take longer to do things, but everything operated at a breakneck pace. There was hardly time to sit down and have a meal, let alone get to know someone better and help them see new sights around a whole country. “You know, you could’ve explained things and returned home, if you wanted.”

“I…I don’t believe that would be the right choice, Ise-kun.” Asia’s smiled faded a bit, but she reached out and grasped my hand. Her’s was so slight and frail that I was afraid that I might hurt her by just holding her hand in turn. Lewd. Shut up, Ddraig. “I know that the Lord wants me to forgive, but it still hurts a lot to think about what happened. Quarta-san and Irina-san told me that they’ll speak on my behalf, especially when you told them there were plans for my Sacred Gear to be extracted by Kokabiel’s followers… but when they offered, I was just afraid of losing everyone at Kuoh.”

Some part of me wanted to disparage the Church for making Asia sad, about feeling the way she did towards the people that raised her, but I chose to focus on the good side of things. Focusing too much on the bad side of things was a good way of losing yourself, feeling cornered, and becoming more and more desperate.

I knew that fact very well.

“Then, stay with us until you feel that you can return the way you want to. As far as I’m concerned, no matter what they tell you, the Church is wrong. You’re kind, pious, and brave. All the things your religion holds in high regard.” Admittedly, I had certain fears that ‘God’ might be a multidimensional entity with its own designs, but there was a lot of evidence to the contrary. The lack of overt destruction of global infrastructure to create as many capes as possible was the biggest one. This place was too peaceful for what little I knew about the Entities. “You don’t need to do everything right now. Plan for it, change, become better, and reach for whatever goals you want to achieve, Asia. You can do it.”

I wasn’t sure about my pep-talk, it felt like what Ddraig would say, but without bloodshed and violence against the people that wronged her.

So, nothing that I would say.

I ignored him.

“Asia, I believe in you. You’ll do the right thing. You’re a good person. Anyone else would take the opportunity to smear the people who betrayed them, and join another organization entirely. You want to forgive them.” That was more than most people could do in this world, let alone my previous one. I couldn’t even recall anyone back then who went out of their way to forgive people who wronged them. Maybe, it was because of the aliens messing with our heads, but even in this world Asia was practically a saint. “Just because you can’t do it now, doesn’t mean you can’t do it in the future when you’re ready.”

People change as time passes. Change is the only thing that is assured in life. Nothing is permanent… no matter how pleasant it is. In a world filled with monsters and terrifying creatures, it was necessary to change and adapt, become stronger, and be beyond anything the world can possibly throw at you. If you want something to happen, then you need to make it happen yourself, because nothing is ever freely given.

Everything must be taken or kept from others.

Even if you make something with your own two hands, if you do nothing, then it’ll be taken from you.

I didn’t tell all of that to Asia, though, I knew how to keep my mouth shut and share only what’s necessary.

My reward for that was a full smile from Asia.

“Thank you, Ise-kun, I’ll remember that. Someday… I’ll see the all again and be happy, despite everything.”

With that said, she looked back outside on the rolling trees, but this time while leaning against my arm.

Not bad, I think.

Seems to have worked out, but I’m also a guy. Wait, weren’t you a girl before?

I didn’t exactly spend my previous life exploring my personal feelings and understanding other people, Ddraig.

Point.

…

It would be pretty useful to be able to teleport, but I didn’t exactly have the time to learn how to bend space and time. Besides, any supernatural organization would have methods to protect against such things, and battlefields filled with magic were terrible places to try and to use it. According to Sona, teleportation via Devil Contracts (pamphlets) had security measures to detect the area the Devil was popping in to prevent Devils from being captured and maybe killed.

If I wanted to do it, as a human, I’d have to learn how to warp space and time with my own power, learn how to create the human version of a teleportation talisman that could do the same security checks, and establish magical circles in key locations. Thus, I judged that the technique would be more of a strategic method of retreating and advancing, and not a tactical advantage like I’d hoped.

Well, if you get good enough at it, you’ll be able to just throw out everyone else’s magic while they’re saturating the air with your own. That should give you the ability to appear and reappear wherever you want in battle. Until then, though, you should just concentrate on speed and reflexes.

I filed away Ddraig’s suggestion, as it was a very good one and I’d very much like to solve all my mobility issues, but stopped as I reached my destination with Asia.

It was a small, chic café outside of official territories of both the Kyoto Youkai factions.

We were an hour or so early, so we could get lunch.

“Reservation for four in an hour, but can we have a table to eat before our meeting?” The hostess at the front blinked at my words and raised an eyebrow. She was ready to ask if we should be out of school, but I slipped a hand into my coat pocket and placed a singular, ten-thousand yen bill on the table and tapped my name on the reservation list. The cash disappeared. Man, it’s nice to have everything covered by my boss. “Thank you.”

The hostess had us to our temporary table, and Asia fretted and took off hat while taking a seat.

“I picked this place because you said you wanted to try our style of pancakes.” It was different from the American kind that I knew from my past life. They folded in whipped egg whites, cooked it slow, and so the pancakes were more cakelike. It was something that I enjoyed, but meat was making up and more of my diet nowadays. You can eat more. You should eat more. We don’t know how our body works yet with the changes, Ddraig. Slow and steady. Bah! “But, get anything that you want. Rias and Sona are both paying for the cost for our lunch and our meeting.”

“Oh my goodness! Praise the Lord for their kindness!” Well, Sona and Rias probably suddenly got some headaches at that very moment. Asia was nothing besides completely earnest when she praised someone. “Uhm, would you like some too? I’m sorry for being a glutton, but I would like an entire plate.”

“Order me their original. You can get the seasonal. That way you can try both.” I stated simply, and Asia gave a squee of delight, before gaining laser focus on the menu. The whole café started to rumble to life as we were served water and bread. There were no other customers. It’s more than likely that one of our points of contact rented out the entire café as a show of force and influence. I checked for magic and found traces of it, so they definitely sent someone to scope it out, and there were probably magical bugs that I couldn’t find. But that was the point. Rias and Sona wanted me to be found out. Here’s a third party with a Longinus that we consider our ally coming here at our behest. You have nothing to fear, because we have everything under our control. That was probably the unstated messages. “Feel free to order more, too. I can eat. A lot.”

I want five orders of pancakes. They look amazing!

We’ll fill up on steak and grains first, maybe a whole chicken, and some pork chops. We’ll have desert, but wait until then to order, and only after we finish what Asia can’t.

No! These pancakes need to be eaten fresh and fluffy! They’re souffles, you idiot! They’ll collapse and become worthless if we eat them after more than twenty minutes! Order them now, so that the chefs know when to start them so we get them fresh!

Ddraig roared at me to order the pancakes, I focused on ordering meat that’ll get us full, and Asia went ahead and gleefully ordered what she wanted.

As far as ways to start a trip went, this was a pretty good one.