High School DxD: Fox of Ill Omen

Issei

Early morning in the trees around the old school building had a weird kind of quiet to it.

Not peaceful, exactly.

More like the world hadn’t fully decided whether it wanted to wake up yet, and we were being idiots in the middle of that quiet moment.

“Ise-senpaiiii….. I’m so tireeeeed…..”

Gasper rubbed at his eyes like the morning itself had personally offended him.

At least he wasn’t crying or running away yet.

“Wake up Gasper! We need to practice so that we can fulfill our dreams!” I said while getting ready to throw a ball to him.

Asia, standing nearby with a small pile of practice balls in her hands, gave me the next one with a patient little smile.

“Dont listen to him about his whole ‘dream’ nonsense, Gasper-kun. Just concentrate on improving bit by bit.”

Kusari-san said while shooting me a disapproving look.

She had been helping Gasper as much as I had.

She would keep him calm and push him in the right direction.

I would motivate him and push him to do more.

And Asia was supporting all three of us.

Gasper had gotten to the point where he could stop one ball out of about twenty, which was awful by any normal standard and amazing compared to where he’d started.

Tonight was the conference, and Gasper still couldn’t come because his Sacred Gear was too unstable, so there was no way I was letting us slack off now.

That, and I still had my own reasons.

If he could master his ability then we could join forces to freeze and then strip any girl.

It was like something out of a wonderful doujin.

A man can only be expected to live so long without being haunted by possibility.

Of course, there were other things haunting me too.

That was another problem.

I threw the ball.

Gasper’s eyes widened.

The ball froze in midair for one perfect second.

Then dropped.

“Nice!” I pointed at him. “See? That was better!”

Gasper immediately crumpled in on himself. “I-It was only luck...”

“No,” Kusari-san said from the side, voice level. “You are improving.”

Gasper turned toward her at once.

Since the talk we’d had at his door, Gasper looked at Kusari-san like someone he could relax a little bit more around.

Like someone who could understand why he was so afraid of everything.

I got it.

And right now, I was using it to help.

“Listen to Kusari,” I said. “Your stopping time is getting tighter. You’re able to use is more consistently than before.”

“It still hit only one,” Gasper muttered.

“One out of twenty is better than one out of who-knows-how-many,” I said. “And if you stop my arm again instead of the ball, that’s also technically progress.”

Asia looked worried. “Ise-san, please don’t encourage the wrong thing...”

“I’m encouraging bravery.”

“I don’t know….” She muttered

Kusari stooped, picked up the fallen ball, and tossed it back to Asia instead of directly to me.

“Try from the left this time,” she said. “We should switch it up a bit.”

I looked at her.

She looked back at me just long enough to make it clear the suggestion was practical, not conversational.

That had become a thing with her recently.

She wasn’t more cold exactly, just more careful than before.

I threw the next ball from the left.

Gasper flinched, panicked, and somehow stopped my hand instead.

My whole arm locked up.

He squeaked in horror.

“E-Eek! S-Sorryyyyyy!”

I looked at my frozen arm and sighed.

“Maybe switching it up threw him off.”

Asia hurried over. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “At least it wasn’t my whole body this time.”

Gasper looked like he was one second from folding into a cardboard box even though there wasn’t one nearby.

“Maybe I should wear my paper bag so that I can feel more safe...”

He was crying again.

“….Paper bag?” Asia asked, tilting her head.

“Don’t worry about it!” I quickly said.

“But-“

“Don’t worry!”

I cut her off before Gasper could get the idea to show her the paper bag he liked to wear over his head.

He said it made him feel safe, like he was in his box or room.

But it was too creepy for Asia to see.

Gasper, Kusari-san and Asia gave me questioning looks before Kusari-san went over to Gasper to comfort him.

Asia watched her with a concerned look on her face before following her to help.

She had been looking at Kusari-san with more concern than normal since yesterday.

Buchou and I headed straight home after she picked me up from the shrine.

Both she and Asia seemed off and would get caught up in their own heads thinking.

Something must have happened while Akeno-san and I were gone.  

Yesterday had been a surprising day for sure. 

I was told by Buchou to meet Akeno-san somewhere and that she would join us later.

The first surprise was that when I arrived at the location I was told to head to, it turned out to be a shrine.

The second surprise was that Akeno-san apparently lived there.

She greeted me at the entrance to the shrine in a shrine maiden's outfit.

It was an amazing sight.

We walked into the shrine with Akeno-san telling me that someone was waiting to see me.

When we arrived in the shrine, the person turned out to be the Archangel Michael.

The leader of Heaven wanted to see me.

He was a gentle and young looking man with a shining halo and 12 golden feathered wings. 

He gave me the holy sword Ascalon and had me absorb it into my sacred gear.

I hadn’t know I could do something like that.

Then when I asked why he was doing this he said it was to lay groundwork for the cooperation he was looking to create at the Three Factions meeting. 

Also apparently I’m known as ‘the weakest  Sekiryuuti in history’, which was great to learn….

I was now able to summon Ascalon so at least I had that.

After Michael-san left I spent some time with Akeno-san.

I decided to ask something that might not have been the best thing to ask, but I was me, so I asked anyway.

I asked Akeno-san if one of her parents was a Fallen Angel like what Kokabiel had claimed.

Then she showed me her wings.

Her black Fallen Angel wing and her Devil wing.

She’d looked at me after admitting what she was, like she was waiting for recoil.

I’d told her that I hated Fallen Angels, but I like Akeno-san

She’d become emotional at my words and then gave me a lap pillow while asking how I felt about Buchou.

After I told her that I really liked Buchou she started talking about first, second, and third place while also mentioning Asia.

She muttered something to herself about Kusari-san as well, but it was too quiet to hear.

I didn’t get what she was taking about so I just enjoyed the lap pillow. 

And then Buchou arrived while I was still getting a lap pillow from Akeno-san.

She had pulled on my cheeks with a scary look in her eye as she questioned me about my meeting with Michael-san.

Then she turned and said we were going home.

As we walked down the steps, Buchou asked me who she was. 

I didn’t understand, but I knew that she was an amazing person.

She was the one who saved me, my master, and the girl of my dreams even though she was far too good for me.

So I answered that Buchou is Buchou.

She seemed upset by that answer for some reason.

When she walked ahead of me the look on her face was sadder than angry for some reason.

Almost like she was distracted by something.

That part had stuck with me.

Because I still didn’t really understand it.

I understood her jealousy of finding me with Akeno-san.

That part was easy.

I didn’t understand why she seemed so upset and if it was from something I did or something with Kusari-san. 

And now Asia was looking at Kusari with more concern.

Things had shifted.

With Kusari.

Or maybe with Buchou and Kusari both.

Asia had only said they’d all had a talk while I’d been gone.

She had looked sad when she told me and didn’t really give me any details.

She said that she thinks things should be better between Buchou and Kusari-san.

Hopefully.

 Kusari-san did seem less on edge.

She was making her dry comments occasionally and didn’t look like closed off and unreadable any more.

So something did change with them, and it looked to be better.

That should have been reassuring.

Instead, because I didn’t know what had actually been said, it left me confused and concerned.

“Ise-senpai?”

Gasper’s voice dragged me back.

Right, we were in the middle of training and I zoned out. 

I could focus on trying to figure out how I could attempt to help fix whatever was wrong later.

“You’re overthinking again,” Kusari-san said.

I stared at her. “How do you know?”

“You have that face.”

“That is not helpful.”

“It wasn’t meant to be.”

She looked like she was trying not to smile at my annoyed glare.

Yeah, she was definitely in a better mood.

Asia gave Kusari-san the next ball instead of me this time.

“Maybe Kusari-san should throw one?” she suggested.

Gasper immediately looked more nervous and more attentive.

Kusari took the ball, weighed it once in her hand, and said to Gasper-san “If you miss this one, it still won’t matter.”

It wasn’t exactly the kind of pep talk I would go for, but it fit Kusari-chan.

No bright encouragement.

No false softness.

Just a clear removal of the fear of failure.

Then she flicked the ball forward.

It flew at him quickly. 

Gasper’s eyes widened.

The ball hung in the air.

Stayed there.

A full second.

Then two.

Then dropped.

Asia lit up. “Gasper-kun!”

I pointed at him. “See!? That’s what I’m talking about!”

Gasper blinked at the fallen ball like it had betrayed him by being proof of success. “I-I did it...”

“Twice as long as yesterday’s stop,” Kusari-san said. “Good.”

He looked at her with the sort of startled gratitude of someone that needed to hear encouragement but didn’t know what to do with it.

It was almost funny.

I picked up another ball and rolled my shoulders.

“All right. Again.”

Asia got ready to pass me the next one, but not before giving me one of those careful looks she used when she thought I was thinking too much and trying not to say so directly.

It must have been obvious what I was thinking about. 

I threw again.

Gasper froze the ball.

Asia praised him softly.

Kusari-san corrected where he placed his gaze and told him he needed to stop anticipating failure before it happened.

We kept going like that until the forest felt less like a training ground and more like a weird little world we had built around one scared half-Vampire and his magic eyes.

And through all of it, my thoughts kept looping.

Akeno-san’s lap.

Buchou’s face on the shrine steps.

Buchou seeming dejected after.

Then Asia saying they’d all had a discussion.

Kusari-san acting different this morning.

What did that even mean?

“All of you” had a discussion?

Just the girls?

The whole peerage except me?

Asia said that Buchou looked more at ease around Kusari.

And Kusari look like she was being more careful and less afraid at the same time.

That made no sense.

Or maybe it made too much sense and I just didn’t have the part of the puzzle that explained it.

Gasper stopped another throw.

Not long this time.

Only for a very brief moment, but it still counted.

Asia clapped lightly.

“That was good too!”

Gasper looked between all of us like he wanted permission to believe that.

Kusari-san folded her arms and gave him a tiny nod.

I grinned.

“See? Even Kusari-san agrees. Which means you really did good.”

“Why is my agreement the deciding factor?” she asked.

“Because you’re the hardest one to impress in our peerage.”

“That sounds like it could be praise or an insult.”

“Yeah.”

Asia smiled in spite of herself.

Kusari-san gave me a small glare without any real heat behind it.

Gasper looked between us nervously, like he wasn’t sure if he was aloud to laugh.

And for a second it all felt easier.

No fight between Buchou and Kisari-san over Gasper’s room.

No weirdness between Asia and Buchou around Kusari-san.

Just our peerage helping a member train.

Kusari’s shoulders had eased more than they were when she first got here.

Gasper wasn’t crying every third sentence.

Asia looked relieved every time the tension lightened by even a little.

And me?

I still had no clue what had happened between Buchou and the girls in that talk, but at least none of them looked like they were about to explode anymore.

Maybe that counted.

I rubbed the back of my neck and looked up through the trees toward the brighter sky beyond.

Tonight was the conference.

This was something huge.

This was a summit where all the important people would be there, and we’d all have to act proper while the Three Great Powers decided whether they could stop trying to kill each other long enough to do something smarter.

And Gasper would stay behind because he still couldn’t control his power well enough.

That part bothered me more now than it did before.

Maybe because I’d seen what one more day of progress looked like.

Maybe because Kusari-san helping this morning had made the whole thing feel more like a peerage job than just “Issei the idiot trying really hard.”

Or maybe because after everything from the shrine and the clubroom and Azazel and all of it, I was starting to get sick of how many people around me carried huge things alone until they became impossible.

I threw the next ball.

Gasper froze it.

Not long.

But it still happened.

I pumped my fist.

“There! Again!”

He gave me a tired, half-panicked look. “Ise-senpai... school hasn’t even started yet...”

“It’s fine! Suffering builds character!”

“That sounds wrong...” Asia said.

“It isn’t, but I don’t think it applies here,”  Kusari-san added.

Neither of them stopped me.

And as Gasper readied himself for another throw, I thought hat maybe the hardest part of all of this wasn’t the training.

Maybe it was standing in the middle of a peerage full of girls I cared about, knowing something had changed between them while I’d only seen the edges of it, and trying to pretend I wasn’t desperately waiting to understand where I fit in that new shape.

Then Gasper accidentally froze the next ball and half my sleeve with it.

He yelped.

Asia apologized to me on his behalf.

Kusari-san looked away like she was either suppressing a laugh or deciding I deserved it.

And for now, that was enough to keep me moving.

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