There was something about sitting on top of a tree in the dead of night overlooking a, seemingly, abandoned town that almost filled Alicia with a sense of familiarity he hasn’t felt since the fallen devils tried to kill him. Maybe it was because later in the war against Corvus’s forces the more common a desolate town became or it might be because he was using his wings to hide just outside of the target's field of view. In his time on earth Alicia hadn’t needed to use his skills to hide from monsters or the rare bandit clan since this realm was far more peaceful compared to his.
Whatever the reason he had a job to do.
With a great flap of his wings Alicia was standing behind a ruined home with his wings folded against his armor. The celestial wasn’t overly concerned the target might spot him, not only did he have the experience of sneaking around Dragons and demons who could sniff out a human from over 3 kilometers, the skills he had picked up from Beatrice made sure his movement was silent. Peering around the corner he noted that the target was not around the outskirts of the town. This was both good and bad. Good as that meant there was objects he could put between him and whatever attacks the target threw at him, bad because that meant there was a higher chance of completely obliterating the fucking town.
And he’s done that more than enough times thank you very much.
Diving into an open window he quickly made his way through the small home and barely noticed the small carnage filled rooms along the way. Alicia quickly and quietly made his way into the center of the town where the target would most likely be residing. Stopping just outside of the plaza The celestial took note of what was inside and what exactly he would be facing. Well he had gotten the details from the agent Rias had pointed in his direction but the Trap wouldn’t put it past them to have forgotten some details that would make this easier.
Just as he was about to dive back into an open window Alicia finally spotted his target.
It was a stray devil, which according to the informant, was a near high-class devil when they had rebelled against their king. From what he could see it looked like the devil had mutated into a lamia or a half snake person and by his lady the mutation had not been kind. What was once a beautiful woman had turned into a horriandace beast. The snake tail that replaced her legs was a dark gray and while still resembling a human-like torso there were a few pieces like the hood of a corba and the tongue that was slithering out of the protruding mouth. Their arms were also covered in scales from what he could see. All in all the stray devil looked more like a snake monster than a devil, which now that he thought about it doesn’t make that much sense. The point was it looked bad and he had to kill it.
‘Hero’s spear or poker’ Alicia thought about which spear to test first, a lower tier spear to get an estimate on how tough a near high class devil is or an ultimate spear to just get the job done.
In the end he decided on the red hot poker, his strongest spear he had. His magic sigil appeared on the ground as he summoned the poker. The spear looked more like a torturing device than a weapon with the twisted and barbed spear tip. Grabbing it Alicia raised it above his shoulder and stepped out from behind the building. Just as the devil seemingly noticed his presence he threw it. The stray devil didn’t get the chance to react before the spear tore through its chest, leaving a large gaping hole to start pouring blood like a river. While the stray stumbled from the force of the spear, which was now embedded in a wall, Alicia summoned his axe and dashed forward. It took the celestial maybe half a second to cross the town square and swing his axe at the strays neck. The galaxy axe sliced the cobra’s neck like it was a warm stick of butter and sent the head flying.
“That was… mildly disappointing if I can be honest.” Alicia muttered to himself, grabbing his spear from where it was embeded. “With a ranking of near high-class I would have thought they would be stronger. Guess those below high-class won’t be much of a problem for me.”
It might, probably will actually, bite him in the butt later but the celestial was hoping the stray would prove to be more of a challenge so he could shake off some of this rust he was getting from not being able to use his weapons for more than an year. Guess he’ll have to ask for a higher class enemy to fight. Or figure out if there's any sparring arenas he could enter, whichever one he found first. He wasn’t picky.
Regardless the job was done and now there was one less monster to prey on the innocent, a win in his book. Granted, as he looked around the dead town he felt a frown tug on his lips, it didn't feel much like one. The supernatural of this realm, more specifically the devils, don't seem to care much for the humans by the looks of it.
He idly flexed his mechanical arm, wondering if the supernatural part of this world also used them. Something told him that should the older 'generation' catch sight of such a thing they would… well he doesn't know what they would do but Alicia doubt's it would be kind.
"Perhaps I should ask the hunt master about his thoughts." He mused quietly, picking up the strays head and putting it into a burlap sack. "He seems like he would know such things."
The Hunt master was one of those individuals that has connections to every Faction in the supernatural world, from the Vatican to the Youkai clans. His job is to organize the bounties, contracts and whatever else the factions are willing to pay someone else to do. Normally the bounty contracts are issued on Stray devils or rogue Exorcists and Fallen when they don’t have the manpower to take care of it themselves. The reward varies on account of several things such as power, risk, and history.
The one He had just completed, a kill contract on a mid-high class stray with an estimated 100+ kill count, mainly because of the town's massacre, was only going to pay him about… 20K USD? The way currency works in the supernatural world is weird. But regardless, hopefully that would be enough for him to start getting some more exotic materials so he could maintain a few pieces of his equipment, such as his scepters. Maybe he could get a new piece of wargear to use while he’s browsing the markets. He totally didn’t have a problem.
“Hopefully the head will suffice.” Tying the string around his waist, he didn't want the stench of the stray devil to stink of his Sigil, Alicia unfolded his wings and took to the sky. “Because I am not grabbing the rest of the body.”
Wind blasted past his face as Alicia flew faster than most commercial planes could, thankfully not breaking the sound barrier. The Celestial had to clench his jaw to prevent himself from yawning. He really did not want to eat a handful of bugs. Thank you very much.
He did that far too many times while he was training beneath Aquila, who would relish in his apprentice's attempts to fly as fast as him.
Elsewhere.
Deep inside the capital of hell named Lilith, Sirzech groaned as he flexed his hand feeling the pains that came with doing so much paperwork on a daily basis. He averaged seven hours of work a day and that was with several teams of devils beneath him helping out with every report coming in. For all their faults, administration offices were a great idea from the humans. Grabbing the next paper he looked over the details of the… oh you have got to be kidding him.
“We will not have any sort of statue depicting a devil decapitating a fearful Angel inside Lilith, golden or otherwise.” The title holder of Lucifer growled as he wrote on the paper before taking his stamp and marking it denied, and just to make sure he got his message across Sirzech stamped it a few more times. “I swear these requests seem to get stupider every week. Why did I even get this request, the other teams are supposed to handle these.”
Sirzech groaned again, he could just feel the stupid coming off the next paper and would rather do anything other than doing it. Maybe his darling wife would join him for brunch, they haven't spent all that much time together today despite being in the same building and it would be nice to relax with her before he went back into his work. Or maybe he could see if his dear sister had sent him a new report. It’s been a few days and the last report had said she was going to try and find some information on her own about some new arrival in Kouh, it stung a little when she underlined ‘on her own’ like he was going to try and find everything from their grandparents to what kind of animals they have.
…actually he would probably do that, who was he trying to fool.
Still as much as it hurt for him to be pushed away it did show his sister was growing up into a respectable young lady, one more than perfect as the heiress of the Gremory clan. Now if only he could find a way to break that engagement it would probably earn him the greatest brother in the world!
As Sirzech was daydreaming about his sister holding a banner and proclaiming him to be the bestest brother ever, as a chibi of course, Grayfia chose that moment to enter with another small stack of paper.
She sighed once she spotted the expression on his face. Not much paperwork was going to be done for at least another hour, not with how her husband works.
“My lord, at least try and look like you're doing your work.” she said in her usual no nonsense tone. When she failed to get a response she looked back to see him even deeper in his daydream, she sighed before she sat the papers down on a nearby table and walked to her husband. With only a little bit of force she started pinching his cheeks.
“Owowowo, Grayfia stop!” Sirzech cried out in mock pain, the pinch nowhere near enough for him to feel pain. “I’ll do my work, just stop pinching my cheek! It’s really annoying.”
“I’ll stop once you start doing your work for an entire day without daydreaming about lady Rias.”
“But Grayfia~” Sirzechs whined like a child at his wife's repramation. “It’s my sister, how can I not want to daydream about her. It's against the natural order of things for a big brother to not love his sister.”
Grayfia sighed at the actions of her husband and picked up the papers she left to the side, all the while Sirzechs rambled on about Rias and how much of a good brother he is. Before slamming the papers right in front of him. Luckily for the holder of Lucifer's title there was only a small amount of paperwork she was adding, only about 200 pages of things he needed to look over. With a disgruntled sigh the demon grabbed the first piece of paper and started looking over it.
With a firm nod, his wife walked over to the small kitchenette in the corner of the room to start brewing some tea for the both of them to drink, it would be a good few hours before they got out of the room and as a plus she could help him with the work she just dropped off.
Granted, not even a few minutes after they started they were interrupted by a knock on the door before it was opened by one of the many messengers that worked in the capital, delivering messages that came in rather than relying on something like a fax machine. It totally wasn’t because there were still some old farts around that refused to allow this inefficient system to be replaced. No, that would be silly.
“Sorry for the intrusion my lord, but a letter was just delivered for you.” The poor messenger bowed his head in apology as he fished the letter out of his satchel. Sirzech gave him a smile to calm his nerves as he stood out of his chair and met him halfway.
With another bow of his head the messenger left, something Lord Lucifer didn’t notice as his eyes instantly spotted the sender. It was his sister! He knew he was going to get something from Rias, his big brother instincts were never wrong before and something was telling him that the contents in the letter was going to be exciting. Maybe Rias managed to finally recruit that one boy she saw, something about his sacred gear being strange?
Sirzechs cheered as he made his way back, his lovely wife pouring him a cup of tea. It was always a good day with one of Rias’s letters.
Sitting in his chair he broke the seal and started reading the contents while slowly siping the hot tea. His eyes drifted from side to side as his sister explained the current situation going on in Kuoh. From the reincarnation of Issei, which he was happy for his sister, to the finding of Alicia who was apparently an angel like being from another dimension, to the situation going on with Asia and the fallen angels being in their territory. By the time he was done reading the letter Sirzech was rubbing his temple with a heavy frown on his normally handsome face.
“Is something wrong my lord?” Grayfia asked. She was answered with a grown and the letter being shoved in her general direction. After a minute or so she too had a frown on her face and sat the letter down on the desk. “... How did Rias get mixed up in so many complications?”
Sirzech threw his hands up into the air with a wordless cry. This was going to end up with Sirzech up to his neck with paperwork, mark his words.
TCOD.
Back in Kuoh.
Back in Kuoh, more specifically the church where the fallen angels (and Asia) were hiding out, the group of fallen angels were having… let’s call it a heated debate… over what they should do about the newcomer that had escorted their ‘charge’ back to their holding not a few days ago. That had been one hell of a shit show, not only had the group of Grigori been discovered mere days after infiltrating the territory held by two of the high ranking devils and their peerages, who in turn had the ears of two of the four great Maou’s as their siblings, they had failed to kill not one but two of the targets they were sent to kill. Oh no that would have been too little done to humiliate them!
One of the targets was literally resurrected by the fucking princess of destruction herself mere minutes after Raynare put a basketball sized hole in his stomach, it turns out the second target was some kind of unknown winged supernatural entity that kicked the asses out of both fallen angels like they were doing the fuckign landry. They had thought with them having a human prosthetic they would be an easy task to kill them.
After that their ‘charge’ Asia had decided to go off on an adventure while most of the Grigori Wing was dealing with covering up their tracks and sending messages to high command to alert them of the situation. Then somehow made friends with the newly resurrected devil and the unknown winged bitch and had them escort her back to the church. Then when Jack tried trailing the winged bitch to make sure they left, he jumped the gun and tried to attack them only to get… the best way they could describe it was the nerves to his pinky were dead and they might have to amputate it.
To make the situation go from ‘dangerous, recommend bailing’ to ‘you are FUCKED’ that psychopathic, perverted excorcist Freed had went off in the dead of night, took Asia with him for some forsaken reason, tracked down one of the random devil summoners around town and butchered the human after making him use his contract. As if that wasn’t bad enough Issei had chosen that exact moment to intrude in the building because the devils just so happened to have a schedule to adhere to and found the butchered corpse of his summoner and Freed trying to kill him. After nearly killing the devil the rest of the princesses peerage showed up to save his sorry ass and Asia had found out what Freed did to get kicked out of the church.
It was, to put it bluntly, the worst mission crash any of the Fallen angels could remember in years. The mission they were given was only supposed to maybe last 2 weeks while they completed each of the objectives they were given. Seriously, they had what, six? 2 winged fallen angels and a few dozen stray exorcists in the Kuoh town area?
While it shouldn’t have been enough to take out the peerages it should have given them some much needed space to complete their objectives.
Now?
Now they might be lucky to get back to Grigori headquarters with everyone alive.
“This has been the worst mission I've ever been part of, Raynare.” The petite form of Mittelt crossed her arms as she huffed from her position on top of a reasonably intact pew. “I’m letting you know this now because I didn't think you could top the last time we were near Israel.”
“Shut it flat chest, we all agreed to never speak of that god forsaken month again.” Raynare snapped, the fallen being in no mood to deal with her subroutines smack. Ignoring the angry cry that came out of Mittelt she paced in front of the ruined crucifix, trying to think of some way to salvage the plan. “We still have the extractor and we have Asia so the mission isn’t a complete failure, as long as we can act fast enough we can get the twilight healing gear out of the girl and at least bring something back to high command to make up for everyone's failure, no! You don’t get to say anything you and Kalawarner were supposed to give the others backup and now Jack has to have part of his hand fuckign cut off so it doesn’t fucking rot while attached to his hand. Actually now that I’ve thought about it where the fuck were you and that big bitch?”
Mittelt opened her mouth to retort, and probably say something she would regret, but before she could she was interrupted by a more ‘mature’ voice speaking from the doorway.
“If you must know, oh great leader, me and the washboard were off making sure the fuckign princess of ruin wasn’t about to rain death upon us. Or did you forget where exactly we are?” Kalawarner said coldly, stepping into the church's back room with a small plastic box in her hands. “Jack and Sarah should have been enough to kill what we thought as an abnormal human with only one flesh arm and a metal limb, that's what we all thought, remember. You specifically said a human was to be no match for a Fallen angel, never mind one of the crippeled ones. Now if you will excuse me, the exorcist dealing with Jack's booboo made me grab some painkillers and I would rather not watch longer than I have to.”
Raynare had never wanted to punch that bitches face more than she did right now, actually never mind that she would rather throw something preferably metal at her smug face.
“Well get it to the human, I want Jack to be walking in as few days as possible.”
“Why, so you can fuck up even more?”
Millelt giggled with amusement as Reynares normal pretty face contorted into an expression of pure loathing at the smaller girl's words. It was so much fun to poke her ‘leaders’ buttons. Her giggles were cut off suddenly when she gave off a short cry as a pink light spear crashed into one of the less stable parts of the pew, breaking it and sending the petite fallen to the ground.
The buxom woman sighed to herself as she walked past the two fallen angels that were now fighting, tempers had been on the rise and they needed to finish up as soon as possible before the whole damn mission blew up in their faces.
Pushing the door open, that led to one of the few intact storage rooms, Kalawarner took the moment to compose herself. She herself was no stranger to blood and guts having served with the angelic legions during the great war as an auxiliary before she fell, but that didn’t mean she was happy to see necrotic flesh in the making.
“Gah! By the fucking archangels when I get my hands on that bastard i’m going to tear of each of those feathers before burning them in front of him!” Jack cried out from the bed situated in the corner.
The injured Fallen was currently strapped to the bed with a multitude of belts the exorcists had laying around to keep him from moving around too much. For his own protection of course.
On his right side one of the few exorcists with medical knowledge was busy trying to do anything to slow down the necrotic effects the Halfling had done to his superior to no avail. Sarah was also there sitting in a chair, looking worryingly at Jack.
“Here I managed to grab a case of meds from a local safehouse, just don’t ask how I did so.” Kalawarner tossed the small box at the exorcist who barely managed to grab the box from the air before it hit the ground.
“You have my thanks, this would have been a world of pain for Jack here if he had to use mortal medicine.” the Exorcist mumbled to himself as he quickly unlocked the box and pulled out a small syringe full of blue liquid. Without a warning he stabbed Jack’s neck and pressed the plunger. “Now he hopefully won’t feel a thing while I remove the infected tissue in just a few minutes. Speaking of which, I can't leave the room until I’m done so if one of you could have one of my assistants grab the light yellow bag from storage and a lot of towels that would make my job easier.”
“I’ll do it.” Sarah responded instantly, practically jumping out of the chair.
That was good for the doctor, because Kalawarner sure as shit wasn’t going to do anything. Plus with her job done she had no reason to stay in the room with them, so without so much as a farewell Kalawarner left to go do something far more entertaining.
A few hours later, and more blood than probably needed to be cleaned, Jack had part of his right hand amputated and while that was bad enough the Fallen angel would be able to keep the rest of his hand which was a good thing of course. At the very least they would be able to leave the Kuoh area soon with most of their body parts attached.
-
kill them Votes: 4 66.7%
-
spare them Votes: 2 33.3%
