Professor Goetia continued her questioning, but beside the first two questions destabilising Pietro, the rest had been fairly simple. Pietro could see the interest in the professor's eyes, for she clearly wanted something from him. Yet he did not ask. He knew it was best not to.
But while Pietro and Goetia spoke to each other, Asura observed in silence. An odd thing from one such as him certainly, but he did so. Asura was an observant boy sometimes, and sometimes he would miss everything around him. He could do a lot of things but only when he wished to put in the effort. And so for once he only observed. He knew that his kind placed power above all, yet Pietro had a questionable amount of eyes on his person. What could it be, that all of those eyes who thought themselves discreet wanted?
Asura knew not, but he would not mention it to anyone. He was not supposed to be seeing such things. He was just Asura, he was a violent being above all else, and so no one else expected him to place attention on anything other than a chance at fighting others. It would remain as such for as long as it would benefit him.
Everyone had their little secrets, didn't they?
-----
Pietro bode Professor Goetia farewell as he was sent to the building to find his group. As the professor had explained to him, the school had a fairly loose system, in which students were not placed in clear classes based on their ranks or the curriculum they pursued, which was different from other academies. No, in fact, they were placed into groups of diverse sizes based on a single factor, their curriculum. They were to be placed in groups made by the Head of the Academy himself, a different group for each specific class they would all choose at the start of every year. But before Pietro and Asura could choose, they needed to join their group for the Hellish History course.
That had made Pietro happy, though a bit unsure as to how Asura would fare. Pietro knew that his desire to learn more about Hell's history would make this course far easier for him than it would be for Asura. It would surprise him if his companion could even sit through a single lesson of this course.
But Pietro's confidence faded away quite quickly, for as he entered the gigantic castle, he was met with the crowd of students he had not approached earlier on. He couldn't quite dodge them now, he needed to mingle with the rest of the students especially since he had no idea how to even find his group. All he had been told was to look for students wearing the same pin he had been offered and told to put on one of his sleeves. It was a small triangular pin made out of oddly warm metal and on it was written 'H.H-5'. Pietro had already guessed what the letters and number referred to, for the letters, were the initials for the course and the number could only be the one attributed to his group, but that did not help him all that much.
How exactly was he supposed to find the other members of his group amongst thousands of students? He could not even guess by looking at the apparent age of the students gathered before him since age was not factored in the creation of each group. Pietro wondered how the groups were even made in the first place, but that was not for him to know. He couldn't quite question the Head of the school to get the answer.
At least he would get an answer for his group problem, for Asura had just left his side to speak with a group of students that had the exact same pin they both did. That group had just entered the main hall of the castle, and yet Asura had immediately spotted them, his eyes were something to be frightened by, truly.
Pietro followed but remained behind Asura. He was not shy, of course not! He simply believed that it would help if those demons were approached by another of their kind. It appeared that he did not even need to somewhat hide behind the taller boy, however, for the group instantly focused on him. They were not the only ones watching Asura now that Pietro looked at the gathering of students without putting his attention on their sleeves.
As much as Asura looked bizarre to Pietro, he had not expected it to be the same for demons. Or perhaps...Could they sense Asura's power? That would explain why only a few of them observed him from a distance.
The group could only notice such a thing as he was standing right in front of them.
"Hellish History? Group 5?" One of the boys in the group asked. He was much smaller than Asura but was not cowed by the presence of the intimidating demon. He was one of the only members of the group who did not appear wary of Asura. And that was something when said group counted at least twenty or so students.
Asura nodded his head and to his surprise, the smaller boy put an arm over his shoulders.
"Great! At least we don't get all the thinkers in this group. I was going mad over it!" The boy said in an almost jovial tone. It was a stark contrast with the expressions the rest of the group had.
An older-looking student with two sets of eyes grabbed the boy by his leather jacket and scowled at him.
"I can't believe this is your third year here. We cannot win the inter classes competitions with muscles alone, you buffoon! Stop whining about it!" She said as she shook him. Instead of taking offence to it, he merely laughed while she let go of him and scowled harder.
Well, they looked fairly friendly. Pietro was happy to know that his view of the demonkind was not completely destroyed on his first day in the city. Until now, they had proven to not be a species of monsters, he could only hope it would last.
"I am not whining though, you know that. We do need some actual weapons with us. It's the third time we're put with some big heads." The boy from earlier mocked two students in particular as he pointed at them with one of his claws. Pietro nearly gasped when he noticed that the student did indeed have claws, and impossibly sharp-looking ones at that. They were dark and so he hadn't noticed them since the boy wore dark clothes and had grey skin like so many other demons, but now he couldn't take his eyes away. He could only imagine what would happen if he had to take a hit from those things. It would tear apart any of his limbs with ease.
Demons truly had fantastic bodies. Funnily enough, Pietro felt that Asura would only seem less bizarre as time went on because he wasn't that much special in terms of looks compared to the rest of his kind. In a way, it did make him think that his own species looked bland in comparison.
Bland, weaker and far shorter-lived. Truly Humans were not favoured. But that would not stop him from trying, even if it did somewhat kill his enthusiasm. Everywhere he looked, he saw students who seemed like they could overshadow him in everything except perhaps intelligence, and that was not something Demons valued as much as humans did.
But suddenly, he felt something tug on one of his sleeves. He turned to look at Asura and saw the incomprehension on the boy's face.
"Why so down, human? I can't say I understand why you are excited by this school thing, but you have reached it, yet you do not look very happy."
"Oh...It's nothing, just a passing loss of enthusiasm. Everyone looks so much stronger than me, and demons have advantages that Humans don't. I don't know how I'm supposed to catch up. Didn't expect you to notice it, though." Pietro joked as he watched the group of students walk away from the main hall. So lost in his thoughts he had been, that he hadn't put attention to what was going on around him. Asura must have done the talking for him anyway. He was surprisingly more capable of interacting with others than Pietro had expected from him.
"I'm neither blind nor stupid, Pietro," Asura said before going to follow after the group. All the while he glared at those who watched him from afar. He had apparently noticed them too at some point. Was it when they entered, or when Pietro did too?
"Wait...My name..."
Asura gestured for him to start walking without turning around, and Pietro did so with a small smile. He was entirely unaware of the set of eyes focused on his person.
From the top of the long stairs situated at the end of the hall, two reptilian eyes observed. They were not attached to any apparent body and after shooting a glance at the professors gathered in the hall, they disappeared.
