The Protagonist System

As we walked to school, Rias filled me in on what had been happening since I had passed out in the bath. My note about what I did at the abandoned church had set off an international incident, because it had revealed a lot of things that shouldn't have been revealed for weeks.

I hadn't quite intended that when I went to the church to clear out the rogue exorcists and only wanted to make them disappear without anyone finding out that it was me. My... ah... explosive mistake had changed that somewhat because I had obliterated 30 of the 50 or so exorcists in the basement and wrecked most of their stored equipment and supplies that they had smuggled into the city.

Unfortunately, I did not kill any of the remaining Fallen Angels that lived there. I had to assume the three presences I had felt approaching the church last night were Raynere, Kalawarner, and Mittelt. If the three of them continued to move around together and not individually, I was going to have a difficult time against them. Dodging one or two light spears is easy. Dodging six or more? Not so much.

Not only had the Fallen Angel's secret base been revealed because of me, the half-ruined sacred gear extractor had been found by Sona and her Peerage. The undamaged light pistols and light swords were just icing on the cake, as the old saying goes. It showed that the Fallen Angels were preparing for war and that was not sitting well with the other factions.

When we arrived at school, we were brought right into a Student Council meeting. Sona explained that scouts had been set up at different entrances to the city to stop anyone else from entering or leaving without Sona's and Rias' permission, which meant the one she had sent to the airport saw a particular excommunicated nun stepping off the first plane to land that morning.

“I'll go get her.” I offered right away.

Everyone's eyes went right to me and I gave them a huge smile.

“I was going to skip class to hang out in the clubhouse anyway, so you might as well have me run errands.”

Sona looked from me to Rias.

“He was severely hurt last night. I won't hold it against him if you don't.” Rias said.

Sona gave me a pointed look. “This does not count as the favor you owe me.”

“Dammit, you had to clarify it.” I said with a chuckle and her lips twitched to smile. “I'll transport over and come back the long way to give you all the time you need to keep working.”

“That is thoughtful of you, Issei. Thank you.” Sona said.

I gave Koneko a kiss on the lips and Rias a kiss on the cheek, then I winked at her and gave Sona's cheek a kiss, too. “See you later.”

“Pervert.” Koneko said, fondly. Rias chuckled and Sona blushed.

I went over to the teleportation circle and saw the coordinates on the wall for the scout locations, adjusted the airport one to be out of sight, and activated the spell. I disappeared in a flash of light and reappeared in the corner of a parking lot between two trees.

I cast a magic detection spell and nothing came up, so I walked across the parking lot and entered the airport. I silently kept casting the detection spell until I had a hit. I followed it to the baggage claim area and easily saw the short girl wearing a nun outfit, because she stood out in the crowd like a lone penguin on an ice shelf. It would have been difficult to avoid seeing her.

“Hello, there!” I said with enthusiasm and the young woman startled slightly. “I'm sorry, Miss Argento. I didn't mean to scare you.”

“No, no. It's all right.” Asia said and waved her hands. “I just didn't expect anyone around here to speak Italian...” She paused and looked up at my face. “...wait a moment. How did you know my name?”

“As soon as I heard you had arrived, I offered to come here to pick you up.” I said, completely truthfully.

Asia beamed a smile at me. “That's so nice of you.” She said and then her smile disappeared. “When they shoved me onto the plane and told me to make my way here, I thought I would be all alone.”

I reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Miss Argento... Asia... no matter where you go or what you are doing, you are never alone. As long as you keep your faith close to your heart, even if it wavers during trying times, it will never fail you.”

Asia gave me a surprised look.

“Oh, look at me! I'm such an idiot for preaching about faith to a nun!” I said with a huge grin and she softly laughed. “My name is Issei Hyoudou. My friends call me Issei.”

“It's nice to meet you, Issei.” Asia said and looked startled. “I'm sorry! Can I... I mean...”

“Of course you can call me Issei.” I said and pointed to the luggage carousel. “I hope we can be good friends for years to come.”

Asia beamed a smile at me and looked at the carousel. “That one's mine!”

I grabbed the small suitcase when it was close and it felt suspiciously light. It was then that I remembered she was a reclusive nun for years and didn't have a lot of personal possessions like clothes. I offered her my elbow to escort her and she blushed prettily as she accepted it.

“We have a lot of time before we need to report to the rulers of the territory, so why don't we drop this suitcase off and we can explore around for a bit?” I asked her as I led her out of the airport. “I recently had an in-depth lesson on the local tourist spots and the best routes to take a date to keep a woman happy while sightseeing.”

Asia stumbled slightly and blushed hard. “A d-d-d-date?”

“Purely platonic, of course. I would never suggest doing anything untoward with a woman of the cloth.” I said and gave her a warm smile. “That doesn't mean we can't enjoy spending some time together, maybe eat some greasy fast food, and talk about everything under the sun.”

Asia looked a little stunned. “I... um... I've never...”

“Don't worry about a thing, Asia. I'll take care of everything.” I promised and led her across the parking lot to the teleportation coordinates I had used.

“Th-thank you, Issei.” Asia said, gratefully.

“Believe me, it's my pleasure.” I said and stepped between the trees. “You might want to close your eyes for a second. Teleportation circle.”

Asia nodded and I created a teleportation circle to jump to a random spot, then used it to jump again near my house.

“Here we are.” I said and Asia opened her eyes.

“This is a very nice house.” Asia complimented as we walked around the corner to enter it.

“Thank you. We try to take good care of it.” I said and opened the door. “Mom! I'm only here dropping off a friend's suitcase as I show her around the city!”

“You can leave it in the living room by the couch!” Miki shouted back from the kitchen. “I thought you went to school!”

“I'm skipping with permission!” I shouted and put the suitcase in the living room and set a small barrier around it. “See you tonight!”

“Bye, sweetie!” Miki shouted back.

I led Asia outside and locked the front door.

“She seems nice.” Asia said.

“She's the best.” I said and we walked down the street. “If I remember the map's orientation right, our first stop should be the duck pond at the park. It should be that way.”

“You haven't done this before?” Asia asked, slightly concerned.

“Nope! This is my first time, so please be gentle.” I joked and laughed.

Asia blushed and then laughed, too.

*

Sona Sitri did her best to not react as her older sister, Serafall Leviathan, pretty much took over the investigation. Her sister's incessant questioning wasn't helping to move things along and Sona spent more time than necessary as she regurgitated the answers that her sister already knew. It was quite irritating and she fought it down. They examined all of the evidence several times, including the damaged items.

It took most of the morning to get through it all and Serafall nodded when they were done. “I need to talk to Issei about his attack on the abandoned church and what he did to cause that much destruction.”

“He told me about that.” Rias said.

“A second-hand account won't work because a description of a description isn't admissible during an official investigation.” Serafall responded.

“You've been watching those police procedural shows again.” Sona said with a sigh.

Serafall gave her a knowing smile.

Sona looked at her friend. “Rias? Where is he? He said he would give us some time and that was hours ago. It's almost lunchtime.”

“I'll send my familiar out to find him. It shouldn't take long.” Rias said and left the room briefly to send her bat-like familiar to Issei, because it could find all of her peerage members easily. When Rias returned to the office, she brought her crystal ball with her.

“I haven't used anything like that in years.” Serafall commented as Rias set it up on Sona's desk.

Rias cast the remote viewing spell on her familiar and the three women watched the crystal ball. The scene it played made all three of them feel some envy, because they watched Issei laughing and carrying on with a beautiful blonde girl while they ate at a fast food restaurant. They also had small food fight with french fries being tossed back and forth with a lot of laughing.

“Familiar, please transform and go inside to ask Issei to bring the nun here to the school.” Rias ordered and the view moved up and down in agreement.

The familiar flew around the side of the building, there was a puff of smoke, and the familiar looked like a woman as it went back and entered the restaurant. “Hello, Issei Hyoudou. Rias Gremory has asked for you to return to the school with your guest.”

“Already? It feels like we just started the tour.” Issei said with a sigh. “Tell Rias we'll be there as soon as we finish eating. It's Asia's first time eating out like this and I don't want to rush her.”

Asia softly laughed. “It's been wonderful and I've never had so much fun, Issei!”

“I'm glad.” Issei said and looked at the familiar. “Maybe another ten to fifteen minutes. I bought large milkshakes and they're delicious.”

“If it gets him here faster, he can bring them.” Rias said to the crystal ball.

“You can bring those along. Rias Gremory approves.” The familiar repeated in a much better way.

“That's great.” Issei said and looked thoughtful. “I wonder if I should get some for everyone?”

“We don't want any!” Rias snapped.

“Speak for yourself. I wouldn't mind a chocolate milkshake.” Sona whispered.

Koneko nodded. “Agreed.”

“It will delay him if he orders something for everyone. Just get him here!” Rias ordered.

The familiar let out a soft sigh. “Two chocolate shakes for Koneko and Sona. You must hurry.”

“I'll order right now and finish eating!” Issei said and ran over to the counter, placed the order and paid, and ran back to the booth. “They'll be done in a few minutes.”

“Plenty of time.” Asia said and picked up her half-eaten hamburger.

“I will wait outside.” The familiar said and quickly left. It's time for transforming was coming to an end and it needed to be out of sight before it changed back. It went back to the window and watched. Issei and Asia did eat quicker than they should have, saving some of their french fries for later, and picked up the two new shakes and carried their own out of the restaurant.

The familiar joined them and they walked around to the side of the building. Issei cast the teleportation circle and they disappeared in a flash of light to reappear in the Student Council office.

“Oh! Lady Leviathan!” Issei gasped and bowed deeply. “If I'd known you were here, I would have picked up another milkshake for you.”

Serafall looked happy at the admission. “That's all right, Issei. I'll share Sona's.”

“You could ask first.” Sona griped.

“I could.” Serafall teased and Sona sighed.

Issei chuckled and handed a chocolate shake to Koneko and the second one to Sona. Koneko looked pleased at the order he had handed them out and started sucking on the straw right away. Sona took a sip and handed it to Serafall, whom also took a sip. Tsubasa took it next and the chocolate milkshake was quickly passed around to the rest of Sona's Peerage.

“I have a few questions about last night.” Serafall said, her voice going serious.

Issei nodded and took a long suck on the straw of his own milkshake and handed the drink to Rias. “Can you hold this for me? It's strawberry.”

Rias held it and blushed a little as she looked at it longingly.

“Go ahead.” Issei said and ignored her delighted squeal and Akeno trying to cuddle up to her and begging for a sip, too. Issei started to eat the remains of his fries and turned to face Serafall. “I'm ready for the interrogation, Lady Leviathan.”

It took half an hour for Serafall to be satisfied with his answers and the milkshakes were long gone. It took her another few minutes to think about something and nodded.

“All right, I think I have the whole picture.” Serafall said and pointed a finger at Issei. “A Fallen Angel murdered you and you were upset and sought revenge. You found out that the church was their hideout and went there to confront her, only to blow up a bunch of stray exorcists instead.”

I opened my mouth to refute that.

“Quiet!” Serafall ordered. “You have pissed off two biblical factions with what you did. It doesn't matter if Raynare was following orders or not. A Fallen Angel killing a human is easily covered up, as the multiple deaths from stray devils easily proves.”

“You're assuming all of the deaths are by the stray.” I said instead of explaining my reasoning.

“Rias saved you and made you a Devil, which means you are under much different restrictions than if you had remained human. Your actions caused a lot of problems for me and our entire race. We have rules and laws...”

“...that you easily ignore whenever you want.” I interrupted.

“Excuse me?” Serafall asked with a frown.

“I don't see you ordering Sona and Rias and their Peerages to clear out the illegal occupation of their territory by the Fallen Angels and the excommunicated Gregori priests pretending to be exorcists.” I said.

Sona and Rias gasped while their Peerages looked surprised.

“They were building up a huge force that could easily take over the entire city and cause untold destruction, and you're standing here and accusing me of a crime when I revealed their entire operation to murder innocent people and steal their sacred gears.” I added, almost unnecessarily.

“That... is beside the point.” Serafall said.

“No, what's beside the point is that you are looking for a scapegoat to make both Heaven and the Fallen Angels back off from taking responsibility for their own mistakes.” I accused.

Everyone gasped this time and Serafall couldn't hide the guilt from showing on her face.

“So, are we having a big showy trial or was this it? No defense for me? No public showing of the evidence? No admission of guilt by anyone but me?” I asked and Serafall stayed quiet. “Well, I have only one thing to say in response to that.”

“Issei, don't!” Koneko exclaimed.

“Cover your ears, dearest.” I said and smiled at her using my name instead of calling me Pervert. I deployed my four wings, that shocked everyone, and I took a deep breath as I looked up towards the ceiling. “Dear God, our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name!”

“Ahhh!” All of the devils in the room cried out and dropped to their knees with hands over their ears.

“Issei! You've been blessed by GOD!” Asia exclaimed and clapped her hands together in prayer as she dropped to her knees in supplication.

“I call upon the Arbiter of Heaven, the High Angel Gabriel, and pray that she will grace us with her divine presence! So shall I ask, so shall she deliver, in God's name, AMEN!” I shouted.

After a few seconds, a swirling golden portal appeared in the ceiling. Sandal-covered feet came through, sexy calves, cute knees, thighs that went on for miles, hips to die for, an epic chest the old Issei would have bled out from a nosebleed for, and a cherubic face that every other angel was envious of. The toga she wore covered everything and hid nothing.

Gabriel, the most beautiful woman in Heaven softly landed in front of me and her twelve gold wings fluttered behind her. “Issei Hyoudou. Reincarnated Devil. Repentant Pervert.” She said as her blank face changed to show a teasing smile. “You have gained my interest.”