Capítulo 26: Chapter 26: Find a burrito in the fridge
"..." Koneko jumped as she heard a door open.
Momon's Peerage had relocated themselves to the estate with the two unconscious now-devil Executors, and Momon had dropped the two off to one of the vacant bedrooms in the mansion. Apparently, the building had sixteen 'main' bedrooms prepared in the second floor, one for each Piece, and two guest rooms in the first floor.
Since the risk of 'Supreme Being's attack loomed over them the group had been forced to stick together, and more or less discard extracurricular activities or hanging out in town or its surrounding areas.
Thus, once Momon had dismissed the group Koneko had more or less holed up in the library of the third floor, reading manga while trying to clear her head of the sudden and brutal violence that had been visited on the two attacking nuns.
She didn't really care about the two, but seeing Momon display his cold, calculating and destructive personality still chilled Koneko to the core. The fact he had almost wiped his own Peerage out while killing the nuns, and had been completely nonplussed about it, was only making it worse.
"Hm… so damage between members of a Peerage isn't reduced… I'll have to experiment to figure out how much damage the members of a Peerage can inflict on each other…" The King straightened himself, eyeing the qipao-wearing Rook...
"Well, time for another experiment…" The King pulled two Pawns from somewhere and leaned over two charred, boiling corpses that had mere moments ago been two young girls…
Koneko couldn't help but to hug her legs close after jumping behind the comfy chair she had been sitting on in the library, trying her best to hide from the shape that had entered the library in search of something.
The emotionless voice of the King of the Peerage she was in was still echoed around her head, almost causing her to shiver which might reveal her location. Her cat-ears extended once again and turned towards the footsteps.
'...If he finds out I can use Senjutsu... ' Koneko stopped breathing as she heard the footsteps getting closer. '...I won't… I can't… If he tells me to use it, if I refuse… He's still in his 'destroyer' mindset, would he just... force me to use it? The new Issei doesn't understand empathy when he's like that, he wouldn't hesitate, he'd… he'd…'
The footsteps went silent, and then the chair behind which she had been hiding moved.
"Ah, Koneko-san- hm?" The male voice sounded surprised that he found the girl cowering behind the chair. Almost as if he hadn't beelined straight to her after entering the room.
Koneko jumped and tried to run for it, deciding that hiding wasn't working so hopefully if she made it to Rias, she'd…
"Ah, please wait!"
"OW!" Koneko yelped as she fell over, a sudden grab and yank of her private parts causing her to almost fall on her face on the floor.
She managed to land on her feet though, but the hold the Destroyer had on her 'parts' forced her to the floor, butt up, like an animal about to be violated. Koneko tried to turn around to kick herself free, but the destroyer was holding onto her precious part and forcing her to stay against the ground, causing her eyes to tear up from the pain and humiliation of having her precious parts groped and mistreated.
"Please, don't… My… I... " Koneko sobbed to the mat as she felt the hand move, violating her further…
"Oh, sorry." The Destroyer said, letting go of her cat-tail. "I… wanted to grab your shoulder, since I feel I need to have a talk with you, but... umu… Sorry, I didn't mean to grab your tail."
Koneko hissed as the humiliation came to an end, and tried to jump back on her feet so she could escape. "I'll never forgive you."
"I, umu, understand. Please wait!" The new-Issei reached for her again when she tried to turn, causing her to turn towards her violator once again to keep him from groping her tail.
The turn caused the two to collide, once again sending Koneko on the floor.
She grabbed the Destroyer, intending on grappling him and locking him in place until she could alert Rias and…
"Oof!" The pervert crashed on top of her, with her attempt to grapple disintegrating as he accidentally flattened her tail with his knee.
"NNYAH!" Koneko screamed and hit the idiot's shoulder, causing it to let a sickening crunch and forcing her to pause in horror. 'H- d- did I just dislocate his shoulder?'
"Oh… bludgeoning damage, of course." the Destroyer seemed unfazed by the fact his arm hung limply on his shoulder. He gazed at it, then flexed it when it let another, somehow even more sickening crunch and the shoulder snapped back in place.
The lack of emotions from the man during the whole incident caused Koneko to shudder in discomfort. "Um, Koneko-san, can you please not attack me? I mean to just talk."
"...Get off me." Koneko hissed as the pervert was now lying on top of her.
"Can you release me, and promise not to run away until I've spoken my piece?" He offered in turn, and Koneko remembered she had tied her legs around the man's waist to pin him in place in her grappling attempt.
"..." Koneko narrowed her eyes. "...I don't trust you."
"Well, I can't really blame you, but…" The new Issei seemed to think about his answer for a while. "Well, I figured I'd have a talk with you since you seem to be really wary of me. Plus Rias, Akeno and Asia are waiting for the two girls to wake up below and didn't want me present, and Yubelluna and Xuelan, um… well, anyway, Gasper is exploring the house and Yuuto is… uh, I think he was shaken a bit by the attack by the two girls and wants some time alone."
"...Why'd you come after me?" Koneko narrowed her eyes. "Why not... Do something else?"
"Well, I was a bit worried. You're not really taking the changes in this whole 'Rias's Peerage becoming my Peerage'-situation well, right?" Not-Issei noted. "Umu, can we, uh, sit down or something? I mean, this pose is a bit embarrassing…"
Koneko noticed a faint blush on the Destroyer's cheeks, causing her to become confused. 'He still retains some emotions other than murder-kill-destroy? Or, what if… Ah, those two perverts from Riser's Peerage must have handled him already… Or at least taken the worst edge off of it.'
Feeling more confident, Koneko released her legs from around the boy, and realized that if his sense of right and wrong was returning, and with the two's hips mushed together…
She kicked the not-Issei off her, using the motion to hide a small blush on her cheeks.
"Hm? Ah, good. Thanks." The boy seemed to land on his feet and offered a hand to her.
She grudgingly took the hand and allowed her to be lifted on her feet.
"Want to sit and talk?" the boy pat a table that had been stacked with Koneko's reading material while sitting on a chair he dragged from nearby.
She sat down on her previous seat, drawing her legs in front of her and hugging them to her chest. "...So."
"Well, I was wondering why you were avoiding me?" Not-Issei asked, seemingly ignoring the glares Koneko sent his way- or perhaps he just didn't care.
"...Issei is perverted and scary."
"Ah, well, I'd like it if you called me Momon, and about that pervert thing… umu… I'm trying my best not to be one." Not-Issei sighed heavily.
For some reason the resignation and tiredness in the sigh seemed genuine. 'Is he really?'
"About scariness… What makes me scary?" Not-Issei then turned towards Koneko, causing her to stiffen up in response.
'Not good, if I tell him then he's going to…' "Scary things."
Not-Issei seemed to deflate from her flat answer. "I was wondering if it was something I did, or said, or… well, you know, something of the sort."
"...Fine." Koneko prepared herself mentally and physically. 'If I just stomp on the floor with Rook's strength, I could cause enough ruckus for Rias to come help… but would he hurt her instead?'
"You're scaring me. You want to experiment on us... and experiment on other people, and you are just… a emotionless, relentless killer... Even when you're not in your 'destroyer-mode' you're scary. It's like you're just swapping masks to hide something really bad... You're scaring me." Koneko told the truth of her feelings.
'Issei' seemed to deflate even further, although there was an underlying wariness in his posture that caused hairs in Koneko's neck to stand on end. Like if he was secretly judging the pros and cons of having her just 'disappear'. "Well, uh, you overheard me back when I, um, recruited Yubelluna and Akeno, so… well, I was just wondering if Peerage members could damage each other. I guess I got the answer today…"
The explanation came to a halt as Koneko had connected the dots and tried to make a run for it, only to be caught by her tail once again. "No, no, I wasn't trying to hurt you!"
"...I hate you." Koneko mumbled to the mat once again, as she was lying on her face again, with her butt up thanks to the hand gripping her tail.
"Sorry. I didn't… you know what, I'll use rope next time. So please stop trying to run away, I'm not going to hurt you." Not-Issei seemed exasperated by Koneko's attempts to flee, causing her blood to run cold.
'Not good... ' Koneko forced herself to be calm as she skulked back to her chair. 'If I fail to escape one more time…'
"Anyway, like I was intending on saying, I think everyone found out why I wanted to find out why I wanted to make sure if Peerage members could hurt each other. It's not like I wanted to hurt you guys, but, well, it looks like my, umu, abilities have a lot of area-of-effect so…" Not-Issei's speech seemed half-rambly half-apologetic. "And I wasn't sure if the Pawns could resurrect those two girls, so I called it an experiment… Sorry if I made you worried."
"..." Koneko narrowed her eyes at the boy. His words seemed to make sense, in a way, but for some reason she still got a bad feeling from him. "...You're still scary."
"How am I scary, and how can I be not-scary?"
"I don't know. You're just… scary. Evil. Bad." Koneko rattled off her gut feelings, fully aware that at any moment the not-Issei in front of her might just reach for her and do something she didn't really know, except that it would likely be painful and really sinister.
"Ah…" Issei seemed to deflate even further, which was starting to reach impressive levels. "Umu. I guess you're right."
Whatever Koneko had been expecting, admittance wasn't it.
"Well, if I think about it, you, er, we are devils. You know, devils. Shouldn't that give us some wiggle room about being evil and such on?" The boy seemed to realize something.
Koneko wanted to scream as she realized that her thoughtless words had caused the boy to take a very disturbing outlook to her observations. 'No, no, no, that was not what I wanted… Oh, no…'
"Killing some people in cold blood shouldn't really faze devils, right? It's not like we're angels who would probably mind, but… I mean, few humans here and there, it's not like we're farming and slaughtering people for bacon… or would that be an issue either? After all, we're devils, right?"
"A-no, no, not… that's not... what I meant!" Koneko tried to stop the disaster that was starting to roll down the hillside, fully knowing that she had somehow managed to knock loose the stopper that had kept the disaster at bay. "...You're too scary! ...I don't want to be in your Peerage!"
The white-haired neko realized what she had said and slapped her hands on her mouth. 'Oh… oh no, no, no, I just…'
"Ah, well, if that's truly such a big problem, then I could…" Not-Issei looked depressed as he lifted his hand from the armrest of his chair.
Koneko bolted from her chair for her dear life while her past flashed before her eyes, briefly stopping to vision of not-Issei blasting Akeno's chest apart with a fireball. 'No, no, he's going to kill me, he's going to kill me, he's going to- OW!'
Her already bruised tail was grabbed for the third time in short succession, and she was forced to a prostrating pose towards the door once again.
"P-please… at least make it painless…" Koneko felt her strength sap from her body.
She could use Senjutsu to save her life, probably. But if she did, she might just explode the whole building and put Rias in danger. And the rest of Rias's old Peerage in danger. Her comrades, her friends.
If she used her strength as a Rook to resist not-Issei, he'd have to use his fire manipulation to kill her. She had seen the devastation he could cause, and she had no illusions that if she forced him to go all out, she'd force him to use the same blast that killed the two nuns.
Which would destroy the mansion, and would likely kill Rias and the others.
'...He planned this from the start. He knew I'd have no options but to die or be forced to hurt Rias, either directly or indirectly. He's holding hostages with both our hands on the hostage's neck. How despicable…'
She didn't want to hurt her friends. She'd rather die alone in this paper-smelling room.
A sob escaped her as she felt a hand on her head, and she waited for the heat to come and end her short life. "Rias… I'm sorry… Kuroka..."
The hand withdrew, confusing Koneko, and then returned, forcing her heart to race again in panic, then withdrew, and then returned.
She felt her tears fall on the mat below from the uncertainty and from the prolonged torture, each time the hand decended on her head it was like the headsman's axe preparing to swing, each time it rose it was as if daring her to raise her hope so it could be crushed again.
"Just kill me! Stop torturing me!" Koneko screamed finally as her mind couldn't take any more of it.
"O-oh, I didn't… umu, sorry." The hand froze, then withdrew. "I, umu, tried to, well, it worked with Gasper, so I figured…"
Koneko froze from the uncertainty in the Destroyer's voice. Then she felt herself getting pulled up from the floor, and put back to the chair.
"Umu, girls are complicated…" Not-Issei mumbled under his breath, the low voice providing little protection against Koneko's cat-ears. "...Or is it because she's a cat-girl, and thus her feelings are even harder to understand than a normal girl's?"
"W-wha… complicated? Feelings?" Kokeno shut up half-speech. But the damage had been done as the Destroyer looked up at her, and… blushed?
"W-well, I tried to pat your head because it worked to cheer Gasper up, but, honestly, I'm running out of ideas on how to cheer you up. I mean, if you keep running away and being scared every time you're in the same area as me then that won't be good. And you probably wouldn't be happy with it either." Not-Issei explained, causing an odd feeling in Koneko's stomach as she started to realize something. She felt it was mostly relief, but had a good part of annoyance and anger. "It would also make our team integrity pretty bad, after all if we're to be a rai- Peerage, then we all need to be comfortable in each other's presence. So umu, I thought to cheer you up and, well… get to know you more. After all we've only spoken to each other in passing. Sorry for grabbing your tail, again..."
"Ah." Koneko was starting to understand why Rias had been so unstable if that'swhat she had been forced to endure. 'Don't tell me…'
It seemed that the new-Issei wasn't perverted like the old one, or wasn't being deliberately scary like she had thought.
Rather, being scary was a side-product.
Simply put, he was absolutely, horrifyingly, reality-bendingly…
Clueless, powerful, and well-wishing.
Or, the new Issei, or Momon, was the equivalent of a well-wishing doctor who operated his patients with tools that had been tipped with lethal poison without the doctor's knowledge.
Koneko had spoken to Yubelluna and Xuelan, trying to understand more about 'Riser' from the people who had known him the best, and had found out that the man, while appearing cruel and arrogant on the outside, had been deeply concerned with his Peerage and those around him, albeit had shrouded his kindness with cruelty so Phenix family's enemies wouldn't take his well-wishing as weakness.
Indeed, it had now become clear to Koneko:
Issei was still Issei, but only partially. Only one part of him remained.
Riser was still Riser, but only partially. Only one part of him remained.
And whatever the Great Red had added, according to the theory Rias had relayed to her, had meshed the two parts together.
Issei's cluelessness, Great Red's power, and Riser's well-wishing. All combined to form one horrifying entity.
The boy in front of Koneko tilted his head in confusion as the cat-girl's face turned as pale as paper.
She felt like screaming.
Instead, Koneko pulled her legs in front of her in the chair and hugged them against her chest, again. Although this time it wasn't to protect herself.
She knew there would be nothing she could do to archive that end, nothing that wouldn't make things worse. She could try to fight, try to flee, she could try to hide, but nothing would help. The new-Issei's power would overpower hers and level those around her. The new-Issei would catch her if she tried to flee, and find her if she tried to hide.
Koneko realized that the person who Issei had become was like her, except that while she had willingly refused to use her powers, knowing that to do so would only end with her hurting people around her, he hadn't realized that the power he used would only hurt the people around him.
"...Why do you do it?" She whispered finally. "Use your powers? The ones given by the Great Red, right? Rias told us about it… You were captured by that dragon and he did something to you… did he give you that power?"
The boy seemed troubled, and Koneko nodded. "So he did… Why do you use it?"
"Well, better to use one's powers than allow one's comrades to be hurt by inaction." It seemed that not-Issei was sweating heavily. Koneko couldn't fault him
"...You killed Akeno and Yubelluna, hurt them bodily... And all of us psychologically. There must have been other ways."
"There were none I could find, and hesitation would have led to the death of both." The answer was resolute. Not-Issei didn't hesitate to explain his reasoning. "I've already gone over this."
"...You almost killed all of us just an hour ago."
"Well, granted, I did hurt you guys but that was because I hadn't really used my powers here, erm, at all I mean. I couldn't properly gauge how much damage it'd do." Not-Issei's resolute voice seemed to waver a bit, and Koneko latched onto the hesitation, doing her best to make him see the problem, to try to get him to understand that his power was like her Senjutsu:
Too powerful, and needed to be sealed, lest it destroyed everyone around them.
"...Can't you see the issue?" Koneko's voice was quiet.
"Yeah. I need to use my powers more." Not-Issei's voice was thoughtful. "Hm, you're correct. Although I had figured out as much myself, it's always good to have a second opinion."
"NO!" Koneko screamed as she heard the answer. "NO!"
"Uh? Umu, did I say something wrong?" Not-Issei seemed confused over Koneko's sudden scream.
"You can't! The more you use your powers, the more you hurt people around you! Can't you see?! You can't! You'll do more damage than good, just… stop!" Koneko's voice began to waver. "Please! Before you hurt us, and before you kill us by accident!"
"Umu… I see." Not-Issei seemed thoughtful for a moment, then Koneko's hopes were crushed. "No. Not going to happen."
"A- ah… W-why?" Koneko shivered as she heard the voice. 'He's like Kuroka… too bold, too sure of their power, he can't even see that he's…'
"Well, simply put, the problem of 'lack of proper control over power' can be only remedied by using said power until mastery of it has been reached, and the power can be regulated to the point where it is a scalpel, and not a flail." Not-Issei explained. "After all, you can't be expected to know how to use a tool if you don't use it and just lock it in a shed. So that way every time you bring out the tool you'll only end up making a mess of whatever you were working on and hurt yourself badly. That means, you'll have to just take the pain when training to use the tools until you can use them, so when you need them, you won't end up killing yourself with the tools There's a reason for the saying 'new blood lubricates machines, but old blood breaks them' becoming popular."
"U-uh, I've… never heard of that… saying" Koneko's face turned disgusted at the 'saying'.
"W- oh, umu, I've… well, I just… Yeah, I just came up with it. Just now. Umu." Not-Issei blushed, suddenly panicked for some reason. "...Please disregard it, yes. But the point still stands, if I stop using my powers I won't be able to function as the King of the Peerage, and instead become dead weight. So I refuse, and instead experiment and use my powers to the point I can use them effectively without accidentally killing my Peerage in the process."
Koneko hugged her legs closer to herself. "...Were it so easy…"
"Oh, that brings me to another point. I figured we should probably go and train a bit together at some point, like this weekend. We have a bunch of teleporter circles set up for that exact purpose so we should use them to get more comfortable with each other's powers, fighting style and abilities" Not-Issei continued. "Moreover, I was wondering if we could fine-tune our powers a bit so we wouldn't accidentally wipe each other. I know Yubelluna is akin to an artillery piece, so unless we all move in perfect unison, she'll accidentally shell our own comrades which won't be good because Peerage members don't receive reduced damage from their fellow Peerage members."
"Ha- ha…" Koneko let a near-sob like chuckle. "And if someone dies because of it?"
"Well, I wasn't planning on anyone dying during training. That'd be counter-productive." Not-Issei tilted his head. "Why are you so worried? I understand your hesitation with what happened earlier, but that was only because I was forced to fight real opponents with powers I hadn't, umu, gauged before. Thus if I gauged them during training, I could then control them the next time I fought."
"..." Koneko lowered her eyes. "And what if you can't control them? Even after trying? What if your powers just… stop obeying you and you'll end up hurting your, um, Peerage?"
"Well… I suppose that could be possible. But if I don't try then I won't find out either way, so I might as well give it a shot." Not-Issei seemed to get a bit confused about Koneko's resistance. "Do you have experience with powers going out of control, Koneko-san?"
"N-no!" Koneko froze as her answer had been too fast. 'Oh… I don't think that he'd… but what if he forces me to…'
"..." Not-Issei seemed a bit suspicious of Koneko's instant answer. "...Well, if you don't want to tell me right now, I won't pry. But if you have some powers you're holding back then I hope you'll come clear of them during the training. If you have some powerful ability you're trying to hold back in fear of hurting us then I'd want you to consider my previous words but towards your power instead of mine."
"...Fine. But if I go berserk... I want you to kill me before I hurt Rias or the others. You should be well capable of doing that." Koneko felt spiteful and placed her ultimatum.
"Very well, but I'll resurrect you afterwards." Not-Issei said something completely nonsensical with a straight face. "Of course, assuming I can't just stop you non-lethally, or you can't stop yourself. Out of curiosity, what is the name of your hidden power, if you want to tell me?"
"...Senjutsu." Koneko somehow felt her hesitation bleeding away before Not-Issei's confidence and resolution
"Sounds interesting. I'll look forward to seeing it in action. Well then, this has been a fruitful conversation, and I'm happy we had it." Not-Issei stood up from the chair and reached to pat Koneko's head, freezing after the second pat. "Ah, sorry…"
"...It's alright." Koneko grabbed the hand after it had almost pulled it away and put it back, allowing him to pat her twice more before swatting the hand away.
Enough was enough, after all. She'd have him take responsibility if he did it any more than that.
She glanced out of the library window and blinked as she thought she saw something pink, but it was almost as if she had been seeing things as second glance showed nothing out of ordinary.
"Well then, I'll see if I can find Yuuto and talk to him, he seemed a bit distressed. Want to come with me?" Not-Issei sighed and offered.
"...No thanks, I'll be here." Koneko felt her tension start to bleed away as she looked at not-Issei's, or rather, Momon's retreating back.
"...Maybe he's alright, after all. Perhaps he can even be good after he gets a grip on his powers and stops being scary…" Koneko reached for the manga she had left on the table when the library's door closed.
She touched her hair, between her cat-ears, and specifically on the spot where the boy had pat her. "...Maybe I can master Senjutsu after all. If he can master what the Great Red gave him… so can I master my blood."
.
.
Momonga sighed as he leaned against the library's door. 'Well, I think I managed to get out of that conversation with my cover intact… Koneko is way too sharp. She almost saw through my cover…'
He considered the fact he had given her a grand speech about using one's power to master it to justify his own accidental splash damage, only to remember that he had sealed Gasper's power, which would more or less prevent the blonde vampire from using it and mastering it unless he allowed him to do so.
"I'm a hypocrite, aren't I?"
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