บท 18: Chapter 18

There was a deadly silence for a few minutes. No one wanted to break the ice. Except for Issei all the girls had fear written on their faces. Issei being the ignorant one asked the question that has been in his mind.

" Why did you all have fearful expressions when talking about Shaltier? Who is she exactly"

" Wait you are saying that you have no idea who is. " Xenovia asked disbelievingly. She then looked at Koneko if she was seeing things. But unfortunately for her, she is in reality as Koneko shakes her head.

Xenovia exhaled a deep sigh and took some deep breaths to calm her mind. After that, she turned to look at Issei with a serious gaze.

" I will tell you about her later but first tell me about how you first met her."

Seeing her serious gaze issei nodded and told them everything. After half an hour all the girls looked at Issei with a weird look.

" I don't know whether to tell you are extremely lucky or unlucky Issei-kun, " Irina said finally.

Issei had more question marks all over his head now.

" Shaltier is a person who can be called the definition of death. When there is a problem the bigger pantheons are about to have she and her group shadow garden will appear and settle it. Well, it's not like it's free since they do charge us" Xenovia said.

" well isn't it like a normal mercenary group? So why are you guys so afraid of her "

"When I said she is the personification of death I really meant it. When some pantheons who were arrogant tried to do something unnecessary well they all died. The Greek pantheon is one of them. I heard 20% of the male gods died to her blade.

And that's not all I heard when Shiva the strongest god had a duel with each other it ended in a draw after a few days of constant fighting. But what's worst is when she appears she steals the identity of a being near you so she has no true face. That is why they called her the ' phantasmal king no face ' Let's also not forget that she appears when the pantheons are at their lowest so we speculate that she has a spy network even Grigori may even pale in comparison. " continued Xenovia.

" that's not all when some devils were about to dirty business she appeared and broke their minds. And when the council was about to make her a criminal all the properties of the person who suggested was lost.

Even their family business as some mysterious company bought them all when they were about to be broken, it's also rumored that when some devils in Satan's class went to capture her all the members of the group they beaten to a pulp, and their minds were broken.

It was speculated that they were crucified with holy weapons and were bathed in sacred water due to the huge amount of holy energy they were emitting. Since that day she was called the ' sacred devil ' which was one of Lucifer's titles due to how he handled the disobedient devils " Koneko added.

" And that's not all when some pantheons went all war with them all of the war instigators mysteriously went missing the other day and in their previous locations they could see a message of ' may the warmongers have some vacation time with to cool off their heads ', and what's more scary is after the incident every other pantheon broke off their deals with them. When asked they all said ' You have angered the wrong party and now you will face the consequence until your stupid pride breaks and offer a sincere apology ' " Irina continued.

" but you see the shadow garden also has the respect of every pantheon. You see when they do you a job they do it very efficiently and you have nothing to complain about. And they destroy some rouges who have criminal backgrounds. It is also said that they will offer their service for a favor if the other party has nothing to offer.

And with their interference, 13 % of crimes have been stopped in the supernatural world. And 13% is a very high number. So what did you offer for Shaltier who is the leader of the shadow garden and most feared among them to come to you personally "Xenovia asked.

" Nothing.. " replied Issei.

" haaah ….." All three of them are stunned.

" Wait what you are saying is she came and gave you a free offer " Issei just nodded.

" well let's put that aside and since that map is from her it is very much alligite.as one of the things Shadow Garden is proud of is that their information is 100% correct. But Issei I would advise you to don't get close to her. From what I have heard she is a war goddess herself and can give our strongest cardinal trouble with Martial art alone."

Issei just nodded his head and said nothing. " so does that mean we have a deal "

Xenovia and Irina nodded and said "Yes until this matter is settled we have an agreement. May we have a happy cooperation"

Both of them then shook their hands. That is how cooperation began with the devils and church but both parties didn't know that this cooperation helped their factions into signing into the peace treaty.

While Issei and co were negotiating a meeting was conducted in a dark room.

In the center of this room, there is a big round table. At that table, there are twelve seats. The entire room is illuminated by lamps. In those seats, 12 figures can be seen seated watching a hologram in the center of the table.

That hologram shows the situation in Kouh Manly about Issei's negotiating with the church and the fallen angel's side. It also showed a meeting between Kokobiel with the Kchaos brigade. After all that is shown it disappeared. Silence rained in the room until the leader spoke.

" So as you already saw, this is the situation in Kouh so let me ask you how will we the shadow garden deal with this"