Koneko wiped away a metaphorical drop of sweat and returned to the others.
"Koneko, that was amazing! To think you're so powerful" Issei said, impressed.
"Don't talk to me, pervert" Koneko said curtly without giving him a second glance.
"Well done" Kaito simply smiled and handed her a chocolate brownie.
"Did you make it?"
"To replenish your energy" Kaito nodded.
"Thank you" Koneko nodded, taking it and beginning to eat it in silence.
"Hey, what about that difference in treatment?!" Issei complained.
"Come on, come on, Issei. You can't expect the same treatment as Kaito when you two just met, right? Your relationship is different" Akeno comforted him. "Besides, how are you going to achieve your dream if you get discouraged so quickly?"
"That's right!" Issei quickly regained his spirits and slapped his cheeks as if trying to wake himself from a bad dream. "My dream is to become a Harem King. I not only have to conquer girls, but also have the strength to protect them. Just like Koneko destroyed that mutant spider, I'll become strong enough to defeat every enemy that easily.
And then, I'll conquer all the girls for my harem" Issei expressed his dream with determination while raising his left hand into a fist.
At that moment, something inside him seemed to resonate with his words, and it seemed like something was about to happen, but...
"...Including Koneko"
Boom!
Issei was sent flying dozens of meters in an instant by Koneko's blow, crashing into a wall and forcibly breaking through it.
"Ah" Koneko realized too late that perhaps she had attacked with too much force for an Issei who hadn't even awakened yet.
"Issei!"
"Issei!"
"Cough... cough... I'm... I'm fine" Issei said, getting back up and brushing the rubble off himself.
As he did so, he noticed the flashy red gauntlet on his left arm, as if it were made of scales and with two gems on it.
"Ooooh! President, look! This must be the artifact you mentioned earlier, right? I awakened my Sacred Gear! And it looks amazing!"
Incredible, it seems to have resonated with your determination" Rias said, observing the gauntlet.
"Or perhaps it was the danger of death caused by Koneko's punch" Akeno joked with a giggle.
Of course, Akeno was only joking and had no idea that this was actually the case. Attacking without controlling her strength, despite it being a weak blow, Issei would have died a moment ago if he hadn't awakened his Sacred Gear.
"Speaking of that, Koneko, you need to be more careful" At Akeno's mention of it, Rias remembered and turned toward Koneko to reprimand her. "He could have died from that blow. Don't do that again"
"I promise I won't kill him on the first try" Koneko apologized.
"O-on the first try?" Issei murmured, somewhat traumatized by the blow.
"If you do it more than once, then you brought it upon yourself" Koneko nodded.
"Koneko, you're being very aggressive today.
Please don't say things like that. Issei is now part of our family, and he has a lot of potential"
"I don't want someone who sexually harasses me to be a member of my family," Koneko said disdainfully. "And if I can kill him, then he wasn't that strong to begin with"
"But isn't that how potential works?!" Issei retorted.
"What kind of useless potential doesn't awaken even when you're about to die?" Koneko retorted as well.
"...Fine" Rias sighed and agreed.
"What?!"
"Don't worry, Issei. You just have to not harass her and that's it, right?"
As they continued arguing, Rias stopped, as she sensed several nearby presences.
"Careful, we're being followed" she quickly told the others.
"How many?"
"Five"
"Well then" Akeno smiled while grinning sadistically. "Looks like it's time to show our dear juniors a real fight"
The next moment, realizing that they had already been noticed, the five hidden people emerged.
The five men looked in their direction with greed.
"Who are you?" Rias asked, stepping forward.
"We're the faction that will dominate this world" one of them said confidently.
"So you're that new faction that's appeared and been causing trouble everywhere. Just as Sona said, you seem to be extremely arrogant" Rias understood the identity of the people in front of her and where they got the courage to go after the heir of House Gremory, but just as Sona had told her, she couldn't understand where their arrogance came from with so little strength.
But upon hearing her words, the man from before laughed.
"Hahaha, perhaps yesterday we could have been called arrogant, but now that we've finally found her, there's no way we can lose"
"'Found her?'" Rias frowned, trying to figure out what they were talking about.
"Peak, should we be saying that?" one of the men asked the one who had been speaking.
"Don't worry, there's no way they'll understand what we're talking about. We've already sent all the information to the others, so even if we die here, they'll find a way to obtain it.
I can already imagine it. Once we return to Gaia with her, we'll be Kings, we'll enter the top, and we might even be able to face Lucifer if we're lucky" said the one called Peak excitedly.
But the next second, a black lightning bolt struck his body, killing him instantly and making him disappear into pixels.
"What?!"
"Ara, he was talking too much, so he annoyed me" Akeno said without ever stopping her smile. "Who's next? Of course, if you tell us what this thing you found is and the location of your base, we could let you live"
"You think we'll tell you anything just because you killed Peak, bitch? You'll see, once we get back I'll use those big... Arghhh!"
"And there he goes" Akeno sighed after attacking. "I know I told you to talk, but not nonsense"
The other three men nodded and advanced toward them. A single lightning bolt from Akeno took all three of them out, meaning Rias didn't even have to act.
"How strange. What they found, the base, when they return. They say too many strange things" Rias murmured in confusion. Just as Sona had told her before, they were an extremely strange faction, and it was impossible to understand their objectives.
"Should we investigate this?" Akeno asked.
"Yes, but let's still send a report to my brother in case he knows something" Rias replied.
"Akeno, that was incredible! Do you think my Sacred Gear can summon lightning too?" Issei asked excitedly. He had gotten excited about a lot of things today.
"No, your Sacred Gear is a Twice Critical. It doubles your power" Rias denied before Akeno could answer.
"W-what? Just that?" Issei asked disappointedly.
"Don't get discouraged, Issei. If you use it properly, it can become quite powerful. Doubling your current power might be fairly useless, but if you ever reach the upper-middle class or even the High-Class, that doubling would be monstrous. Imagine Koneko doubling her power, for example"
Koneko heard this as well and blinked in surprise. She hadn't thought about that.
"Double... my power" she murmured in surprise.
Indeed, doubling her power would make her monstrous, far more than Rias could imagine.
Although, of course, Issei's Sacred Gear wasn't really a Twice Critical capable of doubling the user's power, but the Boosted Gear, a legendary Sacred Gear capable of doubling the user's power every ten seconds. But precisely because Twice Critical was so common, Koneko had thought about getting one for herself.
However, she soon discarded the idea. Why would she choose something that doubled her power if she could get more? Wasn't the Boosted Gear right in front of her?
As far as she knew about Kaito, he didn't have any particular opinion about Issei. He didn't like his personality, but nothing beyond that.
However, she herself didn't like Issei, which translated into Kaito not liking Issei. And if Kaito wasn't planning to take Issei to Gaia, then she should be able to take the Boosted Gear from him, right?
"K-Koneko, you're looking at me way too greedily" Issei said nervously. "I know I was a little disappointed by the Twice Critical, but it's still 'my' Twice Critical, right?"
"Don't worry" Koneko naturally refused. "I'm not interested in a mere Twice Critical"
"What?! What do you mean by mere?!"
"Those two are never going to get along" Rias sighed, watching the two argue again.
"At least things will be more lively from now on" Akeno smiled.
"...Could what they said they found be Issei's Twice Critical?" Rias wondered, but quickly dismissed the idea. His excitement seemed to be over something much more important than a mere Twice Critical.
...
In an office in the Underworld, a voluptuous woman whose silver hair fell down her back sat behind a desk.
The maid uniform she was wearing contrasted enormously with her position as the queen of one of the four Maou of the Underworld, as well as the most powerful known queen.
At that moment, she was reading a report delivered by some servants of the household, brought from the human world on behalf of the younger sister of Sirzechs Lucifer, one of the four Maou, and her king.
Once she finished reading it, she placed the paper on the table and sighed tiredly.
"Another one. This new faction is causing far too many problems. At least a few hundred people spread throughout Kuoh and all its surroundings. I've already received several reports, not only from Rias and Sona, but also from other nearby devils about the trouble they're causing.
Even so..."
Grayfia reread Rias's latest message with interest. Until now, they hadn't known where these people's arrogance came from, but now it appeared to have something to do with something they wanted to obtain, something that Rias's group had.
"I wonder if I should go take a look" Grayfia murmured.
They had given this task great importance when they assigned it to her. The reason was that these people hadn't merely appeared out of nowhere, many of their members were people Sirzechs had investigated and in whom he hadn't noticed anything strange. So the fact that they suddenly had abilities and even seemed to belong to a group was concerning.
The problem was that she couldn't go because of another task she had been given. She had been told to keep a close eye on Riser Phenex, Rias's fiancé, whom Rias herself hated, since lately he had been quite restless about the marriage, wanting to move up the date or even finalize it immediately.
"Although, thinking about it, with that man's personality, it won't take long for him to go see Rias himself" Grayfia realized. "That not only gives me a reason to go to the human world, but even saves me from having to go through the annoying process of asking for permission"
With a plan in mind, Grayfia nodded mentally, satisfied.
For her, with her power, she was confident that she could locate this new faction's base and destroy them all in a single day, using the excuse that she was pursuing Riser, and finally put an end to this headache that was the new faction, reducing her workload.
With that settled, Grayfia moved on to the next matter to review, Lucifer.
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+15 chapters in advance on Patreon.
p-atreon.com/IAMME26
(just delete the hyphen)
80 power stones = 1 extra chapter (cumulative)