While enjoying Lavinia's lap pillow, Rod's progress bar for enhancing Ki steadily advanced. At this rate, he would fully grasp its application in less than an hour.
If other yokai or Ki users knew about this speed, they would be green with envy.
For ordinary humans or monsters, going from zero to sensing Ki required long, arduous practice.
Rod, on the other hand, only needed to wait for the progress bar to fill.
It was practically cheating.
Still, Rod had never considered cultivation a pleasant task.
Let alone dedicating a week, or longer to mastering a skill. Even one full day of focused practice would drive him insane.
Ever since gaining the system, he knew he had become idle. But he didn't see that as a flaw.
He was a transmigrator. Without the system, surviving in this world would already be difficult.
High School DxD might look like a passionate harem series on the surface, viewers enjoying fanservice and flashy fights, but for an ordinary person, the reality was terrifying.
Rogue exorcists who'd slaughter you without hesitation. Stray devils who'd devour you alive. Shockwaves from high-level battles that could kill you instantly.
And even if you survived, your house and car might be destroyed, yet the mortgage payments would still remain.
With no one to complain to, that was worse than death.
Mindset determined everything.
Rod never forced himself to do things he didn't want to do.
Playing games was fun, until it became work. Then it turned into pure suffering.
Still, Rod considered his talent decent.
Though he'd never drawn a combat skill from the system, he was proficient with both firearms and cold weapons.
...
One hour later
Rod reluctantly rose from Lavinia's lap.
He had learned how to sense and control Ki.
Just as Kuroka had said, Ki existed in all living things. But its strength varied.
Among everyone present, aside from himself, Lavinia possessed the strongest Ki. Next was Kuroka, then Akeno, Raynare, Koneko, Kalawarna, and Mittelt. Asia's Ki was the weakest, but since she wasn't a combatant, it hardly mattered.
Kuroka, who had been guiding Shirone, stared at Rod in shock.
"You can manipulate Ki too, nya? Don't tell me, you just learned it, nya?!"
"Is that a problem?" Rod asked.
"It's a huge problem, nya! If you're a beginner, how could you learn faster than Shirone, nya?! You must be cheating, nya!"
Kuroka had never seen a human with such terrifying talent.
Humans could learn Ki, but they were usually far inferior to yokai in both speed and control, let alone nekomata like them.
"You caught me?" Rod raised an eyebrow.
He really had cheated.
Of course, Kuroka didn't truly believe he had a system. She simply sighed inwardly at her cheap master's overwhelming talent.
Wait.
If that was the case…
Could she choose him as her mate, nya?!
As a nekomata, Kuroka shared many feline instincts.
Aside from hissing, the most notable was going into heat multiple times a year.
She had reached that age long ago.
Anyone who had raised cats knew, when they went into heat, they would yowl at night endlessly until finding a mate.
But as an intelligent yokai, Kuroka suppressed her heat using senjutsu.
She had been on the run for years and never found someone she truly liked.
Except for the Naberius branch incident, once a nekomata chose a husband, it was for life.
Originally, she hadn't been very fond of Rod.
But after he helped resolve Shirone's emotional knot, she found him increasingly appealing.
Strong, talented and surely reliable.
The perfect candidate.
No, no, stop thinking about it, nya! If I keep thinking, my body will get weird, nya!
There was no rush. Next time her heat came, she'd find him to make babies.
Rod, of course, had no idea what she was thinking.
If he did, he might have suggested tonight.
After that, Rod learned a few basic senjutsu techniques from Kuroka.
Simple ones, Protective Charm and Body Strengthening Charm.
The former formed a layer of Ki around the body like a barrier. The latter reinforced the body internally and externally, functioning almost like constant physical nourishment.
As for advanced senjutsu,
He had no time. The progress bars were nearly as long as developing Balance Breaker.
He'd deal with those later.
With Ki mastered, Rod could also sense distant movements through fluctuations.
It sounded similar to the power system in Dragon Ball, and in essence, it was.
The only downside was that Ki cultivation absorbed ambient malice and negative energy from the world.
But that didn't matter to Rod.
If it came to being sinister, he could be more sinister than the villains.
It was simply a matter of whether he wanted to be.
…
In the following days, Rod's schedule grew busier.
During the day, he sparred with Lavinia to advance his Balance Breaker progress. When possible, he continued refining Ki knowledge.
At night, when Lavinia occasionally "got lost" after going to the bathroom and wandered into his room, he continued his principle of "just rubbing, not going in," gradually testing her limits.
Of course, he hadn't forgotten Griselda's mission to investigate the Holy Swords.
However, Kokabiel's group of rogue exorcists were slow. Two days had passed, and they were still in Europe.
How long would it take them to reach Kuoh?
Meanwhile, Rod noticed Kuroka's attitude toward him growing increasingly affectionate.
Whenever he asked why, she would simply smile mysteriously.
Sometimes she even transformed into a black cat and snuck into the bathroom while he was bathing, only to saunter away gracefully when caught.
Several more days passed.
As Rod opened the system map during his daily routine, he noticed the red dots marking the mission had entered Japan.
At the same time, he received a message from Griselda.
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