12 Chapter 11

"I'm sorry this has to happen. If your mother wasn't so selfish, she would've listened to us and married a human, not a pest that God flicked away from His Holy Land," the Grandmother says.

She is clearly someone skilled in magic, as she was able to sneak up on Akeno without her sensing.

"You shouldn't have left that boy. He has power, though he's more evil than anything else I have ever come across… then again, I'm not surprised you are affiliated with him." Akeno's grandmother's eyes are cold. "I have nothing else to say. If you want someone to blame, blame your selfish, ungrateful mother who only cared about lust and herself."

Akeno wants to fire something back, but the pain keeps coming. As the sword is pulled out, blood splatters everywhere and Akeno's vision begins to fade. 'Is this really the end?'

As she tries to get up, she stumbles. Her grandmother walks away, back into her family grounds without a trace of regret. Akeno begins limping from the pain, blood gushing out.

If she has one final wish, it's that she wants to see Karan one last time.

~With Karan

Karan is no fool. He knows where Akeno goes, and honestly is very fearful. When he found out that it was actually Shuri's family who hired the Fallen Angels, he was filled with darkness again. Although they hired Fallen Angels instead of killing Shuri themselves, it was still committing horrific acts of murder in Karan's opinion.

As he watches Akeno walk into the family grounds, he is approached by someone he hasn't seen in a long time. Rias Gremory has been watching Karan curiously, often alongside her friend Sona, but Sona is not here this time.

"It's been a while, eh, Karan-kun?" she says, holding her arms out for a big hug. Karan looks at her with disinterest. To him she is just another girl.

"What is it, Rias Gremory?" He doesn't forget names either. Ever since he came to this world, he has been interested in learning everything about it. Unlike his old world, when there was only one real god, this world has many which shape the world.

"Still wondering if you want to be my Queen," she says happily, holding out a queen piece. If it were something more masculine, then Karan may have actually thought about it. But since it was a 'Queen' rather than a King piece, he would not deal with it. Rias also knows it isn't smart to mention the word 'pawn' to Karan, as he would immediately take that as a direct insult and be angry with Rias.

"Knight?"

"…"

"Bishop?"

"…"

"Rook?"

"…."

Rias, being who she is, becomes desperate and ignores her common sense. "Pawn?"

Karan looks at her with warning. She quickly crosses her arms and becomes frustrated.

For a second Karan feels something odd. He instantly feels Akeno's life force using his sensory powers. It's to the brink of zero.

Just by chatting with Rias, he completely ignored the fact that something bad could have happened to Akeno. She had visited the family grounds before but she did not venture into them, she would just immediately return to Karan with saddened eyes.

~With Akeno

Wasting no time, Karan instantly runs to Akeno. He can't believe what is happening; he did not expect this in the slightest. 'Did I really fail? Was I seriously unable to protect her? I'm so sorry Shuri-san, Baraqiel-san.'

Karan feels a hint of pain run through his heart. Seeing Akeno in this state feels literally heartbreaking. He would do anything, anything to make this have never happened. He knows in the back of his mind he could have made Akeno a whole lot happier, but he didn't because he believed he shouldn't be interested in such ordeals.

"Where'd you go running off to?" a crimson haired beauty asked from behind. She looks over Karan, and notices he is holding the same girl she saw all those years ago… except now that girl doesn't look alive. She watches silently as Karan holds her, and then she sees a sad Karan begin emitting a few tears for Akeno.

It isn't like him to show tears after what he has been through in his life, but this is a very depressing thing. Karan won't be able to forgive himself if Akeno dies.

After hearing Rias, Karan has one thing in mind: he knows peerages can revive the dead.

"You! Make her your Queen, put her in your peerage!" he says, with eyes now filled with hope. Rias didn't particularly know Akeno, but she really wanted Karan to be her Queen.

"I…uh…" Rias tries to find the best way to say no. If she refuses, Karan will simply make her revive Akeno.

Karan pleads with Rias who finally gives up. With a smile, she pulls out her Queen piece and begins approaching Akeno.

Rias does a chant and places the Queen piece within Akeno. A red light begins glowing from her body, and miraculously Karan senses a little surge of life come within Akeno. Thrilled, with light in his eyes, he picks her up bridal style and begins carrying her.

"Wait! She's my Queen, she serves me." Rias tries to stop Karan. It's true that the point of the peerage is to live and serve the King. Rias comes from a family which is very kind to the peerages, showing great care and hospitality unlike some peerages where they are raped and tortured. In comparison, Akeno has it lucky.

"I'll think about it," he says neutrally. This peerage can be a good experience for Akeno, to go out and make friends, but if Karan deems this as dangerous he won't let such a thing happen. He's not afraid of anything in this world except losing Akeno.

Before Rias can protest, Karan suddenly disappears. But the crimson haired girl knows where he went.

~Shrine

As Karan gently lays Akeno down, he begins healing her wound with some basic healing magic he learned over the years. He isn't very proficient; in fact, he's pretty bad, even for a beginner.

Karan can feel Rias along with a few others approach the Shrine. He isn't going to let Akeno go while she is wounded. The devils can try all they want to fight Karan, but he won't let them get to Akeno.

When Karan exits Akeno's room, he leaves a emergency formation there just in case something happens. He doesn't know the power of devils, and surely cannot underestimate them.

As he walks outside he is approached by numerous figures. A few look a bit intimidating, but the others look like nothing in Karan's eyes. Rias and Sona are there, alongside a boy around Karan's age and one man whose power is immense. Karan knows that he is the only problem.

The man has brown hair along with blue eyes. He wears the traditional Shisengumi uniform, which consists of a haori and hakama over a kimono, with a white cord called a tasuki crossed over the chest and tied in the back.

The boy has blond hair and blue eyes, and he is holding a normal looking sword. He has a serious expression on his face. Karan can tell just by looking that this guy serves Rias.

"Karan-kun, you do know that my Queen will have to serve me, correct?" Rias asks in a firm tone, trying to sound like she has enough strength to rival Karan.

"I said, I'd think about it."

"Look, kid, you're just a human. You don't know our rules and traditions. It would be wise for you comply, otherwise you will become a devil yourself."

"If you continue to stand in our way I will have to use force," he says, ending with the words with a smirk. Karan readies himself for battle.

The blonde haired boy known as Kiba Yuuto jumps into the air at immense speed and begins crashing down at Karan. As he is about to cut Karan in half, Karan looks up and with his Mana Burst disappears. Someone of this level of strength is no match for Karan, and there's no point in killing him.

"Yuuto!" Rias gasps, as her Knight suddenly falls to the ground unconscious. She looks at Karan, who is staring impassively at the group.

The man narrows his eyes. His prodigy collapsed without even clashing blades with Karan. "What is your name, human?" he asks.

"Karan Lancer," he responds tonelessly.

"My name's Souji Okita, and you will regret crossing us," he warns, before unsheathing two identical looking swords. Karan still keeps his impassive gaze. Psh, two is nothing to him.

"You don't look impressed. Are you familiar with who I am?" Souji asks.

"I once fought against someone who wielded 3 swords… at once," Karan says, causing Souji to raise an eyebrow. After all he did have memories of Karana .

He gives Karan an odd gaze. Karan responds by giving his own. Karan's expression tells the truth, while Souji can't possibly believe something like that can occur.

Not wasting any more time, Souji runs at Karan using superb speed compared to Kiba's.

Souju appears right before Karan and begins clashing his swords with him. Karan blocks with ease with his bare hands. Even without using his Lance, he is a superb martial artist. The devil is impressed at how Karan is able to counter him, despite him using two swords. Usually something like that is unbelievable.

However, Souji is a maou-class knight. Since he is able to take two knight pieces, his speed is what makes him a definite assassin. He decides now it is time to stop holding back. He begins increasing his speed drastically, which confuses Karan as he believes it is physically impossible to move this fast. But, he has seen many unreal things in this world.

As Souji is now at god-like speed. Karan shows the advantage of a lancer class. He counters Souji by streaming flames into his hands and creating a balance. Now activating his Mana Burst, Karan will have a upper hand in the show down with the insane speed of Souji. Karan watches basically in slow motion as Souji tries to go for a decapitation. Karan, who is able to predict this, ducks under his arm, and slams his leg up kicking him in the chest.

To Rias and Sona, this is nothing but a flash of light, but before they know it they both gasp as they see Souji in the air from being hit by a powerful kick.

Souji regains himself and prepares to charge Karan, but suddenly stops when he starts to feel slow. 'What the?' he asks himself. As he looks around, things are beginning to blur. The objects of space within the world are moving slower than they should be.

'Mana Drain.'

Karan is using Mana Drain in order to slow down Souji ,keeping him from using his god-like speed. If Karan wanted, he could've rip off a body part, but he knows killing Souji will only inflict even more conflict to erupt.

The devils instantly know Karan somehow has the ability to manipulate the magic of his opponent and the environment. It isn't common in the world, but a lot of beings have the power to alter magic… but seeing it in action is still astonishing.

After Mana Drain wears off, Souji falls back to the ground, but instead of attacking, sheathes his two swords. Karan raises a brow as he suddenly stops fighting. He knew he doesn't want to give up due to the smirk on his face.

"Sorry to say, Karan, but if we continue to fight my power will start destroying the land," Souji says.

Karan doesn't fall for that crap, he knows he would win if they both go all out against each other. Nevertheless, Karan nods. If the fight continued, he would've killed Souji regardless of the consequences, fighting with his Lance engraved in him the sight of victory. That's something every reincarnator has when they awaken their powers.

As Karan sighs and begins to walk towards Rias, he senses Akeno wake up and immediately runs back.

~With Akeno

As Akeno slowly wakes up, she still feels the pain of her grandmother's sword run through her. Before she can do anything, she hears Karan walk in with a smile. Akeno then begins to remember how she died, and how her last wish was to see Karan one last time.

Akeno quickly gets up and hugs Karan. She does not cry as she stopped doing that long ago. She doesn't need to anymore. She's happy now and alive. Akeno notices as she hugs Karan that her own aura feels a bit darker than usual. Being a Fallen Angel, she has her own share of dark energy, but this feels darker. A lot darker.

As she looks behind Karan, she sees a crimson haired girl with a smile. Although no one can see it, she also has a very envious expression; she wishes that one day, she find someone who will care for her just the way Karan does for Akeno.

"Karan…d-did…I become a devil?" she asks slowly. She never had anything against the devils. She looks at Karan who has a frown. She understands, then, that she was revived into a peerage from a devil. This means she has to serve that person until death.

Karan grabs her hand and they head outside the Shrine. He approaches Rias, who is smirking victoriously. She wouldn't mind if Karan joins her peerage as well. Akeno has a depressed frown. She knows they're here to get her. She looks around the Shrine and notices the ground has a few holes in it, indicating there was just recently some fighting.

"Akeno, I want you to go with them," Karan says, almost in an order.

Akeno's eyes shoot wide open. She would never expect Karan to be the one to tell her to move away, and this is HER home. "Karan I-I…I'm sorry, please don't make me go!" She begins to panic at the vision of being away from Karan after so many years. He has a neutral expression, but it turns into a smile.

"It will be good, Akeno. You need more friends other than me," he says, letting go of her hand. Frightened at the idea of being alone, Akeno hugs Karan and pleads with him for her to stay, Karan doesn't want her to go, but he also wants Akeno to be away from him so that she can make her own friends and not have to rely on him for everything. It will be a healthy experience if she goes.

"I can't leave my home," she says sadly. She doesn't want to miss the Shrine where she grew up, where she spent all of her time with her parents when they were alive, and most of all, where she met Karan in the woods just behind the creek. Karan's smile still shines. He isn't going to anywhere really, although he has been planning to search this world and locate some of its secrets, as he is a foreigner who still has no idea where he really is.

"I'll always be here, Akeno, at home."

Karan then reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small framed picture. It is the one where Karan's holding Akenos hand, Shuri's smiling and Baraqiel has an angry face as he looks down at Karan.

Akeno can't help it now; she starts forming tears and cries from the nostalgia. She knows Karan also has something he looks at whenever he feels like remembering something from the past.

"I'm sure my onii-sama will let you visit!" Rias says. She may have been jealous of Akeno, but it is heartwarming to see something like this. She also feels bad for separating them, which is why she offers to Karan that he can visit every now and then.

Karan releases Akeno and looks down. "Once a month," he says, causing her to frown, but that is it. He wants Akeno to gain friendships with many people, as it is a healthy thing. He knows she is still struggling with the loss of her parents, and this is a good way for her to be happy, even without Karan.

Akeno walks over to Rias, who introduces herself and her peerage. Sona also does this, as well as Souji. A few moments go by of chatting and Karan can tell she will be happy, although she may not be able to sleep well at first.

A magic circle begins to shoot from the ground and Karan looks at Akeno with a smile. He has been training for a while and will certainly become strong when she's older. Karan doesn't see it, but Akeno is clenching her heart heavily as she leaves the Shrine. What really has her down is that she is going to leave Karan. Although she is going to see him again within a month, it's depressing to leave someone after spending so many years with him.

As Akeno departs Karan has a lot of free time now. He will able to go places he didn't want Akeno knowing he went to. He quickly activates his Mana Burst and disappears.

~Gremory Castle One Month Later

After a month, Akeno is excited to see her beloved companion once again. At first, she struggled with sleeping, but that was the only real problem. Rias and Yuuto have become good friends with Akeno, and they are happy to have her as Rias's queen.

She has also become a very popular attraction for the male devils, although they are usually shunned away by Rias, as she already knows Akeno is taken. She has actually become so popular that some of the people now stop looking at Rias and more at Akeno, but Rias doesn't care; she has her eyes set on someone else.

Currently the peerage are sitting on the main floor chatting. They normally train with each other until it's time to venture off into the human world, as they all will attend high school together.

Suddenly the peace is disturbed when someone barges through the door. A tall, handsome man with black hair and violet eyes walks confidently towards Akeno, who's sitting down.

He then gets on one knee and holds out his hand. "Himejima-san, if you would do me the honor of taking you ou-"

Someone punches him.

"She's taken, Sairaorg," Rias says, annoyed by her cousin's constant attempt to ask Akeno out.

When this first happened, Akeno felt as if she had no choice but to say yes. Thankfully, Rias had come and saved her and continued to do so.

"What? By whom?" he asks angrily.

"Karan Lancer" Rias says in a dreamy tone. Everyone in the Gremory Castle knows who he is. Souji told Sirzech that he was able to keep on par, even while Souji used his speed. Plus, Rias and Akeno, when not doing anything else, love to talk about him.

"Fufufu, he's coming today!" Akeno says excitedly. Their newest addition to their peerage, Koneko, has never seen Karan, but she can relate to him in a way.

Plotting something devious, Sairaorg leaves with a smirk, and waits for this Karan Lancer.

~With Karan

Karan was given some sort of odd device when Rias left. It has a weird symbol which he can conclude must be a clan symbol, but doesn't know what to do with it.

He pulls out his device and experimentally pours energy into it. Soon red energy begins circling around Karan and a magic circle is formed. Karan is then engulfed within the red energy and finds himself where he thought he was going to go when he originally died.

Hell.

However, someone was watching his departure. It isn't a human or a Fallen Angel, but an animal: a stray black cat, who watched it happen from a distance with curious eyes. The cat has been watching Karan for a long time. Since she has been able to blend in with the natural energy, his magic sense has not been able to pick up her life force.

The cat is all black, has two tails instead of one, and also has yellow eyes.

'I wonder where you went, ~nya' the neko thinks, as she turns around to look over other things.

~Somewhere in the Gremory territory.

Karan suddenly appears in the plain fields of the Gremory Territory. Looking around and noticing nothing in sight, he assumes Rias must have given him a malfunctioning device, or he somehow misused it.

He uses his senses to try to search for which direction has the most life, which is, unfortunately for him, everywhere. He knows what hell is. But he assumes no one in this world has heard of him. If he recalls properly, Rias is the sister of one of the leaders of the Devils.

Karan thinks it's best to simply walk around.

As he walks, he is stopped when someone appears before him. The man has black hair and violet eyes, and also wears a mischievous grin, as if happy to see Karan.

"Seems as if I got to you first," Sairaorg says.

"And you are?" Karan asks, not really caring who he is.

"Sairarog Bael."

"I'm looking for Rias. Do you know where she is?"

"Yeah, but I won't be telling you." He smirks.

Karan still has his impassive gaze. He detects almost no magical power emitting from him.

"And that is because…?"

"I want to fight you," he answers almost instantly.

"Why?" Karan doesn't see the point in fighting. He came here just to check on Akeno, and here comes someone who wants to fight him. Although Karan isn't backing down, he isn't going to let anyone push him around, devil or not.

"I like fighting strong people. Plus, Rias and Himejima-san never stop talking about you. But I'll prove I'm stronger than you"

"…"

"I wasn't born with any special family powers, but I promise you that I'm strong."

"I sense almost no magical energy from you."

"I just believe in my own body, that's all. Besides, you're just a human. I will prove I'm worthy of having Akeno-san's heart"

One name comes to mind after hearing his speech: this guy can do no magic abilities, relies on physical strength, and lastly wants the girl Karan is affiliated with.

"And once I beat you, I'll become a Mauo!"

Karan smiles at this.

"Sorry, but I'm sure two of those things will not happen," Karan says, closing his eyes. "First, you will not defeat me. In fact you will never defeat me, and secondly… Someone as weak as you will never have Akeno's heart." Karan reopens his eyes before narrowing them.

Sairaorg smirks at Karan's words. True, it hurts to be told that, but this means he can only prove him wrong. He has been called those things in his past before and normally wouldn't let it bother him, but when it comes from Karan, it makes him angry.

"Let's go, Lancer!" he yells, before charging at Karan.