Chapter 173: Incomplete Excalibur

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The next day, at night time, it was when everything went down the drain. At least for the Devil teenagers. Freed Sellzen, armed with one of the Excaliburs, attacked the school grounds, the headquarters for the supernatural governing body of the city, together with a huge group of rogue exorcists. Everything was going well for the Devils with the mages blasting the enemies with magic while the physical fighters protected them until the two envoys of the church appeared to meddle. Irina Shidou challenged Freed Sellzen and lost spectacularly while her companion, Xenovia, was taking care of the rogue exorcists. After the loss of Excalibur Mimic, that was Irina Shidou's Excalibur's piece's name, to Freed Sellzen, the bat-shit-crazy exorcist retreated with his loot while the cannon fodders covered him.

Five minutes later, when all the cannon fodder were rounded up, Freed Sellzen appeared again. Just this time he was holding a very different-looking sword that emanated a very powerful holy aura. The Devils mages started to bombard the exorcist immediately. But it was all in vain. Freed Sellzen just simply used the sword as his shield, nullifying every single attack. It was then that he started to boast about his new sword, the reforged Excalibur. At that moment, a new person appeared at some distance, behind Freed Sellzen. He was an old-looking man that was fully garbed in clothes that could identify him as a high-ranking member of the church. Xenovia recognized the man instantly. It was Valper Galilei, the one responsible for the Holy Sword Project all those years back. Even after being expelled from the church, he continued to use his garbs, believing that what he had done was not wrong at all. The old man simply ignored Xenovia's rants and asked Freed Sellzen why he was taking so long to get Excalibur Destruction, the Excalibur piece that Xenovia was wielding.

That had gotten the girl in a defensive stance. But it was useless. In a burst of speed, certainly boosted by the incomplete Excalibur in his hands, Freed Sellzen appeared by her side and, using the body of the sword's blade like it was a baseball bat, struck Xenovia with all the strength that he could achieve. That was enough to send the girl flying like a baseball ball, letting go of the sword that was in her hands. Freed Sellzen, while mocking the girl because of her 'punny strength', grabbed Excalibur Destruction from the ground and took it to Valper Galilei. The old man gladly took it together with the incomplete Excalibur and started to use alchemy to fuse Excalibur Destruction to the incomplete Excalibur. The Devils, sensing that whatever was happening would not be good for them, started to bombard Valper Galilei's position with magic. But it was in vain. The old man was cunning and had activated an artifact that gave him a personal barrier while he 'waited' for Freed Sellzen to have his fun.

As expected, the barrier generated by the artifact held off the bombardment of magic for enough time for the alchemy fusion to happen, strengthening the incomplete sword even more. From here on, what happened was very similar to the cannon that Erik remembered. Freed Sellzen, while wielding the incomplete Excalibur, threatened the Devils, just for Yuuto Kiba to appear after having recovered from the attack of last night. The boy had a 'conversation' with Valper Galilei, his personal boogeyman, where the old man revealed that he had kept the souls of the deceased children used in the experiment with him for the continuation of his research on Holy Sword users. Then, after claiming that the item that was holding the souls was not necessary anymore, he tried to destroy it, but the item was saved by Yuuto Kiba. After a fluffy moment where the boy talked 'talked to' and heard the voices of his deceased friends, he used the energy stored in the object to boost his Sacred Gear and achieve Balance Breaker, which allowed him to create Holy-Demonic swords, a sword that perfectly mixed the Holy energy with the demonic energy. He was now ready to face Freed Sellzen again.

Taking that as her cue, Xenovia decided to reveal that she was a wielder of another Holy Sword that was more powerful than the Excalibur piece that she was wielding before. Durandal.

Recognizing that she, alone, could not defeat Freed Sellzen in his current state, Xenovia offered a temporary partnership with Yuuto Kiba, who accepted it. Together, both teens of enemy factions tagged along to defeat a common enemy. Their fight was a balanced one, that is until Issei Hyoudou used one of his Sacred Gear's abilities to help them. After being 'gifted' some extra strength from the Boosting Gear, Yuuto Kiba and Xenovia managed to drive off and defeat Freed Sellzen.

It was then that, at the brink of their victory, a new enemy appeared on the battlefield. Yanking the incomplete Excalibur from the hands of an almost dead Freed Sellzen, Kokabiel revealed himself in all the glory of his very punchable face. Like the villain that he was, the rogue Fallen Angel started to monologue about how perfect his plan to reignite the flames of war was. He pretended to use the deaths of the little sisters of two Satans by Holy Swords as the spark to a new and glorious war. Not waiting for an invitation, Akeno Himejima, Rias Gremory's Queen, unleashed her full might of her Holy Lightning over the enemy that wanted to kill her friends. Kokabiel, experienced as he was, managed to avoid the sudden attack with the boost provided to him by the incomplete Excalibur. Recognizing the attack, Kokabiel called Akeno himejima by her relation with Barakiel, the original wielder of the Holy Lightning, and confessed to the girl that he had made plans of giving away the location of her house to the people of the Himejima clan, but when he did it, they had moved away to a place that he could not locate anymore. As if that had been a cue, all Devils started to attack Kokabiel together. But the man did not use to be one of the higher-ups of the Grigori because of his good looks. Kokabiel had the strength to back and secure him a position of power. That strength, while receiving the boost provided by the incomplete Excalibur, allowed him to defend himself or dodge all attacks like it was a child's play.

Just after the barrage of magical attacks stopped, the physical fighters attacked. Yuuto Kiba and Xenovia felt, firsthand, the difference that different users made to the sword. While with the Excalibur wielding Freed Sellzen both of them managed to win the fight, with Kokabiel the history was different. The Fallen Angel was keeping both of the sword users the entire time on the defensive. But there were not only the two of them as physical fighters. Issei Hyoudou, with the extra protection from the holy energy provided by his Balance Breaker and extra power boost, managed to try and give some punches to Kokabiel's face. But the only one that managed to damage the Fallen Angel was Tsubaki Shinra. The Queen of Sona Sitri's Peerage danced around the Fallen Angel while cutting him all over with her katana sword and dodging all the attacks. Kokabiel, with all his experience in battles, was not prepared to be 'handled' by some 'lower' Devil.

Feeling that they had a chance of winning, or at least stalling for the necessary time for the reinforcements that the 'City's Governors' had asked for to arrive, every able fighter started to support the girl to land her attacks, that were landing one after the other, accumulating the damage done to Kokabiel. It was during a little pause to switch supports that Xenovia asked Yuuto Kiba how could Tsubaki Shinra, a girl with a somewhat plain personality, be so good with the sword. The Devil replied to her that the girl in question was a direct student of Musashi Miyamoto, Satan Leviathan's Knight and the strongest sword user in the Underworld. That information shocked the girl. She, of course, knew of how deadly and good with a sword Musashi Miyamoto was. She had heard from her instructor about how good the Devil was with a sword.

But it seemed that Kokabiel's patience was running short. The Fallen Angel's inability to get rid of the lowly Devil was irritating the man. The Devil looked like could foresee all of his attacks and when it looked like he would land a hit on her, another pesky kid appeared out of nowhere to deviate his attack from its target, rendering it useless.

"Enough!"

Kokabiel yelled after having his last attack deviate again from its path. The Fallen Angel looked pissed and it was reflected in his aura that was released completely in all of its glory. One must know that Kokabiel was not the strongest Fallen Angels by far. There were plenty of ones that were stronger than him, but he was no pushover either. If one would classify his power, he would fit comfortably in the mid-tier of Ultimate Class.

"I'm done with you all. I am going to kill you all! And with your deaths, the flames of war will reignite in the supernatural world!"

Kokabiel yelled menacingly to the teenagers while condensing his power to the incomplete Excalibur in his hand.

"Really? You will kill them to try to restart a war that no one aside from you and some other crazy people wants? You and which army?"

A male voice came from behind Kokabiel. The Fallen Angel palled while rearing it. He knew very well who was the owner of it. After all, he had lost to that same person numerous times. With some weight on his heart, Kokabiel slowly turned to confirm with his own eyes who had talked to him. And there, in all of its glory, was Erik Ravenclaw. The man was standing a few meters from him while having his hands inside his pockets and looking at Kokabiel like he was a big joke. Besides him, was a beautiful black-haired woman that was wearing a black business suit, and behind the woman, was a petite blonde girl that was wearing the same school uniform that the Devils were wearing.

"Ravenclaw!"

Kokabiel said with hate spilling from the name.

"Kokabiel!"

Erik replied mockingly, inciting, even more, the hate that the Fallen Angel had for him.

"You despicable human! What are you doing here?"

Kokabiel asked Erik heatedly, totally forgetting his original plan of killing the two Devil Kings.

"What am I doing here? I work here, you moron. I have been working at this school as a teacher for almost three years now."

Erik replied simply to Kokabiel, who didn't believe in what he was wearing and had wide eyes as the result. Erik Ravenclaw, one of the most powerful beings in the supernatural world, was working as a school teacher for the last three years? How come he didn't know about that? How come no one knew about that? In turn, Erik looked at the widening eyes of Kokabiel, chuckled, and turned to look at the black-haired beauty by his side.

"See, Joan. I told you that the guy is a moron."

Erik said to one of his wives, Joan, who giggled at the comment. Joan had come to see what was going on when Asia Argento, her student, didn't appear at the usual time. What she found when she came to the city was Erik and Asia watching a fight between Devils and Rogue exorcists. Erik was explaining to Asia what was happening and why it was happening that way since it was her first time watching such a large-scale battle. After finding the reason behind their lateness, she joined the two of them as a spectator.

"Yes, you did, dear. I just didn't imagine that it was so much."

Joan replied to Erik. She then looked at Asia, who was looking in a concerned way at all of her friends that were hurt.

"Go ahead, Asia. Go and treat your friends."

Joan said to the gentle girl, who looked at Kokabiel that was on her way to them. Joan, seeing the girl's doubts, cleared them for her.

"Don't worry about the big-bad Fallen Angel, he will not touch you."

Joan said to Asia while with a flash of white light, a sheathed sword appeared on the side of her hips due to the use of her Sacred Gear.

"That is, he will not touch you if he wants to keep all of his limbs attached to his body."

Joan said menacingly while glaring at Kokabiel, who gulped at the intensity of the glare.

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