Chapter 21: Cursed True Self

Riser POV

Going through class felt so normal, it was like I was in my previous life, it was actually really weird. Being a supernatural devil with all these powers and then just having a normal school day. Those anime protagonists must have felt like this, hell Ren felt like this.

After school I was going to get the others and assemble on the rooftop when in the stairs I was able to overhear the conversation that was taking place.

"Be careful around those two male transfer students Takamaki, one has a criminal record and one looks like a delinquent who corrupts others. If anything happens, you know where to find me…"

"Thank you…" Ann had an awkward smile on her face while thanking the gym teacher. She escaped after that but the palace ruler let out an annoyed grunt that showed how annoyed he was that his victim didn't cave to him.

After that he went away somewhere downstairs, probably to abuse more students at the gymnasium. Walking down and seeing Ren I went to go and get him and was about to find Ryuuji.

"Hey Jo-Ren, let's go find Ryuuji." I almost slipped up that time. I really have to not look at these people as characters or celebrities. I could get in trouble for it someday.

Ren just nodded to me and said hi to Rias who was beside me fuming about the comments of Kamoshida about me. Though Rias got into a one sided conversation with Ren where she kept asking about his Persona.

Going downstairs and joining the students who were going home, we saw Ryuuji waiting for us at the entrance of the school. He convinced us to go back again at the palace, well that was already the plan though so we didn't really care.

Ren just pulled out his phone and showed us the Metanav App, and then we were up, up and away into the Metaverse. Whheeeeeee!!!

The surroundings once more came up and down, left and right and after going around and around we were in front of the lust palace again.

Now that we are here again, we had the plan to see if we can find anything to implicate Kamoshida with the abuse that goes on daily in the school. While going forward I had the thought if we can even get a Persona.

A Persona is more of a humanity exclusive ability, or at least something close to humanity ability. Because dogs and robots having Personas breaks that theory. But demons and devils are more of the Personas, than being a Persona-user.

I mean, Satan, Lucifer, Michael, and Gabriel are personas, not persona users. I mean there are literally Gremory, Sitri, and not really Phenex but Phoenix personas.

Maybe I should buy a Persona potential for the both of us just in case and to be sure.

Whipping out my company phone, I went to the talent category and bought two potential Personas for both me and Rias. Now I am actually curious. If we ever get a Persona here, I wonder who we would get. 

And then we came across Morgana while looking for an entrance to the castle. We were led to the extravagant ballroom entrance which actually looked like a massive room compared to the castle that I saw in the game.

And then we once more plunged to the darkness of the dungeon. We saw a lot of cages and torture tools once more and we were protected by both Joker and Mona as we ventured forth and saw horrors of all kinds. The sight that I saw before was actually just the tip of the iceberg.

Torture would be putting it lightly. Before all I saw was automated torture. From an automatic cannonball or should I say volleyball. A treadmill that has spikes at the end if you ever stop. And then seeing the pink door with the label of Kamoshida's Training Hall of Love was just sickening even as a devil.

Just shows that sometimes the devil will run from humanity itself.

There were guards that are actually using torture tools now and the pink in the door makes sense now, if it was red that is, because the cages in the room was swimming in blood. All the torture was in a lower level and we were just watching in a higher level where we can see everything from a higher point of view.

Ren, no this isn't Ren right now. This is the genuine Joker right now. He was looking upon the sight with cold eyes, his red covered hands clenched tightly. Rias looked horrified at the sight, no doubt she has seen gore because she has gone Stray devil hunting before but those fights were just that fights to kill monsters quickly but this was a slow death, a torture until they die.

Ryuuji actually vomited at the sight and let out the contents of his stomach all over the floor. Morgana didn't look fazed but I could tell he was just telling himself that this was just a fake world where none of this happened.

Ryuuji, after feeling sick, felt rage and tried to take pictures of the students, but of course it didn't really work. He decided to memorize their faces like in the game instead.

We exited the room and then found a door that was distorted. It was weird because it kept distorting, Morgana informed us that it was a Safe room. And we were finally able to take a break from the horrors that we witnessed. We were silent for a few minutes until

"Dude this is fucked up." You know that it was serious if Ryuuji of all people dropped the F bomb.

"Yeah…" Ren whispered.

"At least it wasn't in real life…" Rias tried to be encouraging.

"But this is how he sees his reality, right?" I directed a question to Morgana.

"Yes, the palace shows how the Ruler sees their reality in the real world. This teacher of yours sees the school as a castle so in the metaverse, it is a castle. He abuses his students so it is reflected on how he actually wants to vent and torture his students to have power over them. Remember that a palace only manifests on an individual who is really twisted so your gym teacher is a real piece of work." Morgana explained to us.

It was really is a fucked situation.

We decided that we had enough of this place for today and decided to exit this now. And just as we walked into the entrance we came across a naked king.

"Oh it's you peasants again. You should have learned not to come to my castle again. But what can I expect from the dumb 'Track Traitor' who let down all of his friends. Oh I can only imagine the anger and despair they felt when they all had to give up on their dreams all because of your selfish violent act." The king taunted.

"Shut up, what you're doing is even worse than what I did back then. Abusing your students, all of them ragged from both practice and you. Making them target practice for you! Not to mention the scandal you have with Takamaki!"

"And so what? I am the king of this school, no one can oppose me here. Not even the principal. Anyways, enough of that! There is no point in talking to a corpse anyways. All of you kill them!"

The king ordered the shadows to kill us and Joker and Mona came to our rescue. And surprisingly there were no troubles. Joker with a toy gun was blasting the guards and doing all kinds of cool shit, like unnecessary back flipping and showing off in general.

Mona was small enough that he can weave through multiple guards and then use his persona to take care of them.

What happened next was the trouble that I didn't expect.

The king himself ordered one of the bigger shadows to take care of us and while it was easy for them to dodge, their attacks weren't able to damage the new shadow much and while they were trying to damage him, we were all being surrounded by new shadows that didn't end until…

"Finish them!!"

"Yes, your highness!"

Wham

"Aagh!!"

"Ugh!"

Joker and Mona were overwhelmed with the numbers of shadows, and not only were they fighting, they were also protecting us. They didn't know that we can protect ourselves but Ryuuji is vulnerable right now.

The king stood above Mona and Joker and started to taunt us once more.

"You worthless piece of reject, You just came here on a whim didn't you? You wanted nothing more than to defame me. So emotional~ you were nothing but an eyesore that should have just bowed to me. Instead you tried to attack me for taking care of your sorry team of sobbing runners."

"Taking care? That was just abuse! You just wanted to have us shutdown!"

"That's right, the only team that should have fame is a team trained by me. I should be the star! But because of your meddling you will never run again!"

"You broke my leg, yes. But involving the other track members is where I draw the line, they never even did anything. And now all our dreams are over. It really is because of me isn't it?" Ryuuji was starting to fall into despair.

"Well that's enough of that, all of you execute these pests. Now where are my honeys~~ Princesses~~ where are you~" He started to walk away and called out to… honeys? Princess…es? As in plural?

"Don't give up! It wasn't your fault!" Shouted Joker in the background but all I was looking at was the king.

And in the other entrance to the ballroom came two scantily clad girls. Anne was wearing an animal print pink mini bikini with pink animal ears on her head, she was wearing so little that we could see her areola and just a little movement her nipples would slip. While Rias came out with a purple slingshot swimsuit that also shows her areola and her pussy would be on full display if she moved a little bit.

And both the girls draped themselves on Kamoshida, and Kamoshida lapped it all up, he put his hands on Rias' tits and Ann's butt. Groping them and even fingering Ann while watching us on the ground. Rage started to fill my very being.

Ryuji started to fall on the ground and clutched his head. Rias fell on the ground hugging herself and then struggling to endure the pain that was emanating from her head, her eyes were wide open and instead of her beautiful blue eyes, what I saw was sickening yellow instead.

And while I wanted to comfort her I couldn't, because my head was filled with pain too, and someone was speaking to me.

"Are you going to rage and lash out once again? Will you let others control you once again? Just like you let Sirzechs control your emotions in the party and become petty like a child? Just like you damned the consequences and almost punched Kamoshida in the real world? Just like you let others' opinions control you in your previous life, the reason you died… were you wrong in that?"

"Yes, I was wrong…"

"No!!! You were right with your rage! Rage out against others! Rage against fate! But! Your rage is too hot, you are too reckless with it. In turn you risk you and your loved ones!"

"Then… What… should I do?"

"Turn your rage into wrath and turn it into a cold but pointed wrath. And let me be the one who rages like a fire who will burn and consume everything wildly. Let yourself be the cold deep ocean who swallows everything calmly…"

"Can I really do that? No… I must do it, don't I?"

"So will you accept this contract of ours and rage against the world? Will you finally mature into the devil you are supposed to be?"

"Yes I understand, I accept your contract!"

"Very well… I am thou, thou art I… Let us join together and rage against the world itself!!!"

"Then come to me…!"

A/N:

Sorry for the cliffhanger,

te~he~ pero!! てへぺろ(๑≧౪≦)てへぺろ

Who do you think his persona is going to be? Here is a hint… he also rages against the comments and the judgment of people around him and tries to right his reputation because he was falsely accused of killing someone he considers a friend and rival…

Thank you once again for your support and I hope to see you in the next chapter!!

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