Chapter 70

Despite all the crazy shit that has been happening... Seeing Grayfia in her maid outfit was reassuring. But it was obvious that Grayfia was on edge, even with the noticeable figure of Artemis beside me as well as my new creations. Instead of welcoming me, as that guard had said previously.

Grayfia wanted to make sure I was who I in fact was.

Grayfia eyed me with her grey eyes that were pits of cold determination for a moment and finally after inspecting me, she spoke coldly. "How did Sirzechs encourage your growth."

Her question made my face twitch as... That was awkward, to say the least, especially to say it around the Gremory clan guards who were waiting with enchanted spears at the ready to impale us. But seeing Grayfia's patience waning I sighed and spoke kinda embarrassedly. "You slapped Sirzechs really hard in the back of the head and made him 'accidentally' spit on my pants leg when you two teleported into my room in the middle of the night," I explained making Grayfia's face relax while I could feel Artemis eyeing me from behind at that sequence of events.

The maid and queen of Sirzechs peerage and one of the strongest living devils sighed with a small sad smile coming to her face as she nodded. "Welcome back Jake." She said and then walked forward and I welcomed her in a platonic embrace with her nose pressing into my shoulder as her deceptively frail form held me in a tight hug for a moment before she pulled back with a watery smile. "Come. There is much to explain and Rias has been beside herself worrying about where you were." She said gently as she pulled me into the mansion with the Gremory clan guards taking back into the air to return to their posts.

Quickly Grayfia led me across the halls of the estate and took some passageways that were clearly magical portals of some kind with Grayfia saying tightly they were part of the estate's defensive measures. But finally, she led us to a large sitting room and there were all my friends, and creations.

Rias and her peers looked to be in good health for the most part... Except for Kiba who had seemingly lost a hand and his right leg past his knee. But the rest were fine, they were alive, and everything else I could fix. But as I took in my creations I noticed that Monet wasn't there in the group of my creations that were sitting next to Rias and her peerage.

"Girls... I am back." I said a bit choked up as Rias instantly burst into tears she leaped up from her couch to run at me and pulled me into a back-breaking hug she then began sobbing loudly with me patting her head into my chest as I took in the rest of everyone in the room. "You guys alright?" I asked softly and the girls all but shrugged looking... Not great at my question with Klee beginning to sniffle and I felt a flash of anger that was so... Buried within myself in this new life that had almost everything be smooth sailing.

I looked around and saw sitting next to Kiba was the apparently last Satan in Serafall Leviathan... And I realized her escape wasn't without cost as like Kiba she was missing a leg though she had made an ice leg for her to work with as she awkwardly stood up on her 'legs'. But also beside her was Venelana Gremory and... She was not in a good way as she clearly had bags under her eyes due to the stress about what had happened.

But Serafall's eyes... They scared me, I don't think whatever happened with her, was enough to drive her to this point as she was a warrior who fought in the Devil Civil War and thus I had no doubt she had seen countless friends die. There was something in her dull eyes that truly made a part of myself reel back as she gazed at me with a heavy intent filled look.

I pulled Rias into a princess carry and with Akeno's help, I sat down on the couch with Rias's face all but glued to my chest as I looked to the calmest person in the room Grayfia, and asked simply. "Please explain what in the hell has happened. How is Kuoh literally a fucking crater, and where are Sirzechs and Zeoticus?" I almost demanded but managed to keep my voice down so I didn't freak out Rias more and...

Frankly, I knew I shouldn't take out my frustration and confusion on them when I wasn't around for whatever had happened. I knew Sirzechs according to Riser's father was supposedly sealed away but I didn't know what had happened with Zeoticus.

Grayfia visibly took a large breath before she pulled out a wooden seat to sit in front of me as my creations came closer and tried to hug me as well with Rias actually allowing Klee to snuggle between our hugging forms as she used the small girl as teddy bear basically.

"Sirzechs, Ajuka, and Fabium may as well be dead... They were sealed away into Pandora's box and then in the resulting battle in which Azazel and Micheal attempted to help us free them from Hades who held onto Pandora's Box...." Grayfia took a breath to steady herself as she clinically spoke. "Pandora's Box was then thrown into the Dimensional Gap by Hades when it was clear he was losing... But not merely to throw it into the Gap. So it would end up being lost in the gap between realms, but he purposefully threw it into the Great Reds face which ended up shattering the vase, and thus Sirzechs and those all sealed away were almost assuredly killed in the resulting gravity well of the dimension collapsing in on itself." Grayfia explained and I sat there floored at the news.

As Grayfia took a moment to breathe and control her emotions as clearly having lost her husband was having a toll on her and I myself was... Lost, as I honestly thought of Sirzechs as a bit of a brother honestly. He welcomed me into his family with no hesitation and put his trust in me to heal his family of their issues and everything.

It was painful...

Then Serafall began speaking and the shit just kept fucking coming apparently. "After hearing of Micheal, Azazel, and the remaining devils of the New Satan faction fighting together to release them from Pandora's Box, Kokabiel in disgust decided to hurt me the most... He killed my Sona. he butchered her Peerage and even your creation Monet, all before Ei and your other creation Arcueid, managed to kill him before I arrived when the battle with Hades was ended." Serafall hollowly explained.

I softly buried my face into Rias's hair as I just had to fucking breathe and think for a minute... What the hell had happened? Why has my reincarnation in DXD gone so fucking off the rails? 'This wasn't some crossover why was everything going wrong!?' I mentally screamed before shuddering and taking a breath as I felt Rias flinch and begin crying again at feeling my own distress.

I leaned back a bit to get my face out of Rias's crimson tresses of hair and I asked choked up. "And Zeoticus? Where is he?" I asked and Venelana flinched and I literally just closed my eyes and with a dull thunking noise my head hit the back of the fucking couch's wood trim.

Venelana, similar to Serafall's hollow voice spoke dully. "The reason Grayfia was so intent on testing you for your identity and checking you magically, was that a shapeshifter that had taken the place of one of the maids many years ago apparently was activated as a sleeper agent and she killed Zeoticus after they were making love. While Zeoticus slipped into his extremely deep periods of sleep due to his oncoming Devil Sleeping Sickness."

I raised my hand to silence them and within my hand was one of the Sepiroth Gralls. "Let me see if I can find their souls or something. I will try to find Zeoticus first. Do you guys still have his body in stasis or something?" I asked hopefully.