The foray in the underworld by Jun's forces was finished for now, however, just like he had previously stated before the whole event, this foray would be a trigger that would set much larger events in motion.
They might not yet be obvious and overt but the undercurrents would swiftly become clear. The devils were hit hard and their inability to cope with Jun's forces would soon be known to the rest of the world.
And as Jun had previous explained to Sona and Rias before the diplomatic meeting between Morgan and the devil leadership was even set up, one a chink was made, there was a group that would love nothing more than to take advantage.
Still, the event was destined to cause waves far beyond the range of those planning to take advantage. Jun's group was, by all definition, one composed of upstarts and yet, they had just force a loss on an ancient and established power without suffering anything for it.
It was not a suicidal attack that cause great damage, it was not a pyrrhic victory, it was not even a close one. Jun had sent forces that were clearly far from his full reserves and completely owned the devils, killing and kidnapping as they pleased while suffering no casualties at all.
Could it even be called war? The scale was certainly sufficient and technically, the Devils were in a full war state at the moment but considering how one sided the whole thing was, they would probably sue for peace very soon.
The factors made it more of a one sided oppression of a weaker force rather than an actual war and that set off all kinds of alarms amongst the many well established forces in the world of DxD.
Both the dominant forces in the world as well as those seeking to usurp and replace them had a vested interest in Jun now whereas there was only a passing one before.
Presented with such a wonderful opportunity, the Khaos Brigade immediately began to make moves with the Old Satan Faction, becoming more willing to abide by the general faction's will after being terrified by the power of Jun's group.
Now that Jun, had both suppressed the Four Satan Faction in the underworld through a humiliating defeat and directly damaged the Great King Faction, the Khaos Brigade was suddenly far more interested in pouring its resources into its endeavours with the Devils.
As a manifestation of this, several other sub factions began moving to try and fish in the troubled waters.
An initial rendering of the future Qlippoth Faction was formed ahead of time, still unannounced to the world but making moves that should not be happening yet if the original timeline was taken into account.
The Hero Faction also began making some moves, sniffing around in the Yokai territory without drawing attention to themselves, most likely seeking to obtain capture Yasaka like in the original series, only differing in their hastiness to do it.
But, as previously mentioned, not only such insurgents were spurred into action. The proper powers from the various mythologies also began paying much greater attention to current events and as an upstart had just managed to overwhelm an established force, they began considering things they had not previously considered, at least not with such seriousness and urgency.
The immediate action was to start paying a lot more attention to their backyard, carefully screening new emerging forces while also investigating possible problematic elements without their own factions.
The second and more measured action however, was to look for possible alliances so as to further strengthen their current position.
Among these forces, one was particularly interested in forging an alliance in order to avoid the wrath of Jun's group as they could be considered to have had conflict with him before.
These were the Shinto Gods, the patron deities of the the Five Principal Clans who had clashed with Jun before.
Relations with the clans were now fine, simply because their gods had not supported them in their clash and Nakiri Ouryuu had certainly tried to get them involved after Jun thrashed him.
The Shinto Gods did not see the matter as worthy of direct interference however, Jun may have disrespected the families but he only spoke the truth, the mere fact that he could disrespect them just by putting verifiable facts forward left the gods displeased with their servants rather than with him.
Additionally, he was, in their mind at the time, just a rising star, still not worthy of their direct interference. The incident in the underworld which had reached their ears however, was a swift and harsh wake up call and now, the SHinto Gods were wondering if Jun was not plotting for their end.
Their servants of the Five Principal Clans still harboring resentment and wishing to go against him also did not bode well and so, they were seeking an alliance in order to better secure their continued prosperity.
All this taken into consideration, what better alliance to seek than one with Jun himself? After all, considering how he usually acted, there was simply no way he would attack an ally without them doing something serious to him or his people first.
Of course, they were under no illusion that it would be easy to secure such an alliance but the leader of the Shinto Pantheon, Amaterasu, already had a pretty good plan thought up.
Even though she had never met Jun, she could tell lot from what she heard of him, she was quite the old hand by this point after all and thus, she knew of a way to, even if not to the point of securing an alliance, earn some favor from the mysterious new powerhouse.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
P.a.t.r.e.o.n is officially up!
The link is: https://www.p.a.t.r.e.o.n.com/lusoba without the extra dots of course.
You'll get to read up to FOUR week ahead, a full month, but I'll still post here.
There's also my other novel Archon of DanMachi, do check it out!
I would greatly appreciate any support since this is going to be my breadwinner.