Argentorum
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Non Serviam: Chapter 21
🕑 Added 2025-02-13 03:43:40 +0000 UTCChapter 21: Make Disciples of All Nations
Akeno was weird after our spar.
“There.” I tucked the finished braid behind Asia’s ear. “How does that look?”
Asia turned towards the mirror, twisting back and forth to look at her new school uniform. She’d been excited to go to school, any apprehension wiped away by the knowledge that I’d be there as her translator. That hadn’t stopped her from ‘demanding’ I braid her hair.
She took such small pride in any perceived act of selfishness that I couldn’t help but reward her.
“I love it!” Asia spun back to me pressing against my side.
I patted her back as her arms squeezed tight around my waist.
Then she pulled back, looking up at me with mirror blue eyes. “Are you…alright, Taylor?” she asked.
Of course, Asia’s core would always be selfless.
“I’m fine,” I replied. “Just…”
The door opened, and Mittelt breezed into the room. “She just doesn’t know what to do about Rias’s moody queen.”
I frowned. Annoying, but rarely inaccurate, Mittelt once again cut to the heart of the issue. Before we fought, Akeno had regarded me with distrust and disdain. She’d favored me with expressions reserved for interesting new smells and detritus from the bottom of one’s shoes. Now an edge of wariness colored our interactions. She stood closer to her king when I was near, and her eyes never left me.
She still said that she lost our spar, despite smashing me into the ground with lightning and draining all of my demonic power, while she’d still had plenty of magic left to throw around.
“What’s wrong with Miss Akeno?” Asia asked.
“I don’t know.” I shrugged. “That’s what’s bothering me.” Now we had more important problems than our feud, and now I felt silly having beef with a high schooler in the first place. “And Mittelt is trying to distract me from her clothes.”
“Whatever do you mean?” Mittelt batted her eye lashes. She was in Kuoh Academy’s uniform, or rather, an interpretation of it. The white blouse was almost sheer, and it clung to her petite form in a way that bordered on indecent. The ribbon at her throat hung artfully loose, allowing the top button to be unfastened. That the skirt and petticoat were also shorter bore no mentioning.
In short, she looked exactly how you’d expect a fallen angel to look.
“Do you like my modifications?” Mittelt flounced over to my side. She pressed against me as well, throwing an unreadable look at Asia. “They’re all for you, lovely…”
“Mittelt, if you go around seducing high school boys—”
“Pish toss.” She waved a hand through the air. “Collecting cherry boys was Kalawarner’s obsession. Teaching virgins how to have sex makes me gag.”
I had nothing to say to that.
“You won’t solve any problems waiting around here.” Mittelt squirmed under my arm. “Akeno is already at school, and you wouldn’t want to make little Asia late on her first day!”
I sighed. “Alright, you two. Ready for your first day of high school?”
Asia looked between the two of us once more, before deciding the answer was to extend her hug to include Mittelt as well. “Thank you for coming with me, Miss Mittelt!”
Mittelt stiffened against my side before forcing herself to relax. “It’s my first time through high school as well, after all.”
“We’ll figure it out together!”
“…Quite.”
I smiled. “I’ll teleport us to the Occult Research club room now.”
It was a bit of a shuffle over to the teleport circle, but I managed, and in a flash of red light, we were back in the human world.
I convinced my two limpets to release me on pain of tickles—Mittelt just needed Asia to let go first, for her own pride—and shepherded them both to the main building. We’d scheduled our arrival during the first class of the day so that the halls would be clear. Sona Sitri and her Queen, Tsubaki Shinra, met us in the student council room.
“A pleasure to meet you, miss Asia.” Sona inclined her head as we entered. “Please allow me to welcome you to Kuoh Academy.”
“Ah, uh!” Asia wavered for a second before clasping her hands and bowing back. “The pleasure is mine. It is an honor to be welcomed here.”
“Hmm.” Sona turned. “Tsubaki.”
“Yes, Lady Sitri.”
I took a step back, and Tsubaki handed maps and class schedules to my two charges. With Rias and Sona owning the school, fitting them into the same class had been even easier done than said. Their class also included Koneko, for an extra level of familiarity and protection. If Diodora tried something here, we’d be ready.
“If you have any difficulties, please do not hesitate to ask one of the members of the student council for assistance,” Sona said. “We have a vested interest in ensuring Kuoh Academy makes a good impression, so few expenses will be spared.”
“Hoh?” Mittelt’s eyes flashed with interest.
Asia shook her head. “I could never abuse your hospitality, Miss Sona.”
Sona raised an eyebrow. “It is part of my duty as President to ensure your experience here is as pleasant as possible. You would not seek to make that duty more difficult, would you?”
Asia blinked in surprise. “I’ll…let you know if I need any help, then?”
“Please do.”
“Ah.” I nodded. “You’re thinking of expanding your rating game school downward.”
“Indeed.” Sona’s glasses flashed. “And overseeing the start of Kuoh’s international program will serve as an excellent basis for extending that program to the university.”
I sighed. Devils never did things by half. “We’ll be sure to let you know if we have any difficulties.”
Sona sniffed. She had a strange regard for me ever since I’d dismantled a quarter of her peerage in our rating game. “There’s a brief meeting with the principal, and then you’ll be free to join classes.”
“Meeting the faculty after the student council?” I asked.
Sona smiled for the first time. “You’ll find that the student council handles the school quite well.”
I felt almost bad for the kids she’d recruited, but meeting the principal went smoothly, no doubt because of Sona’s control. He’d given a brief welcome, which I’d ‘translated’, and praised Sona for her wonderful job handling the transfer. Then we were off.
High school was high school.
I found it briefly interesting that the teachers rotated between classrooms instead of the students, but in the long run that only meant I got to see less of the school. For their part, the rest of the kids couldn’t keep their eyes off of Mittelt and Asia, and I heard multiple wistful sighs about kinpatsu, golden hair. Half of the girls seemed convinced that the transfers were fairytale princesses before even speaking to them.
At lunch, I served as translator for Asia with several of her school mates.
“Eeto…” A girl fidgeted with her sleeve. “Dou you speak any Japanes?”
Asia glancing up at me. I leaned forward, switching that peculiar bit of focus Rias instilled in me to make my words sound like only one language, instead of all of them. “She’s asking if you speak Japanese.”
“Ah!” Asia beamed so bright the other girl almost had to shield her eyes. “Hai! Nihongo o…ben-benkyo shiteimasu!”
“Uwaa!” The girl and the rest of the table laughed. Asia’s smile dimmed slightly in confusion, gaze flicking back to me.
I fought down my initial response to being laughed at in a high school setting. “…They’re impressed.”
“Oh.” Asia smiled back at them. “I’m still learning though…”
“Well, if it was easy to learn a second language, it wouldn’t be so impressive.”
Our brief exchange drew the first girl’s attention back, and she asked in stuttered English what language we were speaking.
“Italian,” I said.
“Ah, hontou?” The girls turned to chatter with her friends before waving for Asia and Mittelt to come sit with them for lunch. Mittelt maintained an aloofness that contrasted with Asia’s friendly and open demeanor, and I could hear the school’s rumor mill start to spin around the two Italian exchange students and their tall translator.
Good thing I’d remembered to glamour my hair.
I half expected another member of Rias’s peerage to show up over lunch, but she seemed content to let Asia have a first day to herself. Koneko was friendly, if transparently standoffish as she was with the rest of the class. After school, she did offer to give Asia and Mittelt a tour of the school.
We ended up in the Occult Research club, but Koneko did make good on her tour.
Rias glomped us the moment we walked through the door. “How was your first day?”
“It was…fun!” Asia replied. “I really need to work on my Japanese though…”
“I’ll have a tutor brought in.” Rias stepped back, nodding firmly. “Language learning in Japan is mostly focused on English, but we have people that can get you up to speed.”
“Or perhaps…” I leaned against Mittelt slightly. “We have a language tutor right here?”
Rias turned to a surprised Mittelt, eyes gleaming. Of course the fallen knew Japanese, otherwise she wouldn’t have been stationed here, and her Italian was already proven. I gave her a small smile as Rias and Asia quickly roped her into the role of tutor.
“F-fine!” Mittelt crossed her arms. “It would be a shame if the littlest faithful had to wait for a new teacher. But only if Taylor also learned Italian.”
My smile grew. “I’d be happy to.” It would be nice to actually speak another language, even if it was just the one.
“I’m glad it’s settled. Asia, you can use the club room after school, of course,” Rias said. “Oh, but you should also try out the other clubs, but if you want to join my club, you totally can too!”
“Oh, ah.” Asia shifted from foot to foot. “What are clubs?”
Rias’s eyes widened comically. “What are—! We need to take you around the rest of the school immediately. Joining a club is maybe the most important part of high school!”
Asia gasped. “Really? Why didn’t anyone tell me.”
“She’s being dramatic, Asia,” I said. “A club is just a place where you can socialize with people who share a specific interest.”
“Oh, is there a…prayer club, or a church club?” Asia asked.
“Ah, that’s…” Rias shifted uncomfortably.
“Poor devils, discriminating against the religious.” Mittelt shook her head. “I wish I could still be surprised.”
“Th-there’s a Shinto club!” Rias shouted.
“Hmph.” Mittelt wound her arms around Asia. “Vieni, cara, lassiamo alle spalle ‘sta tana di bigotti. Vediamo se a’trove ci sono a’tri più accojenti ‘sponibbili.” (Come, darling, let us leave this den of bigots behind and see if there are more welcoming individuals available.)
“H-hey now, just because I’m a devil—”
Mittelt met her with a soul-rending glare. “Be better.”
Then, she took a confused Asia with her to tour the rest of the school, leaving Rias sputtering and stuttering behind.
I laughed. “Sorry, Rias, as their translator…”
“Mou, Taylor!” Rias sighed, before waving off my playful concern. “I’m fine. I’m fine. Go do your job, just make sure they’re back here for language practice.”
“I’ll see if we can’t convince Asia to go for another sleep over,” I said. We weren’t going to confine her to the underworld, but if she wanted to spend more time with Gaspar of her own volition, then I certainly wasn’t going to stop her.
“It might be the final push Gaspar needs to go to school next semester.” Rias clenched her first, a fire of determination glowing in her eyes. “Then, my whole peerage would be at school together, just in time for prom!”
I blinked. “…Prom?”
Rias blinked in turn, before her eyes locked onto me like a laser guided missile. “That’s right, Taylor. You’re American.” She took a step forward.
I took a step back. “…Yes?”
“You know how to organize a prom, right? A real authentic prom, with a prom committee and a prom queen?”
I opened my mouth, but Rias was already dreaming of her crown. “You have to help me plan next semester’s prom!”
“I don’t—”
“It’s part of our high school global outreach program!” Rias clasped my hands. “Please, Taylor. I’ll never ask anything of you ever again, but it would be so perfect, can’t you see?”
“Okay, Jesus!” The jolt of pain got Rias to release me, if nothing else. “I imagine Sona also has opinions on this prom idea?”
Rias rallied immediately. “Yes. You’ll be my spy on the inside.”
I sighed. “Whatever you say.”
And if Akeno kept a leery eye on me the whole time, I just couldn’t bring myself to care.s
Comments
leopard eye
Getting knocked down in a fight doesn't make you weak... Staying down does though. Akeno finally realized that she can't surpress Taylor, not by force. You can only soothe her or smother her in genuine kindness. Like Rias is doing. I wonder if our Lightning queen will try to improve herself now that she has been shown what a few months of vigorous training will do to a pawn.
leopard eye
That's one of the challenges of non verbal communication over internet.
Matt.Silver
*sigh* next time, I'll add [sarcasm][/sarcasm] around the sentences to make it more obvious
Jeffrey Gassenheimer
That’s like basic parahuman. Taylor will be really surprised Akeno doesn’t just use the power whenever anyway.
Matt.Silver
Taylor just needs to understand that Akeno was forced to use a power that reminded her about the worst moments of her life. It might be a bit difficult for Taylor to comprehend such an unusual trauma, but I'm sure she'll be able to eventually sympathize with Akeno.
