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Game of Monsters - 160
🕑 Added 2024-10-01 17:52:18 +0000 UTCBuilding Castles in an Hourglass
Despite being in a situation where he shouldn’t be able to concentrate, Joshua did so anyway.
Sometimes, his absentmindedness came in handy, he supposed. Because even then and there, with people talking and moving around, some of them even shouting, he remained where he was. He stood, leaning against a brick wall, with a notebook in hand and ideas in his mind. He ignored the world in favor of his mind, going over projects and writing down anything that seemed worth anything and even things that didn’t.
Never knew when some discarded idea could be useful later on.
Back to his work, he was blending Project Soul with a bunch of others, like Project Awakening, at that very moment. His working theory was that the reason why his attempts worked on Soren and not Misla was simple. He thought that, when the disease progressed, it’d latch onto the soul. That was why he’d been able to break its hold on the Sitri. The hold on Soren’s soul had either been inexistent or weak – he was leaning on the latter, considering it took a while for the disease to fully go away – while the one on Misla had been fully “realized” as it were.
‘Otherwise… maybe some fundamental part? Like a change in the self, similar to the way I add wings to a fallen, but less drastic?’ he wondered, once more trying to brainstorm ideas for things to test or try during his next visit. He had information to work on a possible approach to curing Misla, but he’d learned the price of being too optimistic already. It was better to assume it wouldn’t work and keep looking forward.
That way, even if he failed, at least he’d have used to attempt to learn more. Sure, it’d be extra work done uselessly if he succeeded, but he’d take that over failing and not learning anything. One was more of a waste of time than the other. Moreover, one left him feeling much more guilty than the other, that was for sure.
‘Could go further down the virtual intelligence rabbit hole, probably,’ he mused to himself, tapping an empty spot on the notebook thoughtfully. He was already setting up spells that activated, did and focused on determined things depending on the information picked up by sensing spells, which he imagined was sort of like coding. What he had in mind now was pushing that a notch or ten further, making a network of spells that would act differently according to the feedback they got, targeting specific things and better dealing with any unexpected result.
Maybe, even if he failed to fully cure Misla, he could force a stalemate against the Sleep Disease with her awake. That’d probably be very complicated, but then again, curing her was even more so. Finding a makeshift solution was better than no solution at all. So long as he didn’t make things worse, then anything was a step up.
Which meant that he had to be extra careful, really.
“Domino!” a voice called, making him blink and look up. Sure enough, the sight of the Levia-tan show set greeted him. He’d almost forgotten he was there for a shot. Good thing the scene was basically planned around what he was doing. Serafall’s doing, surely. “Were you even paying attention?”
“Of course I was,” Joshua replied, lying through his teeth shamelessly. He was a little bummed to be interrupted in the middle of his tinkering, but it was also sort of… nice. It helped him relax a little and distract himself, which was a welcome thing.
“What was I talking about?” she asked him, raising an unimpressed eyebrow at him.
“Nevermind that,” he replied instead of answering. There was no point, after all, and Domino would do anything other than admit being wrong or apologizing. In most cases, at least. “Did you need anything?”
“What are you even doing? I know for a fact that you aren’t studying,” Serafall commented and Joshua grinned widely. He had to twist that into a smug gesture instead of an amused one. Because that’s what would be in character, not him being amused by how contrary to reality the scene was. He’d definitely been studying, after all.
Idly, he noticed the same amusement he was feeling shining in Serafall’s eyes.
That is, before Domino’s expression changed to a slightly nervous one.
“... Nothing?” he answered in a very uncharacteristic, lame voice.
“... What do you want to steal now?” Serafall asked him, seeing through his character’s act and staring at him through narrowed eyes. With that slight slip though, Domino was back at the top of his game.
“I don’t know what you are talking about, Levi. I’ve gone straight already. I told you,” he replied, expression calm and confident. It was perfect… or it should have been.
“I don’t believe a single word you are saying, spill,” Serafall accused and he deflated dramatically.
“Fine,” he conceded, because Levi knew Domino entirely too well and vice versa. There was no point trying to fool her, not really. It’d been worth the first shot at it though, but nothing else. “In my defense, this is for a good cause.”
“Somehow, I doubt that,” Serafall said, looking thoroughly unconvinced.
“You hurt me, Levi, truly.”
Yeah, it was nice to take a break from serious thoughts and just be a different character in a different story.
[}-o-{]
Joshua stepped back and watched his spells at work.
He was testing a very crude, very early prototype version of Project Intelligence, so he didn’t need to do much… in theory. This was what one would call the first actual step, if one decided not to count the much more basic conditional spells and such. He was actually pretty sure this didn’t even count as actual virtual intelligence, but that wasn’t really the important part, he supposed.
The important part was making progress towards a spell array that would work and – most importantly – adapt by itself. That, also, without developing into some monster living spell that’d work against him. He didn’t need to be the one to unleash magical Skynet on the world. DxD Earth had enough shit going on for him to make it worse.
Setting it up so that it wouldn’t overdevelop would be a hassle, but baby steps. He needed to go through a lot of steps before he was even close to that and he needed to start making progress quickly. Project Everchanging, Intelligence and Soul were all key to dealing with Annihilation Maker, he was sure. Or, at least, they were the only ones that gave him a sense of being able to deal with Leonardo, or whoever the Longinus wielder was.
He needed something that could deal with unpredictable things. Furthermore, he needed something that could counter things that were specifically created to counter that specific something. It sounded like an impossibility, but Joshua was counting on Annihilation Maker being unable to create something that adapted. At least, not right off the bat. Once he revealed the card, it’d complicate matters, but he could cross that bridge when he got to it.
If he could get the upper hand once then maybe he could do something with that.
As it was, Annihilation Maker could just turn his spells to nothing and call it a day. There was nothing Joshua could do about that and he didn’t like that fact at all. So, he wanted to do something so that he could give the guy a taste of his own medicine, if only once.
Furthermore, maybe, just maybe, he’d be able to use that one chance for a lot more than he was planning to at the moment. It all depended on how long he had before the next attack, because he was sure there’d be a next one… And if there wasn’t, then he’d cause one.
Khaos Brigade had made an enemy out of him and Joshua clearly wasn’t doing enough.
Either way, he still needed to make some progress before anything else could be done in regards to those projects. Theorizing didn’t cost him anything though and it wasn’t like he was doing much other than looking at his spells work and idly checking on things through his senses and other spells.
As it was, things were looking fairly well so far, which was neat.
“Of course you made a tea-making spell,” Jeanne commented from beside him, having entered the kitchen and stopped to look at his spells working. Making tea was simple, but it required a bunch of things being done. There were also plenty of variables, if tiny ones. So, Joshua had decided that he might as well kill two birds with one stone.
On the one hand, he took a step in one of his most important projects. He was sure it’d give him some ideas of where to improve, which had been proven sort of right so far. Sure, it wasn’t at all related to what he wanted to attempt ultimately, but this was a huge thing that he could take one step at a time instead of going straight for the bigger things. Something that Project Awakening hadn’t really allowed and he was grateful to have in this instance.
On the other hand, Joshua thought a tea-making spell would be great. So… might as well make one while testing stuff, right? As good an excuse as any.
“What should I have made? A clothes-sorting spell?” he asked, not turning towards her and keeping his eyes locked on the steps the spells were going through. So far, everything was going smoothly, even if there were some parts that could be improved. The whole thing worked though, which was more than he expected.
“I feel like that’s sexist,” Jeanne commented and he could imagine the narrow eyes she was looking at him with. “But it does sound nice.”
Joshua snorted.
“That’d be plenty useful, Joshua,” Asia told him, radiating light and warmth even without him turning towards her. Either his sisters were predictable or Joshua was just very good at guessing what they’d do. Considering his people skills though… Yeah, it was definitely the former.
“Next one then,” he replied, yawning. Maybe he should have waited to test the prototype after breakfast?... Well, hindsight and all that, right? He’d been kind of eager.
“Looks like it’s done!” Asia said excitedly, clapping and all.
“Time for the true test then,” Joshua replied, taking a deep breath in, nodding and moving forward. Taking the cup, he blew on it and then went for a sip… “Could be better,” he declared solemnly before taking another sip.
Yeah, there was room for improvement. It was drinkable though, and that was actually more than he’d expected. Wasn’t as good as it could be though. The spells would have to wait to be fine tuned, unfortunately.
While finishing that would be nice, ultimately the whole thing was for another purpose. Joshua would focus on the important part for the moment… Although, maybe he could keep working on the tea-making array in his free time when trying to relax?...
Yes, that sounded good.
“Can we have breakfast already?” Jeanne asked, to which he finally turned towards her and stared.
“Someone’s bossy today. Maybe you want to prepare your own breakfast?”
“Have I told you that you are my favorite brother, Josh?”
“Your only brother, more like,” he replied dryly.
“The point stands, doesn’t it?”
To that, he just sighed.
[}-o-{]
“It’s probably rude of me to ignore you like this, isn’t it?” Joshua asked, his shyer side shining through stronger than usual as he kept his gaze down, moving only from his notebook to the cup of tea he held on the side. He felt a little bad for ignoring her while he just tinkered away with his spells. He knew she didn’t mind, but he still found it rude. It was just… Always a little awkward to spend time with her.
“It’s no problem at all. Especially considering what you are working on right now,” Gabriel reassured him kindly and a glance presented him with the sight of the angel’s soft, warm and kind smile. Sometimes, she could be a little too… much, in general, too bright, too warm, too kind. It left Joshua feeling like he was standing too close to the sun, sort of.
“I know, but still,” he commented, an awkward grimace on his face as he tried to explain himself. “It feels wrong to just sit here like you are not sitting there, doing nothing and waiting for me.”
“I don’t mind,” Gabriel told him, which didn’t really make things any better. “It’s nice to take a moment for myself here and there. I like to think of these moments like a break.”
“I’m sure you can do better than this for a break,” Joshua replied, glancing around at the tables that had been arranged and the tea and snacks on them. Snacks that were being decimated by Jeanne, Xenovia and Irina while they talked animatedly some distance away. Joshua was grateful not to be there, since it looked draining. Especially then and there when he seemed to be having a bit of a regression in his social anxiety.
That was probably why Gabriel had set their table a little further away, which he was grateful for.
“This is good enough for me,” Gabriel waved off with a smile that never seemed to leave her face for long. “I hope things are going well for you after what happened?” she asked, leaning forward as if to give him her undivided attention.
Which only made him feel even more nervous for… reasons.
She couldn’t be doing that on purpose, right?
“Doing better. Busy, but better,” he answered, taking a deep breath in and letting it out, as if to make the awkwardness and weariness leave his body. “Working to be better prepared next time,” he explained simply. It was a very accurate summary though. “And helping Kunou. She’s trying to act strong and like she’s fine, but she’s still shaken,” he added, looking down at his notebook.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Gabriel said, sounding genuinely so. “If there’s anything I can do to help with anything though, feel free to let me know.”
“I think you have your hands full enough, but thank you. I appreciate the offer,” he replied, trying to express how grateful he was with a smile. With any luck, even if he didn’t do a good job, she’d be good enough at reading people to make up for that. Evidently, he was right, considering the beaming smile she returned at him, especially bright this time. “Things will just get better on their own. Khaos is already being dealt with and I doubt you can do more on that front. And Kunou will get better. She just needs time. Yasaka and I have plenty of help, between Serafall, Jeanne, Asia and others.”
Margalo chose that moment to trill something, making him chuckle.
“My familiars included, obviously,” he said, but that correction didn’t seem to satisfy the bird. This was, after all, evidenced when he got his ear pecked. “Especially Margalo. She’s the best,” he added, making the bird puff her chest and leave him alone.
Evidently, the whole thing was very amusing for Gabriel, given her giggling.
“Well, I don’t mind helping anyway,” the angel told him and he almost sighed. She was too nice. He was starting to feel bad turning her down, but then again… if she was that insistent, then maybe she just wanted to help and wasn’t forcing herself or anything? He guessed that would be. “Maybe you can bring her on your visits, if she’s not in class,” Gabriel offered and his eyes widened a little.
“Uh… Would that be fine?” he asked hesitantly, trying not to insult her or her people. However… Joshua looked around at the Church base he was working on at the moment. The Church wasn't known for its welcoming of other faction members. Sure, they could be neutral or friendly with other factions, but there was a huge leap from that to welcoming people into their bases and such.
Especially someone like Kunou. He was pretty sure youkai had been considered almost on par to devils by the Church at one point. Furthermore, politically important people doing literally anything could be troublesome if not handled well.
“Don’t worry about it,” Gabriel replied, waving off his worries. She was the picture of ease and confidence, which certainly helped assuage some of his fears, but still… “I’ll deal with it. She’s a sweetheart, so I don’t mind at all.”
“We’ll see then,” he told her with a smile of his own. He’d need to check with Yasaka, of course, but he was sure Kunou would have fun visiting new places. Maybe they could walk around the surrounding area after he finished working. Church bases were in some nice places for sightseeing, surprisingly… or maybe not so surprisingly.
“I’ll look forward to it anyway,” Gabriel told him jokingly.
“How are things on your end though?” he asked, deciding to push aside his notebook. It didn’t look like he’d get much done and the break was almost over anyway. He’d continue working on Project Ascension when he got home.
Somehow, Gabriel seemed happier with that than with him working on giving angels extra wings. Maybe she wanted a break from work too? It was true that it wasn’t like a few minutes would make a difference with the project, he supposed.
“Well, things seem to be calming down now, which is amazing, I have to say…”
Bringing his cup of tea to his lips as he heard Gabriel start speaking, Joshua decided that yeah, an actual break sounded nice.
[}-o-{]
“Can I?! Can I?!” Kunou asked, to which Yasaka raised an eyebrow. She looked amused though, but that was hardly surprising.
“Yes, you can,” the mother answered, drawing a cheer from her daughter. “You have to stay with Joshua, alright? And listen to him.”
“I will, mom! This will be great!” the little girl exclaimed, looking like she was entering super excitement mode. This included loud speech, plenty of quick movement and a hundred words a second or so.
Ok, so maybe Joshua was exaggerating.
Just a little bit.
“Auntie Jeanne! I’m going to visit Europe! Spain!” Kunou called loudly, darting out of the room and looking for his sister. Joshua, for his part, was left with a giggling Serafall and a smiling Yasaka.
“Well, there she goes,” he commented, grinning himself. “Thanks for agreeing.”
“If she can’t be safe with you and Gabriel right there, let alone the rest of whatever base you go to, then I don’t know where she’d be,” Yasaka replied, waving him off. “Especially with as weak as the defenses were left here. My people are still repairing their side. It’s honestly mostly thanks to your defenses being up already that I feel any safety here.”
“I’ll be updating those at the end of the week, by the way,” he informed her, taking a deep breath in and looking up. He had a feeling he would forever be working on better defenses. It wasn’t only Annihilation Maker that was a danger, after all. The Longinus Gear was just the most glaring weakness he had, but not the only one.
All defenses had weaknesses that could be exploited, but Joshua would do his best to reduce that number as much as possible.
“On a different note, it’s good that the little one went away,” Serafall commented and Joshua felt like there was a shift in the atmosphere of the room. Why? Well, the most obvious clue was that the devil didn’t go for something overly dramatic and that she shared a very meaningful look with Yasaka.
“Is it?” he asked, glancing between the two of them curiously.
“Mhm,” Yasaka hummed with a nod. “There was something we wanted to talk about with you,” she answered and Joshua almost felt worried. Neither of them seemed to be sad or upset or anything negative. They just seemed… slightly wary, but that might not have been the best word for it, with how mild it was. Careful, maybe? That still sounded too strong a word.
“So, are you still oblivious or have you realized that there’re women interested in you?” Serafall asked, eyes wide like a kid asking an innocuous question instead of… whatever that was. Joshua had already not known what to expect from them, but that had been a multiverse away from any of his guesses.
Thus, his mind drew a blank for a long moment, leaving him blinking dumbly.
“Er… I have low self-esteem and poor social skills, but I’m not completely blind… anymore,” he defended himself. It was a poor defense, but it was what he had. He was getting better, alright?... Or so he thought, at least.
Back to the question though. He had noticed. Some of the women that visited the cafe or that he came across when picking up the girls from Kuoh Academy were anything but subtle, after all. There was the odd student at House of Water – which made him incredibly grateful that classes weren’t actually divided by age and instead were divided by skill level – too, along with the occasional mage he could cross paths with over at the association.
“Hmm, what do you think?” Serafall mumbled, turning to address the question to Yasaka.
“Definitely oblivious,” the youkai said without a shadow of doubt. The devil readily agreeing further drove the dagger in.
He wasn’t that bad!... Anymore, at least.
Probably.
Maybe.
“Anyway,” Serafall continued, deciding to just ignore what they’d said… even though she was the one to bring it up. “The point is that Yasaka and I do notice-”
He went to say something, but before he could even finish opening his mouth, Yasaka interrupted.
“No, we aren’t accusing you of anything nor are we angry nor is this a problem in any way,” she told him as if reading his mind. Was he that predictable or was it Senjutsu stuff? “This isn’t a bad thing, just something we thought would be better to bring up.”
“And, uh… why, exactly?” he asked, even more confused now. He thought it was a problem that he’d have to address. Maybe let the women down or something? That’d have been fine with him. He honestly thought he was entirely too lucky as it was, really. If he could not mess up things with Yasaka and Serafall, then he’d be more than happy.
Somehow, this response caused another shared look between the two of them. Whatever silent conversation the two held went on for a few seconds before Serafall nodded. Then Yasaka turned towards him and started speaking again.
“What we wanted to address was the possibility of other women joining our relationship,” she said and Joshua was left, once again, blinking. He was doing that a lot, he felt, but he did need those moments to gather his thoughts with the stuff that was getting thrown at him.
“This is a trap of some kind, isn’t it?” he asked with an amused half-smile. “I’m already beyond lucky and happy with you two. I really don’t need anyone else,” he told them, knowing full well that they’d be reading him like a book and realizing he wasn’t lying.
This was proven right when both gave him beaming smiles… even if Yasaka’s was a little more controlled than Serafall’s.
“Good answer,” Yasaka replied.
“Indeed,” Serafall followed up, taking over the conversation from their side again. “But still, we aren’t so greedy as to keep you off the market… Unless someone decides to barge in where they aren’t welcome,” she told him, her voice taking a dangerous edge at the end there.
Joshua was focusing on the first half though, actually. Because it stirred something half forgotten that should have been very fucking obvious. With this piece of knowledge dislodged, he pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Fucking DxD logic. Of course.’
“Greedy?” he asked anyway, because what the fuck?
“You are a powerful man, Joshua. A faction of your own, almost, considering how disconnected the Egyptian Pantheon is,” Serafall replied, somehow speaking like one would about the weather. “And you are getting more powerful, by the day. I know you’ll hate it, but…”
“Politics,” he finished, almost spitting out the word.
“Politics,” Yasaka confirmed with a calm nod.
It was good that the two of them seemed so relaxed, because he was decidedly not.
“We can at least put this off, right? I’m sure you aren’t in any rush to talk about this,” he told them, which he thought would at least be something they’d agree with, even with DxD’s twisted common sense. He remembered DxD characters being jealous and such, even if the harem thing was still pushed forward… for whatever reason.
“We’ve actually been putting this off for a while, but something forced our hand,” Yasaka told him, taking a sip from her cup of tea while Serafall nodded with the most dramatically serious expression on her face.
“That’s right. We can’t just push it for later when you are going on dates with someone and even bringing Kunou along,” the devil told him.
“What are you even…?” Joshua started before trailing off. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Judging by their expressions, no, they were not.
He felt himself pale.
“Gabriel?!”
Both women nodded and Joshua felt a headache coming his way.
[} Chapter End {]
Hey guys! How’s it going?
Joshua is working towards more bullshit spells and the world is not ready for them. It’s most certainly not, guys. I’m kind of looking forward to the next project reveal… Which I don’t know why, really. Joshua’s so isolated from the rest of the world that we usually don’t really get a perspective of the madness he unleashes, not from the world’s perspective, either because things are mostly secret or because they aren’t really relevant enough to guarantee a PoV…
Still though, I guess I enjoy the success second-hand through Joshua.
As for this latter half… I’m sure everyone and their mothers saw that coming, but there it is. It’s happening, guys. I think some people might not be fans of this development, but… Characters will do as they please, as usual. Don’t get angry with me, get angry with them… and DxD as a whole for its nonsense logic.
Anyway, hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.
Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ
Random Question: How’s the weather over there? Over here October hasn’t even started and the area is already turning into an oven. I wanna die.
See you.
Comments
kksssss
Was raining today. Quite liked it
Joaquin Cisterna
Raro frio y nublado en la mañana y lalido y soliado en la tarde, se aserca la oportunidad de kuicha y rias y otras chicas que no se rindan.
