hummed in affirmation and relaxed into my armchair. My body had been aching lately, which was unusual. I was trying to relax but the aches weren't going away.
Something was wrong with me, but I wasn't sure what it was.
"The three Christian Factions are allying." Mihaela perked up. "Do you want to witness the meeting?"
Mihaela nodded rapidly, likely thinking the alliance meeting was history in the making. Who wouldn't want to be a part of history?
"Alright." Even if we didn't form a contract, Mihaela would at least get to meet some other heirs. She would also get to see the faction leaders.
I wasn't excited about seeing them. There was a good chance they would somehow see how powerful I was. That or they would see my 'evilness', eating evil beings indiscriminately was now seeming like a bad idea.
"Well, I'm going to bathe." I stood and stretched my aching body. "Watch the box-Vampires for me."
Mihaela nodded and I started towards my room. Having a personal bathroom was one of the finer things in life.
Now that I've had one, I can't go back.
...
The Gap isn't a place but an 'absence' that is 'kind of' a place. The Gap is a place where the fundamental forces of the universe don't apply. The very idea of matter doesn't exist in the Gap.
Everything that isn't 'magically heavy' ceases to exist when exposed to the Gap. Watching Mihaela fade away when I brought her there had solidified that in my mind.
I vaguely remembered that there was an organization of Stray Magicians that made their home in the Gap. My realization of the Gap's nature made their survival and habitation of the Gap seem more impressive.
I shook my head and rewound time. In an instant, I was back in a time before Mihaela knew about my trips to the Gap.
She had asked what I was doing and I foolishly told her. After begging me to bring her, I accidentally killed her with exposure to the Gap.
It was mainly due to my lack of thought, but also because I forgot that not everyone was as strong as I was.
Even If I didn't have the required techniques to destroy a country, I could still transverse the gap like other powerful beings.
Sadly, I forgot that not everyone could do that...
"Your usage of the elements is crude, wasteful, but effective." Mihaela lectured me as though being wasteful mattered when you were a Devil. "Nonetheless, your extremely skilled in your use of Wind Magic."
I nodded languidly. I already had this conversation once and couldn't summon up the will to even act interested.
Devils had more power than sense and didn't need to worry about being efficient. I was the same, only with more sense than most Devils.
"Do you want some book's on Wind Magic?" Mihaela asked, cutting the conversation short.
Last time she had talked my ear off, but this time she had perhaps lost interest or saw I wasn't interested.
"I'm good, but thanks." I scratched my chin trying to remember how this conversation went. "Have I given you full access to the library yet?"
Mihaela shook her head.
"Alright, I'll have the wards adjusted so you can see the books." It would take some minor tweaking, but it wasn't a big deal. "I'll do it now before I forget."
Forgetting I rewound time and hadn't done stuff I said I would, was my new problem lately. But the more I messed around with time travel the more experienced I got with time travel shenanigans.
Eventually, I wouldn't be talking to people about a conversation that we hadn't had yet and confusing them. It was just a matter of time until I was a competent time traveler.
...
"What's happened to your eyes?" That was of course Rias, who came to get her Dhampir. Said Dhampir had only just left his box after a month of staying in my house.
"I decided I wanted to have cool eyes like my favorite Vampires." I gave the two Dhampir's head pats. "I felt lonely being the only one without cool eyes."
In reality, your body changes to reflect your soul. My soul had a lot of Vampire and other assorted evils within it. Thus, my wings became weird, and Shadowy, my skin became a little paler, and my eyes became red and glowed eerily.
The wings were fine as they were entirely optional, no one would see them if I didn't want them to. The skin was also fine, as a slight shift in skin color was hardly noticeable. The eyes on the other hand were an annoyance.
They resisted any attempts to change them and even seemed pretty resistant to Transformation Magic.
"Looks cool eh?" I fluttered my lashes at Rias causing her to exhale in annoyance. She shook her head and scooped her box-Vampire up before teleporting away in a smooth motion.
"She could have stayed and chatted..." I put up with her when I visited. She could at least pretend to like my company...
I reached down and gave Valerie some more head pats. While thinking about solutions to my new changes.
Transformation Magic and my natural transformation ability didn't work, so I would have to try something different.
I might have to stop eating things for a while, especially when I seemed to become what I eat, even without taking on their physical traits intentionally.
The good thing about the changes is that they only seemed cosmetic. Nothing internal had changed nor had any weakness been gained.
I just needed to figure out how to hide my new traits and the show could get back on the road...
...
Sealing magic provided an easy solution. Just 'seal' away my desired traits or powers and I would be able to access them upon releasing the seal.
I was essentially sealing away my true form and some of my powers so my body could maintain a more human appearance.
It wasn't too bad as I already planned on sealing away most of my power in preparation for the alliance meeting. But it didn't feel comfortable. Being weak again made me feel nervous as well.
"Magic has limitless applications." I gestured towards the swarm of Vampires that were held within my barrier. "I could kill them in any number of ways, I'm only limited by my imagination and mentality."
"But I want you to find your own way to use your magic." Valerie nodded but didn't look like she understood. "I want you to use this opportunity to try out anything you want. It can be lethal or non-lethal. Whatever you want."
With a thought, one of the mid-class Vampires separated from the group and floated in front of me and Valerie. I spun him around looking for hidden weapons, before placing him on the ground.
"Alright, go get him." Valerie nodded and rushed towards the silent Vampire. I stood a distance away, watching as Valerie ran towards said Vampire with Shadowy Claws.
Within the first few exchanges, it became apparent that Valerie was winning the fight. Each time the Vampire attempted to hit Valerie she would turn into bats and reform a distance away.
Valerie scored a few hits until the Vampire eventually adopted the same tactic and turned himself into bats, successfully dodging Valerie continued attacks.
"Shroud." Valerie spoke, and the area instantly covered in a thick dark fog. I blinked in surprise, I could see through the cloud as could Valerie and the other Vampire.
Valerie stared in what I thought might be an annoyance as the Vampire continued towards Valerie unimpeded.
"Animated Shadows." Hundreds of Shadowy Bats flew from Valerie's shadow and surrounded the approaching Vampire.
With a wave of her hand, the bats descended and sucked the blood from the vampire before I even had time to blink.
They returned to her shadow in short order and I felt her Demonic Power raise minutely. Though I wouldn't have noticed had I not been expecting something similar.
"Well done." With a thought, I arrived beside her and awarded her with some head pats. "I like the bat thing, maybe add mosquito or leeches. Other bloodsucking animals would add variety."
"I made it after looking at your Shadows." Valerie smiled shyly. "They're not as smart as yours, but they can follow simple orders."
"Good work." I continued patting her head. "How about the Shroud? That was a good move."
"Vampires can naturally make fog, I just added shadow to the fog." I reached down and gave her some more head pats. Valerie smiled and pushed her head into my palm causing my heart to melt.
Dhampirs liked head pats.
"Alright, I'll release two this time." Valerie nodded resolutely, and I dragged another two Vampires from the sphere. "Alright, show me what else you've got."
I released the two Vampires and they sprinted towards us with feral roars. I shook my head and allowed myself to drift off into thought.
Making Valerie kill vampires for practice didn't seem so bad currently. She didn't mind, and I was going to kill them anyway.
She was gaining experience and I was ridding the world of Vampires. What more could I ask for?
...
Even though I could do nearly anything I wanted with my power, I found it hard to make truly strong attacks.
City or world-destroying attacks were cool but also a mental burden. I wasn't sure I wanted the ability to destroy the world.
I didn't feel I could trust myself not to go the easy route and destroy a city to kill a single annoying enemy.
Which is why I wanted to develop a strong unlockable move. Something that killed the target without fail, with as little destruction as possible.
"The Vampires have started involving other factions." I eyed a few nameless Ultimate-class Devils staying in the castle from my spot within the shadows. "That's not good."
I rubbed my nose feeling a little embarrassed about speaking to myself like a psychopath. As if killing nearly a thousand Vampires wasn't psychopathic enough.
"Rift." I slipped out of the shadows and through the rift not caring who sensed me. I was once again within the Gap and enjoying the silence.
I rested my arms behind my head and shed my seal's allowing my true form to surface. I was now an ever-shifting mass of Shadow, with no notable human features besides the hundreds of red eyes that covered my form.
In this form, time worked as I desired it to, especially in the Gap which was devoid of laws. I could sit here for hundreds of years and allow myself to naturally grow in power while only a few seconds passed in the 'real worlds' outside of the Gap.
I wasn't quite an eldritch abomination, but I was getting there. Soon, I'd be causing people to go insane when they gazed upon my true form.
"But that won't be for another few hundred years." The Gap seemed to cause some sort of evolution if you stayed in it for an extended time. Or at least it did in my case.
I enjoyed the freedom that releasing the seals brought for a moment longer before taking on my usual appearance. I created a reflective surface in front of me to make sure I hadn't accidentally forgotten to make my skin before straightening and placing my hands in front of me.
"Dimensional Rift." I settled in for another fun-filled day of getting lost in thought while trying to jump worlds.
Going from vaguely different to demi-eldritch monstrosity was a huge jump. But it happened throughout hundreds of years of artificial aging.
I had thought to artificially age myself in the Gap and this was the result. My form changed, I became more powerful and my magic became a weird inky black.
I didn't want to look like a monstrosity but I had little choice in the matter. I couldn't travel back far enough in time to fix my new problem.
"Sucks to suck..." I closed the Rift with a wave of my hand and opened a second. "Dimensional Rift." This one was black and empty just like the near one-hundred of its predecessors.
"I might need to try something different." I stared out into the void hoping for a flicker of light or really anything besides endless blackness.
Nothing was there, just like my past attempts the void as I've taken to calling it was as black and still as it always was...
...
I stared into a mirror while leaning on a wall, surrounded on both sides by Ria's and Sona's peerages. I was trying to make my eyes pink but they kept slowly changing into a bright red no matter what I sealed or how many times I changed them.
"Staring at the mirror won't make you look any better, ya know?" I turned and stared dully at Mihaela.
She didn't seem excited to be witnessing the meeting. But months of knowing you were going to attend a meeting probably dulled any excitement she felt.
"It's hard being so perfect." I said dully. "You can't get any better than perfection." I dismissed the mirror causing it to disperse into blue motes of light.
Mihaela huffed at me and leaned back against the wall while eying the faction leaders seated at a round table.
Issei was doing his best and being the harem protagonist, he was meant to be, while Vali stood across the room and eyed him. I tuned everything out around me and instead focused on the magic surrounding the school.
I could feel it subtly shifting and pulsing, a sign of what was to come.
"Calm down Issei." Rias held Issei back from causing a scene just as the magic in the surroundings shifted causing everyone magically aware to tense.
The world turned a purplish-pink and most of the weaker members baring the holy sword users and Issei were frozen.
I tuned out Rias's and Issei's moment and focused on the surrounding time. The earth rumbled but I ignored it, and instead continued to focus on the local time stream.
With a twitch of my fingers, everyone that had been frozen in time was unfrozen. I opened my eyes and made my way to the windows.
Outside hooded Magicians made quick work out of the three factions guards. The Magicians shot beams out of their weird hoods with eyes on them and the guards were teleported away one by one.
The group chattered for a little while longer, I tuned them out and focused on Mihaela and Valerie who both were nervous and nonchalant in that order.
Vali in a move worthy of a Shonen action protagonist flew into the sky with his blue and activated his balance breaker. He was covered in white armor, with gold pauldrons and blue glowing eyes.
The surrounding Magicians launched beams from the eyes on their hoods towards Vail, which he skillfully blocked using small defensive magic circles.
Vali launched lightning at the Magicians causing many of them to disintegrate. More Magicians came from the large magic circle in the sky and replenished their lost numbers.
Rias and Issei disappeared in a flash leaving behind a roof piece on the floor.
"Not how you expected it to go huh?" I nudged Mihaela with my elbow causing her to swat at me.
Whatever moment we could have had was interrupted by a brown-haired, blue-eyed glasses-wearing woman. Katerea Leviathan was dressed like most women of the DxD world dressed, which was barely.
I eyed her form for a moment, considering it a shame that she would die.
"I'm here to bring distraction and chaos." She raised her staff causing our surroundings to detonate. "Adorable, the three great powers forming a defensive barrier together." She giggled sweetly.
"Adorable and pathetic!" She continued much to my annoyance.
I again tuned them out, too bored with the whole charade to even focus on the conversation. The barrier lowered to the ground and Katerea followed lowering herself to the ground as well.
"Once I kill you today, I'll simply take back the name of the Devil-king Leviathan for myself!"
I rolled my eyes, nudged Mihaela and Valerie, and submerged into my shadow, earning a raised eyebrow from Grayfia and a blink from Sirzechs.
I slunk away, mostly unnoticed, and made my way towards the edge of the barrier hoping to snatch some magicians.
...
I returned to see Issei take some of Vali's power and thoroughly thrash him after being taunted by Azazel who was now missing an arm.
I stood out of hearing distance and watched as Vali was taken away by his friend.
"That was fun to watch." I said mostly to break the silence. I had taken the cowardly route and fought only those around the outside of the perimeter, avoiding the spotlight and allowing Issei to have his Protagonist moments.
It wouldn't look good in the eyes of the Satans, nor would it sound good were the Agares to hear about it.
Thankfully I could ignore the Agares and would soon be stronger than the Satans. Neither of those would matter in a few 'months' of time.
"So, who's hungry." I snuck a look around, making sure no one was eyeing me. "We can head wherever you guy's want." I caught Sona's eye and nodded in acknowledgment before looking away.
I let my eyes linger on the Holy Sword users longer than was polite while fantasizing about duplicating them. Unlimited swords plus discount Shadowy-Gate-Of-Babylon could be interesting.
"Ice cream please..." Valerie tugged on my sleeve and Mihaela looked too tired to bother protesting the unhealthy snack.
I thumped Mihaela on the back waking her and earning a scowl in return for my good deed. I turned my eyes to Valerie and pointedly ignored the indignant Mihaela.
"Ice cream it is." I slowly sunk into the shadow's bringing Mihaela and Valerie with me under the watchful eyes of Michael, Azazel, and Sirzechs. I stuck my tongue out and made faces at them as I disappeared from the school.
Don't look at me like you discovered something! I might get nervous and jump back in time!
...
I could do nothing more than stare at the display of gluttony before me. After returning to the mansion and throwing the wards up to prevent disturbances, we held an ice cream party.
Though it seemed to be a one-person party as Mihaela was doing an excellent job at offending my sensibilities. I continued to stare as Mihaela wolfed down her eighth tub of ice cream and rubbed her extended stomach.
"I forgot how good ice cream was." She continued to rub her stomach while seemingly drifting off to sleep where she sat. "I don't ever want to go a day without ice cream for as long as I live."
She closed her eyes and slumped over the table nearly knocking her stack of ice cream tubs off the table.
I stared at her in mild disdain for a moment before noticing Valerie looking a little bored.
"Here." I waved my hand depositing a mountain of different sweets beside the table. "Throw some stuff on top of your ice cream, if you don't like it just get a new tub."
Valerie nodded but didn't move away from her tub of ice cream, seemingly content with plain vanilla.
With my sweets offered but promptly ignored I set about finishing my own bucket of ice cream. Vanilla with heath-bar crumble was the flavor of the day and it was working quite well to sate my post-battle hunger.
"Is there anything you want to do before we start hiding inside the house again?" I waved my spoon around pointing at the house as I spoke. I flicked my finger and erased some spilled ice cream from existence after flinging it off my spoon.
"Hm." Valerie nodded. "I want to buy some books."
"Hmmm?" I hummed with a raised eyebrow. "Do we not have them?"
Valerie shook her head. "No, I want storybooks." She mimed reading a book as if that was more specific.
I just nodded thinking she wanted something that was fiction. Hopefully, this was her new hobby, it would be nice if she had something to do while everyone was busy.
I knew she sometimes got lonely when she was by herself.
"We'll get whatever books you want in a few minutes." I stuck my spoon back into the ice cream for another scoop before I tossed the tub away. "If there's anything you want to try, we can get that while we are out."
Valerie nodded and started on her ice cream once again. I joined her and we both ate ice cream in silence for the next few minutes.
...
I spent a lot of time going through the memories of the Magicians I had eaten. Some of it was useful and was subsequently integrated into my mind, but most of it was not.
The location of their base hidden in the Gap and some general magical knowledge was all I obtained after hours of sifting through memories, both disturbing and not.
I didn't get what I wanted, but I got what I deserved. Mediocre knowledge from mediocre Magicians...
My soul-stealing went undetected as I hadn't gotten a visit from the forces of Heaven or Hell and everything seemed good to go.
I just needed to bumble my way out of this universe and everything would be fine. Though I was doing a better job bumbling my way into becoming more monstrous, I could only keep trying.
Eventually, I'd figure it out.
"Zoom-Zoom, Iyaaan. Zoom Zoom, Iyaaan." I watched dully as the colossal Great Red did a loop while speaking to itself. I quickly turned my eyes away from the big, red, four-winged dragon to not bring attention to myself.
Great Red didn't seem to mind my presence and seemed mostly content with doing different loops and twirls within the Gap.
It was only when I was making Dimensional Rifts that he ever gave me more than a glance. Even then he seemed content to watch me and didn't bother to ask what I was doing.
His presence made me wary, but he was also a welcome distraction from the nothing-ness that was the Gap.
A little company was welcome in the Gap. It at least let me feel like I wasn't completely alone, the human mind wasn't capable of handling isolation for long periods after all.
Even if I wasn't human, the principal was the same...
"Hmmm..." I hummed to myself and allowed myself to drift around with my form unrestrained.
Dimensional Rifts as I called them didn't work as I wanted them to and I was slowly losing hope that they would ever work.
It seemed that no matter how far I 'reached' with my Rifts I was unable to find anything other than 'void' or darkness.
I had a feeling that I should be traveling through the darkness or at least trying to, but I was too hesitant to commit. Or too scared to commit.
The darkness or 'void' was terrifying, even if I was a being made of something similar. The complete lack of sight was by far the most terrifying thing about the 'void' even the Gap as mentally disturbing as it was had some color.
"Devils." I turned abruptly towards the source of the booming voice. Great Red had spoken to me, for the first time. "They could easily become as powerful as Gods." Great Red's large yellow reptilian eye met mine. "Any yet, they remain lazy, their pride halting their growth."
"Out of all the supernatural races Devils have it the easiest, filled with potential and born with naturally superior senses. Their downfall being their pride and hubris." His eye moved away from mine and stared off into the Gap. I took a moment to note that his mouth didn't move despite the fact he was speaking.
"Few Devils become strong..." Great Red's voice trailed off. "Even fewer attain Spiritual Transcendence..." His eye brightened, the yellow became piercing, freezing me in place. "And until now, none have been touched by a concept."
His eye lingered on me for a moment longer, before he looked away allowing me to move once again. If I had needed to breathe, I would have taken a deep shuddering breath, but in my current form breathing was not necessary.
"For one so young, to come as far as you have is unprecedented." He slowly drifted forward and away from the area I had been occupying. "What will become of you?" He continued lazily drifting away.
I remained stationary, transfixed as Great Red drifted away. He gradually became smaller and smaller until he was nothing more than a dot in my vision.
I stayed still, my numerous red eyes looking at the spot the Dragon occupied moments ago.
"What?" Was all I could muster.
I continued staring blankly out into the Gap, thoughts quickly flickering through my mind.
What just happened?
...