DxD : Emiya Shirou

It may have been rather cruel of me, but I couldn't resist sparing a moment to take in and enjoy the rare sight of Sona in such an undignified state. Her usual dignity and rigid formality was nowhere to be seen as she laid prone on the ground, face-first, breathing into the patch of grass her head was resting on.

The Sin of Pride was such an unusual thing.

...

It was her Pride that demanded for her to grow stronger. To grow strong. To suffer through whatever pain and hardship, to bear any indignity it had to and do it all willingly if it meant removing the stain on her Pride that was caused by her weakness. It would never allow her to relive the helplessness she felt on that day. 

The shame of being crushed and defeated, only to watch on, helpless as a newborn child, as others decided her fate. Never again.

Yet it was the very same Pride that barred her from training with her Peerage. To her, her Peerage was what lay in the heart of her Pride, and it is for that very reason she didn't want them to see her reduced to such a state. To allow those that she prided herself in, see her in anything less than her best was intolerable.

So she would sneak out every day without them knowing, forgoing time usually spent on extra-curriculum studying to train instead. And did she ever train. Though by far the weakest of us all physically, she refused to allow us to slow our pace down for her sake.

Every morning without fail she appeared bright and early to train alongside us, not stopping until she collapsed as her body gave up on her and even then she wouldn't leave. When her limbs ended up quivering like jello and held just as much strength remaining in them, she still forced herself to remain standing and tried to hobble along after us, only allowing herself rest when we did.

It was then, after the first week that I saw her do this, did I begin to suspect that there may have been something more to her new found effort. That there was something other than her Pride driving her to do this.

Not for the first time I began to wonder, what was it that she saw reflected in the light of that sword?

Whatever it was it couldn't have been as bad as whatever Saji had seen. While his fellow Peerage members were understandably skittish of me for a while, Saji was the complete opposite. The very next time he laid eyes on me he broke down crying, sobbing like a little girl before, with a cry of 'Aniki', he embraced me in a hug and wouldn't stop weeping for a good ten minutes after.

Yeah, that would have been a rather awkward moment under any circumstance, but he had managed to make it even worse by doing it in the middle of Homeroom.

Saji had just barged into my classroom on our very first day back, ignored the teacher and just ran straight at me with arms wide open and tears running down his face.

Ever since. rumors about Kuoh Academy's newest BL couple had begun to circulate, alongside with the Issei/Kiba pairing.

But that wasn't important.

What was important, is that Sona had asked me to both help her train and to keep her Peerage from finding out about it. Since I was beginning to find myself become quite familiar with the folly of Pride, I was more than happy to oblige her.

However, that didn't mean I was above a bit of petty revenge. What with all the losses I suffered by her hand in chess, it's only fair that I use this chance to get back at her. And her asking me to do this to her just made it that much sweeter.

"As for me I'm a mix of both of physical and magical." I continued my explanation. "I may not look it but I used to practice a bit of Magecraft before I became a Devil. I was never very good at it but it was enough to help boost my magical supply to its current level."

"Not very good he says." With her head still face first in the grassy ground, too tired to bother lifting it, Sona grumbled out. "He created an entire bloody world with nothing but his soul and magic, and he say he's not very good. What kind of system do you measure yourself with? Probably the same one he uses to judge that 'yes' is an adequate answer to 'if you have a lot of swords?'"

"I…see." Kiba finally added when Sona's voice continued to diminish in volume until it devolved to a near silent, incoherent grumbling. His eyes shifted upwards until they landed on Shirone. "What about Koneko then?"

I had already opened my mouth to respond before shutting it again when I realized that I did not know the answer. Except for when she had one of her playful streaks like she did today, Shirone usually trained just as hard as the rest of us did during our little get together. Yet she had no trouble keeping pace with me.

Why did she out last Kiba?

I tilted up my head up towards her, only to find her already looking down at me with an answer ready on her lips, "It's because I'm a cat silly."

After a few more seconds of silence, it became clear that she didn't have anything else to add so I turned back to Kiba and told him, "She's a cat."

"A cat?" he cocked an eyebrow.

I nodded "A cat."

"Yup a cat, nya-ha" Shirone finished with cheer.

"What she means is," Sona interrupted, still not bothering to lift her head up from the grass, "that she's a Nekoshou. While as a species they have a rather unimpressive amount of magic supply, rating somewhere near the lower end of the spectrum, they still have a lot more Mana running through their system than your average human."

She lifted her head from the ground and looked up at us. Strands of grass covered her face, tangled up in her hair and hanged off her glasses but she ignored them. "Add in their body's ability to channel extraordinarily amounts of Mana, then what you more or less end up with are a species made up of stamina freaks." And having said her part, she dropped her head back down again with a thud.

Shirone just stared dumbly at her for a few seconds before nodding knowingly. "That's what I said. Cats."

I resisted the urge to shake my head at her. "Kiba, you might want to start heading back soon if you want to squeeze in a shower before class starts." I told him as I took in his sweat drench form. "With all the parents coming today, I doubt any of the teachers would tolerate us looking anything less than our best."

"That's right, that's today isn't it?" He ran a hand though his hair, grimacing when it came back soaked.

"Buchou has been fretting over it for weeks now, trying to make sure her brother doesn't hear about it. She makes such a big deal about it every year." He shrugged. "I don't understand it myself, Sirzechs isn't that bad. And it must be kind of nice, having someone coming." His voice drifted off towards the end, before he visibly gave himself a shake and turned back to me.

"What about you Senpai? Do you have any parents coming?"

"I don't have any parents so no but my sister is definitely coming." Smiling at the thought. It's been almost two months since I've last seen Ilya. I don't think we've ever been separated for this long, not since the first time we met. 

A small pang of sadness hit me as I realized that this would be the first time that Fuji-nee wouldn't be the one coming but I quickly pushed the thought away. "And unlike your king, I'm actually looking forward to seeing my sibling again."

"That's good then." He flashed me a genuine smile, happy for my own fortune, before looking towards Sona. "How about you Kaichou, do you have anyone coming?"

Sona didn't say anything in reply, either having not heard him in her exhaustion or too tired to answer. Just as Kiba about to ask again he was interrupted by a low ominous chuckle. As quite as it was, it took us a moment to realize that it was coming from Sona.

"Ha…haha…hahahaha…" it started off as a quite thing but it wasn't long before Sona tossed her head back and all but cackled like a demented Disney villain. "Hahahaha! Is anyone coming he asks? Is anyone coming? Well let me tell you." She turned her manic eyes, which seemed to glow with an inner fire, to Kiba while a twisted smile adorned her lips.

"No." She answered him, rolling the word in her tongue as if she could taste it. "No one is coming, and it's going to be positively wonderful!" She flipped herself over onto her back before breaking down into another fit of cackling laughter, one that showed no sign of abating anytime soon.

Kiba shot me a worried glance but I had no better idea to what was wrong with her than he did, so I just shook my head in return. We both looked up to Koneko but see looked just as confused as we were. Feeling our eyes on her, she just gave us a shrug. Looks like she didn't know either.

So for a lack of anything better to do we collectively agreed to stand by and watch as Sona continued to laugh like a maniac. It was only when what felt like the better part of a minute had past did she finally begin to taper off.

"Do you know what it feels like," She pushed herself up into a sitting position, her voice taking an oddly sober tone, "to be have a sister like mine? To have her appear, cosplaying as a magical girl and embarrassing you in front of the entire student population, year after year?

"I am the Student Council President and the top honor student of my school. I had worked hard for that position, spent years cultivating my reputation so that I could earn it, truly earn it rather than use my family's influence to gain it.

"So can you imagine how it feels like to see that reputation ruined, no, not ruined, but utterly demolished over the course of a single afternoon as the entire student population bears witness to you running down the school corridors for all you've got for the better part of an hour while being chased by a magical girl cosplayer who keeps yelling 'yuri-yuri love' all the while?

"Then after suffering though all of that only to spend the reminder of the week using every scrap of free time you have tracking down and erasing the entire student body's memory of the event because the only way you would dare show your face back in school otherwise is with a paper bag over your head?"

"Do you what that feels like, to go through that every single year since freaking Kindergarten? Well, do you? No, no of course you don't. You couldn't possibly know what it feels like. And this year," her smile returned, "neither will I. And it's going to be wonderful." She threw her arms into the air and fell back down onto her back.

"This year we made sure neither one of our siblings knew about the class visits. We gave them the wrong date, telling them that it will take place during next week, which will be a holiday. By then it'll be too late. This year, there is absolutely no way my sister will turn up.

"Rias and I, we have spent months planning for this. Though it's a rather simple plan, we're taking no chances. For almost a year now we've been meticulously going through every detail, looking for each and every possible way of our siblings finding out, no matter how improbable it may be, and taking steps to eliminate it.

"Do you know what this means?" Her eyes shining with joy. "It means that there will be no family to embarrass me, no sister chasing me throughout the school and most especially there will be no one trying to get me dressed up as magical girl only to take a bunch of pictures to fill the family album.

"No, none of that. This day will be nothing special, nothing extraordinary. It will be mundane and, dare I say it, dull. 

Today will be remembered in our memories as nothing but another completely ordinary school event, one that will not distinguish itself from the countless others like it." She let out a content sigh. "And it will be glorious."

…Oh shit.

...

Hey guys I really need you to throw some power Stones ;)

...

if you want to read ahead of the public release you can go to my p atreon :

 p atreon.com/Aerle