DXD SI : Chapter 67 : The One where Mag becomes a Farmer....... (Patreon)

Disclaimer - I don't own any of the characters appearing in High School DXD or the Anime or the manga whatsoever.

The Garden, Somewhere in Norse territory [A Few Years Later]

–Magdaran Bael–

His eyes fluttered open, a yawn escaping his lips, his body flopping around on the bed, as the urge to continue lazing around in his body was immense, and since he did not have any obligation to do anything, he did the same. Turning around, he closed his eyes and snapped his fingers, closing the blinds of his bedroom, plunging it back into blissful darkness.

Even with all his strength, he could never quite get rid of the innate tendencies of most Devils when it came to feeling comfortable in the absence of light. It just felt right to him.

Ofcourse, that rightness had to be violated by a goblin who simply couldn’t take no for an answer. He felt the magical equivalent of a bell ringing, as he ignored the first one, then the second, then the third and—

His eyes snapped open, a groan escaping his lips as he got up, looking at the soo soft and warm blanket with longing, before getting out of bed and getting out of his bedroom. 

The scene that greeted him was one of absolute greenery, everywhere his eyes could see. Well, the green was mixed in with purple, blue, even a few Golden ones, as the Norse ones had finally begun blooming now, after 3 years of constant work on them.

Alas, his focus was another thing entirely. Namely, the forcefield around the Garden, which was now visible, rippling with waves, as it was currently under a furious onslaught of punches from the fighting gremling that refused to go away no matter what he did.

On his way, he picked up his broom, a high tier one that he built as part of his many hobby finding sessions with the Odin recommended Therapist, and as soon as he saw who it was that was knocking aggressively on his front door, whacked her on the head with it.

The forcefield smoothly parted around the head of the broom, as it made contact with the fully armoured figure in white, breaking the armour and punting the little shit in the ground. 

Looking at the now downed and unmoving form of Vali, he snorted and leaned on the broom, before nudging Vali with his foot, “Come on, now. I know you’re not really knocked out, Vali.”

There was silence for a moment before he felt the telltale signs of her Sacred Gear activating, a “Divide!” echoing in the clearing around them, as the white armour came roaring back, as did Vali’s punch, now aimed at his crotch. 

Seamlessly putting the broom in between her fist and his private parts, he looked down, bored at her, “You know, one would think that after the nth time, the same tactic wouldn’t—”

His words were halted as Vali simply launched herself in the air, and while that alone would not have been much of a concern for him, the fact that he had to lean back at the sword in Vali’s hand was definitely a surprise. It seemed to be melded with her Scale Mail as well, which made him all the more curiouser.

The sword, as well as her armour, glowed before she came flying at him, her speed having doubled. He smirked in amusement at the rather lethal aim of Vali, because if the sword connected, he would definitely be severely injured.

Alas…..

With a snort, he assumed the bored pose, with the broom under his chin, looking at the plants outside the main dome, seemingly uncaring of the highly lethal Longinus wielder approaching him with a magical sword. 

He could almost feel Vali’s panic as he did not react at all until the last moment, at which point he unleashed his magical aura, which he had kept at bay. A cloud of his Power of Destruction manifested all around him, with small arcs lashing out at everything around him, a recent change as he had worked on his power over the years. It had changed in its manifestation, and it felt like he only needed time and something esoteric to advance into the next stage, but he was in no hurry to do that now, not when he finally had some semblance of peace, along with nice and gradual growth, on top of being aware that haphazardly forcing progress was only going to backfire on him in the long run.

The cloud of his power itself was unneeded, as the pressure alone was more than enough to send Vali careening into the ground, landing right in front of him. He could feel Vali’s struggle, as she tried to muster up the power required to merely stand in front of him, let alone actually fight him, but that too just made her sink further into the ground.

He kept it up for a couple of seconds before abruptly withdrawing the pressure, making Vali shoot up in the air with a yelp, her form spiralling as she struggled to control her flight.

A chuckle escaped his lips as he looked at Vali’s now stabilised form, the sword still clutched within her hand, or rather, one of her armoured hands had now seamlessly melded with the sword, before she came down on him, once again, aiming at his head this time.

This time, he stopped the sword with a finger before pushing her, making her stumble, before a well placed punch in the abdomen made her fly back until her back hit the outer forcefield, the one she was, sadly, permitted to enter without having to ask for his permission.

His smile turned genuine as he watched Vali fall down after hitting the forcefield, Scale Mail broken, but still floated a few feet above the plants in that place, before she slowly floated over to him, blood stained but pouting at him.

“You promised not to use that cheating move!” She pointed one finger at him, her pout out in full force as she complained about the cheat move, about using his overwhelming power, with a small mental component added to it that made her entire body realise she was facing certain death, and made her mind hesitate and her body stop.

It was a nifty little trick he learned from Odin. When he had faced Thor for the very first time, he had felt something similar, his instincts telling him that he was going to die the next moment, but that was something different. It was just pure power, with no mental magic involved, which is why Vali could somewhat fight back in the face of that aura, even now. Ofcourse, it went without saying that he could withstand that with ease now as well.

But Odin had something one step above that, a mental component added into the death aura, as Vali dubbed it.

The power difference made the target’s mind and body stutter for just a fraction of a second, and then, the mental spell took advantage of that small opening to paralyse the opponent. If it was someone other than Vali here, the power difference would have put the target into a coma. 

As things stood, because of the existence of Albion muddying things when it came to mentally attacking her, and her own immense willpower, the spell worked only for a minute, maybe even less, as Vali only seemed to be adapting to that spell.

He just looked down at her and her pointed finger, making her withdraw the offending finger immediately, the last lesson still on her mind, as he asked her, exasperated, “Why are you here so early, Vali? I thought we agreed that no spars in my Garden.”

She perked up at the question, “Well, yeah, but you haven’t been seen in weeks. No messages, no meetings, no fights, no meals at the Club. Nothing. I just wanted to check if you’d croaked or something.”

He snorted, ruffling her hair, something she fought tooth and nail against, actually trying to scratch his arms using partially summoned Scale Mail, but unfortunately for her, it did not work. “You are a century too young to worry about me, kiddo.”

Withdrawing his hands, he watched as Vali straightened her admittedly short hair, because they were not optimal for combat, before looking at him with clear desire on her face, “Well, now that you are awake, can I get some—”

He stepped back in one smooth step, the door shutting on her face, as he called out a clear, “Nope!”

Unfortunately, the damage was already done, and Vali had already infiltrated the inner dome, and thus was free to open the door and walk freely into what he liked to call his Inner Sanctum, already on a direct path towards his kitchen.

The kitchen was a small building, built in the middle of multiple tall trees, looking very much out of place, just like his bedroom, just like his living room, just like his hosting room. 

As one might conclude, he did not have one single building wherein he had crammed all his rooms. No, he had built, by his own hands, multiple small units all around the Inner Sanctum, for multiple purposes.

It was a fun little activity he did when he first created the Inner Sanctum, the place with the highest of protections, when he reached the point where expanding the same high tier protections to the expansions he wanted to add would have proven unfeasible.

A chair appeared beneath him as he sat down, broom still in hand, waiting for Vali to come back with ice cream. 

He smiled, exasperated, as Vali came back, humming happily to herself, already licking her ice cream, and sat down in a chair right next to him after offering him his own cone of Vanilla ice cream, the absolute favourite of Thor, Vali, Odin, Azazel and many others who had the fortune of tasting it.

Of course, some of them had higher privileges when it came to how frequently they could get the ice cream, but it was an undeniable fact that no one who tasted his ice cream could resist another serving, if he bothered with it anyway.

Azazel’s comment of ice cream worthy Falling over, was something that came to mind. An exaggeration, no doubt, but something that stoked his ego nonetheless.

After all, that was something he created with his own two hands.

Of course, Odin’s act of gifting him Divine Cows was the thing that spurred this entire thing into motion, but he was pretty sure that the Cows were just high tier cows, nothing Divine about them, aside from the God who was their previous owner.

He never would have thought that creating high grade feed for Cows was something that would make him a known entity in the wider supernatural world, under a pseudonym, of course. Azazel took care of the finances, taking a neat 20% off every sale, but that was fine with him, as he did not have to face customers or deal with supernatural tantrums. Odin’s name alone took care of any faction that wanted to pressgang him into service, not that they would have succeeded anyway.

The reason for his absolute fame these days was because of the effects of the feed. When fed to even mundane creatures, their meat turned extremely nutritious, creating a partial regeneration factor, along with having the ability to make people more powerful, if consumed regularly.

Now, it was not going to work on beings on Odin’s or even Azazel’s level, but they were in the minority there. 

Entire armies eating that stuff would quickly lead to entire factions wafting over their enemies because of the (relatively) sudden increase in power, which is why the stuff was heavily regulated.

Now, that was just feed, but the second order items were even more powerful. 

For example, Milk from the cows that Odin gifted him could outright help beings increase their pool of energy in a relatively short period of time. He was talking years instead of decades to have a 10% increase in energy pools, provided they were not really up there in terms of power.

Then there was the taste as well. It was supernaturally addictive, which was high praise coming from Freyr.