Me? Human? : Chapter 42 : Day 1 - Fight Club! (Patreon)

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

Nephilim Institute

–Motohama Kenji–

The man continued to mutter to himself and walked in circles around him for almost 10 minutes before he finally snapped out of whatever trance he was in and took a step back before stretching forward, almost comically, to shake his hand. He took the hand with obvious wariness practically written on his face, as the man just shook his hand with extreme enthusiasm, his big glasses shining, which was a type of magic being used just for aesthetic purposes.

Something he could tell instantly right now because of all the growth he experienced in that damned Training Centre, even though he wasn't even conscious for some of it. Still, the fact that the Fallen Angel, his instructor, was just a huge nerd who could fight did not disturb him all that much.

“Hi! I am Sahariel! I am not your instructor!” His eyebrows rose in confusion as the man continued to smile with that giant smile of his, telling him with a straight face that he had no business being here. Nevertheless, he introduced himself.

“Hi, I am Motohama Kenji, I am–”

“You are the one who broke Kokabiel’s nose! I am such a huge fan! I have wanted to do the same for decades but never had the strength to do so! Please! You must visit our facilities. You have so many fans; you have no idea. I just happened to have the clearance to come here at this time and meet you.” The man interrupted him, while almost shouting enthusiastically, all the while his hand was being shaken like a helicopter.

Also, he could totally believe the part about many people despising Kokabiel and wanting to break his nose.

“Uh, thank you?”

“No! THANK YOU! Also, here, take this!” The man handed him a card. A black, rectangular, sharp card. What was it with Fallen Angels and handing him this same looking card with a variety of different functions embedded into it?

“You’re more than welcome to my office anytime you need something. I will always be grateful to you for shattering Kokabiel’s image in such a  spectacular manner.”

Saying so, the man turned around and marched out of the classroom, his head held high and laughter echoing all around him, right up until the door closed behind him, leaving him standing there, bewildered and questioning if the whole thing was even real or not.

The Fallen Angel was strong, not as much as Kokabiel but likely one of the higher-ups in the entirety of Grigori, which somewhat justified his weirdness as, in his opinion, any sufficiently strong person was sure to have a dash of weirdness just in their very being. It was practically a requirement in the supernatural world to reach the top of the totem pole.

Shaking his head, he turned the Card over and read the information on it after taking his seat.

“Sahariel - Researcher of the Moon, huh?” he read that out loud before resuming his wait for his actual instructor to arrive. 

Where the fuck was he? It was almost 15 minutes past the notified time. He couldn't be dealing with the Kakashi version of this verse, right?

____xx___

It was almost an hour after the designated time did he felt a magical signature headed his way. Multiple ones, in fact. All of them were strong, but most of them departed from the strongest magical signature before the strongest headed his way.

A surge of excitement ran through him as he imagined his instructor being very strong, which would help him become even stronger, and that was the end goal, as of now.

He stood up in anticipation as the door opened up to— Wow, that was a lot of muscle and a cool beard.

“Greetings, I am Baraqiel. I am to be your instructor until such a time comes that I deem you worthy of participating in our operations.” 

Oh. So, this was Baraqiel. The Lightning of God, the only Fallen Angel who can use Holy Lightning, on top of the usual Holy Light. 

He was also one depressed ass motherfucker, which is probably why Kokabiel even had the chance to become the strongest after Azazel. From what he could feel, the Fallen in front of him was much stronger than Kokabiel even, which meant that Akeno Himejima rejecting the man in front of him allowed  Kokabiel to grow so arrogant that he believed himself capable of retreating a Great War, where beings like him were slaughtered wholesale.

Man, talk about the butterfly effect.

The man, finished with his greetings, stood straight and looked at him, so he snapped out of his thoughts and replied, “Um, hi. I am Motohama Kenji. I look forward to learning from you.”

Baraqiel nodded. “Well met. Now, let’s begin with our lessons. Follow me.”

The man then marched out of the classroom as he hurried behind the tall and burly Fallen. Many humans, Fallen, Youkai, and more practically leapt out of their way as Baraqiel reached the dead end of a corridor and placed his palm on the wall in front of him, opening a secret passage that was more akin to an elevator shaft with none of the associated machinery, just a deep, dark hole.

Baraqiel turned to ask him, “Can you fly?”

He shook his head. “No, but I can safely descend, and can walk on any surface.” Or at least, that’s what he could tell from the disjointed memories he still got whenever he went to sleep, of his time spent in that trance, constantly being improved by some unknown force as he fought Kokabiel.

Baraqiel nodded, “Very well, then. Follow me.”

The man’s wings unfurled, all ten of them, before the man jumped into the elevator shaft. He did the same, his Light Armour manifested partially, on his back before tendrils shot out and latched onto the walls around them, only instead of stabbing into the rock and damaging it, the tendrils changed shape to become rectangular blocks and stuck themselves to the walls of the shaft, making him a pseudo spider, what with his six legs attacked to the walls and his other two dangling in the air.

Baraqiel nodded from down below, having waited to see what he was going to do, and then floated down, first slowly and then just dove below, angling his descent.

Meanwhile, he was left behind, having to do the awkward dance of descending slowly before he just gave up and retracted everything into his back with a satisfying SHINK! sound as he just fell down, not that concerned about fall damage since he still had the tendrils.

As soon as he saw the light at the end of this tunnel, light tendrils shot out of his back and stabbed into the walls, slowing him down before he landed on the white plates, along with some rubble that fell alongside him and one small piece that fell on top of his head directly.

Taking a look around, he found himself standing in an identical Test Room, only this time, instead of Kokabiel waiting for him, it was Baraqiel, who was looking at him with a neutral face, a far cry from the arrogant smirk that Kokabiel had on his face when they first met.

Also, instead of meeting Kokabiel after having just come out of a mental Curse of sorts, he was seeing Baraqiel with excitement in his veins, curious as to how he could measure up to Baraqiel, someone who was probably quite a bit stronger than Kokabiel himself.

The elevator shaft above him closed up as  Baraqiel floated down, hands behind his back. “Very well. Come at me.”

Knowing that the being in front of him was quite strong, he went all out from the start, summing his Light Armmour, feeling infinitely more powerful in this form, his vision undeterred despite being encased in a helmet that had no openings, but then again, he supposed that as long as the light reached his eyes, it did not matter what was in between his eyes and the world.

Then, he jumped ahead explosively, cratering the tiles beneath him, his fist pulled back, aimed at the chest of Baraqiel, an area that could be easily defended, and it was defended.

Only instead of Baraqiel blocking it effortlessly, he was pushed back quite a bit, his forearms smoking as Baraqiel looked at him with slightly widened eyes, along with a shift in his expression.

___xx__

–Penemue–

Once again, she was in the command room, looking at a disaster just waiting to unfold. Once again, her warnings had been overridden by Azazel himself, and once again, she was to watch as a Cadre took on a human and managed to hold his own. This time, it was Baraqiel, arguably more capable than Kokabiel, simply because he was just that rigid and simply could not fathom holding back or mocking or underestimating his opponents.

If Baraqiel was to fight someone, he was going to fight someone. He simply didn’t know how to play the tricks on people’s psyche, which Kokabiel ruthlessly exploited to become a very feared entity within the Grigori. A fear that was shattered ever since someone made sure to distribute the clips of Kokabiel getting his nose punched into all the corners of the Grigori and beyond.

Kokabiel was fuming, and that was just music to her ears.

What was happening in front of her worried her far more than that, though, as Baraqiel was pushed back once more by the human boy, hitting Baraqiel with that Light Armor of his. Baraqiel was just testing the boy right now, which is why the human kid was even able to hit Baraqiel, but if her hypothesis turned out to be right, then it was not going to take long before even Baraqiel had to take things seriously here.

Because, despite her vehement protests, about the boy’s true nature and what it could mean., not just for the Grigori but of the entire supernatural world if her thoughts turned out to be real, Azazel had vetoed her decision of getting rid of the boy and had instead tasked Baraqiel, the head of the Combat lessons for Nephilim, to take measure of the boy, as if that was not just going to add fuel to the fire.

She watched as Baraqiel finally began using his Light Spears, one of the tasks given to him, as she instantly got to work, as all the sensors aimed at the boy began doing their work, telling her just what was happening with the boy. If he truly was absorbing the Light from light spears to replace the need to eat food to fuel his powers, then he was truly an anomaly.

She still couldn’t believe that Azazel was going to risk so much just so he could satisfy his curiosity about the boy.

No Hero Bloodline. No Hero Spirit Reincarnation. No Sacred Gear. Nothing.

And yet, the boy just got hit in the face by a Light Spear from the Lightning of God himself and still continued advancing undeterred, forcing Baraqiel to move around.

Baraqiel switched seamlessly from Light Spears, Elemental Magic, and Physical combat, something that seemed to be working as it threw the boy off his game, but even that was only going to work for so long, as she had watched Kokabiel, a War veteran, get overwhelmed all the same.

The only unique thing that Baraqiel here could do was use his Lightning to quickly knock the boy out just in case the boy slipped back into that combat trance as before. They could not risk a repeat of that incident, and she could only hope that the boy could do the absorbing trick only for Light and not for Lightning.

If that happens, then she will petition once more to rein in the boy using all means necessary because that would mean that Motohama Kenji could adapt to anything, and become strong enough to match the likes of Kokabiel and Baraqiel within the span of months instead of decades.

A perfect weapon, IF wielded properly.

IF.