DXD SI : Chapter 108 : A Soldier following orders..... (Patreon)

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

Garden

–Magdaran Bael—

He had no idea how he just knelt there, on his knees, looking at the hole in the ground, his entire mind numb and blank to everything around him. It was all so….useless. He was so useless! 

His power raged within him as arcs of his power zapped the ground around him, erasing it. What had he done so far? Just when it finally felt like he had made some progress and had taken vac-vacations! to relax somewhat, thinking that he deserved some break, the world kicked him in the face and told him of his standing in this world. Even now, he was nothing.

What use was all this power? What use was this space? What use was his name as the Pharmacist? What use were all his relationships with people he thought were his friends?

What fucking use was it all when he couldn’t protect the ONE thing that he was supposed to protect? The one thing that had been with him ever since he was a kid, ever since he knew what he could do with it.

He knew! He knew that it was just some random seed of some random demonic tree species. Worth less than the fertiliser used to maintain the massive Gardens in Bael Estate. He knew that because he found it right next to the trash, after having escaped his solitary confined room, and suffered a sprained ankle from it.

He had been deathly afraid of being discovered back then, to the point that he had spent hours hiding himself in that small corner, surrounded by bushes big enough to hide his tiny form, and in that scary, dark place he found the seed. The same seed that he latched onto, the same seed that told him what he could actually do with plants, trees, and seeds, the same seed that allowed him to discover that he could also use his powers for stuff other than destruction.

He took a deep breath, shaking his head as he got up and stumbled down to his office and the Labs. With the Mother Tree gone, there really was no way to communicate with Aldric. His poor student must have been worried sick. The only reason Aldric’s bunker wards even held was because they had been built recently and did not rely on the overarching ward structure that was maintained by the Mother Tree. He had planned to connect it to the scheme later on, because of some changes, but….

He supposed that it was good that he never came around to doing it. Otherwise, Aldric might have come out of the bunker in the middle of his fight. 

With a start, he realised that he was slipping back into his thoughts, so he continued walking to free Aldric from the bunker. Also, he had to get out of here. Get away from this place, from the people he once thought of as his friends, the people he thought he could trust, the people he did trust with stuff that was just as important as his life.

On his way there, he paused, as he realised he was walking past his Lab. The long term experiment lab. 

The one that held the Same Globe experiment he had been working on, the project he had hoped would one day help him create a self sustaining pocket dimension capable of absorbing any type of energy for growth.

He looked down at his hands, at the energy that felt an order of magnitude easier and denser to use, then resolutely walked into the Lab.

_____xx____

–Vali Lucifer–

She looked at the dome of Magdaran’s power around the Garden and knew right then and there, even if she successfully managed to brute force past that without severely injuring herself, she would not be able to talk to Magdaran in any meaningful capacity. After all, what reason did he even have to stay here anymore?

As long as she could remember, Magdaran’s Garden had been the one thing he cared about. He obsessed over it, to the point that he fought multiple powerful Devils, forged a deal with the likes of Odin and Azazel all by himself, all so he could finally get his Garden out of the Underworld and into a supposedly safe space.

Fat load of good it did.

Now, here she stood, looking at a dome of power that would be hard to breach. Magdaran was a Super Devil now, and no amount of power was ever going to force him to talk to her, not in his current mindset anyway. The problem with that was Magdaran was incredibly stubborn and rigid when it came to his mindset, and it took multiple years for him to change his opinion on anything.

Right now, she knew he was not going to listen to anyone. He was grieving and…

Sigh.

She had no idea what to do now. It was funny. It felt like she had atleast a somewhat handle on things in her life before she reached the level of power she had always dreamt of, but now that she was powerful enough to do whatever the fuck she wanted, the one thing she wanted to do was out of her reach, likely for a long time.

She would have said forever, but Devils lived for a long time, and she did not want to close that door forever. Magdaran looked at her with those blank eyes and indirectly told her that he blamed her for it, which was only partially true. She had just hastened the process so that Magdaran would have a smooth integration without taking much time or enduring the mental anguish of forcing himself to go through with the process without wanting to.

But she was not going to blame Magdaran for it. His anger was very much justified, and she had other people she could blame for this. Azazel, Odin, even Thor. What purpose did they have in stopping him here?

Magdaran told him that Thor was here to keep him here. Why was that? Were they afraid that he would come to rescue her? But why? In fact, he would be more disappointed in her, as he had already warned her of taking any overt actions to fulfill her goal. She knew that he was going to help her kill Rizevim, and that he was going to one day be strong enough to do so. There was no question about that.

Magdaran would actually be supportive of Azazel’s actions, and yet..

Her eyes narrowed as she realised that this was just a small part of some overarching scheme. Even being a Super Devil, she might just be a pawn in all of this. The only way to get some answers would be to force them out of the people who can see the future and act on it.

With that in mind, she floated up to look at Thor, who was looking at the dome of power around the Garden solemnly. She couldn't help the caustic remark that came out on its own, “Happy?”

Thor was silent for a moment longer before Mjolnir came flying back into his outstretched hand. “Nay. It brings me no joy to see good men break.”

Her fists clenched at hearing the genuine remorse in Thor’s voice, as she floated forward, her power flaring all around her. “Then why did you do it? YOU did this. Why did you come here? What did Odin tell you?”

“I cannot tell you much, for Father only gave me orders, and I am duty-bound to follow them.”

“So, you attacked him? Without asking for any explanation?”

Thor shook his head. “Nay. I was just told to keep him here. It was he who decided to fight me. Even then, I was suppressing him before you arrived.”

“No. You don’t get to push the blame on me. I was not the one who was keeping him here in a Lightning cage. It was you, and it is you who is to blame for his current condition.”

Thor was silent for almost a minute, looking at the dome of power in the distance, crackling with power, having changed and upgraded within minutes of its first manifestation, as Magdaran probably got used to using his new level of power with his already powerful gifts to create shields that could probably could have stopped her if she did not have her bloodline trait. It trumped all other bloodline traits, especially at the same power level.

“You speak the truth. I am to be blamed for this. It is my burden to bear.” Thor spoke remorsefully, but what made it worse for her temper was that she knew that if Odin ordered Thor to do it all over again, he would unflinchingly do it again. He might hate it inside, but he would follow the given order to the end.

Because he is a soldier.

All the fight drained out of her as she realised that Thor was merely the means, a weapon. The actual betrayal came from someone else entirely. From Odin. 

Even so, before she could do something stupid like march down to Agard or the Oppai Club to demand answers from the Norse God, she turned around, a massive flare up of power alerting her to whatever Magdaran might be doing inside. The dome of power crackled with more and more power, angry waves roiling just beneath the surface of the dome, as she saw so much energy being used to fuel whatever it was that Magdaran was doing. And he was doing something. That much she could tell. He was not one to needlessly waste energy on mindless rage inducted tantrums, or so she would have thought before today. Today had been particularly….hard on Magdaran, and she would not blame him one bit if he–

“He’s leaving.” Thor’s baritone voice made her snap out of it as she turned to look at Thor’s solemn face.

“What?!”

“He is leaving. I can tell. And he will not return for a long time.”

“Then what are you doing? Help me stop him!”

“Nay.” His hand latched onto her shoulder as he stopped her from moving forward to stop Magdaran from disappearing, potentially forever. “He cannot, should not be stopped.”

“What the fuck do you mean? He’s still right there.” She thrashed in his grip, her power flaring as she switched its nature to outright poison for Gods, and even as she saw Thor’s flesh start to wither away under her onslaught, the God of Thunder did not budge one bit, his gaze locked onto the dome of power, uncaring of the injuries.

She snarled, struggling harder as she tried to get out of Thor’s grasp, as she had to stop Magdaran. She couldn’t let him leave, not like this. If he left, then—

A flash of white blinded her for a bit, then she felt air rushing in to fill the void left behind in front of her, ruffling her hair. She slumped mid air, Thor’s mangled hand finally leaving her shoulder, as she stared blankly into the massive hole in the ground. 

He left. 

Rushing forward, she tried to gather any trace of the spell he used. There must be something that could help her locate–

She slumped as she realised that Magdaran had teleported to the Dimensional Gap somehow, and likely teleported to a different location from there. It was definitely within his power now. A very simple way to throw off any tails. It was something he himself taught her. With the nature of the Dimensional Gap, even if she followed him a second later, she would not find herself in the same location. It was a foolish gamble to even try.

With the failure came a white hot rage that made her turn around and look at the God of Thunder with incandescent rage. It took everything within her not to try and fight the God once more, this time with murder in her actions, and speak those words.

“WHERE. IS. ODIN.”