DXD SI : Chapter 113 : The Chickens coming home to roost.... (Patreon)

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

Ruby Auction House

–Aldric Zagan–

“S-Sir,” He looked up from where he was leisurely reading a book that he picked up during his brief travel in the human world. “Yes?”

The portly man, who was a High Class Devil, who had ties to some of the high level Pillars in the Underworld and, as such, was able to muscle out some of the more genuine Auction houses in this corner of the supernatural world and become the biggest player, looked terrified as he replied, “T-They are r-ready to see you now, Sir.” 

He hummed as the Devil bowed his head at him, terrified of being punished, despite him not showing any propensity for doing such a thing. In fact, had it not been for his teacher’s training, he would have been loath to use his newfound power to bully a weaker person. The only reason he was even letting the man stew in his own delusions of fear was that he knew what the man had done, and what he would have continued doing had he not been stopped.

Well, the owner was not stopped yet. But let’s just say that Ruby Auction House’s days were quite limited. He had deliberately used this stage to spread multiple rumours about the Pharmacist’s return, with a decidedly explosive lot of goods that promised tempting results, all available to people who were present physically for the Auction, ensuring that the place would have a massive spotlight on it for a long period of time, and that was guaranteed to destroy it, without even lifting a finger on his part.

“Fine,” He said and snapped his fingers, teleporting directly onto the stage, as a spotlight naturally appeared on top of him. The Auction House, usually catering to middle-class factions, was full of bigwigs today. Not a single Pantheon was absent, and all of them had sent in heavyweights as well.

His gaze roamed all over the private booths that surrounded the stage, as the seats were all removed to make space for the extra private booths installed today, for the privacy of the bigwigs. That didn’t mean that he couldn't see who was behind those booths, just as most of them could see each other through the privacy wards as well. At a certain level of power, magic just stopped behaving normally, and at his level, even without dispelling the wards actively, he could usually get a glimpse of who was behind them.

Plus, that was before he had to use his actual powers. He had to say. It was kind of a masterstroke on his teacher’s part to use that. It just made sense in hindsight. Still did not justify the terror he had felt at the moment, but he had come to accept that his teacher had become somewhat of an asshole since that day, or maybe he was always like that.

He made sure to focus a bit more on the booths that held the representatives from the Three Factions, especially the Heaven faction, which had surprisingly sent in Gabriel of all beings. It was surprising to see the Archangel here, but he wasn’t really worried for his own safety here. Plus, he was not here for a fight anyway.

“Welcome, Ladies and Gentlemen! Let’s get started right away, shall we? And for the people watching from home or office, or bunkers, hello to you too!” He bowed to the hidden audience before turning around to showcase the first in line of products that he was authorised to sell outside his home, only to pause as he felt an energy wave erupt from one of the booths, a distinctly draconic aura roaring to life.

He smiled, recognising the aura, and the name of the entity immediately flashed within his mind. Beyond the information that his teacher had directly crammed into his mind before leaving, he had a level of background knowledge that allowed him to identify the being in front of him.

In this case, he was facing a Dragon. A strong one at that. One of the strongest, if he was not wrong.

Crom Cruach.

The Darkness Dragon.

As strong as, if not stronger than, the Heavenly Dragons in their prime. A Dragon of pure physical might, capable of overpowering all save for a dozen individuals in the entire world. A being who pursues and values strength above all. He would have been glad if he could meet his teacher.

Alas, his teacher was not here, and if he was not wrong, was not going to leave that place for a long time. Sure, he could go back, but he had a hunch that he had some kind of purpose to fulfill before he could do that. He did not know what it was, and how he could do it, but there had to be a reason, right? Otherwise, his teacher had just told him to experience life. Nothing more and nothing less.

And the first thing he had done when he came back was to try and sell his wares and gain the respect his teacher would have eventually commanded had he been allowed to fully mature his business. This time, he was going to do it right, and make sure that the Pharmacist’s name was spread far and wide.

But even before he could show them the goods, he now had to deal with an Evil Dragon that was apparently just as strong as one of the Heavenly Dragons that was now housed in a Longinus tier Sacred Gear. It was just his luck, or was it his teacher’s luck? Man, his teacher must have truly rotten luck for it to be passed down to his disciple. 

All these thoughts ran through his mind in a split second, as he remained calm under the assault of that draconic aura, only using a thin sliver of his energy to protect the stage and the surrounding support structures.

“Yes, what can I do for you, esteemed guest?”

“I want to fight you at your best.” The demand was straightforward and full of bloodlust, and yet somehow polite-sounding. 

“I am sorry, but I am busy at the moment. Can we do this later?”

“Sure.” Saying so, the dragon retracted his aura, and normal activity returned. He could almost feel the whispers of confusion and horror radiating from some of the people in the booths.

“Now,” He smiled and gestured behind him, “Shall we begin?”

____xx___

The Auction was a smashing success, even if the products he’d sold were some of the most elementary ones. Stuff that geniuses like Ajuka could crack given enough time. They just required a certain expertise that these beings would have to spend way too much energy to replicate. After all, Life was in his bloodline. The others would have to use magic to imitate Life to a certain extent to replicate some of his teacher’s products.

Shaking his head, he looked at the register and hummed at the deposits made, along with deliveries done. Most of them had taken the stuff directly from the stage, and some of them had come later on.

He had let them do things as per their convenience. After all, this was just a way to formally declare his presence. There weren’t any truly absurd things inside the current collection.

Now, speaking of doing things as per the customers’ convenience, he turned around to find a serious looking man looking at him as well as the stuff inside his makeshift office with naked interest, before turning to him with a nod, “Let’s go fight.”

Warding off the Evil Dragon with a hand, he said, “I have to stop you there, Mr.Crom Cruach. I assume your intent here is to find the strongest beings to fight, irrespective of their position?”

“Yes.”

“What if I told you that there is a being out there, unkillable, representing a concept that cannot be killed, and has to be sealed away by seals that are currently failing, and very soon, the entire world is going to have to fight the being?”

“I would say you are lying and trying to deflect me, based on past experiences, but something tells me you are serious.”

“I am. Incredibly so. I swear on my soul that whatever I am about to tell you is the truth. As per my knowledge.”

___xx___

With the Auction done, as well as the first combatant secured for the final fight, he walked out of the Auction house, smiling, and disappeared right in front of the Silver Super Devil, who was flying towards him at an incredible speed, her face set into a frown. He caught the tail end of that energy as he teleported to the Dimensional Gap, before teleporting to his safe house, with the energy trapped in between a Green sphere.

It was heavy, incredibly so, and dense as well. Despite being as powerful as he was right now, he could not mould it into something else. With every other type of energy, he could simply absorb that energy and use that to some other effect. Maybe it was just the energy of Super Devils that was different from the rest and could resist being changed into something else?

Dismissing the energy, he noted that it took just about twice the amount of energy required to forcibly dissipate the energy of his teacher, atleast in its pure, unamplified form. When it was amped up by all the means of his teacher, it was an entirely different beast. Even then, he knew that it was not the final form of that energy. His teacher was full of mysteries like that. He supposed that spending years awake, without an ounce of sleep and one tone dedication to his craft would mean that his teacher had means that he was not even aware of.

With the Auction done, he had firmly established the fact that he was not a quack, which is why Vali Lucifer had come running. It was likely that she had sent someone to confirm the items, as there had been many other copycats during the time his teacher had been absent, with all of them turning out to be frauds that found their end under the hands of the newest Super Devil that the world knew of anyway.

Still, it was not yet time to meet Vali Lucifer, or he might just never meet her anyway. It was not like she was instrumental to his plan.

According to the knowledge downloaded into his brain, the world had the idea that they had more than five years before they absolutely had to go down there to repair the seals. The world was wrong to assume so, or rather, they were going to be proven wrong within a few moments.

See, his teacher had figured out some stuff after essentially banishing himself to his self creation of a universe. It was that Precogs were scary and hateful beings, and that Divination was a mandatory branch of magic to learn if one wanted to operate with any level of autonomy.

In his opinion, a man who could not set his own future and let himself be manipulated or even guided into his actions was not a free man at all. He could see the parallels being drawn between him and his teacher, but the difference with him was that he could choose not to follow the subtle nudges his teacher gave him.

His teacher never explicitly asked him to do anything, save for training that did kill him at one point, but that was for his benefit, so he couldn't really count that. No, he was going to do all this of his own free will.

So, with that in mind, he looked at the assortment of items in his safehouse before cracking his neck and getting to work. Time to put into motion a plan that would trash the plans of the so called precogs who thought they always knew better than the rest, and could manipulate people they had called friends without an ounce of hesitation, so self assured in their own magic.

Now, let’s see them get a taste of their own magic.