The Protagonist System

278 Setting Limits

Sona gave me a very pointed look when I arrived at school the next day. I wasn't sure why until I poked her mind and saw Rias pretty much laying everything on Sona's shoulders and letting her deal with the entire territory on her own, because she was so distraught over the events during the last few days.

Since I didn't want to deal with her blaming me, even if it was all pretty much my fault, I said the first thing that came to mind. “Call she-who-must-not-be-named and tell her I can change her face permanently and she can come here to school to support you without anyone knowing who she really is.”

Sona caught her breath and stared at me, giving me a perfect opportunity to pass by without her stopping me. I entered the school and greeted my classmates, whom gave me the third degree as they asked about why I skipped school yesterday. I chuckled and said I didn't skip, I asked the Student Council president to excuse me from classes for a single afternoon to start my new job as an assistant.

“I'm starting to respect politicians for everything they deal with, especially the mountains of paperwork.” I joked and a few of the girls laughed.

Miss Yamanaka entered the room and we settled down and paid attention. She taught the subjects on the syllabus and only I had an easy time with them all. She saw this and asked me to help with the examples. I used a teaching power to impart the knowledge to anyone learning from me, so by the end of class, all of the students were giving me looks of appreciation, even Miss Yamanaka.

“I've had some experience tutoring.” I lied just as the lunch bell rang.

I was immediately bombarded by all the girls with requests to tutor them in the subjects they were having trouble with. I politely refused, since my after school time was going to be at my new job, so they all looked sad. I sighed and offered to buy them all lunch as an apology, which perked them all up, and I was almost carried out of the room and brought to the cafeteria by the huge gaggle of girls.

I had to hold in my laugh at the expression on the cafeteria staff as the entire group of girls tried to ask for what they wanted at the same time. It took me several minutes to explain what was going on and to sort out the girls to let the line move forward without too much hassle.

I was the last to be served and I paid for everything, giving the young woman at the register a shock at how much thirty meals, desserts, and sides all cost when bought at once. Funnily enough, she was not allowed to accept tips after doing so much work, so I offered her a kiss on the cheek as compensation. She refused and claimed she couldn't fraternize with a student.

I told her I understood and gave her a sad face before I walked over to the part of the cafeteria the girls from class had claimed. I wasn't surprised that their friends outside of class and in their various clubs had also gathered around them. It gave me a flashback to Arcadia High and I kept my idea for rearranging the tables to myself.

I had to sit at the far end of the last table and I was barely included in any of the conversations, mostly because I was the topic and wasn't asked any questions. The talk did spread out to the rest of the cafeteria as everyone expressed disbelief over my teaching skills and being stupid enough to offer to buy lunch for all the girls in my class.

I finished eating and slipped away while everyone was busy, returned my tray, and left the cafeteria. I had a cat-girl to track down and a hairpin to make a copy of. Once I had that, I could start my slow and steady extermination of all the people responsible for creating said evidence and causing such unrest among so many races.

I ended my search for her at the outside of the club building and gave Koneko a mental poke that let her hear a soft clink of stone against glass by the window I stood under. She appeared a moment later, saw me, and looked sad. I motioned for her to call and she shook her head. I motioned for texting and she shook her head. I sighed and motioned us talking face to face, which was the last option she would want.

Koneko visibly sighed as she held out a hand with two fingers up, apparently agreeing. I had the mental impression she meant two minutes and I nodded. I walked over to the tree closest to the building, within sight of the door she would come out of, and sat down with my back against the bark.

I sighed loudly when all four members of the Occult Research Club came out through the door. Koneko looked embarrassed as she stopped in front of me and the others arrayed themselves around me in an attempt to surround me and protect her from whatever I was planning to do to her.

“I suppose I can't blame you for this reaction after what happened the last time we met.” I said and Rias didn't respond with anything but a blank face. “You're not going to rant and rave at me about it? Really?” I asked and she didn't answer. “I didn't tell anyone what happened, by the way. I figured you would handle that all on your own.”

That comment earned an embarrassed blush and her thoughts went right to her ranting and raving as she told everything to her mother, Venelana. Even though she had visited personally, there were several staff members around and it had already gotten out to the public that she had lost the baby. Her family was already suffering the backlash over how convenient that was after Riser's demise.

“You will be contacted by my father through the Foreign Affairs office.” Rias said, her voice flat.

I knew what that was about without having to read it from her mind. “I'll talk to Grayfia about it after school.” I said and stayed sitting on the ground as I turned my attention to Koneko. “Can I ask you to sit or am I allowed to stand and approach you without being attacked?”

“Issei...” Koneko whispered and didn't answer.

I glanced around at the others to see their faces and Akeno had a blank face like Rias and Yuuto looked sad. I slowly stood, giving them time to react, and both Akeno and Rias stiffened while the hilt of a sword appeared at Yuuto's feet. Once I was standing, I smiled at them and took a single step to appear beside Koneko and then took another to appear in Grayfia's office.

“The meeting room is empty.” Grayfia said without missing a beat.

“Thank you, Minister.” I said and stepped from there to the meeting room.

Koneko blinked her eyes at me several times and looked stunned.

“I just wanted to talk to you, not have a confrontation with Rias and her Peerage.” I said and she didn't respond. I reached up and pulled the hairpins from her hair and used my fingers to fluff her hair out to show me what she looked like without them. “They're just affectations.”

Koneko nodded and I took a few moments to comb her hair back and slipped one pin back into place and then did the other one.

“I won't do the same thing to you.” I whispered and Koneko's face briefly showed sadness. “You know I had no choice to do what I did. Rias might have done something bad and I didn't want an innocent soul to suffer because their parents had an argument.”

Koneko nodded and stayed silent.

“Lunch is almost over. I should take you back.” I said and she nodded again. “Do you have any preference or is back to where we were good enough?”

“Back.” Koneko said, finally.

I checked with my clairvoyance power and Rias, Akeno, and Yuuto were still there. “I'll still watch over you and will keep you safe, no matter what.” I said and stepped close to hug her and looked down into her eyes. “You are my first love and my first partner, which was why I came back for you. I also didn't want our child growing up never knowing his father.”

“His?” Koneko asked, her eyes wide.

I smiled and leaned down to softly kiss her as I stepped us back to beside the tree.

“Koneko!” Rias gasped and her hands started to glow black with her Power of Destruction.

I broke the kiss and let Koneko out of my embrace. “Lunch is almost over.” I said as she walked over to Akeno. “I'll be watching to see if you put Koneko into dangerous situations that could harm her or the baby. If you do...” I stepped behind her and whispered in her ear. “...you won't live long enough to regret it.”

Rias jumped at the scare and whipped her hands around to blast me. I had already stepped away and her blasts of energy hit another tree and most of the trunk disappeared. The rest of the tree came crashing own and several students screamed from the loud noise. Rias realized then that she had an audience nearby and sighed.

“Akeno, can you get Sona for me?” Rias asked and gave her Queen a sheepish look. “There's a few memories she needs to modify.”

“Yes, club president.” Akeno said and gave me a pointed look.

I stepped over to the downed tree and put a hand on the broken off part and on the stump, then used Overhaul's power to reform and reset the thing back to its complete and healthy self. I also hardened it up a little as an apology and made it much tougher to break apart again.

“It was just a magic trick!” I shouted and the nearby students did a double-take as they looked at the restored tree that had just been in pieces on the ground. “Taadaaaa!”

A few of them gave me odd looks and I took the opportunity to erase the explosion from their minds. They all shrugged and started chatting with each other, then the bell rang.

“I need to get to class.” I said and walked over to Koneko. “I'm sorry your choices were between the home you have and the home you could have had. I never meant to put you in that position.” I didn't try to kiss her again, because I didn't want to set Rias off again. “I might have kept my mouth shut about not being in Rias' Peerage anymore if I'd known all of this would happen afterwards.”

“I do, too.” Koneko said, sadly.

I walked by her and Akeno. “Did you mount your father's head on a wall yet?” I asked her and didn't wait for an answer as I kept walking and returned to the main school building.

The afternoon's classes went by a lot quicker with the teacher letting me help her teach. The approving looks she gave me occasionally were not filled with lust or anything, either. She just liked that she had someone in her class that knew what she was talking about and could help get it into the heads of the other students.

Both she and the students thanked me when the final bell of the day rang and I went to my locker to pretend to drop off my things. I walked around until I found a good spot to disappear and popped home. After a quick explanation to my mother about my after school job and that I would be back for supper, I changed into my best suit and stepped back to Grayfia's office to resume my duties as her assistant.

“I've received several missives from the Youkai faction.” Grayfia said as soon as she saw me appear and handed them to me. “Two are from their exiled bureaucrats and one is from Yasaka herself.”

I took them and the first two were just rants about being kicked out of their rightful place and I was to restore them to their homes immediately. Yasaka's was a politely worded order to fix what I did or she would cancel everything we negotiated yesterday and not just the repair of her sub-dimension.

“How much discretion do I have to operate with here?” I asked.

“The other two you can hand back to Yasaka, since they do not have her office seal or carry her approval. She can deal with her own malcontents over what happened.” Grayfia said and I nodded. “Hers, however...”

I took a breath and let it out. “I know, Minister. I can't let all your hard work go to waste because I'm being an ass.”

Grayfia glanced down at my waist and back up to my face. “I think she's only giving you this much leeway about handling it properly because of your ass.”

I fake gasped and pointed at her. “You just made a joke! You... you DID! I heard you!”

Grayfia formed an ice spike near her hand and aimed it at me. “Did I?”

I debated my odds and smiled. She shot at me and I darted to the side to let it barely miss me. I dove for her desk a second later, rolled behind it to get under the next shot, only to stop when her high heel shoe stomped on my face and she slowly stood up to look down at me with a small smile.

“Mo.” I said, because my 'no' was muffled by the sole of her shoe.

“Good boy.” She said and pulled her foot back. “If you can handle putting the exiles back under her custody without endangering the client, please do so. If she's happy, so are we.”

“Good point.” I said and stood up, pretended to dust myself off, and bowed. “I'll look into making an attachment or maybe dividing off that empty Oni village into its own sub-dimension, that way they are still protected and hidden from human sight, while also not endangering Yasaka, her family, and the people that actually support her.”

Grayfia nodded and sat down. “Just be sure to exclude any resources Yasaka promised us. We do not want to negotiate with every one of her various clan members for every single resource individually.”

I thought about that. “Well, depending on how many ley lines are under the main territory, I could possibly split off a few smaller chunks and they can have their own spaces.”

Grayfia went quiet for a moment and nodded. “Make sure she still has overall control with that book, so no one can plan behind her back to take it from her or control the whole thing themselves.”

“Right, I should have blood bound it to her family. I forgot about doing that.” I admitted.

“Then you should head right there to fix the problems.” Grayfia ordered. “Use the normal entrance for her territory, please. She's angry enough without you popping into her personal domain unannounced.”

I checked the missive from her and it did have a phone number to call. “If you'll excuse me.”

Grayfia nodded and went back to her paperwork.

I left the office and went to the meeting room and dialed the number. I didn't expect to get her personally, so I wasn't surprised when a cat-person answered the phone and had a similar voice to the one I met in the meeting. I apologized for calling and asked for permission to arrive at the designated teleportation spot, then to have her schedule a meeting with Yasaka about yesterday's meeting.

To my surprise, she agreed for me to show up as soon as I could and I said I would be right there. Since I didn't want them to question why I was using that spot and not my own powers, I used a devil magic teleportation spell and disappeared in a flash of light and appeared in the same spot as yesterday. I felt some malice and heard a few unkind thoughts from several of the youkai nearby. Thankfully, nothing was life-threatening or a cause for concern.

I didn't have to wait long for a cat-person to come out of the crowd and she was a nice calico color with a modest breast size and her hips were a good width for grabbing onto. She must have noticed my appraisal of her, because she blushed and almost stumbled when she approached me.

“I don't have any Evil Pieces, so you can relax. I'm just admiring you.” I said and she actually did relax. “I assume you've seen similar looks before?”

“Not quite.” She said and waved for me to follow her. “It's usually a little more leer and a lot less appreciation.”

“Ah, lechers. I used to be one before I was murdered by the Fallen Angels and reincarnated.” I told her and she looked surprised. “I really was. I peeped on my classmates, other club members in the gym and showers, and owned tons of porn because I was obsessed with breasts.”

The cat-person stumbled and I easily caught her and held her tenderly as she gripped my arms. “But... why...”

“You could say I saw the light when I died.” I said and stood her up and she didn't let me go. “I was taking things too far and I apologized to everyone, gave out roses to the ones I wronged, and I changed my ways.”

“You...” She stopped talking and let me go. “Why are you telling me this?”

“I'm a little blind about some things and I've been through a lot. I say and do things that would make sense if you knew about everything and I miss some basic things I really should be telling people when I'm making deals.” I said and sighed. “I also overreact sometimes if someone angers me or does something stupid, which also angers me. I try to help as much as I can and it's almost never appreciated.”

She gave me a searching look for a few seconds, then she leaned in and gave me a closed mouth kiss. “You can pet my tail and scratch my ears if you can help her highness repair the things that went wrong when you did what you did yesterday.”

I smiled. “That's why I'm here. I'll do what I can.”

She smiled back. “Then I look forward to seeing if those strong hands can scratch my itch as well as I think they can.”

I chuckled and motioned for her to lead the way. “After you.”

“Thank you.” She said and turned around and walked forward. Her ass swayed fairly far and her tail swished in a much wider arc than it should have.

Someone's really happy about getting petted later. I thought and followed her into the youkai's main compound. I had a lot of work to do to make up for reacting so harshly the day before.