12 Ch9: First Friend?

Mc pov

After I killed the stray devil, I roamed around the city to find Erina and Alice.

Unfortunately, they were nowhere to be seen, and even though I called them multiple times they didn't pick up which just made me more worried about their whereabouts.

One reason that I didn't make much progress was due to the fact that I couldn't communicate with these people as they weren't that good with English and neither was I with Japanese.

Thankfully a kind shop owner gave me a map and told me how to use it, but as I said I didn't understand her hence why even with a map, I was lost in this big city like a stray cat.

There was also this green-haired guy that gave swordsman vibes, well he did carry three swords which I found cool. He helped me with the map and showed me how it works. Not that I had problems with maps, but rather the language it has and the location I was in was unknown to me.

Since I was in Japan I thought that the first thing I had to look for was the Himejima clan as I needed their location for my other mission.

So going for a shot in the dark, I asked the green-haired swordsman to help me. He was kind enough to help and most importantly he could speak English in a rather broken style.

Anyway, getting directions from the guy, I bid him farewell and followed the directions only to find out that I had come to the wrong place.

It seemed that guy's sense of direction was shit like me. Sigh... I'll never trust a green-haired person again.

After wandering around randomly, my phone started to ring. Answering the call, I was relieved to hear Erina's voice.

Apparently, Alice and her were teleported to the correct place unlike me, and the escort from the hero faction had guided them to one of their bases.

I briefed my situation and instructed her to stay there with Alice till I came.

Ending the call I looked around only to find myself in front of a temple or shrine I guess.

Walking in out of pure curiosity, I was met with a young boy around my age. He had short black hair and pale grey eyes making his appearance pleasant to the eye.

But what got my attention was the amount of mana I could feel from him, making me suspect him to be anything but a normal human.

Looking at me he smiled "You seem troubled, need help?"

Huh? He can speak English? Thank god I finally found someone who can help me.

"Yes, I'm looking for a certain location and I was wondering whether can you help me or not."

With the same happy expression, he answered "I'll try and see if I can help you, by the way, I'm Ikuse, Tobio Ikuse."

"Thanks for the help and you can call me Kaiser. I'm not familiar with Japanese customs so I hope you don't mind me calling you Tobio."

"Don't worry I'm fine with it. Now, mind giving me the name of the place you're looking for?"

"Sure, I'm looking for one of the Himejima clan resorts."

Upon hearing the name Tobio chuckled "I Guess it's your lucky day because you came to the correct place."

Huh? So the green-haired guy guided me correctly? I'll show him my gratitude if I see him again.

"I see, are you a member of the Himejima clan?" if he is then I need to be a little careful as he might not be on the side of the client that I have to protect.

"Yes, But I don't live here, I just visit this place to spend time with my cousins and aunt."

Good to know he doesn't live here, or I had to deal with him too.

"I was wondering... What kind of business do you have with our clan?" Tobia asked randomly.

Now that I think about it, he should be around the same age as me, even if he has a vast amount of mana I don't think he can harness much of it, so I can come clean and tell him the truth. If he turns out to be an enemy I'll just use cleave and silence him.

"I was tasked to protect two people, Shuri Himejima and her daughter Akeno Himejima."

As I gave him my answer and was ready to react to anything he might try, he just stood in his place and looked at me with a shocked yet suspicious expression.

"What do you mean by protecting them? Is someone after my aunt and little cousin?"

Oh so they are his family, guess he's on our side, but just in case I better not let my guard down.

"I can't give any info about this to you per my client's request, but I hope you are willing to help me in protecting them."

Tobio looked away and it seemed that he was deep in thought or rather talking with someone.

After a short time, the silence was broken as he gave me his answer "I don't completely trust you, as you are a complete stranger but if what you are saying is true, I'm willing to assist you because this is about my family's safety."

"Great to have you on the team."

"But there is something that I need to confirm, are you capable of protecting them?"

Then without any warning, Tobio grabbed a sword out of his shadow and swung it towards me.

'Hmm utilizing the situation to his advantage, guess he has some brain.' I thought to myself as I took out my sword from my inventory and blocked his blow.

"So you're a swordsman too..." He muttered and attacked me again.

Going back and forth at each other, I felt thrilled battling an opponent that had some skill, after all the fight against that stray devil was quite disappointing.

Still, he's below my level and is already showing signs of fatigue given that the speed of his slashes is getting slower.

I could easily use magic or any trick that I had learned to defeat him, but my goal wasn't defeating him but rather trying to see how my swordsmanship could compare to another person outside of the Pendragon family.

After a while he stopped and sat on the ground while his sword was swallowed by the shadow "I accept my defeat. I can tell you were holding back a lot which kind of hurts my pride, but I'm happy to know that you do have enough strength to back your words. I'll gladly work and assist you in your mission."

Good to know he isn't a sore loser and knows his limits. With this spar, I managed to understand his character and what kind of person he is.

"I can tell the same about you, you also were holding back right?" a guy can't simply have that much mana and just know how to use a sword, so he also must have held back and only gone for a contest of swordsmanship.

"Maybe but Even then I'm sure I would have lost. I hope you don't have a bad opinion of me for testing you, if you do then I'm sorry."

Sigh, what a nice guy "Don't worry no grudge taken. Now about-" As I was about to ask him something, my stomach grumbled.

Right, I hadn't eaten anything since I came here.

Tobio chuckled much to my embarrassment "I guess you don't mind if we eat something first and then discuss this later, right?"

I just nodded awkwardly.

"By the way, how did you take that sword out of the shadow?" I had inventory and a ring with the same capability, so he also must have something similar.

"Oh, that? It's all thanks to Jin."

"I'm sorry who?"

"My friend, you'll get to know him very soon. Thanks to him I can summon swords from his shadow."

"Cool."

*A/N: writing this for those who don't know who Tobio Ikuse is, he's the MC of Slash Dog which is one of dxd's author other works that takes place in the same world as dxd and he also appears in dxd a few times in the latter arcs. He's the owner of one of the thirteen Longinus known as Canis Lykaon who takes the shape of a large black dog. It also is known as the dog god of the black blade as edgy as it sounds. Anyway, tobio named it Jin, and similar to Ddraig and Albion, Jin is sentient and can also act as an independent avatar. Its power lets the host of it summon and use blades that can cut even gods. Strength-wise, tobio's a master swordsman, a top-rated magician, and is one of the top five humans in dxd verse which is quite an achievement in itself. He was strong enough that in the dxd novel, he was tasked to act as Sirzech and Azazel's bodyguard.

As for his personality, he's a kind and introverted guy who doesn't mind helping others and cares for his friends deeply, literally bro material. I guess this much should be enough for now, but if you have any questions regarding him, ask in the comments and I will answer. Now back to the story.*

"So what about you? Where did you take that sword from?" Tobio asked curiously.

I showed him the ring that I was wearing "It's all thanks to this ring, it lets me store items in it."

"That's pretty cool." he complimented me the same way I did for him.

'I guess we'll get along nicely.'

"Alright we're here, now just stay silent and follow along with what I say, we don't want to make them panic or worry." Tobio said with a serious expression.

A family guy huh? He cares for them deeply, makes me remember how everyone in Pendragon's mansion took care of me and treated me.

"Wow I didn't think you could smile or show any emotion but I guess I was wrong." Tobio remarked which made me realise I was smiling.

"Did you think I'm emotionless?"

"Yes."

"I'm not, I'm not just fond of showing emotions much, I rarely show my emotions and that's with people I'm comfortable with."

"So I count one of those people?"

"Well yeah, you're the first person that I became friends with." outside of the Pendragon family circle that is.

Uther told me that if you spar against someone, that person counts as your friend. When I asked Why, he said that when you clash with another person without the goal of killing them, you are conversing with them in a special language, and that brings you closer to each other.

I guess what he said was true because during our fight I felt a joy that I didn't from the training I underwent with Uther.

With that logic, I considered this foreigner, Tobio Ikuse, the first friend that I have made.

"You okay Kaiser? You were zoning out for quite a while."

"Ah sorry I tend to think by myself a little too much, please don't mind me. Were you saying something?"

"Yes, I said that I would be glad to be your first friend."

"Same here." I said in return.

"Now back to the important matter." He then was going to knock on the door which I stopped him.

"What?" He asked confused by what I did.

"Before that, I know this might sound weird but do you know any spells that can work with language?"

"Yeah, and how did you know I'm a magician?"

"Just a guess, tho how do you know that kind of spell?"

"There's this uncle that I meet on weekends, he likes to sit in the Riverside and catch fish. Pretty much a boring activity. But he's a nice guy and has taught me most things I know about magic."

"I see. Mind teaching me the spell?"

"Sure it's not that hard."

------------- Mini Time skip brought to you by Chibi Erina scolding Chibi Alice -------------

After learning the spell from Tobio and trying it a few times to be sure that it worked perfectly fine, Tobio knocked on the wooden door and waited for a response.

"Coming" a feminine voice yelled from the other side and in a matter of seconds, footsteps were heard.

The wooden door was slid to the side and we were met with a beautiful woman who had long, flowing black hair and light brown eyes.

"Oh my, Tobio-kun you came back, did you forget something and leave it behind?" she then looked at me "And who might this young man be?"

"Hi Shuri-san, no I didn't leave anything. As for him, he's my friend. I was hoping that you could house us for a few days if it's not a problem."

"Of course dear. I'm Shuri Himejima, it's nice to meet you Arthur-kun, please feel free and think of this place as your own home." Shuri smiled gently and greeted me, which I found the kun part a bit weird, and like Tobio, she seemed to be a kind-hearted person by nature.

"It's nice to be meeting you too, I'm not too familiar with Japanese honorifics so I hope you don't mind me calling you something else."

Now, I might not be familiar with their honorifics but I know that much that just using a person's name without any honorifics shows the closeness of the said people, and given that she's a married woman I might accidentally be disrespectful to her if I just say her name.

"You can just call me Aunt Shuri or Auntie, they might be easier for you to use. Either is fine."

"Then I'm in your care Aunt Shuri." I said while slightly bowing.

After that, She guided both of us to a room and we settled in there. As it was quite late we decided to sleep in turns so that in case something happened one of us would be awake and alert the other one.

I told Tobio to sleep first which he was against and said as a guest I should sleep first. But with some small talk, I managed to convince him to sleep first which he did pretty much quickly.

Now that a few problems that I had were solved, I could finally think about my next course of actions.

Strength-wise I don't think I would be facing any challenge against the intruders if they were at the same level with Tobio which I doubt.

But having a talent for jinxing myself, I began to think about quick ways that could help me get a boost in little time.

I can use the tickets that I have, speaking of tickets, I already have two character trials so it is best if I try them.

A long time has passed since I got them and I have grown enough to try them. Plus the condition in both of them is relatively easy now with the abilities that I've got so there shouldn't be any problems dealing with Yami and Yoriichi.

Right?

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Hello there, how you all doing? Hope you've been doing great in life.

First of all, I'm sorry for the late update, my university clases started this week again and I'm quite busy with them so I only might be able to upload 1 chapter per week instead of 2 or 3.

If this drop in upload speed saddens you and makes you want to drop this fic, then you are free to do so. Or well you can just check on this fic later and stockpile chapters to read.

Next chapters will focus on mc trying yami and Yoriichi character trials and getting a first hand beating from both of them. I mean do you expect anything else from them?

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter and I'll see you on the next chapter.

Word count: 2671