Chapter 16: Kuudere cat girl spotted, target locked on.
~ one years later.
Julian and Issei were walking across the bridge they would thread on every day after school as it was the shortest path to their home.
The sun was well on its way to sleep, causing the sky to burn in a soothing orange color. Some clouds in the path of the rays of the sun put refreshing spots of shade in the path of both teenagers.
Noticing that the atmosphere was pleasant and that there was no hurry, the duo stopped themselves on the side of the bridge and leaned against the raillings, watching the rare cars going under them.
Resuming the subject they were talking about before, Issei sighed. "Ah, it's hard to find a girlfriend when all the girls around only have eyes for you, it rather suck."
Julian rolled his eyes, he afterward turned himself so that it was his back leaning against the cold railing, a flash of disgust immediatly passed through his face at what he saw on his left. "Well, sorry for being so handsome, I guess. I could play matchmaker with you and a girl if you want, what do you think of this one, she's rather cute isn't she?"
Issei wanted to protest at the last part, but his words got stucked in his throat when in curiosity he turned his gaze in the same direction as Julian.
She wasn't just cute, she was gorgeous.
With long black hair reaching to the middle of her back, and beautifull violet-pink eyes. One of the greatest body he had the chance to see to date. And most importantly, her enormous pair of boobas. All of these things made Issei immediatly develop a great impression of the unknown girl.
However, a perplexed expression soon found its way on his face, as the girl was directly coming toward them. Now, he would normally think that she was just a new victim of Julian's charm who was tempting her chance, but the girl's gaze that was shily and expectantly fixed on him made him wonder what the fuck was going on.
Stopping before the two boys, the girl had Issei undivided attention when she adressed him in a soft voice. "Excuse me, you are Issei Hyoudou from Kuoh accademy right? Or am I wrong?"
Casting an unsure glance briefly at Julian, who was looking on impassively, Issei answered. "Yeah, that's me."
"Hi, I..." The girl hesitated a bit.
"Do you need something?" Issei asked slowly.
"Oh, I just wanted to ask you something. Are you seeing anyone right now?"...
"Err, no? I-"
Julian made his presence known by suddenly slapping Issei shoulder and whispering a you got it to him. After that he left a bewildered Issei behind and continued on his way home alone. But not before casting a last impassive glance toward the girl.
If he had stayed only a moment longer, he was afraid he would have directly ripped the girl's face off. She triggered and disgusted him so much he wanted to puke. He wasn't unaware of why it was so. It was because of her mask, it reminded him too much of his past life.
She came with a facade, just like them. And she came with hidden intention, same as them. This feeling of unlogical hate became only sharper when these hidden intentions were so malicious and directed toward his friend.
He was well aware of that his reaction was related to a trauma. But what could he do about it? His reaction wasn't just related to it, but to a deep set opinion he had about fake people.
That it was a persona created for a mission did not matter when it came to it.
Taking deep breaths, Julian calmed himself and listened to the rest of the encounter.
From what he could hear, his presence made little differences appear in the meeting from canon, the only thing changing from Raynare's speech being that she complimented him on his great body due to the martial arts Julian himself dragged him in from young.
He could sense that he was not the only one monitoring the situation, as a bat was standing on one of the roof of a building at one end of the bridge.
Now he just had to wait, he shouldn't be with Issei when Raynare is around, as he would probably slip and kill her.
He wasn't sure how to proceed concerning her future attempt to kill Issei, as he knew he wouldn't die. But he felt sick to just let it happen when he could do something about it.
The true problem with the situation was with how Rias would let Issei die so that she could be sure to get him into her peerage. As Julian would have done the same in her place, he didn't really ressent her. She was probably not in her right state of mind so close to her engagment.
In the end, Julian just shook his head and sighed. He was thinking too much about too many things, he should just do what he do best, go with the flow and act how he want to.
~~~
Issei was pretty worried when he said that he wouldn't go with him to school, but he was relieved when he specified that he was just lending him some space for his new girlfriend. Julian could swear he saw him almost brought to tears at him willingly breaking the golden rule of bros before hoes for his sake.
But in fact, he was just chilling at home and setting multiple countermeasures in it in preparation for the future. He also spent some time with his parents as he didn't see them often because of his busy schedule and them only teaching third years. His parents who didn't give a single fuck about him skipping school by the way. It was to be expected as it was really just a waste of time for Julian.
He also went to see his little 'slave' spy that tried to monitor him five years ago. As their collaboration date back to a few years, he naturally found out the fallen girl name a long time ago. Melissa was a pretty mundane name for a fallen angel, but it seemed she was not an original one, but a half-blood. With a sacred gear at that which allowed her to manipulate shadows.
Of course, her mission wasn't to monitor him anymore. At least not since she reported to her superior for one year straight that besides being a 'slightly' smarter human, he was not special in any way and therefore not a threat.
Now, the interesting part came from her newly assigned mission who was to become a direct subordinate of Raynare's group, and assist them in whatever way they needed.
Yeah, it surprised him at first as he could not see Raynare being much stronger than Melissa. But it was then that he remembered that on the format of DxD from this AU world that he had in his mind that Raynare, compared to vanilla version, had two pairs of wing in which she had one.
Indeed, stronger antagonists was something he had wished for. And as Raynare and company had two pairs of wing compared to Melissa who had one, the hierarchy was indeed correct.
Lost in his thoughts while reminiscing about these events, Julian jumped and crouched on the roof a building proceeded to spectate Issei and Raynare set up their first date on the very same bridge and in the very same atmosphere they met for the first time.
Julian would find such a setting pretty romantic if it wasn't for him knowing that the girl was indeed thirsting for Issei, but not in a good sense.
He still forced himself to not look directly in Raynare direction in fear of his trauma annoyingly acting up.
He watched impassively but internally facepalming as Issei rushed down the stairs gleefully screaming. "Ah! Julian can suck it! I'm so gonna lose my virginity before him! Who would've had thought!?"
'Yes, Issei you're gonna lose your virginity, just not like you would have thought. Just in the form of a big ass spear fucking your innards out.' Julian thought sarcastically, or not.
Of course as it was his job as the big bro, he wouldn't let it happen.
After watching Issei floating away in ecstasy, Julian turned his gaze toward a smol white hair girl sucking on a popsicle who got out of the shadows to, like him, watch Issei make a fool of himself.
She probably thought she was being sneaky, but unfortunately, Julian would be the oriole right now, while she would be the mantis, and Issei the perverted cicada.
Julian needed to blow some steam off because of Raynare, so he decided to tease the cat a little.
Jumping silently from the building to a small distance of three meter behind Koneko. He suddenly asked loudly. "Why are you spying on my friend?"
The poor girl nearly jumped a full meter high in the air in fright and in the process also threw her popsicle high in the air behind her.
Julian grabbed it from the air and watched as Koneko swiftly and hurriedly turned herself toward him as soon as she regained her footing.
He nearly lost it when he saw how blank her expression was even though he knew how close she was to a heart attack just then. He could also see how tense she actually was, ready to react against any threats.
It was all but impossible for normal human to sneak pass a nekomata's sense, so the barely noticable furrow of her brows in confusion and warriness was expected by Julian. After all, it should be the first time she was ever sneaked on.
Right there, Julian realized that he didn't choose the best way to go about his teasing with this particular girl. But he still found it funny however.
Of course, he wasn't finding the fact that her expression actually came from a trauma, just the situation in itself.
"Oh, sorry for the scare, here." Julian apologized while offering her the half finished popsicle, not sounding sorry at all.
Julian watched as Koneko released the tension in her body a bit when she confirmed that she wasn't in immediate danger.
She shifted her gaze from his face to the popsicle before her, hesitantly taking it. "Thank you." She replied in a quiet voice. She couldn't just let a sweet go to waste like that, right?
Julian replied unbothered with a small smile plastered on his face. "No problem. Now, why were you spying on my friend?" He asked with suspicion.
Koneko shifted on her feet, a little bit uncomfortable at being questioned so directly. After all, what could she say? That it was an order from her king to spy on the fallen angel and his friend that was the possesor of a sacred gear? As if.
Seeing that she was lost on what to say, Julian faked an idea, bringing his fist atop his palm. he said out loud, Half-asking and half-assuming" Oh! Are you perhaps having a crush on him too? He did seem to be pretty lucky with girls right now."
Koneko at that, froze for a second, and afterward gained a disgusted expression on her face and just said two word. "Pervert, disgusting."
Julian almost felt sad for Issei, at least he would be if he didn't know that in canon Koneko fell to Issei like all the rest.
Not even bothering to defend his friend, as there was really nothing he could say, Julian decided to drop the matter. "Nevermind then." He shrugged.
He made a show of inspecting her a bit. "That's Kuoh accademy uniform, you going to Kuoh too? I never saw you around before."
---
~Koneko Pov
Koneko, who really wasn't the best, nor the most interested with strangers, surprisingly was not that averse to continue conversing with the boy in front of her.
In search of why it was like so, her small and delicate nose sniffed the air a little.
If there was to be a reason, then it would be that the boy in front of her didn't smell like the others. His body odor was a unique and comforting mix of freshly baked bread, fresh cut lemons and... the same subtle smell of roses as Rias?
There was also the fact that his face was somehow familiar.
Then she remembered, he was the one Rias told them she wanted to bring in the peerage last year. She also said that she wanted to wait until this year, her engagement with Riser was coming very soon, so why hadn't she made a move yet? Had she changed her mind?
Shaking her head at these thoughts, she gave up thinking about it as she was confident in whatever plan her king had. Tilting her head up, Koneko met the blue-red eyes of - 'what was his name again? Julian, wasn't it?' and answered his previous question. "I'm in first years."
---
~ Back to Julian
"I'm in first year." Koneko said in her usual soft voice and lackluster expression.
"Oh, maybe that's why." Julian replied simply.
'Man, it's though to make a conversation with someone who doesn't speak with sentences containing more than four words.' Julian thought sheepishly.
Since his rebirth, he had imagined an infinite kind of ways how his first time interracting with a member of the cast would be. But he didn't expect it to be this ankward. Not that he really care though.
"Okay then, I still don't know why you were staring at my friend so intently. But I'll believe that you aren't some kind of weird stalker as long as I don't catch you doing it again, gotcha?" Julian took petty pride in the really, really subtle annoyed expression that appeared on the white haired girl's face at his words.
Not sure how to go about it, Julian just shrugged and dip his head a little in a Japanese greeting. "A little late but I'm Julian Håberjorgen-Marquis by the way. You can use my first name as no Japanese as of yet could say my family name correctly. Please to meet you."
Hesitating for a moment, the Nekomatas relented. "Koneko Toujou."
Julian gained a grin and satisfied, turned around and started walking away, waving at her with the back of his hand. "See you around, Koneko-Chan."
Not returning himself to see her reaction at using her first name or waiting for a reply that would probably never come, Julian added. "Your popsicle is melting by the way."
Thus came and went the first meeting between Julian and a member of Rias's peerage.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
No_Existence
No_Existence Yo, is it just me or Julian interaction with Koneko is odd? I don't even know why too, it just is. Anyway, relatively big chapter as I'm a little late with the release. Canon is beginning too, yay. Can you guys guess why Rias hasn't made a move on Julian yet? Also, I'm trying some things in this chapter like a multiple povs conversation. Your thoughts on how you found it would be much appreciated. In fact, any thought about anything concerning this fanfic is welcome.
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