Ch 72: Good job!

"That's a huge house!" exclaimed Irina as they approached the large house, no, the mansion where Rias Gremory lived.

"Yes. She is the heiress of one of the most prominent families of the underworld, after all." nodded Asia.

Today was Saturday morning, and Asia had contacted Rias using the number she had been provided, requesting a meeting. To her surprise, Rias had immediately agreed and asked them to come right away.

"Please let me conduct the talks. I have done this a handful of times already." asked Asia, and they nodded.

Asia pressed the intercom button.

"Hello, I am Asia Argento, representing the Church's Inquisition." politely said Asia.

"Please wait an instant, I am coming."

Asia, Kaede, Irina and Xenovia waited with trepidation. They saw the door of the mansion open, and a gorgeous young woman with very long black hairs walked in their direction.

"She doesn't have horns…" muttered Kaede absentmindedly, admiring the girl's beauty.

"What nonsense are you thinking about, Kaede?" asked Irina as she raised an eyebrow.

As the girl came closer, she suddenly stopped, her eyes widening. Kaede was pretty sure that she was staring straight at her.

"Ara ara…" laughed the girl as she resumed her walk, looking at the four of them in turn. She opened the gate from them.

"Welcome to the Gremory residence. I am Akeno Himejima, Rias-sama's Queen. Please come inside, we have prepared tea."

"Thank you for your welcome, Akeno-san. I hope our coming does not bother you too much." said Asia with a slight bow.

"Not at all, ufufu. Please come inside."

Akeno led them toward the house, and Kaede looked at her companions in confusion. She didn't understand why Akeno seemed so happy suddenly, as if she knew some private joke. She hoped they wouldn't be the butt of it.

The house inside was tastefully furnished, and Akeno paused in front of a large door.

"Rias-sama and most of her peerage are waiting inside." she grinned. Then she opened the door, invited them in with a gesture, and…

Kaede froze in shock, and suddenly, Akeno's behavior made sense.

"Suzu!"

"Sis!"

Before they even became aware they moved, Suzu and Kaede were fiercely hugging each other, while Akeno was making "ufufu" sounds on the side, and everyone else was watching in amazement, then with warm gazes.

"Well, it looks like not everyone needs to be introduced." smiled Rias.

Kaede stepped back, holding her little sister's hands, and saw the few beautiful girls standing nearby, before she looked back at Suzu.

Suzu looked at the three beautiful young women who accompanied her big sister, and looked back at Kaede.

They wordlessly questioned each other, and nodded in sync.

"Good job!" They both praised each other at the same time, before hugging again.

"If anyone ever doubted that they were twins…" laughed Akeno. She had a sneaky suspicion about what this 'good job' was about.

"Ahem, I guess we should introduce ourselves. I am Asia Argento, a spokesperson for the Church, and my companions are Irina Shidou, Xenovia Quarta, and Kaede Aizawa from the Inquisition, although it seems Kaede doesn't really need the introduction."

"She doesn't. Suzu often spoke about her. I am glad they found each other. I am Rias Gremory, and it is nice to meet you all. Behind me are some of the members of my peerage, Koneko Toujou and Yuuto Kiba."

"Sis! I have met Master!" suddenly claimed Suzu.

"You did? Where is he?" Kaede jumped in joy.

"He's off training, but I'll contact him. He will come back right away." said Suzu as she whipped out her phone and started typing a message.

"Ohhh, we're going to meet Kaede's Master at last." grinned Irina. "He must be a three meters tall, fire-breathing giant with the body of a Greek God, from all the things Kaede said about him."

"Don't forget the flaming sword, too." quipped Xenovia, making Irina giggle.

"Sent. I just asked him to come, but did not tell him why." said Suzu.

A few seconds later, the church girls saw a very handsome man suddenly pop into existence near Suzu, a sheathed sword at his waist. Xenovia and Irina were appraising him when he noticed them, and his eyes widened at the sight of the twins.

"Master!" cried Kaede as she jumped into his arms.

"Kaede!" cried Noah as he hugged her tightly and kissed her.

"I've missed you a lot, Kaede. How have you been?"

"Fine, Master. I missed you a lot, too."

They shared another quick kiss, before Noah looked at the other people watching.

"I want to catch up, Kaede, but that will have to wait for a more appropriate time and place."

"Ah, yes… Master, those are my friends, Irina Shidou and Xenovia Quarta, and Asia Argento. We’re on a mission. Irina, Xenovia, Asia, this is my Master, Noah Enfield."

Noah bowed with a polite smile.

"It is a pleasure to meet you. And thank you for taking care of Kaede."

"It's nice to meet you, but I am disappointed, you're not three meters tall after all.” said Irina, grinning. “Kaede boasted so much about you, we couldn't stop her once she got started."

"Eheh." giggled Kaede, rubbing her forehead on her Master’s chest, before she regained her seriousness.

“Master, Suzu, have you found Asuna?”

“Not yet, but from the power I received from her, I am confident that she is with the Shinigami. And it just so happen that Lilith gave me another mission that will start in a few weeks, that will allow me to go over to the place where they reside and start making friends. I’ll try to find her then.”

“Lilith?” asked Asia.

“The goddess I work for. She is benevolent and wants me to fix the wrongs of the world.”

“Master, you said ‘another mission'? “

“Sis, Master is the one who liberated Hagun Island!” boasted Suzu.

“With the help of the Returnees. They did most of the work. I only freed them from their curse and killed a few of the stronger enemies.” shrugged Noah. He wasn't going to take all the credit for what had happened there.

“I should have realized earlier. Are you also a member of the Anti-Demon Corp, then? They took credit for it.” said Kaede.

“Yes, I am.”

"Everyone, please take place at the table, and I will serve the tea." suggested Akeno.

Everyone took their place, with Kaede's spot being Noah's lap, and Akeno started serving everyone. Asia seemed to be pondering how much she should tell, when Noah took her by surprise.

"Considering the timing of your arrival, I assume that you are after Valper Galilei."

Asia froze in shock. Irina and Xenovia blinked in surprise.

"Huh? H-How do you know about it?" asked Asia.

"That's simple. I'm the one who lured him in Japan. He should be at the abandoned Church today at midnight.

"You… lured him in?"

"A few days ago, a bunch of fallen angels tried to kill Suzu. She got the upper hand, interrogated them in return for sparring them, and one of them mentioned once working for a short time for Galilei, searching for relics and such. Since that fallen angel still had a way to contact him, I used her to send him a message, to come here using a false pretext. And it seems like he did."

Noah looked at Yuuto as finished talking, and Yuuto nodded. Akeno had told him the day before what Noah had been up to, and he felt very grateful, and very eager, for the opportunity to get revenge at last.

He had a lot of ill feelings toward the church, as a result of being treated as a test subject and seeing his friends die, but he knew not to be outright hostile with Church members he knew weren’t involved, especially when one of them was Suzu's sister, the others were her friends, and they were trying to stop Galilei.

"I see. Thank you very much, Noah-san, for getting him out of hiding. We've been searching for him for a long time. Can we assist you?"

Noah had so issue with it, but that wasn’t only his decision to make, and he looked at Rias.

“If you agree to let Yuuto deal with him, I do not mind.”

“As long as we can report to our superiors that we saw his body, they will be satisfied. Although, if possible, we would like an opportunity to interrogate him, to confirm that he doesn’t hold more people captive in some of his hideouts.” said Asia.

“Yuuto, do you agree to that?” asked Rias.

“Yes. We will make him talk, before I kill him.”

“From our information, Galilei came with two more people. One is a rogue exorcist, but we do not know who the other is. And he may have more accomplices already in Japan.” said Xenovia.

“Then all the more reason for us to work together, just in case.” suggested Rias.

“I agree. Thank you, Rias-sama. We are very grateful for your assistance.” replied Asia.

“It’s fine. We are assisting each other in this matter.” said Rias. “In fact, why don’t you spend the day here? There aren’t many chances for us devils to talk with people from the Church, and I’m curious about a few things. Among others, I’d like to know how you met Suzu’s sister.”

“I appeared directly inside a church in the Vatican, and as I was testing the power I had just been granted, Sister Griselda found me and promised to train me if I joined the Inquisition. Master, you should spar with her, one day. She’s strong.”

“If I ever get the opportunity. So you’ve trained in the Vatican those last few weeks?”

“Well, mostly. We also participated in a mission. A previous attempt to capture or kill Valper Galilei. But it was a trap, and instead, we almost got captured by a snake woman.”

“…A snake woman?” asked Noah, frowning.

“A woman with long black hairs that she could transform into snakes. She’s dangerous, Master.” warned Kaede. “She overpowered me in an instant. I only escaped by pretending to be under the effect of her sleeping poison, and she dropped her guard.”

“Did she give you her name?”

Kaede frowned. “She did, but… Yoshuko? Sho…”

“Shikoku?” asked Noah.

“Yes! That’s it! …You met her already?”

Noah patted Kaede’s head and smiled.

“Movie time, everyone.”

Noah projected his memories of the fight between Rairen and the members of the Seventh squad into everyone’s mind. He had only shown it to Claire, Alice, Rui and Hisui previously.

“Those guys will be troublesome.” frowned Irina when the mental projection ended.

“Master, I remember her saying she was collecting humans with strong life force as ingredients for the next Thunder God.”

“We’ll do something about them. The Corps is already taking steps to prepare. For now, we just need to focus on getting stronger.”

“Yes.”

“Noah-kun, what was that thing you used to make your comrades stronger? That was very effective to fight those hollows. Can it be used on anyone?” asked Xenovia.

“Please call me just Noah. As for that power…”

Noah went on to explain how Eternal Chains worked. And when he spoke about the compensation part, mentioning it might start at kissing and get more intense from there, the girls had various reactions. All displayed various level of embarrassment, Asia and Koneko being the worst cases, while Kaede looked eager to test it.

“And, well, for that reason, I’ll only use this on willing and unmarried women.”

“I understand.” Hurriedly said Asia, blushing. “Thank you for warning us about this Rairen, and their objectives. Now if you do not mind, we will return to our hotel and inform the Church about them.”

Rias nodded. “Should we meet again here at 20:00? We can discuss more as we prepare the ambush.”

“That would be great. Thank you, Rias-sama, and everyone else, for your cooperation. It is much appreciated.”

“I’ll be staying with Suzu and Master until then. See you later, Asia, Irina, Xenovia.” declared Kaede.

“Yes, you need to… catch up. See you later, Kaede.” Replied Irina, blushing. She had a pretty good idea of how they would ‘catch up’.

“Later.” waved Xenovia.

Akeno accompanied them to the door, and Noah turned to Rias.

“Well then, I’ll take Suzu and Kaede with me for a while, if you do not mind.”

“I do not. Just be sure to be well rested for tonight, please.”

“Ah?” Noh raised an eyebrow, pretending to be dense. “Why would I not be rested tonight? What kind of physical activity do you expect me to do with Kaede today?”

Rias gasped as she went beet red, and Akeno laughed on the side.

“Stop teasing me and get going already!”

“See you later.”

Noah extended his hands to Suzu and Kaede, and they disappeared.

When the three of them teleported into Noah’s bedroom, they were already about to strip, when they froze, as they weren’t alone.

“Oh my…” muttered Noah as he noticed the intruder.