Fajar Purnama Highschool DxD Fan Fiction Project - Route 0 Fajar Purnama
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- Route 0: Realistic Path
Route 0: Realistic Path
The Prologue
Date: Sunday Evening Location: 2LDK Apartment, Kuoh Town.
The cardboard boxes are still half-packed.
I looked at the calendar on my phone. Three weeks.
That’s the hard limit. Let’s see, the narative is due to a visa complication and the abrupt nature of my parent’s research grant ending, I only have three weeks in this Japanese high school.
Three weeks to experience the “Youth” I felt I missed out.
I looked in the mirror. Just a guy. Not ugly, but not striking. Average build. A bit stiff in the shoulders. I took a deep breath, trying to apply what I’d read about Bio-Feedback. I forced my shoulders to drop, trying to manually lower my heart rate.
“Let’s try not being an invisible guy this time,” I told my reflection. “Let’s try making memories.”
Day 0
Date: Monday Morning Location: Kuoh Academy, Class 2-B.
08:30 AM - The Introduction
The uniform felt tight around the collar. Kuoh Academy was formerly an all-girls school, and you could tell. The ratio was skewed. The hallways smelled of perfume and expensive shampoo. For a guy who spent his teenage years burying his head in books and video games to avoid eye contact, this was a battlefield.
I stood at the front of the class.
“Everyone, we have a short-term exchange student,” the teacher announced, sounding bored. “Please welcome Fajar Purnama.”
I bowed. 45 degrees. Textbooks said 45 degrees was polite. “Nice to meet you. I… I hope we can get along for the short time I am here.”
Polite applause. Scattered whispers. I scanned the room.
There were the “Normal” students. And then, there were the others. A blonde boy with a smile that felt too perfect (Kiba). A small, white-haired girl eating snacks who looked like she could bench press a truck (Koneko).
And then, sitting near the window, a brown-haired guy who looked like he was vibrating with restless energy.
12:15 PM - The Lunchroom Alliance
I didn’t want to eat alone. That was the old me. The new me had to be brave.
I saw the brown-haired guy from class sitting with two others—a guy with glasses and a shaved-head guy. They were arguing loudly. The rest of the cafeteria seemed to have drawn an invisible “Do Not Enter” circle around them.
Perfect, I thought. Outcasts.
I walked over with my tray. “Is this seat taken?”
The three of them stopped talking. The glasses guy (Motohama) adjusted his frames. The bald one (Matsuda) squinted.
The brown-haired guy—Hyoudou Issei—grinned. It was a stupid, wide, honest grin. “Fresh meat! You got guts sitting with the Perverted Trio, transfer student!”
“Perverted Trio?” I blinked. “Is that an official club name?”
They laughed. It wasn’t malicious. It was the laughter of guys who knew they were at the bottom of the food chain and didn’t care.
“I’m Issei. That’s Matsuda and Motohama,” Issei pointed with his chopstick. “We’re discussing the most important topic in the universe.”
“Which is?”
“Why the kendo club girls wear spats under their hakama,” Matsuda said with dead seriousness.
I sighed, but I sat down. It wasn’t the intellectual conversation my parents would want me to have, but it was conversation.
15:30 PM - The Vibe
As I walked home with them (they insisted on showing me the “best route,” which suspiciously went past the tennis courts), I felt it.
A strange… pressure.
It came from the Old School Building on the hill. Every time I looked at it, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. It triggered my Sensory Overclocking practice without me trying. The air felt heavier there, thicker.
“Scary place, huh?” Issei noticed me staring. “That’s the Occult Research Club. Rias Gremory runs it. She’s… well, she’s top tier.”
“Rias Gremory,” I repeated the name. It felt heavy on my tongue. Like a name I shouldn’t say too loud.
I looked at Issei. For a second, just a split second, the shadow stretching out from his feet looked wrong. It looked jagged. Like a wing.
I shook my head. Focus, Fajar. You’re just tired. Stick to the training.
“Hey, Fajar!” Issei slapped my back, nearly knocking the wind out of me. “You busy tonight? We’re planning something big for tomorrow morning. Operation: Peeping Tom. You in?”
The old me would have run away. The moral part of me wanted to lecture them. But the lonely part of me? The part that knew I was leaving in three weeks and might never see these idiots again?
“I… I’ll come watch,” I said. “But I’m not peeping. I’m just… observing the environment.”
“That’s the spirit!” Issei cheered.
22:00 PM - The Night Routine
Back in my room. I felt exhausted, but not physically. Socially.
I sat on the floor, legs crossed. Module 4: Mental Reset.
I closed my eyes. I visualized the day. The noise of the cafeteria. Issei’s weirdly intense energy. The ominous feeling of the Old School Building.
I breathed in. I am here. I breathed out. I am normal.
I have three weeks. I don’t know why, but I feel like if I don’t survive these three weeks… I’ll lose something more important than just time.
I laid down to sleep. Tomorrow is Monday. The real schedule begins.
Day 1
Date: Monday Location: Kuoh Academy Status: Normal Human (Bruised Ego & Body)
🌅 Morning: The Quartet & Bio-Maintenance
07:45 AM - Behind the Old Gym
The air was crisp. Too crisp. It felt like the calm before an execution.
“Alright, listen up,” Issei whispered, huddling us into a circle. “The target is the Kendo Club changing room. The ventilation shaft on the east side has a loose grate. Matsuda, you bring the screwdriver. Motohama, you’re on optics. Fajar… you’re the lookout.”
“Why am I the lookout?” I asked, adjusting my bag.
“Because you have the ‘innocent transfer student’ face,” Matsuda grinned, giving a thumbs up. “If a teacher comes, just pretend you’re lost.”
I sighed. My first day of ‘Youth’ and I was an accomplice to a felony.
While they argued about angles and lens apertures, I leaned against the brick wall. I wasn’t just leaning; I was performing 1. Bio-Maintenance (Stretching & Mobility).
I rolled my ankles, feeling the pop of nitrogen bubbles. I extended my neck, engaging the trapezius. Internal Note: The body is stiff from stress. Cortisol is high. Need to lubricate the joints. If we have to run, a cold hamstring means a torn hamstring.
“Look at him,” Motohama adjusted his glasses. “He’s limbering up. Fajar takes peeping seriously.”
“No,” I muttered, rotating my shoulders. “I just have a bad feeling about this.”
☀️ Class/Noon: The Neuro-Somatic Drill
10:30 AM - Math Class
The teacher was droning on about quadratic equations. My eyes were open, but my brain was elsewhere.
I looked two desks over. Issei was asleep, drooling slightly. But even in his sleep, there was that… vibration. It was subtle, like a distinct hum that only I could feel.
Focus, I told myself. Don’t look at the supernatural. Look at your own hardware.
I shifted in my seat, placing my feet flat on the floor. I initiated 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Bio-Feedback).
Step 1: The Physiological Sigh. Double inhale through the nose. Sniff. Sniff. Long exhale through the mouth.
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Step 2: The Scan. I mentally traced the line from my neck down to my stomach. I could feel the lunch I ate (cheap convenience store bread) sitting heavy.
Step 3: The Shift. I visualized a switch flipping from “Alert” to “Calm.” My heart rate dropped from 85 bpm to 72 bpm.
It wasn’t magic. It was biology. By manually engaging the parasympathetic nervous system, I was conserving energy that Issei was currently wasting by twitching in his sleep.
🍱 Lunch: The Pact
12:30 PM - Cafeteria
“We strike after school,” Issei announced, stabbing a sausage with his fork. “The Kendo girls change at 3:45 PM exactly.”
I chewed my rice slowly. “Issei, have you considered that Kendo practitioners carry wooden swords? And that they know how to use them?”
“High risk, high reward!” Matsuda cheered.
I looked at the three of them. They were idiots. But they were my idiots. For three weeks, at least.
⚔️ Afternoon: The Massacre
15:45 PM - Outside the Kendo Dojo
We were in the bushes. The smell of soil and leaves was overpowering.
“Quiet,” Motohama hissed.
I was trying. I really was. I was attempting 5. Sensory Overclocking (Ninja Training) and 12. The Art of Invisibility (Stealth).
Technique: Breathe through the mouth to silence the windpipe.
Technique: Step toe-to-heel to dampen impact.
I was doing okay. I was silent. Issei, however, was not.
“Oh my god,” Issei gasped, his voice cracking. “I see a shoulder blade!”
SNAP.
Issei stepped on a dry branch. It sounded like a gunshot in the quiet afternoon.
The window of the dojo slammed open. “WHO’S THERE?!”
It was Katase. And Murayama. And they were armed.
“RUN!” Matsuda screamed, abandoning all honor.
“WAIT FOR ME!” Issei scrambled up.
I tried to move. I tried to use 14. Traverse & Adapt (Parkour) to vault over the hedge.
Reality Check: I am not a ninja. I am a student who spent yesterday stretching.
My foot caught on a root. I stumbled. Before I could recover, a shinai (bamboo sword) came down.
WHACK.
“OW!” I took a solid hit to the shoulder.
“PERVERTS!” Murayama yelled, swinging again.
I didn’t fight back. I couldn’t. I just curled up and protected my head, letting the adrenaline numb the pain as I scrambled backward, crab-walking away from the furious amazons.
We escaped. Barely. We regrouped at the park, panting, bruised, and humiliated.
“Worth it,” Issei wheezed, nursing a bump on his head.
I rubbed my throbbing shoulder. “I hate you guys.” But I was smiling. I am hurt, but it was a memory.
🌙 Evening: Recovery & Ground Mechanics
19:00 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
My shoulder was turning a lovely shade of purple. The Kendo girls didn’t hold back.
“Okay,” I winced, looking at the bathroom mirror. There is a bruise, there should be a bruise, and therefore “Damage assessment: Contusion on the left deltoid. Minor scrape on the shin.”
I couldn’t just lie down. Stiff muscles heal slower. I needed blood flow.
I moved to the living room floor for 2. Primal Movement (Ground Mechanics) and 3. Functional Dynamics.
Instead of standard pushups, I did “Lizard Crawls.”
Action: I stayed low to the ground, moving my left hand and right foot forward, then switching.
Goal: It forced my spine to rotate and my core to stabilize, flushing fresh blood into the bruised shoulder without high impact.
Then, “Rocking.”
Action: Hands and knees. Rocking hips back to heels, then forward.
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Result: It calmed the nervous system. The rhythmic motion told my body, “ The threat is gone. You can heal now.”
I realized something terrifying today. Issei took a hit to the head that would have concussed me, and he was laughing ten minutes later. I am fragile. If I want to survive even the mundane hazards of this school, I need to be better.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:00 PM - Bedroom
I laid in bed, staring at the ceiling. The adrenaline was finally fading, leaving just the dull ache.
- Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I closed my eyes. I didn’t try to stop my thoughts. I just watched them.
The sound of the bamboo sword hitting flesh.
The fear in my gut when they yelled.
The laughter at the park.
I visualized putting each memory into a box and closing the lid. Inhale. Exhale.
I drifted toward sleep. Outside my window, far in the distance, a crow cawed. It sounded wrong. Too mechanical. I ignored it. I’m just a normal student. I have 20 days left.
—
Day 2
Date: Tuesday Location: Kuoh Academy & Apartment Status: Normal Human (Should be sore, but adapting)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
My alarm went off. I rolled over, and my left shoulder should immediately screamed in protest. The shinai strike from yesterday should have left a deep, purple contusion.
Okay. Time to boot up the system.
I dragged myself onto the floor for Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4).
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Bio-Maintenance: I started with gentle neck and shoulder rotations. I avoided stretching the bruised muscle directly; instead, I stretched the opposing muscles (the pectorals) to relieve tension on the back.
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Primal Movement: I transitioned into a slow “Bear Crawl.” It hurt, but the mechanical pressure forced blood to circulate through the damaged tissues, carrying away the lactic acid and cellular waste.
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Functional Dynamics: I practiced moving from the floor to a standing position without using my hands, relying entirely on core and hip stability.
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Mental Reset: Five minutes of dead silence. Reminding myself: I have 19 days left. Pain is just a biological signal. Do not let it dictate the mood.
By the time I put on my uniform, the sharp pain now should have had dulled to a manageable ache.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Ant Crawl
11:15 AM - History Class
The teacher was discussing the Edo period. Issei, predictably, was sketching something highly inappropriate in his notebook. I needed to be productive without looking like I was doing anything.
Time for 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Bio-Feedback). Today’s target: The Extremities (Foot-Shaoyin pathway).
I placed my feet flat against the floor inside my shoes. I closed my eyes just a fraction, blurring the blackboard, and shifted my brain to the NSDR (Non-Sleep Deep Rest) border state.
The Focus: I directed 100% of my sensory attention to my right toes. Big toe. Second toe. Middle. Ring. Pinky.
The Symptom: Within two minutes, it started. Formication. The “ants crawling” sensation. It felt like carbonated water bubbling just under the skin of my sole. It was maddeningly itchy.
The Fix: The natural reflex is to shift the foot or scratch it. I refused. I used the “Parking” technique. I held my attention right on the itch and breathed out slowly. I am safe. Open the capillaries. * The Shift: After thirty seconds of agony, the itch suddenly “popped.” The static noise vanished, replaced by a deep, heavy warmth. Vasodilation achieved. I successfully commanded my nervous system to flush blood into my foot just by thinking about it.
I smiled slightly. Level up.
🍱 Lunch: The Contraband Trade
12:40 PM - Behind the Main Building
“Behold,” Motohama whispered, adjusting his glasses until they glinted in the sun. He pulled a slightly crumpled magazine from his blazer. “The holy grail. Busty Babes Monthly, limited edition.”
Matsuda gasped, falling to his knees. “You actually got it!”
Issei wiped a fake tear from his eye. “Motohama… you’re a hero.”
I sat on a nearby bench, eating a rice ball, watching the Magazine Trading ritual. It was so utterly, painfully mundane. They analyzed the glossy pages like scholars deciphering an ancient text.
“Fajar, you have to see this,” Issei thrust the magazine toward me.
“Very interesting” I said.
“right?” Issei said.
It was ridiculous, but being around them was grounding. It reminded me of exactly what I was supposed to be: a dumb high schooler killing time.
⚔️ Afternoon: The Warning & The Iron
15:30 PM - The Old Gym Storage
I was taking a shortcut behind the old gym, looking for a quiet place to stretch, when the temperature seemed to drop ten degrees.
I stopped. My Sensory Overclocking flared up. Every hair on my arms stood on end.
A small girl with white hair and a Kuoh Academy uniform was standing in the doorway of the gym storage. Koneko Toujou. She was holding a wooden crate that looked like it weighed at least eighty pounds, and she was holding it like it was filled with feathers.
She turned her gold eyes toward me. There was no hostility, just absolute, crushing apathy.
“Don’t go in there,” she said. Her voice was flat.
“I wasn’t—”
“Gym storage is off-limits to perverts,” she interrupted, her gaze locking onto me with the pressure of a physical weight. “Go away. Or you’ll get hurt.”
She didn’t wait for a response. She just turned and walked into the shadows. I felt a cold sweat on my neck which I supposed to feel. That wasn’t normal. That wasn’t a normal human girl. 16:00 PM - The Modern Gym
I ignored her advice as I am alone without the perverted trios, I am a different person who I focus on myself without caring for anyone and anything else. I needed to ground myself in physics and biology.
- Anatomical Optimization (Muscle Training). I grabbed a pair of moderate dumbbells. I wasn’t here to build massive size; I was here to optimize my hardware.
Technique: Slow eccentrics. I lifted the weight in one second, but took four agonizingly slow seconds to lower it.
Focus: Mind-muscle connection. I wasn’t just moving weight; I was visualizing the muscle fibers contracting and tearing micro-scopically. I imagined the fascial web tightening. I was building density, not volume.
🌙 Evening: Stress Inoculation
20:00 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
My physical body was tired, but my nervous system needed testing.
I turned off all the lights in my room, put on noise-canceling headphones, and booted up a notoriously terrifying psychological horror game on my laptop.
- Stress Inoculation (Fear Training). The goal wasn’t just to play the game. The goal was to control the chemical dump of fear. I kept a finger lightly pressed to my carotid artery.
I walked down a dark digital hallway. The music swelled. BAM! A grotesque face smashed through the screen with a deafening screech.
My heart spiked. I felt the jolt of adrenaline, the classic “Sympathetic” fight-or-flight response. Immediately, I paused the game.
Double inhale through the nose. Long exhale through the mouth. (The Physiological Sigh).
I forced my shoulders to drop. I forced my hands to un-clench.
I sat there until my heart rate returned to resting baseline. Then, I unpaused. I subjected myself to the terror again and again, conditioning my body to recover from panic in seconds rather than minutes. If a real monster ever jumped out at me, freezing in fear meant death.
🛌 Night: The Reset
23:30 PM - Bedroom
I was exhausted. My shoulder throbbed, my toes felt overly sensitive, and my adrenal glands were drained from the horror game.
I lay in bed. 4. Mental Reset. I visualized a blackboard. I mentally erased Koneko’s golden eyes. I erased Issei’s magazine. I erased the jump scares.
Just black. Just the void.
19 days left.
The world outside my window was quiet. I let the darkness take me.
I have checked the schedule from the provided CSV file, and you are absolutely right. The Meeting with Asia and the Stray Devil Hunt happens in Week 3. We are currently in Week 1, Day 3 (Wednesday).
According to the schedule, this is a day free of canon plot events, allowing us to focus entirely on Fajar’s daily high school life, his interaction with his environment, and his intensive PTD training.
I have also integrated your brilliant narrative tweak: the use of the word “should” to hint at his self-suggestion, and his cold, detached focus when he is alone without the “Perverted Trio” role to play.
Here is the continuation for Day 3.
Day 3
Date: Wednesday Location: Kuoh Academy & Kuoh Town Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
The alarm beeped. I opened my eyes. The sharp pain in my left shoulder from Monday’s Kendo club incident had already faded into a dull, yellowish ache.
I sat up and initiated Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). I went through the motions—joint rotations, bear crawls, and functional squats. It was fascinating. The human body is a self-repairing biological engine. The micro-tears in the muscle fibers from yesterday’s dumbbell session were already fusing with new protein strands, making the tissue denser.
I felt a bead of sweat roll down my neck. I should feel burdened by the soreness, so I let out a soft groan of exertion, perfectly in character. Nineteen days left. The script required me to be a diligent, fragile human trying to survive. I intended to play the role flawlessly.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Hand Circuit
10:45 AM - Chemistry Class
The teacher was balancing equations on the chalkboard. Issei was staring out the window, likely daydreaming about the Occult Research Club President.
I kept my eyes on my textbook, but my internal focus shifted entirely to my right hand resting on the desk. Time for 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Bio-Feedback).
Yesterday was the feet. Today, the upper extremities.
- The Focus: I commanded my brain to map the exact physical space of my right palm. Thumb, index, middle, ring, pinky.
- The Symptom: Because the hands have a massive amount of real estate in the brain’s somatosensory cortex, the reaction was almost instant. The “ants crawling” sensation—formication—erupted across my knuckles. It felt like tiny electric sparks dancing beneath the skin.
- The Shift: I didn’t twitch. I didn’t break my posture. I just breathed out, performing a microscopic physical surrender. Open the valves. The static shock feeling dissolved with a satisfying ‘pop’ in my mind. A rush of heavy, fluid warmth flooded my right hand. It felt as if I were wearing a thick, heated winter glove. I squeezed my fist under the desk. The grip strength felt noticeably more rooted. I smiled slightly at the chalkboard. The biological feedback loop is such an elegant design.
🍱 Lunch: Environment Object Awareness
12:30 PM - Cafeteria
I sat at a table near the edge of the room. The Perverted Trio was a few tables away, arguing loudly about the structural integrity of the female gym uniforms. I decided not to join them today. When I am alone, I don’t need to wear the mask of the naive transfer student. I can simply observe.
6. Environment Object Awareness. I looked around the cafeteria, stripping away the social context. I stopped seeing “students” and “lunch.” I started seeing geometry and ballistics.
- My plastic lunch tray: A wide-surface shield capable of deflecting a blunt strike.
- The wooden chopsticks: If held in a reverse grip, a localized piercing tool for soft tissue.
- The swinging kitchen doors: A choke point.
- The spilled soup on the floor near the trash can: A friction hazard to lure an opponent into slipping.
I ate my rice methodically. I should feel paranoid constantly scanning the room for weapons, but instead, I just felt a quiet, clinical satisfaction. This was how a weak creature survives in a world of predators.
⚔️ Afternoon: Primal Instincts
16:00 PM - Abandoned Lot behind the Shopping District
After school, I avoided the Old School Building entirely. I walked to a fenced-off, overgrown lot near the edge of town.
I took off my blazer, loosened my tie, and began 9. Primal Instincts (Quarrel Movements). I had to unlearn the neat, structured martial arts I had seen in movies. Real violence isn’t a tournament; it’s a desperate scramble.
I shadowboxed against the empty air, but I kept my movements intentionally ugly. I practiced bringing my hands up to protect my head and neck while violently shoving forward. I visualized an attacker grabbing my shirt. I didn’t visualize a clean counter-punch; I practiced the mechanics of clawing, eye-gouging, and frantic, explosive scrambling.
I threw my weight against an old wooden fence post, practicing the feeling of being slammed, learning how to disperse the kinetic energy through my back rather than letting my spine take the shock. I scraped my knuckles on the rough wood. It stung. A perfect, realistic feedback response.
🌙 Evening: Traverse & Adapt
18:30 PM - Kuoh Town Alleys
The sun was setting, casting long, orange shadows across the streets.
I didn’t jog home. I used 14. Traverse & Adapt (Open World / Parkour). I took the back alleys. When a chain-link fence blocked my path, I didn’t walk around. I found the footholds, pulled my center of gravity up, and vaulted over it, landing softly on the balls of my feet.
I jumped across a small drainage ditch, using a wall-run to maintain my forward momentum. My lungs burned, and my calves felt tight. The human cardiovascular system has strict limits, and I was pushing right up against them.
I moved through the town like a ghost, avoiding the main roads, mapping the escape routes in my head. If the supernatural entities of Kuoh Academy ever decided I was a nuisance, I wouldn’t fight them. I would disappear into the concrete maze.
🛌 Night: The Reset
21:45 PM - Bedroom
I took a cold shower to reduce muscle inflammation and lay down on my bed. My body was battered, tired, and thoroughly exercised.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I closed my eyes. I gathered the sensations of the day—the warmth in my hand, the rough texture of the fence, the burn in my lungs. I placed them all into the mental void.
I am Fajar. I am an exchange student. I have eighteen days left.
I let the self-suggestion wash over my consciousness, cementing the role. I allowed the heavy blanket of human sleep to pull me under, eager for what the next scene of the play would bring.
Day 4
Date: Thursday Location: Kuoh Academy & Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
I woke up before the alarm. The deep aches from the Kendo club beating were almost gone, replaced by the tight, fibrous soreness of muscles adapting to a new baseline. It was a fascinating sensation. A mortal body is constantly breaking down and rebuilding itself based on the stress it encounters.
I rolled out of bed and began Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). I moved through the stretches with methodical precision. During the Primal Movement drills, I focused on my hip mobility. I lowered myself into a deep resting squat, feeling the tension in my Achilles tendons. I should feel groggy and resentful of the early hour, so I let out a heavy, tired yawn as I stood up, perfectly mimicking a sleep-deprived teenager.
The play continues. Seventeen days left.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Core Scan
11:00 AM - English Class
The teacher was explaining grammar structures. The midday sun was making the classroom comfortably warm, a trap that was lulling half the students to sleep. Issei was already nodding off, his head bobbing dangerously close to his desk.
I kept my pen moving, pretending to take notes, but initiated 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Awareness & Relaxation).
I had mastered the feet and the hands. Today, the target was the core—the chest and the abdomen.
- The Focus: I used the Physiological Sigh to drop my heart rate, then directed my internal awareness to my ribcage.
- The Symptom: This area is heavily guarded by the nervous system to protect the vital organs. The feedback wasn’t “ants crawling.” Instead, it felt like a tight, restrictive band wrapping around my lungs. The biological armor of a stressed student.
- The Shift: I employed Diaphragmatic Breathing. I pushed my stomach out on the inhale, leaving my chest completely still, massaging the vagus nerve. Slowly, the tight band dissolved into a deep, radiating warmth centered just below my navel. The Lower Dantian area. I wasn’t generating magic; I was simply pooling heavily oxygenated blood into my digestive core. The physical grounding effect was immense.
🍱 Lunch: Sensory Overclocking
12:30 PM - School Courtyard
I bought a carton of milk and a sandwich and sat under a tree in the courtyard. The Perverted Trio was huddled by the vending machines, undoubtedly scheming.
Instead of joining them, I closed my eyes and began 5. Sensory Overclocking (Ninja Training). The goal was to strip away the brain’s natural filters and process raw data.
- Hearing: I tuned out the overarching hum of the school. I isolated the rustle of the wind in the oak tree above me. Then, I pushed further. I picked out the muffled clack-clack of a teacher’s dress shoes walking down the second-floor hallway. I shifted focus to the vending machines. “…If we angle the mirror just right…” I heard Motohama whisper.
- Smell: I breathed in sharply. Damp earth. The ozone smell of the impending afternoon heat. The faint, sweet scent of hairspray from a group of girls walking past.
I opened my eyes. The sensory flood was overwhelming, making me slightly dizzy. I quickly re-engaged my mental filters. A mortal brain can only process so much raw data before it crashes. It was a thrilling limitation to experience.
⚔️ Afternoon: Dynamic Flexibility
16:00 PM - Kuoh Public Park
I changed into my gym clothes and found a secluded, grassy patch in the park. No weights today. No shadowboxing. Today was about survival physics.
16. Dynamic Flexibility (Acrobatics). Real acrobatics isn’t about looking cool; it’s about kinetic energy dispersal. If a supernatural entity throws me, I need to know how to hit the ground without shattering my spine.
I started with forward rolls. Tucking the chin, rounding the shoulders, and letting the momentum carry me across the grass diagonally from shoulder to opposite hip. Then, Judo break-falls (Ukemi). I stood up, let my legs give out, and slapped the grass violently with my forearms and palms right before my torso hit. Smack!
The sting on my arms was sharp and immediate, but my ribs were perfectly fine. I repeated it backward, sideways, and from a slight jump. My clothes were stained with grass and dirt, and I was covered in minor scrapes. I examined a scratch on my elbow, watching a tiny drop of human blood bead up. The realism of this avatar’s frailty was impeccable.
🌙 Evening: Combat Summary
19:30 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
My parents were “working late at the university lab” again. The apartment was completely empty. I moved the coffee table to the edge of the living room to create space.
10. Combat Summary (Basic Martial Arts). I stood in front of the sliding glass balcony door, using my reflection as a partner. I drilled the absolute basics, the alphabet of violence.
- Jab, Cross. Keeping the elbows tucked, twisting the hips, pivoting the back foot.
- Lead Hook. Shifting the weight, whipping the torso.
- Elbow Strikes. Stepping in close, visualizing the devastating short-range impact.
I didn’t try to look fast. I tried to look perfect. I moved with slow, agonizing deliberation, ensuring that the kinetic chain from my toe, through my hip, to my knuckle was flawless. Only when the mechanics were perfect did I add speed. By the end of the hour, the living room window was fogged with my breath, and my knuckles were red from clenching.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:15 PM - Bedroom
My body was a map of dull aches from the break-falls and the shadowboxing. I lay flat on my mattress, arms resting at my sides.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I let the darkness of the room swallow my vision. I cataloged the data of the day. The vagus nerve manipulation was successful. The sensory isolation required more bandwidth but was functional. The kinetic dispersal of the break-falls was adequate for a human frame.
I am a high school student. I am tired. I have homework to ignore.
I pulled the mortal persona tightly around my consciousness like a warm blanket. Seventeen days left. I surrendered to the heavy, chemical pull of human sleep.
Day 5
Date: Friday Location: Kuoh Academy & Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
The alarm rang, signaling the end of the workweek. I pushed myself off the mattress. The bruises from Monday were practically gone, leaving only a faint yellowish tint on my skin. The human body’s capacity for cellular regeneration, even without supernatural enhancement, is a marvel to experience firsthand.
I moved into Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). Today’s stretching felt fluid. The fascial web throughout my body was adapting to the daily mechanical stress, becoming more elastic and responsive. I performed my primal crawls across the living room carpet. I should feel the accumulating fatigue of a long school week, so I let my shoulders slump slightly as I walked to the bathroom, adopting the heavy-footed gait of a teenager who just wants to sleep in on Saturday.
Sixteen days left. The first week was almost complete.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Spinal Circuit
11:30 AM - Physics Class
The teacher was explaining thermodynamics. I sat near the back, my posture appearing relaxed and slightly bored, but my internal architecture was firing on all cylinders.
8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target: The Spine and the Back (Foot-Taiyang pathway, the longest channel).
- The Focus: I grounded my feet and directed my attention to the base of my tailbone, mentally tracing the line up each individual vertebra to the base of my skull.
- The Symptom: Because the spine houses the central nervous system, the feedback was intense. It wasn’t just “ants”; it was a deep, vibrational heat. It felt as though a warm, heavy liquid was trying to push its way up my back but was catching on pockets of tension between my shoulder blades.
- The Shift: I used the ‘Parking’ technique. I didn’t force it. I held my focus on the tension in my upper back, using slow diaphragmatic breathing. Exhale. Surrender the structural tension. Suddenly, the blockage cleared. A rush of warmth flooded up to my neck, bringing an extreme level of mental clarity. The ambient noise of the classroom became sharper. I quickly dialed the sensation back into the Lower Dantian to store it. I couldn’t afford to look overly energized while everyone else was drowsy.
🍱 Lunch: The Catalyst
12:30 PM - School Gates / Cafeteria
I was walking back from the convenience store with a melon bread when I saw Issei, Matsuda, and Motohama standing near the front gates. Someone wearing a Kuoh Academy uniform—a familiar, though they wouldn’t know that—had just handed Issei a small piece of paper.
I walked over as Issei was examining it.
“What’s that?” I asked, taking a bite of my bread.
“Some weird flyer,” Issei said, scratching his head. “Says, ‘I will grant your wish. Please summon me if you need help.’ And it has this weird circle drawing on it.”
He held it up. To Issei, it was a joke. To my intentionally suppressed, mortal eyes, it was just ink on paper. But to my underlying awareness, the magic circle on that paper was radiating a faint, crimson hum. It was the Occult Research Club’s summoning circle. Rias Gremory’s calling card. The exact item that would save Issei’s life on Sunday.
“Probably a promotion for some underground club,” Motohama scoffed, pushing his glasses up. “Or a scam.”
“Yeah, maybe,” Issei shrugged, but he folded it and stuffed it into his pocket anyway.
I should find this completely unremarkable, so I just nodded and changed the subject. “Are we eating or what? I’m starving.”
Internally, I felt a profound sense of satisfaction. The script was executing flawlessly. The pieces were moving into place.
⚔️ Afternoon: Improvised Weaponry
16:00 PM - Empty Classroom
After school, I found an unused classroom on the first floor. I locked the door and closed the curtains.
11. Improvised Weaponry (Common Tools). A normal human cannot fight a stray devil barehanded. If I was ever caught in the crossfire of the overarching plot, I needed equalizers. I took out the items I had bought or scavenged: a solid wooden broom handle, a heavy metal pen, and a thick, glossy magazine.
- The Magazine: I rolled it up as tightly as physically possible, folding it in half. It became a dense, rigid baton. I struck the edge of a desk with it. CRACK. It didn’t bend. It was hard enough to break a collarbone.
- The Pen: I held it in a reverse grip, anchoring the flat end against my thumb. I practiced short, brutal thrusting motions aimed at hypothetical soft targets—the neck, the eyes, the solar plexus.
- The Broom Handle: I practiced the basics of Kali/Escrima. Circular strikes, parries, and controlling the centerline.
I drilled until the magazine was frayed and my forearms burned. A weapon is only an extension of the body’s mechanics. If the foundation is weak, the weapon is useless.
🌙 Evening: Close Quarter Combats (CQC)
19:00 PM - Fajar’s Apartment (Hallway)
I needed to simulate a confined environment. Real fights rarely happen in open fields; they happen in hallways, elevators, and bathrooms. I positioned myself in the narrow corridor connecting my living room to the front door.
15. Close Quarter Combats (CQC). I couldn’t extend my arms fully without hitting the drywall. Perfect.
I shadowboxed using only short-range weapons.
- Knees and Elbows: I visualized an opponent pressing me against the wall. I dropped my center of gravity, generating power purely from the rotation of my hips, and delivered horizontal elbow strikes to the empty air.
- Clinching: I practiced the “Plum” (Muay Thai clinch), simulating grabbing the back of a neck, pulling down, and driving a knee upward.
In a space this tight, footwork is micro-movements. I pivoted, slipped, and struck, ensuring I never crossed my feet or lost my balance. The walls felt claustrophobic, but I forced my heart rate to remain steady using the breathing techniques from the morning.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:00 PM - Bedroom
I took a hot shower, letting the water ease the tension out of my neck and shoulders.
I lay down on my bed, staring into the dark room. 4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I visualized the blackboard. I erased the image of the magic circle on Issei’s flyer. I erased the feeling of the rolled-up magazine. I erased the claustrophobia of the hallway.
Just the void.
I am Fajar. I am a normal human. I am ready for the weekend.
Sixteen days left. The prologue is over. Tomorrow is Saturday. I closed my eyes and went to sleep.
Day 6
Date: Saturday Location: Fajar’s Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
07:00 AM - Living Room Floor
There is no school today, which means there is no audience. But a true actor does not drop character just because the curtain is closed. I woke up an hour later than usual, allowing the mortal avatar the simple luxury of “sleeping in.”
I began Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). The apartment was quiet. My parents were predictably absent, off at some weekend seminar. I went through the joint rotations and primal movements. My body felt surprisingly light. The accumulated stress of the week was synthesizing into functional strength. The bruises were yellowing memories. The human biological machine is remarkably efficient when given proper maintenance.
Fifteen days left.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Library of Motion - Karate
10:00 AM - Living Room
Today was dedicated to the systematic download of human martial arts. Not to become a master in a day—that is physically impossible—but to map the neural pathways of different kinetic systems.
17. The Library of Motion: Karate. I stood in a traditional Zenkutsu-dachi (front stance). I stripped away the sporting aspects and focused purely on the biomechanics.
- Kime (Focus): I practiced snapping my punches, tensing the entire fascial web of my body for a fraction of a second at the point of impact, then instantly relaxing.
- Rooting: I visualized the energy transferring from the floor, up through my calf, twisting at the hip, and exploding out the knuckles. I repeated the basic Tsuki (punch) hundreds of times in the air until the movement felt less like a conscious action and more like an automated reflex.
🍱 Lunch: The Library of Motion - Judo
12:30 PM - Living Room
I ate a high-protein lunch of chicken and rice, then cleared the coffee table out of the way again.
17. The Library of Motion: Judo. Without a partner, I had to rely heavily on shadow-grappling (Uchikomi).
- Kuzushi (Off-balancing): I visualized an opponent stepping forward. I grabbed imaginary lapels and sleeves, pivoting my hips, dropping my center of gravity below theirs.
- The Throw: I practiced the entry for an Ippon Seoi Nage (one-arm shoulder throw), focusing on the absolute necessity of leverage. Size doesn’t matter if you can manipulate a heavier object’s center of gravity past its base of support. I drilled the footwork until I was sweating profusely onto the carpet.
⚔️ Afternoon: The Library of Motion - Jujutsu
15:00 PM - Living Room Floor
I transitioned seamlessly from the standing throws of Judo to the ground control of its parent art.
17. The Library of Motion: Jujutsu.
- Joint Manipulation: I visualized an opponent’s arm extended. I mapped out the fulcrum of the elbow, the rotational limits of the shoulder, and the fragility of the wrist.
- Ground Control: I practiced moving my hips on the floor, shrimping, and applying imaginary weight to a pinned opponent’s chest. Human joints are mechanical hinges; they are only meant to bend one way. I drilled the angles needed to force those hinges to their breaking point using minimal effort.
It was a cold, clinical session. Just physics applied to anatomy.
🌙 Evening: Entertainment Time & The Subconscious Block
19:00 PM - Bedroom / Laptop
My physical body was taxed. It was time for mental conditioning. I sat at my laptop for Entertainment Time. As a mortal teenager, this is standard behavior. But as the actor, I was meticulously curating the input to feed my avatar’s combat psychology.
I booted up my reading and streaming tabs:
- Return of The Bloodthirsty Police (Ch. 45 & 47): I studied the fight between Bi Gwang and the giant Black Lespedeza. Black Lespedeza relied on the logic that “catching the opponent once is a victory.” But Bi Gwang proved that size is irrelevant if the speed, precision, and martial stats are overwhelmingly superior. I internalized that logic. As a fragile human, I cannot get caught. Not even once.
- Teenage Mercenary: I watched Ijin Yu (001) chapter 192. His combat wasn’t flashy; it was fearless, precise, and utterly lethal. The psychology of a weapon.
- Weak Hero: I specifically studied Gray Yeon. I do not have a strong physical body yet. Donald Na is the ideal, but Gray Yeon is the reality. Using the environment, exploiting momentum, striking the vitals with absolute ruthlessness—that is how the weak survive.
- Samurai Champloo (Ep 25): I watched Mugen and Jin fight Kariya Kagetoki. The clash of swords, the millimeter-precise deflections.
- Hajime no Ippo (Ep 32): I absorbed Sendo Takeshi’s immense, suffocating “tiger aura.” Then I watched Ippo’s grueling struggles. The raw, bleeding desperation of human effort.
- God of Blackfield and The Boxer. Cold, calculating violence and the limits of human potential.
Then, a strange phenomenon occurred.
I saw a thumbnail for Dragon Ball Super. Next to it, One Piece, Bleach, and a recommendation for The Return of the Crazy Demon.
I moved my mouse to click them. I wanted to see planetary destruction. I wanted to see Haki and Heavenly Demon arts. But my finger wouldn’t click the mouse.
A heavy, suffocating wave of apathy washed over me. It was a subconscious blockade, so dense it felt physical. No, a voice whispered in the back of my mind. If you look at the stars, you will forget the dirt.
I closed the browser, breathing heavily. The immersion holds.
🛌 Night: The Reset
23:00 PM - Bedroom
My mind was buzzing with kinetic theories, joint locks, and the phantom sensation of Sendo’s tiger aura.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I laid flat on my back. I visualized the blackboard. I erased Bi Gwang’s strikes. I erased Gray Yeon’s ruthless efficiency. I erased the strange, terrifying mental block that prevented me from looking at higher powers.
I swept the board completely clean. Just the void.
I am Fajar. I am a normal human. I am learning to fight because it is fun.
Fourteen days left. Tomorrow is Sunday.
Day 7
Date: Sunday Location: Fajar’s Apartment & Kuoh Town Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
07:00 AM - Living Room Floor
The final day of my first week. I woke up with the sun. The intense physical conditioning from the previous days had settled into a baseline of functional readiness.
I moved through Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). My joints cracked quietly in the empty apartment. The deep diaphragmatic breathing felt natural now, a constant background process that kept my nervous system anchored. I should be feeling the typical Sunday lethargy, the dread of Monday approaching, so I let out a heavy sigh and dragged my feet as I went to the kitchen for water.
Thirteen days left.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Library of Motion - Muay Thai
10:00 AM - Living Room
I cleared the floor space again. Yesterday was the precision of Japanese arts. Today was about raw, percussive trauma.
17. The Library of Motion: Muay Thai. The “Art of Eight Limbs.” I didn’t have a heavy bag, so I had to rely heavily on visualization and shadowboxing.
- The Stance: Taller, lighter on the lead foot to check kicks.
- The Strike: I practiced the roundhouse kick. Unlike Karate, where the leg snaps, the Thai kick is a baseball bat swing. I visualized stepping off the center line, opening my hip, and swinging my entire body weight through the target using my shin as the impact surface.
- The Clinch: I practiced firing knees upward while pulling down on the imaginary opponent’s neck. It is a brutal, exhausting art designed to break ribs and collapse lungs. I drilled until my shirt clung to my back with sweat.
🍱 Lunch: The Library of Motion - Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
13:00 PM - Living Room Floor
After a quick lunch, I stayed on the floor. If the Muay Thai clinch fails and I end up on the pavement, I need to know how to survive.
17. The Library of Motion: Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
- The Guard: I laid on my back, practicing hip escapes (shrimping).
- The Levers: I mentally deconstructed the human neck and arms. I visualized applying a triangle choke, crossing my ankles over the back of an opponent’s neck and squeezing my knees together to cut off the carotid arteries.
- The Reality: Fighting on the ground is exhausting. It relies on microscopic shifts in leverage and weight distribution. As a normal human, if I get pinned by something stronger than me, I am dead. The technique must be flawless to bridge the gap in raw power.
⚔️ Afternoon: Event - The Bridge
16:30 PM - Kuoh Town Pedestrian Bridge
I took a walk through town to clear my head and practice my urban traversal. The sun was beginning its descent, casting a deep, golden-orange hue over the streets.
As I approached the overpass near the train station, my Sensory Overclocking triggered involuntarily. It wasn’t a sound or a sight. It was a sudden, chilling drop in the ambient pressure. The hairs on my arms stood straight up. My heart rate spiked to 110 bpm before I forced it down with a sharp exhale.
I stopped at the base of the stairs and looked up. Issei was standing on the bridge, looking out at the sunset. Approaching him was a girl in a different school’s uniform. She had long black hair and a sweet, timid smile.
To my mortal eyes, she was just a very pretty high school girl. But my nervous system was screaming. The air around her smelled faintly of ozone and old, dry feathers. The shadow she cast on the concrete looked unnaturally dense, almost jagged.
Fascinating, I thought, keeping my face perfectly neutral. A severe cortisol reaction without a visible threat. The human instinct for danger is remarkably acute.
I watched as she bowed slightly, holding her hands together. I couldn’t hear the words over the traffic, but I saw Issei’s face light up like a firework. He bowed frantically, his mouth moving in rapid, ecstatic confirmation.
The girl smiled, turned, and walked away. The oppressive pressure in the air vanished the second she was out of sight.
I should just think my friend got lucky. I relaxed my posture, putting my hands in my pockets, and walked up the stairs to meet him.
🌙 Evening: Issei Celebrates
17:15 PM - Fast Food Restaurant
“SHE ASKED ME OUT!”
Issei slammed his hands on the plastic table, nearly knocking over my soda. Matsuda and Motohama stared at him, their faces pale, their eyes wide with a mixture of profound shock and violent envy.
“A date,” Motohama whispered, his glasses slipping down his nose. “Hyoudou Issei… is going on a date.”
“With a beautiful girl! Her name is Yuuma Amano!” Issei was practically vibrating. “She said she watches me all the time! She likes me!”
Matsuda gripped his own hair, looking like he was about to rip it out. “Why?! Why him and not me?! What does he have that I don’t?!”
“A date,” Motohama repeated, staring blankly at the wall. “The natural order has collapsed.”
I took a sip of my drink, leaning back in the booth. “Congratulations, Issei,” I said, offering a small, supportive smile. “When is the big day?”
“Next Sunday!” Issei cheered, pumping his fist. “I’ve got exactly one week to prepare!”
“We have to sabotage him,” Matsuda hissed to Motohama, tears of frustration in his eyes.
“I’m going to be a man!” Issei yelled to the ceiling, ignoring them entirely.
I watched the three of them bicker and celebrate. It was loud, chaotic, and wonderfully mundane. Yet, beneath the plastic table, I kept my hands open, subconsciously ready to perform a block. The scent of ozone was still fresh in my olfactory memory.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:00 PM - Bedroom
My apartment was silent. The contrast between Issei’s explosive joy and this dark room was stark.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I laid flat on my bed. I visualized the blackboard. I erased the image of Yuuma Amano’s smile. I erased the smell of ozone. I erased the erratic spike of my own heartbeat.
I am Fajar. I am an exchange student. My friend got a girlfriend today. That is all.
The suggestion wrapped tightly around my mind, sealing the anomalies away. Thirteen days left. Week one is complete. I closed my eyes and descended into sleep.
Day 8
Date: Monday (Week 2) Location: Kuoh Academy & Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
Week two begins. The alarm pulled me from a deep, dreamless sleep. I sat up, cataloging the state of my physical vessel. The soreness from the weekend’s intensive martial arts download had faded, leaving behind a baseline of tightly coiled kinetic potential.
I initiated Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). I moved through the neck rotations and ground mechanics with fluid precision. The human body is a creature of habit; it was already anticipating the mechanical stress and preparing the fascial tissues for the load. I should feel the quintessential Monday morning blues, so I allowed my posture to sag slightly under the weight of an invisible backpack as I made my way to the kitchen.
Twelve days left. The countdown continues.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Cervical Circuit
10:30 AM - Mathematics Class
The teacher’s voice was a monotonous drone, writing complex formulas on the board. Issei was vibrating in his seat two desks away, completely unable to focus on the numbers. His leg was bouncing with a frantic, nervous energy.
I focused on my own physiology. 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target: The Neck and Shoulders (the intersection of the Yangming pathways).
- The Focus: I grounded my posture and directed my sensory awareness to the trapezius muscles and the base of my skull. This area holds the most psychological stress in a mortal frame.
- The Symptom: I found a massive “dead zone” of tension on the right side of my neck—a knot of muscle fibers clumped together, restricting blood flow to the brain. It felt cold and numb.
- The Shift: I didn’t try to stretch it physically. I used the ‘Parking’ technique. I rested my attention entirely on the cold knot, syncing my heart rate with slow, measured breaths. I waited for the neuro-chemical signal to drop the guard. Release. Suddenly, a sharp, electric ‘zap’ shot down my collarbone, followed immediately by a rush of warm, oxygenated blood. The headache I didn’t even realize I was developing instantly vanished.
I blinked, my vision sharpening. Biological optimization is incredibly rewarding.
🍱 Lunch: Issei Brags
12:30 PM - School Courtyard
Lunch was a chaotic affair. The natural order of the Perverted Trio had been fundamentally disrupted.
“I’m telling you, it was destiny!” Issei shouted, practically standing on the courtyard bench. He was holding his bento box like a trophy. “She smiled at me, and it was like… like angels singing!”
Matsuda was gnawing aggressively on his chopsticks, his eyes bloodshot. Motohama was sitting in the fetal position on the grass, muttering to himself about statistical impossibilities.
“A whole week,” Motohama whispered. “He has a whole week to prepare for Sunday. The anticipation… the shopping… the planning. It’s too much for a normal man to bear.”
“What are you going to wear, Issei?” I asked, taking a bite of my sandwich, playing the role of the grounded, supportive friend.
Issei froze, his triumphant grin shattering into sheer panic. “Wear? I… I just wear my uniform! Or… wait, do I wear a t-shirt? A jacket? Oh god, what if she hates my casual clothes?!”
“You’re doomed,” Matsuda cackled, finding a shred of dark comfort in Issei’s sudden anxiety. “You’re going to show up looking like a clown, and she’ll dump you at the fountain!”
“Shut up, baldly! Fajar, you have to help me!” Issei pleaded.
“I’m an exchange student, Issei. My wardrobe consists entirely of plain shirts and jeans,” I replied calmly. “You’ll have to figure out the local fashion on your own.”
Internally, I observed his physiological state. His cortisol and adrenaline levels were spiking erratically purely based on social anxiety. The human capacity to invent internal stress is both a fatal flaw and a powerful evolutionary driver.
⚔️ Afternoon: Issei Leaves Early
15:30 PM - School Gates
The final bell rang. Normally, this was the time the Trio would scheme about peeping on the various sports clubs.
Not today.
“I’m out of here!” Issei yelled, sprinting past the gates before I had even fully packed my bag. “I have to hit the mall! I need to find the perfect jacket! Operation: Sunday Date is a go!”
He disappeared down the street in a cloud of dust. Matsuda and Motohama watched him go with bitter resentment, eventually shuffling off to the arcade to drown their sorrows in fighting games.
I watched the empty street. The protagonist was off preparing for a date that would end his mortal life. I turned and walked toward my apartment. I had my own preparations to make.
🌙 Evening: Anatomical Optimization
17:30 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
My apartment was a sterile, quiet training ground. I had purchased a heavier set of adjustable dumbbells over the weekend.
13. Anatomical Optimization (Muscle Training). I focused on the “Go Muscles”—the posterior chain, the core, and the stabilizers.
- The Movement: Bulgarian Split Squats. I elevated my rear foot on the couch, holding the heavy dumbbells at my sides.
- The Execution: I dropped my hips slowly, taking a full five seconds to reach the bottom of the movement, pausing, and then exploding upward.
- The Focus: I visualized the glute and quadricep fibers tearing at the microscopic level under the immense eccentric load. I was manually forcing my biology to adapt, to build thicker, denser tissue to survive the mechanical stress.
I moved relentlessly from exercise to exercise—rows, overhead presses, hollow-body holds—until my muscles were trembling and the living room floor was slick with sweat. I didn’t stop when it hurt; I stopped when the kinetic chain compromised.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:00 PM - Bedroom
My body felt heavy, packed with the dense fatigue of severe muscular exertion. I lay flat on the mattress, feeling the accelerated pulse of my heart pumping nutrients to the damaged tissues.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I closed my eyes. The blackboard appeared in the void of my mind. I erased Issei’s frantic, joyful face. I erased the bitter jealousy of the Trio. I erased the burning lactic acid in my legs.
I am Fajar. I am a student. I am training to feel strong.
I pulled the mortal persona tightly over my consciousness. Twelve days left. I let the darkness pull me down into recovery.
Day 9
Date: Tuesday (Week 2) Location: Kuoh Academy & Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
The alarm pulled me awake. My posterior chain—hamstrings, glutes, and lower back—was screaming from yesterday’s heavy dumbbell session. This was the expected biological tax of Anatomical Optimization.
I rolled onto the floor and began Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). I didn’t force the sore muscles into deep stretches. Instead, I focused on mobility, using the Primal Movement crawls to gently pump blood into the stiff tissues. The discomfort was a sharp, grounding reminder of my physical limits. I should be groaning about the pain and contemplating skipping school, so I let a heavy, tired breath escape my lips as I pulled on my uniform.
Eleven days left.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Lower Extremity Circuit
11:15 AM - Literature Class
The teacher was reading a classical Japanese poem aloud. Issei was sitting straight up, practically vibrating with nervous energy, sketching what looked like outfit combinations in the margins of his notebook.
I kept my eyes on the textbook, but my internal engine was running. 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target: The calves and shins (Foot-Yangming and Foot-Taiyin pathways).
- The Focus: My legs were heavy from yesterday’s lifting. I used the Physiological Sigh to drop into the Theta state and directed my awareness to my lower legs, specifically the Zusanli point just below the knee.
- The Symptom: Instead of the usual tingling, I felt a throbbing, dull ache—the restriction of blood flow due to muscular inflammation.
- The Shift: I parked my attention on the ache. I visualized the fascial tissue softening, opening the micro-capillaries. Exhale. Dilate. “Purnama,” the teacher called out suddenly, shattering the classroom’s quiet. “Can you explain the metaphor in the third stanza?”
My heart rate didn’t spike. I simply paused the internal cultivation, stood up, and delivered the textbook answer I had memorized the night before.
“Correct,” the teacher nodded, slightly surprised. I sat back down and seamlessly re-engaged the vascular flush in my calves. The throbbing ache slowly morphed into a comforting, liquid warmth.
🍱 Lunch: Sensory Overclocking & The Student Council
12:30 PM - School Courtyard
Matsuda and Motohama were sulking by a nearby tree, eating their lunches in bitter silence. Issei was completely ignoring them, aggressively flipping through a fashion magazine he had clearly bought on his way home yesterday.
I sat a few feet away on a bench, unwrapping my food. I closed my eyes against the midday sun and initiated 5. Sensory Overclocking (Ninja Training).
I stripped away the ambient noise of the courtyard. I pushed my hearing outward, mapping the environment through sound. The rustle of Issei’s magazine pages. The distant bounce of a basketball in the gym. The heavy, syncopated footsteps of two people approaching.
I opened my eyes just enough to look. Walking down the paved path was a girl with short black hair and sharp glasses, accompanied by a taller girl with long hair. Sona Sitri and Tsubaki Shinra. The Student Council President and Vice President.
My physiological sensors spiked instantly. The air around them felt… dense. Organized. It was a completely different signature from the chaotic, ozone-scented pressure of the girl on the bridge. It felt like standing too close to a high-voltage server rack.
Sona’s gaze swept over the courtyard. She looked at Issei with a microscopic sigh of disapproval, ignored Matsuda and Motohama entirely, and then her eyes landed on me.
I should feel intimidated by the strict Student Council President, so I quickly averted my eyes and took a large bite of my sandwich, looking like a guilty student caught slacking off. Sona held her gaze for a second longer, perhaps analyzing why an exchange student was sitting so quietly apart from his friends, before turning and continuing her patrol.
I slowly let my breath out. The ecosystem of this school is incredibly complex.
⚔️ Afternoon: Dynamic Flexibility
16:00 PM - Secluded Park Area
I walked to the quiet, grassy park I had used last week. My legs were sufficiently flushed and recovered from the morning’s cultivation.
16. Dynamic Flexibility (Acrobatics). Today wasn’t about break-falls; it was about aerial control and kinetic chains. I started with simple cartwheels, ensuring my arms were locked and my core was braced. Then I moved to round-offs, focusing on the explosive snap of the hips as my feet came together to launch me backward.
- The Drill: I practiced jumping and rotating my body 360 degrees in the air, trying to land softly, toe-to-heel, completely silently.
- The Goal: Spatial awareness. If an opponent throws a strike, or if the environment shifts violently, the human body needs to know exactly where ‘down’ is without relying on sight.
I stumbled a few times, scraping my palms on the grass. My vestibular system (inner ear balance) was working overtime. By the time the sun started dipping low, I was covered in sweat and grass stains, but my physical coordination felt marginally sharper.
🌙 Evening: The Library of Motion - Tae Kwon Do
19:00 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
My parents were still out. The apartment was my dojo.
17. The Library of Motion: Tae Kwon Do. After the heavy Muay Thai strikes of yesterday, today was about speed, flexibility, and fast-twitch muscle fibers.
- The Stance: Sideways, light, bouncing slightly on the balls of the feet.
- The Kicks: I visualized the biomechanics of the snapping kicks. The Ap Chagi (front kick) and the Dollyo Chagi (roundhouse). Unlike the Thai kick, the TKD roundhouse requires lifting the knee first, then violently extending the lower leg like a whip.
I practiced spinning hook kicks in the center of the living room. The rotational force threatened to throw my mortal balance off completely. I focused entirely on the pivoting foot and the stabilization of my core. I didn’t care about power; I cared about velocity. A human cannot win a contest of strength against a supernatural entity, but speed and precise targeting to soft tissue—the throat, the eyes—might buy enough time to escape.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:15 PM - Bedroom
My calves were burning, and my hips felt stretched to their absolute limits. The physical toll of acting out this human conditioning is relentless.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I laid on my back, letting the darkness wash over my vision. I visualized the blackboard. I erased Sona Sitri’s calculating gaze. I erased the dense, static pressure of her aura. I erased the sharp, snapping sound of my own kicks in the living room.
I am Fajar. I am a student. I am tired.
The self-suggestion settled over me. Eleven days left. The countdown to Issei’s date—and whatever consequences follow it—is quietly ticking away. I let sleep claim me.
Day 10
Date: Wednesday (Week 2) Location: Kuoh Academy & Kuoh Town Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
Ten days left.
The alarm clock was unnecessary; my internal circadian rhythm had perfectly synced with this routine. I got out of bed, noting the heavy, satisfying density in my legs from yesterday’s kicks.
I began Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). Today’s Primal Movement felt exceptionally smooth. The human fascial web is highly adaptable. When subjected to consistent mechanical stress, it fortifies the connective tissue, turning the body into a more efficient kinetic spring. I moved across the floor in a low, crawling pattern, ensuring my spine remained neutral. I should be feeling the mid-week slump, so as I prepared my breakfast, I allowed my eyes to droop slightly, moving with the sluggishness of an ordinary teenager forcing himself awake.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Facial Circuit
10:45 AM - History Class
Issei looked like a corpse. He was resting his head on his desk, dark circles under his eyes, completely exhausted from staying up all night researching “ideal date spots in Kuoh.”
I maintained my posture, a textbook propped open in front of me, but shifted my focus inward. 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target: The Face and Jaw (the intersection of the Stomach and Large Intestine meridians).
- The Focus: The masseter muscles in the jaw are where humans subconsciously store massive amounts of psychological stress, constantly clenching their teeth. I directed my attention to the hinges of my jaw and the muscles around my eyes.Sumber: ShutterstockJelajahi
- The Symptom: It felt like a tight, rigid mask made of hardened clay pressing against my skull.
- The Shift: I initiated the Physiological Sigh. Exhale. Unclench. I forced the micro-muscles around my eyes to physically drop. The “clay mask” cracked. A sudden, intense wave of warmth flushed across my cheeks, and my sinuses instantly cleared. The pressure in my head vanished, replaced by an acute, vibrating alertness. I kept my expression blank, hiding the sudden rush of highly oxygenated blood to my brain.
🍱 Lunch: Environment Object Awareness & The Prince
12:30 PM - School Cafeteria
I sat at a table with the Trio. Issei was practically face-planting into his curry rice, while Matsuda and Motohama debated the structural flaws of Issei’s planned date itinerary.
“A movie? That’s a rookie mistake! You can’t talk during a movie!” Motohama adjusted his glasses furiously.
I took a bite of my lunch and engaged 6. Environment Object Awareness. I stripped away the social context of the cafeteria.
- The heavy ceramic soup bowl: A blunt projectile.
- The metal chopsticks: Improvised piercing tools.
- The wet floor sign near the entrance: A tripping hazard or a makeshift bludgeon.
Suddenly, a shift in the room’s atmosphere broke my concentration. A collective, high-pitched sigh echoed from the female students near the entrance.
Yuuto Kiba was walking through the cafeteria.
I watched him carefully. To the girls, he was the handsome, flawless ‘Prince’ of Kuoh Academy. To my sensory awareness, he was something entirely different. He possessed a completely different signature than Sona Sitri or the girl on the bridge.
There was no wasted movement in his stride. He walked heel-to-toe with perfect, floating balance, his center of gravity completely stable. The air around him felt sharp, metallic, and cold. It was the gait of someone who had spent a lifetime holding a blade.
He smiled and waved at a group of girls, but his eyes constantly scanned the room—a predator casually strolling through a flock of birds.
I should feel a twinge of standard male jealousy, so I frowned slightly, muttered, “Show-off,” and went back to my food. The mask remained intact.
⚔️ Afternoon: Traverse & Adapt
16:00 PM - Kuoh Town Outskirts (Near the Shrine)
After school, I avoided the main roads. I headed toward the wooded, hilly area near the local shrine to push my cardiovascular limits in a varied environment.
14. Traverse & Adapt (Open World / Parkour). I didn’t stick to the paved paths. I ran through the trees, vaulting over exposed roots, sliding under low-hanging branches, and scrambling up steep embankments. The uneven terrain forced my ankles and knees to constantly micro-adjust, building stabilizing strength.
I reached a stone retaining wall near the shrine’s rear entrance. I planted my foot, drove my knee upward, and pulled myself over the ledge, landing softly on the mossy ground.
I knelt there for a moment, catching my breath.
Then, the atmospheric pressure plummeted. My body reacted before my brain did. My arm hairs stood on end, and a sharp, metallic taste flooded my mouth. The scent of ozone and impending rain overwhelmed the smell of the forest.
I looked up. Walking down the stone steps of the shrine was Akeno Himejima.
She wasn’t doing anything threatening. She was just walking, carrying a small paper bag, humming a soft tune. But the sheer density of the aura bleeding off her felt like standing beneath a massive thundercloud seconds before a lightning strike. The sheer voltage was staggering.
She noticed me kneeling near the wall. She stopped, tilting her head, a soft, enigmatic smile playing on her lips.
“Oh my,” she said, her voice like velvet. “Are you lost, underclassman? Or just enjoying a very energetic walk in the woods?”
I forced a flush of embarrassment to my cheeks, scrambling to my feet and brushing the dirt off my pants. I played the role of the flustered, caught-off-guard boy perfectly.
“I-I was just jogging, Himejima-senpai. Taking a shortcut.” I bowed awkwardly.
“Fufufu,” she chuckled, her eyes sparkling with an unreadable amusement. “Be careful on these paths. They can be quite treacherous if you aren’t paying attention.”
She walked past me. The static charge in the air slowly dissipated as she descended the hill. I exhaled a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. The entities in this town are walking natural disasters.
🌙 Evening: The Library of Motion - Wing Chun
19:30 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
I needed to recalibrate. After the sheer, overwhelming presence of Akeno Himejima, I needed an art focused entirely on defense and deflection.
17. The Library of Motion: Wing Chun.
I stood in the center of the living room, adopting the Yee Jee Kim Yeung Ma (the goat-clamping stance). Knees slightly bent and turned inward, protecting the groin and rooting the center of gravity.
- The Theory: Control the centerline. The shortest distance between two points is a straight line.
- The Practice: I drilled the Lin Wan Kuen (chain punches). I didn’t pull my hands back to my hips; one hand fired out from the center of my chest while the other immediately followed, creating a relentless, rolling barrage of strikes.
- The Trapping: I visualized an opponent throwing a wide, sweeping hook. I practiced the Bong Sao (wing arm) to deflect the kinetic energy outward, instantly following up with a palm strike to the throat.
Wing Chun assumes the opponent is larger and stronger. It relies on structure rather than muscle. I practiced redirecting force until my triceps burned and my knuckles were raw from cutting through the air.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:15 PM - Bedroom
My body was thoroughly exhausted, my nervous system buzzing from the physical exertion and the intense encounter near the shrine.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I lay flat, staring into the dark. I visualized the blackboard. I erased Yuuto Kiba’s perfect, balanced stride. I erased the terrifying, suffocating static charge of Akeno Himejima. I erased the rapid-fire geometry of the Wing Chun punches.
I am Fajar. I am an ordinary student. I was flustered by a pretty senior today.
The suggestion took hold, wrapping my consciousness in the safe, quiet blanket of humanity. Ten days left. I surrendered to the dark.
Day 11
Date: Thursday (Week 2) Location: Kuoh Academy & Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
Nine days left.
The alarm rang, piercing the quiet of the apartment. I pulled myself off the mattress. The heavy soreness in my calves and the deep ache from the Wing Chun centerline drills had synthesized into a dense, functional tension. The human frame was adapting, reinforcing the micro-tears with thicker muscle fibers.
I immediately initiated Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4). I moved through the joint rotations, focusing on the synovial fluid lubricating my knees and shoulders. As I transitioned into the ground mechanics and primal crawls, I made sure my breathing remained completely synchronized with my movements. I should feel the accumulating exhaustion of the school week, so I deliberately dragged my heels against the floorboards as I walked to the bathroom, letting my eyelids droop to play the part of a fatigued student.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Thoracic Circuit
10:45 AM - Chemistry Class
The teacher was explaining molecular bonds, his chalk tapping rhythmically against the board. Issei was staring blankly at his textbook, his mind clearly a million miles away, likely obsessing over the logistics of his upcoming Sunday date.
I kept my pen in hand, simulating taking notes, but turned my internal focus inward. 8. Bio-Feedback (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target: The chest and pectoral region.
- The Focus: The chest houses the lungs and heart, areas heavily guarded by the sympathetic nervous system. I grounded my feet and directed my complete attention to the sternum and the surrounding muscle tissue.
- The Symptom: Almost immediately, the physical feedback triggered. It started as an intense “ant crawling” sensation—formication—spreading across my pectorals. It felt like static electricity dancing just beneath the skin, a sign of the nervous system hyper-focusing on the targeted area.
- The Shift: I didn’t tense up. I used the Physiological Sigh. Exhale. Surrender the guard. I visualized opening the vascular valves in the chest cavity. The static, crawling sensation dissolved smoothly, replaced by a profound, radiating warmth. It felt as if a small, heated stone was resting perfectly over my sternum, expanding my lung capacity and dropping my resting heart rate to a slow, powerful rhythm. I should be bored by the chemistry lecture, so I propped my chin on my hand, looking completely disengaged while my internal engine hummed perfectly.
🍱 Lunch: The Art of Invisibility
12:30 PM - School Cafeteria
The cafeteria was loud and chaotic. I sat at our usual table with the Trio. Issei was rambling about which movie theater had the best popcorn, while Matsuda and Motohama were actively trying to ruin his mood by calculating the statistical probability of him being stood up.
“It’s 87.5 percent, Issei,” Motohama adjusted his glasses. “The math doesn’t lie.”
I decided to use this distracted environment for 12. The Art of Invisibility (Stealth). Stealth in a crowded room isn’t about hiding in shadows; it’s about psychological erasure. Humans track movement and noise. If you eliminate both, you drop off their sensory radar.
- The Drill: I stopped contributing to the conversation. I slowed my breathing, matching the ambient noise of the cafeteria. I physically shrank my posture, rolling my shoulders inward to minimize my silhouette.
- The Execution: While Issei was loudly protesting Motohama’s math, I stood up from the table. I rolled my weight from the outside of my foot to the inside, eliminating the squeak of my shoes. I walked to the vending machines, bought a drink, and returned.
I slid back into my seat without making a sound.
“…and Fajar agrees with me! Right, Fajar?” Issei turned to my seat, jumping slightly when he realized I was already sitting there sipping a juice box. “Whoa, when did you get back?” Matsuda blinked, genuinely confused.
“Just now,” I said mildly. I should find their lack of awareness amusing, so I offered a small, standard smile. My physical presence had been completely ignored. The exercise was a success.
⚔️ Afternoon: Improvised Weaponry
16:30 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
I headed straight home after the final bell. I locked the door and moved to the center of the living room, gathering a few mundane items.
11. Improvised Weaponry (Common Tools). I needed to expand my arsenal beyond the rolled-up magazine. Today, I focused on a thick, hardbound textbook and a leather belt.
- The Belt: I wrapped the tail end tightly around my knuckles, leaving the heavy brass buckle swinging free. I practiced whipping it in figure-eight patterns. It created a terrifying snapping sound. It was an extender of reach, capable of shattering bone or blinding an opponent.
- The Textbook: I held it in a double grip. I practiced using the flat surface to violently parry incoming strikes, then driving the rigid corner of the spine forward into a hypothetical opponent’s face or throat.
A weapon is only as good as the body wielding it. I drilled the transitions—parrying with the book, whipping the belt—until my forearms burned and my grip strength was pushed to its absolute limit.
🌙 Evening: Close Quarter Combats (CQC)
19:00 PM - The Bathroom
The living room was too spacious. I needed the claustrophobia of a truly confined space. I moved into the small bathroom, shutting the door behind me.
15. Close Quarter Combats (CQC). There was barely enough room to turn around. The sink was at my back; the shower glass was to my right.
- The Drill: I visualized a larger, stronger opponent rushing me in this tight corridor. I couldn’t retreat, and I couldn’t throw wide punches.
- The Mechanics: I dropped my center of gravity, bringing my forearms up in a tight shield. I practiced short, brutal horizontal elbows, generating power purely from the explosive torque of my hips. I drilled the “dirty boxing” aspects—grabbing the back of the neck, stepping on the opponent’s foot to destroy their mobility, and driving knees upward.
In a space this tight, survival relies on brutal, instantaneous violence. I repeatedly struck the open air, stopping mere millimeters from the tiled walls, ensuring perfect kinetic control.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:00 PM - Bedroom
I took a cold shower to bring down my core temperature and soothe the micro-traumas in my muscles.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. I summoned the mental blackboard. I erased the satisfying weight of the belt buckle. I erased the claustrophobia of the bathroom walls. I erased the deep, electrical warmth in my chest cavity.
I am Fajar. I am a normal human. I am just a student going through his daily routine.
The self-suggestion blanketed my mind, burying the sharp instincts of the day. Nine days left. I closed my eyes and let the physical exhaustion pull me into a deep sleep.
Day 12
Date: Friday (Week 2) Location: Kuoh Academy & Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
Eight days left.
The alarm buzzed. I rolled off the mattress, feeling the compound fatigue of the week settled deep into my joints. I immediately initiated Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4).
I went through the joint rotations and primal crawls to pump blood back into the stiffened muscle tissues. The human body requires constant mechanical upkeep to prevent degradation. I should be desperately looking forward to the weekend, so I let out a prolonged, dramatic groan as I stood up, allowing my shoulders to slump in perfect alignment with a fatigued high schooler’s posture.
☀️ Class/Noon: The Cervical Bio-Feedback
11:00 AM - English Class
The teacher was writing vocabulary words on the board. Issei was bouncing his leg erratically, the impending reality of his Sunday date driving his anxiety into overdrive.
I kept my gaze forward and engaged 8. Bio-Feedback (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target was the neck, specifically the cervical spine and the sternocleidomastoid muscles.
- The Symptom: I directed my focus to the base of my skull. The nervous system responded instantly with a severe “ant crawling” sensation—a localized formication. It felt as though hundreds of tiny insects were scrambling under the skin along my vertebrae, a biological alarm signaling intense structural tension.
- The Shift: I held my focus steady and utilized a deep diaphragmatic exhale. Release the guard. The crawling sensation peaked, then rapidly dissolved, replaced by a deep, flushing warmth. The heavy, restrictive tension in my neck vanished, granting me instant mental clarity and a wider field of peripheral vision. I should be bored, so I rested my chin on my palm, looking completely zoned out.
🍱 Lunch: Primal Instincts
12:30 PM - Behind the Old Gymnasium
I ate my lunch quickly in the cafeteria before slipping away from the Trio. I needed an isolated environment.
9. Primal Instincts (Quarrel Movements). I stood in the grassy patch behind the old gym. I stripped away the structured martial arts and focused on pure survival panic.
- The Mechanics: I practiced frantic, explosive movements. I simulated an attacker grabbing my throat. Instead of a clean martial block, I drilled violent eye-gouges, tearing motions, and dropping my body weight abruptly to break a grapple.
- The Mindset: The movements were intentionally ugly and desperate. This is the reality of human violence—a chaotic scramble where clean technique degrades into animalistic survival.
⚔️ Afternoon: The Library of Motion - Silat
16:30 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
I headed straight home. The weekend was approaching, and I needed to expand my close-quarters lethality.
17. The Library of Motion: Silat. This Southeast Asian art focuses on destructive entries and joint manipulation.
- The Stance: Extremely low, deeply rooted, minimizing the target area.
- The Execution: I visualized incoming strikes and practiced shearing deflections—using the point of my elbow to intercept a fist, destroying the attacker’s hand on impact.
- The Follow-up: I drilled sweeping the opponent’s base and simulating the use of a kerambit (curved blade) to target the femoral and carotid arteries. It was a cold, brutal session focused entirely on biomechanical dismantling.
🌙 Evening: The Library of Motion - Jeet Kune Do
19:30 PM - Living Room
I shifted gears. From the low, destructive mechanics of Silat, I moved to the philosophy of interception.
17. The Library of Motion: Jeet Kune Do.
- The Principle: The way of the intercepting fist. Stop the attack before it fully deploys.
- The Practice: I adopted the modified fencing stance, keeping my strong side forward. I practiced the lead straight punch, firing from the hip without telegraphing the shoulder.
- The Efficiency: I minimized all wasted motion. If an imaginary opponent stepped forward, I didn’t block; I struck their advancing center of gravity. I drilled the explosive bursts of speed until my knuckles burned and my lungs ached for oxygen.
🛌 Night: The Reset
22:15 PM - Bedroom
My body was thoroughly taxed, caught between the brutal joint trauma of Silat and the kinetic bursts of JKD.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I laid flat in the darkness. I brought up the mental blackboard. I erased the frantic eye-gouges behind the gym. I erased the destructive elbow deflections. I erased the intercepting punches.
I am Fajar. I am a normal human. I survived another week of school.
The suggestion cemented itself in my mind. Eight days left. I closed my eyes and surrendered to the physical recovery of sleep.
Day 13
Date: Saturday (Week 2) Location: Fajar’s Apartment Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
07:00 AM - Living Room Floor
Seven days left.
I allowed my mortal frame an extra hour of rest before waking. The apartment was entirely quiet, devoid of the weekday rush. I immediately moved into Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4).
The primal crawls and joint rotations felt incredibly fluid. My connective tissues had adapted to the daily microscopic trauma, weaving a denser fascial web. I should be relishing the lazy Saturday morning like any normal teenager, so I let out a wide, dramatic yawn and stumbled slightly on my way to the kitchen for a glass of water, maintaining the illusion of baseline human grogginess. Tomorrow is Sunday. The day of Issei’s date.
☀️ Noon: Visualization Protocol (Body Hardening)
10:30 AM - Living Room
Today required pushing the physical structure to its isometric limits.
19. Visualization Protocol (Body Hardening). Without supernatural reinforcement, a human body must rely on structural density to survive blunt trauma.
- The Mechanics: I stood in a neutral stance and began systematically isolating and tensing every individual muscle group to absolute failure.
- The Execution: I started with the calves, pulling the muscle fibers taut against the bone. I moved to the quadriceps, the glutes, and the core. I visualized the abdominal wall turning into a rigid plate of armor. I tensed the pectorals, the lats, and finally, the forearms and neck.
- The Result: By holding maximum isometric tension across the entire body for sixty seconds at a time, my heart rate skyrocketed. Sweat pooled on the floor. I was manually conditioning the nervous system to recruit 100% of the muscle fibers simultaneously on command, creating a momentary, biological shield against impact.
🍱 Afternoon: Integrated Combat Summary
13:30 PM - Living Room
I ate a high-protein lunch, let it settle, and then combined the morning’s theory with dynamic movement.
10. Combat Summary (Basic Martial Arts) + 19 (Body Hardening).
- The Drill: I shadowboxed through the basic alphabet of violence—jabs, crosses, hooks, and elbows.
- The Integration: At the exact microsecond of hypothetical impact, I engaged the Visualization Protocol. I violently exhaled and tensed the entire kinetic chain—from the rooting foot, through the twisting hip, locking the core, and hardening the striking arm.
- The Feedback: The sudden stops sent shockwaves back through my own joints. It was exhausting. Striking the air with full muscular engagement burned through my oxygen reserves exponentially faster than fluid shadowboxing. It forced my body to understand the physical cost of generating lethal, unarmed stopping power.
⚔️ Late Afternoon: Sensory Deprivation
16:00 PM - Living Room
I closed the blinds, plunging the room into shadow, and tied a dark t-shirt tightly over my eyes.
Attempt 22. Only Blindfolded Training. Sight is a crutch. If the environment goes dark, or if I am blinded by debris, the vestibular system must take over.
- Spatial Awareness: I began to move cautiously, mapping the dimensions of the coffee table and the couch purely through memory and the faint shifts in air currents.
- The Execution: I threw slow combinations. Instantly, my balance wavered. Without the horizon line to anchor my vision, my inner ear struggled to establish equilibrium.
- The Adaptation: I widened my base and lowered my center of gravity. I relied on the sound of my own footwork against the floorboards to gauge my position. When I threw a kick, I almost fell over, forcing me to aggressively snap my foot back to the ground to catch my weight. The human brain frantically rewired its sensory hierarchy in real-time.
🌙 Evening: Entertainment Time
19:30 PM - Bedroom / Laptop
My muscles were twitching from the intense isometric load. I sat at my desk to feed the combat psychology of my mortal avatar.
I strictly consumed human-tier tactical violence.
- I reread chapters of Return of the Bloodthirsty Police and Teenage Mercenary, absorbing the cold, methodical dismantling of larger opponents through superior speed and striking accuracy.
- I watched The Boxer and Weak Hero, internalizing Gray Yeon’s ruthless use of the environment to bridge the gap in physical strength.
- I reviewed Samurai Champloo and Hajime no Ippo, focusing on the millimeter-precise deflections and the grueling, bleeding desperation required to win a mortal fight.
The subconscious blockade remained firmly in place. Any intrusive thought of planetary-scale power or magical systems was instantly suffocated by a wave of heavy apathy, anchoring me flawlessly to the grit and limitations of flesh and bone.
🛌 Night: The Reset
23:00 PM - Bedroom
My physical vessel was thoroughly exhausted. The isometric tension had left a deep, radiating ache in my core and forearms.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I lay flat on my back in the dark. I summoned the mental blackboard. I erased the suffocating darkness of the blindfold. I erased the burning sensation of the full-body muscular lock. I erased the cold, tactical violence on the laptop screen.
I am Fajar. I am an ordinary human. Tomorrow, my friend Issei goes on a date.
The suggestion wrapped securely around my mind. Tomorrow at sunset, the blood would spill. I closed my eyes and descended into sleep.
Day 14
Date: Sunday (Week 2) Location: Kuoh Town & Central Park Status: Normal Human (Method Acting deeply engaged)
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
The day of the date. Six days left until the third week.
I awoke before the alarm. The atmosphere in the quiet apartment felt unnaturally heavy, as if the air itself were under high voltage. I sat up on the floor and immediately executed Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4).
I went through every joint rotation, joint-loading squat, and primal crawl with absolute deliberation. My fascial system was fully primed, the muscle tissue dense and reactive from two weeks of ruthless mechanical conditioning. I should feel an unexplainable knot of anxiety in my stomach today, so I allowed my hands to tremble slightly as I laced up my sneakers, leaning into the physiological signals of an impending storm.
☀️ Midday: The Cranial Bio-Feedback
11:00 AM - Living Room
I sat cross-legged in the center of the room, preparing the most sensitive region of the human body.
8. Bio-Feedback (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target: The head, scalp, and cranial fascia (the apex of the Baihui node and trigeminal nerve pathways).
- The Focus: I directed my entire internal awareness upward, mapping the thin layer of muscle and connective tissue stretched across my skull.
- The Symptom: The neuro-somatic feedback was violent. The “ant crawling” sensation erupted instantly across my scalp. It felt as though thousands of microscopic needles were pricking the surface of my skull, a massive sensory overload as the nervous system hyper-focused on the brain’s protective casing.
- The Shift: I initiated a double-inhale, slow-exhale Physiological Sigh. Surrender structural tension. I held my focus steady on the static storm until the crawling sensation broke. A sudden, deep wave of liquid warmth washed over my entire head, dropping from the crown down to my jaw. The neurological noise cleared completely, leaving my sensory processing extraordinarily sharp and absolute.
🎒 Afternoon: Inventory & Preparation
14:00 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
It was time to gear up. A normal human going into an unknown threat profile does not go empty-handed.
Inventory Preparations:
- The Main Weapon: A high-carbon steel, full-tang combat knife with a non-reflective black finish. I secured its hard Kydex sheath inside my waistband at the small of my back—concealed, accessible by either hand, and positioned for a rapid draw.
- Concealed Tools: A heavy metal tactical pen clipped into my front pocket, a small high-lumen strobe flashlight, and a roll of high-tensile grip tape wrapped around my wrists beneath a dark jacket.
- Apparel: Reinforced leather boots, thick denim, and a low-profile windbreaker.
I checked my reflection in the glass door. I looked like an ordinary, slightly edgy high school student dressed for a cool evening. The lethal utility was completely hidden beneath the fabric.
🌆 Late Afternoon: The Stalk
16:30 PM - Central Park Fountain
Using 12. The Art of Invisibility (Stealth), I shadowed Issei from a distance of fifty meters. He was wearing his best jacket, pacing nervously around the central stone fountain in the park, holding a cheap plush toy he had won for Yuuma.
Yuuma Amano was standing beside him, wearing a white dress, holding his arm with a sweet, delicate expression.
I melted into the shadow of a dense oak tree near the park’s perimeter, matching my breathing to the rustle of the leaves. Through my overclocked sensory field, the illusion was grotesque.
To anyone else, they were a cute teenage couple. To my refined biological sensors, the air around Yuuma was suffocating. The scent of ozone was so thick it burned the back of my throat, and the faint, jagged distortion of light behind her back indicated a physical mass trying to tear its way through reality.
She was leading him toward the isolated area near the fountain as the park began to empty. The sun began its final descent, painting the sky in violent shades of crimson and violet.
⚔️ Sunset: The Intervention
18:00 PM - Central Park Fountain
The park was silent. The last family had walked out the gates.
Issei and Yuuma stood alone by the water.
“Issei-kun?” Yuuma’s voice echoed in the evening quiet, high-pitched and sweet. “Would you… do something for me?”
“A-Anything, Yuuma-chan!” Issei stammered, blushing furiously.
“Would you die for me?”
Issei froze. “Huh…?”
The atmosphere ruptured.
A violent wave of atmospheric pressure blasted outward from her body, blowing back the fallen leaves. Black feathers materialized in the air as a pair of massive, ink-black wings tore through the back of her dress. Her sweet expression melted into a sadistic, terrifying sneer.
“My name is Raynare,” she purred, her voice dripping with cruel amusement. “And you, little boy, are a dangerous variable that needs to be erased.”
She raised her right hand. Static electricity crackled wildly in the air, gathering into a blinding spear of light. The sheer energy radiating from the weapon scorched the grass beneath her feet.
Issei stumbled backward, tripping over his own feet, paralyzed by raw, primal horror. His jaw worked, but no sound came out. He stared at the spear of light, completely trapped in the headlights of his own execution.
“Goodbye, Issei-kun!” Raynare laughed, pulling her arm back and launching the light spear directly at his exposed chest at terrifying speed.
Kinetic drive. Explode.
Every drilled reaction in my physical vessel fired simultaneously. I didn’t think; my conditioned nervous system took over.
Using the maximum rotational force of my legs and core, I burst from the tree line like a bullet. The grass tore beneath my boots. In a fraction of a second, I closed the distance, lunging laterally through the air with my low-center-of-gravity sprint.
I slammed my shoulder directly into Issei’s midsection mid-flight.
CRACK-BOOM!
The spear of light impaled the concrete where Issei had been standing milliseconds prior, detonating in a blinding flash of kinetic force and scorching heat that shattered the fountain’s edge.
Issei and I rolled violently across the dirt, tumbling away from the explosion as stone shrapnel rained down around us. I dug my boots into the earth, stopping our momentum, and shoved Issei behind my body.
My right hand reached behind my lower back, my fingers locking firmly around the hilt of the concealed knife. I stood low in my stance, eyes locked on the fallen angel hovering above us.
The smoke from the shattered concrete cleared, leaving a ringing silence in the park. Issei scrambled backward in the dirt, hyperventilating, his eyes darting between me and the massive, ink-black wings protruding from his date.
“Fajar?” Issei choked out, his voice cracking with terror. “What… what is she?!”
“Stay behind me, Issei,” I ordered. I kept my voice perfectly level, completely devoid of the paralyzing panic a normal teenager should be experiencing.
Raynare clicked her tongue, floating a few feet above the scorched grass. Her sweet facade was entirely gone, replaced by arrogant disgust. “An interception? How annoying. You were just supposed to be the clueless friend. No matter, I’ll just skewer you both.”
She didn’t chant. She simply raised her hand, and a second crackling spear of light materialized. She lunged, thrusting the weapon forward like a clumsy fencer.
To a normal human, her velocity was terrifying. To my hyper-conditioned sensory field, her mechanics were a complete disaster. She had zero centerline control, her hips were completely squared, and she telegraphed the strike entirely through her right shoulder. She relied purely on overwhelming supernatural stats, utterly devoid of true martial discipline.
I didn’t attempt to block the magic. I executed a Wing Chun Bong Sao (wing arm) to parry the physical wrist holding the spear, letting the lethal heat of the weapon graze harmlessly past my ear. Simultaneously, I stepped inside her guard, dropping my center of gravity into a deeply rooted Silat stance. I bypassed her armored corset and drove the heavy steel pommel of my combat knife directly into her floating rib.
CRACK.
Raynare gasped, a shockwave of pain widening her eyes as the air was violently emptied from her lungs. The light spear fizzled out. Before she could flap her wings to retreat, I pivoted, hooking my boot behind her ankle to destroy her base, and delivered a brutal, twisting elbow strike directly to her jaw.
She crashed heavily into the dirt, skidding across the grass.
I held my stance, breathing in a steady rhythm, but a sudden, chilling realization hit my mind. This is wrong. I was winning. I had seamlessly dismantled a Fallen Angel using nothing but applied physics and human biomechanics. If Raynare was defeated here, Issei wouldn’t die. If Issei didn’t die, Rias Gremory wouldn’t resurrect him as a devil. The entire foundation of the canon timeline was actively collapsing because my mortal avatar was too technically lethal.
Before I could calculate a way to intentionally throw the fight without getting us both killed, the atmospheric pressure violently doubled.
Two massive, heavy signatures materialized in the sky above us, dropping like stones onto the grass beside Raynare. One was a sharp-featured man in a fedora and trench coat—Dohnaseek. The other was a tall woman with flowing blue hair—Kalawarner.
“Pathetic, Raynare,” Dohnaseek sneered, manifesting a light spear twice the size of hers. “Bested by a human child?”
I tightened my grip on the knife handle, feeling a bead of cold sweat trace down my neck. They weren’t supposed to be here. The reinforcements were an anomaly, a direct, aggressive immune response from the world itself. Because I had broken the script by winning, the plot was forcibly rewriting the variables to ensure the execution happened.
The air in the park turned scorching hot as Dohnaseek launched his massive light spear. It wasn’t a thrust; it was a sweeping, horizontal cleave designed to cut me in half.
I didn’t block. Blocking supernatural mass with human bones results in amputation. I dropped instantly, executing a Silat ground-evasion, letting the blinding light scorch the air millimeters above my scalp. From my crouch, I whipped my arm out, hurling the heavy tactical pen from my pocket like a throwing knife. It struck DohnThe metallic tang of blood mixed heavily with the sudden, pouring rain. Fajar stood in the center of the ruined park, his breathing perfectly even despite the violent clash that had just concluded. His movements had been a masterclass in lethal precision, his strikes landing with calculated devastation against the feathered assailants, yet the arithmetic of combat had failed him in one crucial metric: he was a fraction of a second too late to intercept the spear of light that pierced Issei’s chest.
The fallen angels had retreated, leaving behind the dying boy and a witness who refused to panic. Fajar simply knelt beside Issei, his sharp eyes assessing the fatal wound. There was no medical salvation here. He remained completely motionless, a silent sentinel in the downpour, waiting for the supernatural contingency he suspected was coming.
The air grew heavy, thick with the scent of ozone and demonic power, before a brilliant crimson magic circle flared to life on the wet asphalt. From the bloody luminescence stepped Rias Gremory. Canonically composed, fiercely proud, and accustomed to holding the absolute upper hand in the human realm, Rias paused. Her azure eyes darted from Issei’s fading form to Fajar. She expected to find a hysterical friend or a terrified bystander whose memory would need immediate altering. Instead, she found a warrior watching her with unnerving, clinical detachment.
“You are exceptionally calm for someone surrounded by death and magic,” Rias noted, her voice carrying that signature blend of regal authority and underlying curiosity. She moved gracefully toward Issei, her demonic aura expanding to claim the territory, subtly testing Fajar’s resolve.
He didn’t flinch. “He doesn’t have much time,” Fajar stated simply, his voice a flat, steady baritone that cut through the rain. He took a single, deliberate step back, yielding the space not out of submission, but out of tactical necessity.
Intrigued by this anomaly but bound by her immediate objective, Rias turned her full attention to the dying boy. She knelt, her crimson hair spilling over Issei’s chest as she summoned the eight Pawn pieces. While she performed the ritual to bind Issei’s soul to the Gremory clan, she remained acutely aware of Fajar’s presence. Rias was inherently a tactician; she recognized that a man who could survive a Fallen Angel ambush and watch a devil’s reincarnation without a spike in his heart rate was a wild card she would inevitably need to confront. But for tonight, as the glowing red pieces sank into Issei’s chest to pull him back from the abyss, she allowed the stoic warrior to witness the birth of her newest servant.
The crimson light faded into the rain, leaving Issei’s chest completely unblemished. His breathing settled into a steady, mortal rhythm. Rias Gremory stood up, the ethereal bat wings folding behind her back as she turned her full, undivided attention to me.
“He will live,” she stated, her tone laced with absolute authority, clearly expecting a display of overwhelming relief or hysterical questioning.
“Acknowledged,” I replied, my hands remaining loosely at my sides.
Her perfectly sculpted brow furrowed. “You have witnessed an ecosystem that humanity is fundamentally blind to. For your own safety, and for the absolute secrecy of my clan, I must erase your memory of this night.”
She raised her hand, a soft, hypnotic red aura blooming in her palm.
A standard mortal mind would be immediately entranced, its neural pathways easily isolated and rewritten by demonic suggestion. I did not resist. Instead, I executed Neurological Surrender. To maintain the flawless integrity of my normal human avatar, I had to allow the supernatural frequency to penetrate my conscious mind. I completely dropped my mental guard, letting the heavy, lethargic weight of the demonic magic wash over my senses, while safely archiving the raw combat data deep within my subconscious vault, secured behind the impenetrable wall of my self-suggestion.
“Forget this, and sleep,” Rias commanded softly.
The red light flashed. I allowed my eyes to roll back, cutting the tension in my legs to collapse bonelessly onto the wet grass, simulating a perfect, chemically induced blackout.
Monday Morning - Week 3
I awoke in my own bed. The physical tax of exceeding mortal biomechanical limits had arrived to collect its debt. My ribs screamed with deep tissue contusions, and my forearms were painted in ugly, mottled bruises from narrowly deflecting Dohnaseek’s kinetic blasts. I dragged myself through Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance, manually forcing blood into the damaged fascia.
When I arrived at Kuoh Academy, the timeline had officially shifted. Issei sat at his desk, staring at his hands with a haunted, deeply confused expression. His mortal life had ended; he was now a Pawn.
I took my seat, adopting the posture of an ordinary, slightly fatigued student. However, my overclocked sensory field immediately registered a sharp, dense gaze fixed on the back of my neck. From the hallway, Rias Gremory was watching me. Her eyes were analytical, stripping away my mundane posture. She had executed the memory wipe flawlessly, yet my sheer survival against three Fallen Angels remained a mathematical impossibility in her tactical mind.
How deeply should I allow Rias to investigate my background before feeding her a fabricated alibi?
I do not have backend access to your private Google Workspace to retrieve the Fajar Purnama Infinite Reality Biography. To ensure I capture his true cosmic scale and absolute immunities accurately, please paste the core lore, rules of his existence, or the biography itself directly into our chat.
Here is the corrected reality of that Monday morning, establishing the absolute failure of the memory wipe based on his true nature:
Monday Morning - Week 3 (The Anomaly)
I awoke in my own bed. The physical tax of the fight remained—bruised ribs and battered forearms from deflecting kinetic blasts—but my mind was razor-sharp.
I remembered the park. I remembered the spears of light, the Fallen Angels, and the crimson magic circle of Rias Gremory.
The memory wipe had completely failed.
The Paradox of the Mortal Avatar
- The Attempt: I had executed Neurological Surrender. I actively lowered my mental defenses, inviting the demonic magic to rewrite my short-term memory to perfectly simulate a fragile human psyche.
- The Reality: Localized dimensional magic cannot overwrite an Infinite Reality consciousness. The demonic suggestion washed over my mind, found no mortal anchor it could actually alter, and simply evaporated. I faked the physical blackout flawlessly, but the “Normal Human” restriction I placed on myself cannot bypass my absolute conceptual immunities. I cannot be forced to forget.
When I arrived at Kuoh Academy, the timeline had shifted. Issei sat at his desk, staring at his hands with a haunted, confused expression, clearly feeling the phantom weight of his death and rebirth as a Pawn.
I took my seat, adopting the slouch of a fatigued teenager. Instantly, my sensory field registered a heavy, calculating gaze fixed on the back of my neck from the hallway.
Rias Gremory was watching me.
She believed her memory wipe was a complete success. Yet, my survival against three Fallen Angels remained a glaring, impossible variable in her tactical mind. She was analyzing a boy she thought was a blank slate, entirely unaware that I retained full tactical knowledge of her, her clan, and the incoming supernatural war.
Please provide the details from the Infinite Reality Biography so we can properly define how Fajar navigates this broken restriction moving forward.
Day 15
Morning: Recovery & Reality The physical toll of exceeding mortal biomechanical limits settled deep into my bones by dawn. I bypassed the standard kinetic foundation, prioritizing cellular repair for my bruised ribs and battered forearms. Across town, Issei awoke undoubtedly grappling with the heavy, phantom weight of his resurrection and the unfamiliar hum of his new demonic physiology.
Class/Noon: Joint Bio-Feedback During morning lectures, Issei kept stealing frantic, confused glances at me. I maintained my baseline posture and engaged 8. Bio-Feedback (Awareness & Relaxation). My target was the synovial joints—knees, elbows, and shoulders—which had absorbed the shockwaves of Dohnaseek’s kinetic blasts. I localized my internal awareness until the intense “ant crawling” sensation covered my joints, a sign of the nervous system’s acute hyper-fixation on the trauma. With a deep, rhythmic exhale, I forced the structural tension to drop. The crawling static smoothly dissolved into a deep, flushing warmth, actively accelerating blood flow and reducing the inflammation.
Lunch: The Amnesia Reveal Issei cornered me by the courtyard vending machines, looking like a man on the edge of a breakdown. “Fajar,” he whispered, his voice trembling. “About yesterday… with Yuuma-chan. Did we… go to the park?” He was desperately hoping it was just a vivid nightmare, assuming my memory had been flawlessly wiped.
“Yes, Issei,” I answered directly, keeping my expression entirely flat. “We went to the park. The girl sprouted black wings and put a spear of light through your chest. I engaged her, we were overpowered, and a woman with crimson hair arrived to save you.”
Issei’s face completely drained of color. His knees gave out, and he slid down against the vending machine, clutching his chest. I didn’t offer false comfort; I simply left him to process the shattered reality of his world, finding a quiet bench to resume my somatic recovery.
Afternoon: Divergent Paths When the final bell rang, we did not cross paths. Canon dictated that Rias Gremory was carefully observing Issei’s every move, evaluating her new Pawn. I deliberately removed myself from their operational radius, returning straight to my apartment to avoid interfering with the script.
Evening: The Park Ambush While I sat quietly in the center of my living room—focusing entirely on circulating oxygenated blood to repair the micro-tears in my muscle tissue—Dohnaseek ambushed Issei at the local park. I felt the distant, violent spike in atmospheric pressure. Issei would be unlocking his Sacred Gear tonight, pushed to the brink of death once again. I held my position, dedicating all my energy to internal recovery.
Night: The Mental Reset Rias Gremory arrived to save him, officially finalizing his entry into the underworld. I lay on my mattress and engaged 4. Mental Reset. I visualized the blackboard and erased the lingering ache in my ribs. The canon script was back on track, but I was now an active, un-wiped anomaly. I surrendered to sleep, letting the mortal vessel heal.
Day 16
Morning: The Crimson Awakening & Recovery
While I remained on my apartment floor forcing oxygenated blood into my bruised ribs, a vastly different morning was unfolding at the Hyoudou residence. My overclocked sensory field, combined with my intrinsic knowledge of the timeline, painted a vivid picture of the absolute chaos.
Issei had awoken to the sensation of soft, warm skin pressing against his chest. Rias Gremory was sharing his bed, completely naked.
“Good morning, Issei,” Rias purred, her crimson hair spilling across the sheets. She was flawlessly composed, watching his brain violently short-circuit.
“B-B-Buchou?!” Issei shrieked, scrambling backward until he hit the headboard, his face matching the color of her hair. “Why are you naked in my bed?!”
“I prefer sleeping like this,” she replied smoothly, sitting up and making zero effort to hide her spectacular figure. “Besides, you are my cute servant now. What’s mine is mine.”
Before Issei could process the sheer sensory overload, the bedroom door swung open. His mother stood frozen in the doorway, holding a laundry basket. She stared at Issei, then at the stunning, naked foreign girl in his bed.
“I… I told you to knock!” Issei wailed.
His mother’s face shifted from shock to overwhelming pride. “Oh, Issei! You finally became a man! And with such a beautiful girl! I’ll go make a celebratory breakfast!” She slammed the door shut, leaving Issei to die of embarrassment while Rias simply giggled.
Meanwhile, I initiated my cellular recovery, exhaling deeply to flush the lingering lactic acid from my system. The mortal vessel requires patience.
Class/Noon: Lower Dantian Bio-Feedback
During math class, Issei was completely useless, vibrating with residual adrenaline and teenage fantasies. I ignored his erratic energy and engaged 8. Bio-Feedback.
Today’s target was the Lower Dantian, roughly two inches below the navel. I directed my focus inward. The nervous system responded with an intense formication—a violent “ant crawling” sensation swarming across my lower abdomen. I utilized the Physiological Sigh to drop the structural guard. The crawling static dissolved instantly into a dense, radiating pool of warmth, centering my balance and grounding my internal kinetic engine.
Lunch: The Prince’s Escort
The classroom door slid open, instantly silencing the room. Yuuto Kiba stood in the threshold, offering a flawless, polite smile that made half the girls in the room audibly sigh.
“Excuse me,” Kiba said, his eyes locking onto Issei. “Hyoudou Issei-kun? The President has requested your presence.”
The male students erupted into furious muttering. Kiba gracefully ignored them, walking Issei out of the room. I simply watched them leave. The pawn was being summoned to the board.
Afternoon: The Occult Research Club
While Issei was formally introduced to the old school building, meeting the sadistic elegance of Akeno Himejima and the quiet, crushing strength of Koneko Toujou, I remained detached from the main cast. The anomaly must not overcrowd the narrative early on. I spent the afternoon recalibrating my baseline physical conditioning, ensuring the micro-tears in my fascia were fully healed from the Fallen Angel encounter.
Evening: Pamphlet Distribution & Middle Dantian
As the sun set, Issei was pedaling furiously around Kuoh on a bicycle, distributing ORC summoning pamphlets. I sat in my living room, continuing the somatic conditioning. I moved my focus up to the Middle Dantian, located at the solar plexus. The ant-crawling sensation was sharper here, closely tied to the respiratory diaphragm. I held my breath, letting the nervous system panic slightly, before executing a slow, controlled release. The static melted into a profound, soothing heat that expanded my lung capacity and stabilized my core.
Night: Kalawarner Attack & Mental Reset
From across town, I felt a sharp, hostile spike in atmospheric pressure. Kalawarner had ambushed Issei, forcing him to manifest the Boosted Gear for the very first time. I did not intervene. He needed the crucible of combat to temper his new demonic soul.
I lay flat on my mattress and engaged 4. Mental Reset. I visualized the blackboard and erased the residual heat of my Dantian training. The board was clean. I closed my eyes, letting the timeline run its bloody course as I drifted into sleep.
Day 17
Date: Wednesday (Week 3) Location: Kuoh Town & Academy Status: Normal Human (Method Acting) / Un-wiped Anomaly
🌅 Morning: The Golden Nun
07:30 AM - Kuoh Town Streets
Issei and I were walking to school. He was dragging his feet, complaining about the sheer exhaustion of being Rias Gremory’s new demonic errand boy.
Suddenly, a figure hurried around the street corner and collided directly into Issei’s chest, dropping a worn leather suitcase to the pavement.
“Ouch! I-I am so sorry!” a soft, panicked voice cried out.
She was a foreign girl in a crisp white nun’s habit, with brilliant blonde hair and eyes like emeralds. Issei froze, instantly captivated by the sheer, unadulterated purity radiating from her.
“Whoa, it’s totally fine!” Issei scrambled to help her pick up her suitcase. “Are you hurt? You’re a nun, right?”
“Yes, my name is Asia Argento,” she bowed deeply, her hands clutching a silver cross pendant. “I have just arrived in Japan, and I am looking for the town’s church. But I seem to have lost my way.”
Issei stepped closer to point out the route, but suddenly winced, instinctively pulling his hand back. Through my overclocked senses, I saw the violent reaction: her holy aura was passively burning his new devil physiology.
“The church is on the western hill,” I interjected smoothly, stepping between them to cut the holy radiation hitting Issei. “Follow the main road past the park, then take the stone steps up.”
“Thank you both so much! May God bless you!” Asia smiled radiantly, bowing once more before hurrying off.
Issei stared after her, rubbing his stinging hand. “Fajar… what the hell was that? It felt like my skin was on fire.”
“Different ecosystems, Issei,” I replied calmly. “You belong to the night now. Keep walking.”
☀️ Class/Noon: Upper Dantian Bio-Feedback
11:00 AM - History Class
8. Bio-Feedback (Awareness & Relaxation). Today’s target was the Upper Dantian, located at the pineal gland between the eyebrows.
- The Focus: I grounded my feet under the desk and directed my internal awareness entirely to the center of my forehead.
- The Symptom: A fierce “ant crawling” sensation erupted instantly across my brow. It felt like a tight band of static electricity wrapping around my skull, a neurological bottleneck.
- The Shift: I utilized the Physiological Sigh. Exhale. Dilate. The static broke. A profound, piercing warmth flooded my prefrontal cortex, instantly sharpening my visual acuity and stabilizing my heart rate to a flawless resting rhythm.
🍱 Lunch: Integrated Sensory Overclocking
12:30 PM - School Courtyard
I combined 5. Sensory Overclocking with the active warmth of the Upper Dantian Bio-Feedback.
- The Execution: I sat on a bench and expanded my sensory radius while maintaining the internal heat in my skull. I didn’t just hear the courtyard; I processed the overlapping data flawlessly.
- The Result: I could map Issei’s chaotic, demonic pulse from three buildings away, completely distinct from the heavy, organized signatures of Sona Sitri’s peerage on the second floor. The Upper Dantian integration prevented the sensory data from overwhelming my human processor.
⚔️ Afternoon: Traverse & Adapt vs. The Stray
16:00 PM - Kuoh Outskirts
After school, our paths diverged. Rias summoned Issei to an abandoned warehouse to hunt Viser, a grotesque Stray Devil, forcing him to witness the brutal reality of the underworld.
I headed to the dense woods near the shrine. 14. Traverse & Adapt (Parkour) + 8. Bio-Feedback.
- The Drill: I sprinted through the uneven, heavily wooded terrain. I vaulted fallen logs and scrambled up rock faces, forcing my joints to micro-adjust to the chaotic environment.
- The Integration: The true test was maintaining the Bio-Feedback warmth in my Dantian while under extreme cardiovascular stress. If my breathing broke, the warmth shattered. I ran until my lungs burned, forcing the human vessel to synthesize movement and internal cultivation.
🌙 Evening: CQC & The Exorcist’s Blade
19:30 PM - Fajar’s Apartment / Freed’s Safehouse
While I was locked in the narrow confines of my hallway, practicing 15. Close Quarter Combats (CQC)—driving explosive elbows into the empty air while locking the Bio-Feedback heat in my core—Issei was facing true terror.
He had taken a solo summon, only to find Asia Argento at the client’s house, accompanied by Freed Sellzen.
Freed was a deranged Exorcist. He had Asia cornered against the wall, tracing the flat of a glowing light-sword against her cheek, his tongue rolling out in a sickening display of predatory madness.
“Oh, look what the cat dragged in!” Freed cackled, pointing his exorcist gun at Issei. “A filthy little stray rat! I was just about to have some highly inappropriate fun with our precious little holy maiden, but shooting you sounds like a great warm-up!”
Issei charged, blinded by rage, but he was painfully weak. Freed moved with trained, lethal precision, effortlessly sidestepping the clumsy teenager and slashing him across the back with the light-sword. Issei collapsed in a pool of his own blood, gasping in agony, completely outclassed by a seasoned killer.
🛌 Night: The Escape & Reset
22:30 PM - Bedroom
Issei barely survived. Asia healed him against the church’s doctrine, allowing him to escape into the night, only to be harshly scolded by Rias for acting without authorization.
I stood in my quiet apartment, taking a cold shower to wash away the sweat of the CQC drills.
4. Mental Reset. I lay on my bed. I brought up the blackboard. I erased the image of the golden nun. I erased the burning exhaustion in my lungs.
I am Fajar. I am a normal human. I am not part of their war.
Twelve days left until my limits are tested again. I closed my eyes.
Day 18
Date: Thursday (Week 3) Location: Kuoh Town & The Abandoned Church Status: Normal Human (Method Acting) / Un-wiped Anomaly
🌅 Morning: The Foundation
06:00 AM - Living Room Floor
I awoke before the sun. The timeline was accelerating toward its first major climax. I moved straight into Tier 1: Foundation & Maintenance (1 - 4).
My bruised ribs from the Fallen Angel encounter were healing rapidly thanks to the focused oxygenation of the past few days. I moved through the primal crawls with predatory fluidity, ensuring my kinetic chain was flawless. Tonight, this mortal vessel would be pushed to the absolute edge of human capability.
☀️ Class/Noon: Total Bio-Feedback Integration
10:45 AM - Mathematics Class
Issei looked terrible. His face was pale, and he kept wincing, the phantom pain from Freed’s light-sword still haunting his nervous system.
I ignored his fidgeting and engaged 8. Neuro-Somatic Cultivation (Awareness & Relaxation). Today, I didn’t isolate a single area. I targeted the entire body.
- The Focus: I grounded my feet and sent my awareness sweeping from the crown of my head down to the soles of my feet.
- The Symptom: It was an agonizing neurological load. A massive, full-body “ant crawling” sensation erupted across every square inch of my skin. My nervous system was screaming, interpreting the full-body focus as an impending, lethal threat.
- The Shift: I held the panic response in a vice grip. I executed a long, slow Physiological Sigh. Surrender. Like a dam breaking, the crawling static collapsed, replaced by an overwhelming, surging tide of warmth that flushed through my entire circulatory system. My resting heart rate plummeted to a calm, deep rhythm, but my muscular reactivity was dialed to a razor’s edge.
🍱 Lunch: Inventory Preparations
12:30 PM - Empty Stairwell
I skipped the cafeteria. I stood in an isolated stairwell, checking my gear.
- The Combat Knife: Sheathed at the small of my back, blade oiled, edge sharp enough to shave hair.
- The Tactical Pen & Flashlight: Clipped to my pockets.
- The Grip Tape: Wrapped tightly around my wrists and knuckles beneath my uniform jacket to brace against impact fractures.
I was going to war against Exorcists and Fallen Angels using nothing but carbon steel and human biomechanics.
☀️ Afternoon: The Final Hangout
15:30 PM - Kuoh Town Square
After school, Issei pulled me aside near the station, looking utterly defeated.
“Fajar… that Exorcist, Freed. He was a monster,” Issei muttered, staring at the ground. “Asia healed me, even though I’m a devil now. It burns her hands, but she still did it. I can’t stop thinking about her being stuck with those psychos.”
Before I could answer, a soft voice called out. “Issei-san? Fajar-san?”
We turned. Asia Argento was standing there, wearing a simple civilian dress instead of her nun’s habit, holding her worn suitcase. She looked incredibly fragile, but she was forcing a bright, radiant smile.
“Asia!” Issei gasped. “What are you doing here? Did you get away?”
“I… I have a little bit of free time today,” Asia said softly, clutching her bag. “I was hoping… could we spend it together? I’ve never really seen a normal town before.”
I recognized the resignation in her eyes. This wasn’t an escape. This was a farewell tour.
“Of course we can!” Issei grinned, masking his worry.
We spent the next two hours simulating a normal teenage life. We took her to the arcade. Issei spent two thousand yen desperately trying to win a stuffed animal from the crane game for her, completely failing until I stepped in, calculated the claw’s drop-tension, and secured a plush dog on the first try. Asia held it like a holy relic.
We took her to a fast-food restaurant. Asia stared at her hamburger with wide-eyed wonder.
“You eat it with your hands?” she asked, marveling at the bun. Taking a bite, her eyes sparkled with genuine tears. “It’s… it’s wonderful. So much flavor. I’ve only ever eaten plain soup and bread at the church.”
Issei looked like his heart was breaking. “Asia, you can eat this every day if you want! We can come back tomorrow!”
Asia’s smile faltered. She looked down at her lap. “Issei-san… Fajar-san… thank you. Thank you for showing me this world. Being with you both today… it was the happiest day of my life.”
“Asia? Why are you talking like that?” Issei asked, panic rising in his voice.
“I was excommunicated,” she whispered, a tear slipping down her cheek. “I healed a devil, and the Church cast me out. The Fallen Angels… they took me in. Tonight, they are going to extract my Sacred Gear. They told me I won’t survive the ritual.”
“No!” Issei slammed his hands on the table, standing up. “I won’t let them! We’re getting you out of here!”
Suddenly, the atmospheric pressure in the cafe plummeted. The temperature dropped sharply.
“How touching. A stray dog and a human playing hero.”
Standing by the cafe entrance, completely ignoring the frozen, terrified stares of the regular patrons, was Raynare. She wore her gothic dress, her eyes burning with sadistic amusement.
“Raynare!” Issei roared, his left hand glowing as the Boosted Gear threatened to manifest.
“Ah, ah, ah,” Raynare mocked, raising a finger. “Make a scene here, little boy, and I’ll slaughter every human in this building.” She looked at Asia. “Come along, little nun. It’s time to die.”
Asia stood up, trembling, but she stepped toward Raynare to protect us. “I’m coming. Please don’t hurt them.”
Issei lunged forward to grab her. I reached out and clamped my hand down hard on his shoulder, rooting him in place.
“Let me go, Fajar!” Issei yelled, struggling against my grip.
“If you fight her here, civilians die, and you die,” I said coldly, my voice cutting through his panic. “Let her go for now.”
Raynare sneered at me. “Smart boy. Keep the stray on a leash.” She grabbed Asia’s arm, and in a flash of dark light, they vanished from the cafe.
Issei fell to his knees, punching the floor. “Dammit! Dammit! We have to save her, Fajar!”
I pulled him to his feet. “Then stop crying and use your resources. Go to your master. Get the Occult Research Club. I will go to the church on the hill and scout the perimeter.”
“You can’t go alone! There are monsters there!”
“I am a scout, Issei. I don’t fight monsters, I find them. Go to Rias. Meet me at the church gates.”
🌙 Evening: The Plea for Help
18:00 PM - Occult Research Club Room (Issei’s Perspective)
Issei sprinted all the way to the old school building, throwing the doors open. He begged Rias Gremory, tears streaming down his face, asking the Gremory clan to save a rogue nun.
Rias sat behind her desk, her expression stern. “Issei, this is a matter between the Church and the Fallen Angels. As devils, if we interfere, it could spark a massive conflict. We have our own business to attend to tonight.”
“She’s innocent!” Issei pleaded. “She’s just a girl who wanted a friend! Please, Buchou!”
Rias looked at her desperate Pawn, her strict demeanor softening just a fraction. “I cannot order my peerage to start a war for a stranger.”
“Then I’ll go myself,” Issei said, his voice hardening with resolve.
“Not alone, you won’t,” Kiba stepped forward, summoning a standard demonic sword into his hand. “You’re our comrade now, Issei-kun. We don’t let family march to their deaths alone.”
“Yeah,” Koneko added softly from the couch, crunching on a snack. “I’ll smash them.”
Rias smiled warmly. “Very well. Kiba, Koneko, you may accompany him. Akeno and I will join you once our prior business is concluded. Do not die, Issei.”
🌃 Night: The Church Raid Begins
20:30 PM - The Abandoned Church on the Hill
The moon was hidden behind thick clouds. The abandoned church loomed at the top of the hill, a rotting, Gothic structure surrounded by overgrown weeds and an oppressive, suffocating aura of dark magic.
Issei, Kiba, and Koneko arrived at the rusted iron gates. Issei’s left arm was already armored in the red gauntlet of the Boosted Gear, his face set in grim determination. Kiba held his sword at the ready, and Koneko adjusted her combat gloves.
“Fajar said he would be here,” Issei whispered, looking around the dark, empty courtyard. “Where is he?”
High above them, concealed in the pitch-black shadows of the church’s rotting bell tower, I crouched on a wooden beam. My breathing was completely silenced, my heart rate steady. I had bypassed Freed’s perimeter traps an hour ago.
I looked down through the broken stained-glass window, watching the Devils prepare to breach the front doors. My hand rested on the hilt of my combat knife.
The raid had begun.
The heavy oak doors of the abandoned church shattered inward, kicking up a cloud of dust and rotting splinters.
Issei stormed into the sanctuary, the red jewel of the Boosted Gear glowing violently on his left arm. Kiba and Koneko flanked him seamlessly, weapons drawn and fists clenched.
“Give Asia back!” Issei roared, his voice echoing off the vaulted ceilings.
Standing before the altar, spinning a customized exorcist pistol on his finger and holding a glowing light-sword in his other hand, was Freed Sellzen.
“Well, well, well! If it isn’t the filthy little stray rat and his devil friends!” Freed cackled, his tongue lolling out in a grotesque display of madness. “I was just getting so, so bored waiting for the ritual to finish downstairs! Praise the Lord, He brought me some target practice!”
Hovering above the altar, bathed in the moonlight streaming through the shattered stained-glass windows, were the four Fallen Angels.
“You actually came,” Raynare sneered, crossing her arms over her gothic dress. “How pathetic. Three low-class devils trying to play the heroes for a rogue nun.”
“Ugh, devils are so gross,” Mittelt, a blonde Fallen Angel in a gothic-lolita dress, whined. “Can we just obliterate them? This place already smells like wet dog.”
“Don’t underestimate them, Mittelt,” Kalawarner warned, her blue hair shifting as she summoned a light spear. “They belong to the Gremory House.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Dohnaseek grunted, pulling his fedora down low. “Freed, butcher the vanguard. We’ll mop up the rest.”
“With pleasure!” Freed laughed hysterically. “I’m going to carve you into little devil pieces, starting with your—!”
Freed never finished his sentence.
From the deep shadows of the rafters above, I had already executed 12. The Art of Invisibility. My physiological signature was utterly suppressed. I dropped completely silently, landing on a wooden pew directly behind him.
Before Freed’s enhanced exorcist senses could even register the displacement of air, I grabbed a heavy, solid oak chair from the front row. Using the kinetic rotation of my hips, I swung it like a baseball bat.
CRACK.
The chair shattered directly against the back of Freed’s skull. The sheer blunt-force trauma sent him stumbling forward, his eyes rolling back in shock.
I didn’t give him a microsecond to recover. I closed the distance instantly, initiating 15. Close Quarter Combats. Right elbow to the throat. Left knee driven brutally into the liver.
Freed gasped, dropping his pistol and light-sword as his nervous system violently shut down. I swept his leg, dropping him flat onto his stomach on the stone floor. I dropped my full body weight onto his back, my left knee pinning his spine. My right hand shot out, wrapping like a steel vice around the back of his neck.
I slammed his face directly into the stone floor. CRACK. Again. CRACK. A third time. CRACK.
Freed’s body went completely limp, his maniacal laughter permanently silenced.
The entire church froze in absolute, stunned silence.
“F-Fajar?!” Issei yelled, his jaw hitting the floor. “When the hell did you get here?!”
Kiba lowered his sword slightly, his eyes wide with genuine shock. “Such flawless stealth… I didn’t sense a single ripple in the air. He just took down a top-tier Exorcist with his bare hands.”
“Savage,” Koneko muttered, her golden eyes blinking in rare surprise.
Kalawarner floated backward, pointing a trembling finger at me. “A human? A normal human just did that?!”
Dohnaseek’s eyes narrowed in fierce recognition. “It’s him! The brat from the park!”
Internal Monologue: I knelt over Freed’s unconscious body, my heart rate completely steady. This was a miscalculation. I was supposed to provide tactical distractions, not completely neutralize the miniboss before the vanguard even engaged. My martial algorithms had overridden my acting. If I didn’t correct this immediately, Rias and the Fallen Angels would realize my threat level was entirely unnatural.
My body moved on its own to construct the alibi.
I reached down and picked up Freed’s discarded light-sword. The hilt hummed with dangerous holy energy. I stood up, gripping the blade with both hands, and let out a loud, theatrical gasp.
“Whoa… this sword!” I shouted, projecting my voice to ensure every devil and Fallen Angel heard me. “I can feel it! The holy magic is flowing into my arms! This weapon… it’s giving me incredible power!”
Issei blinked. “It… it is? So that’s how you moved so fast?!”
Raynare scoffed, her shock morphing back into arrogant disgust. “A filthy, fragile human holding a holy sword? Don’t make me laugh. The weapon might give you strength, but this isn’t a place for a monkey to play hero. You’ll die just like your friend did!”
I looked up at Raynare, dropping the theatrical awe, my eyes going dead and cold.
“Fragile?” I asked. “Did you forget the park so quickly, Raynare? You, Dohnaseek, and Kalawarner couldn’t kill me when all I was armed with was a pocket knife.” I raised the humming light-sword, adopting a flawless, historical high-guard (Vom Tag). “Now I have an Exorcist’s weapon giving me ‘power’. Let’s see how you handle it.”
“Kill him!” Raynare shrieked.
Mittelt attacked first, giggling maniacally as she threw a barrage of deadly light daggers.
I didn’t use Wing Chun or Silat. I switched my internal library to Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) and Kenjutsu. I stepped off the centerline. Using the holy blade, I executed a precise Zwerchau (helicopter strike), batting the light daggers out of the air with perfect edge alignment.
Dohnaseek roared, diving at me with a massive light spear meant to impale my chest. I didn’t retreat. I stepped into his guard. I used the flat of my blade to parry his spear outward, sliding my hilt down his weapon to trap his hands. With a sharp twist of my wrists, I disarmed him, simultaneously driving the heavy steel pommel of the sword directly into his temple.
Dohnaseek’s eyes rolled back, and he crashed into the pews, unconscious.
“Dohnaseek!” Kalawarner yelled. She tried to flank me, sweeping her light spear at my legs.
Kenjutsu footwork. I leaped lightly over the sweeping blade, bringing my sword down in a blindingly fast Kesa-giri (diagonal cut). I didn’t use the lethal edge; I twisted my wrists at the last microsecond, striking her precisely across the collarbone with the flat of the blade. The blunt-force trauma shattered her stance. I followed up with a spinning back-kick to her solar plexus, launching her into a stone pillar. She slumped to the ground, wheezing.
Mittelt panicked, trying to fly upward to escape. I grabbed a piece of shattered wood from the broken chair with my free hand and hurled it like a javelin. It struck her squarely in the shin. She yelped, dropping her altitude just enough. I closed the distance in two massive strides, swatting her light spear away and striking the vagus nerve on her neck with the butt of the sword. The gothic-lolita Fallen Angel folded like a lawn chair.
Only Raynare was left.
She hovered near the altar, her face pale with absolute terror as she looked at her entire squad incapacitated on the floor.
“Y-You’re a monster…” she stammered, frantically manifesting a massive, unstable spear of light. She hurled it at me with everything she had.
I planted my feet. Since I was wielding a holy weapon, I didn’t need to dodge. I swung the light-sword in a flawless, two-handed upward cleave. The blades connected. The holy energy of my sword effortlessly sheared through her projectile, shattering it into harmless sparks.
I followed the momentum of the swing, stepping forward and pressing the glowing edge of the light-sword directly against Raynare’s throat, forcing her to freeze mid-air.
“Drop it,” I commanded softly.
Issei, Kiba, and Koneko stood by the doorway, completely paralyzed, having not swung their weapons a single time.
Internal Monologue: The glowing blade of the light-sword hummed against Raynare’s throat. My heart rate remained perfectly flat, but my mind was rapidly calculating the damage I had just done to the narrative. I went too far. I was supposed to be a tactical distraction, a minor variable. Instead, I had single-handedly incapacitated an elite Exorcist and four Fallen Angels using a stolen weapon and sheer biomechanical superiority. I had completely shattered the illusion of my mortal avatar. If I keep overriding the script, the world’s immune system will escalate the threats to compensate.
I let out an imperceptible sigh. Oh well. My time in this reality is ending soon anyway. The countdown is almost up. Let the script break.
Before I could lower the blade, the shattered remnants of the church doors were blown completely off their hinges by a burst of crimson demonic energy.
Rias Gremory strode into the sanctuary, bathed in the red glow of her aura, with Akeno Himejima walking gracefully at her side, lightning sparking at her fingertips.
“Issei, Kiba, Koneko! Why are you just standing at the entrance?” Rias demanded, her voice echoing with authority. “Have you not engaged the—”
Rias froze. The crimson aura surrounding her flickered and died. Akeno’s usual sadistic smile vanished, replaced by genuine bewilderment.
They took in the scene. Freed Sellzen, face-down and unconscious on the stone floor. Dohnaseek, Kalawarner, and Mittelt scattered across the pews, battered and groaning. And standing in the center of it all, a normal human boy holding a glowing Exorcist sword against the throat of the Fallen Angel leader.
Rias’s azure eyes locked onto me. Her composure shattered completely.
“You…” Rias breathed, taking a stunned step forward. “The boy from the park… Fajar. How are you here? My memory wipe… I erased your mind! And how in the name of the Underworld did you defeat them?!”
“The memory wipe didn’t take, Buchou,” Issei mumbled, still too paralyzed to process my martial arts display. “And he… he just grabbed Freed’s sword and went crazy! He said the holy magic made him stronger!”
Rias stared at the light-sword in my hands, then back to my perfectly calm face. “That is impossible. A normal human cannot process raw holy magic without training, let alone use it to dismantle Fallen Angels!”
I kept my face perfectly blank, but in the chaos of Rias’s interrogation, the atmospheric pressure shifted violently.
I felt the buildup of dark energy a microsecond before it deployed. While our attention was divided, Raynare practically detonated her remaining aura in a blinding flash of black feathers and concussive force.
I was forced to step back and raise the light-sword to shield my eyes. By the time the feathers cleared, Raynare had scooped up her unconscious comrades and plunged down a hidden staircase behind the altar.
“Fools!” Raynare’s hysterical, echoing voice drifted up from the basement. “You’re too late anyway! The ritual is complete! The Twilight Healing is mine!”
“Asia!” Issei roared, the shock instantly evaporating into pure panic.
He bolted past me, Kiba and Koneko right on his heels. I dropped the stolen light-sword—its hum dying out as it clattered against the stone—and followed them down into the suffocating darkness of the church’s underground ritual room.
We burst into a massive subterranean chamber. It was too late.
Raynare was already gone, having slipped through a teleportation circle the moment she absorbed the artifact. In the center of the room, chained to a massive stone cross, hung Asia Argento. The brilliant green rings of her Sacred Gear had been violently ripped from her soul.
“Asia!” Issei screamed, sprinting to the cross. With a surge of raw, demonic strength from his Boosted Gear, he shattered the heavy iron chains. Asia collapsed, and Issei caught her fragile body before she hit the stone floor.
Rias, Akeno, and I stopped at the edge of the dais. The air was thick with the scent of death.
“Issei… san?” Asia whispered. Her skin was as pale as porcelain, and the brilliant emerald of her eyes was rapidly dulling.
“I’m here, Asia! I’m right here!” Issei cried, pulling her close, his tears falling onto her cheeks. “We came to save you! We beat the bad guys!”
Asia offered a weak, trembling smile. “I see… I’m so glad. You came for me…”
“Of course I did! We’re friends! You’re going to come live with me, and we’ll eat hamburgers every single day!” Issei was hyperventilating, his voice cracking.
“That sounds… wonderful,” Asia murmured, her breathing turning shallow. “But, Issei-san… it’s strange. I can’t feel the pain anymore. I can’t feel anything at all.”
“No, no, no! Just hold on! Buchou, heal her! Please!” Issei turned to Rias, begging.
Rias looked down, her eyes filled with sorrow. “Her Sacred Gear was tied directly to her life force, Issei. When it was extracted… it severed her soul. There is no healing magic that can fix this.”
Asia reached up with a trembling, icy hand, gently touching Issei’s cheek. “Please… don’t cry. Fajar-san… are you there too?”
I stepped forward into her fading line of sight. “I am here, Asia.”
“Thank you… for today,” she whispered, her voice barely audible. “Issei-san… would it have been okay… for someone like me… to be your friend?”
Issei let out a gut-wrenching sob, burying his face in her shoulder. “We are friends! We’re friends forever! Don’t leave me!”
“I’m so happy…” Asia smiled, a single tear slipping from her eye.
Her hand fell limp from his face, striking the stone floor. Her chest stopped rising. The Golden Nun of Kuoh was dead.
Issei threw his head back and unleashed a scream of absolute, devastating agony. His aura flared violently, a chaotic storm of demonic red energy and the roaring, draconic power of the Boosted Gear threatening to tear the room apart. The sheer grief was palpable, suffocating everyone in the chamber.
I stood completely still, watching the tragedy unfold, acting as the silent witness to the necessary crucible of the protagonist.
Rias Gremory stepped into the storm of Issei’s aura. Her crimson hair whipped around her, her expression shifting from sorrow to absolute, regal determination.
“Do not weep for her, Issei,” Rias commanded, her voice cutting through his screams.
Issei looked up, his eyes bloodshot and filled with rage. “How can you say that?! She’s dead!”
“I am a Devil of the House of Gremory,” Rias declared, raising her hand. In her palm, a golden chess piece materialized, glowing with a brilliant, crimson light. “And we do not let our family’s tears go unanswered. The Church may have abandoned her, and the Angels may have discarded her, but I will not.”
Rias walked to Asia’s lifeless body and knelt. She placed the golden Bishop piece directly over Asia’s heart.
“By the name of Rias Gremory, I command thee,” she chanted, her demonic aura flooding the underground chamber, rewriting the laws of life and death. “The holy maiden who lost her god. Drink my blood, take my flesh, and be reborn in the darkness! Live again, Asia Argento, as my Bishop!”
The golden piece sank into Asia’s chest. A blinding, crimson magic circle erupted beneath her body, bathing the dark room in a warm, pulsing light.
For a tense, agonizing moment, nothing happened.
Then, Asia gasped, a sharp intake of breath filling her lungs. The color rushed back into her pale cheeks. Her emerald eyes fluttered open, filled with confusion as she looked up at the weeping boy holding her.
“Issei… san?” she murmured. “Why are you crying?”
Issei tackled her into a desperate, crushing hug, sobbing uncontrollably.
I exhaled slowly, slipping my hands into my pockets. The canon had corrected itself. Asia was saved. But as Rias looked over Issei’s shoulder, her azure eyes locked onto me once again, filled with a dangerous, calculating curiosity that promised I would not be allowed to remain on the sidelines any longer.
The heavy, suffocating atmosphere of the underground ritual chamber slowly began to dissipate, replaced by the quiet, exhausted relief of salvation. Issei held Asia gently, helping the newly reborn Devil to her feet. She was still incredibly weak, her legs trembling, but the color had returned to her cheeks, and the warmth of life radiated from her once more.
Kiba sheathed his demonic sword, offering his shoulder to help support Asia’s weight. Koneko stood nearby, dusting off her gloves, though her golden eyes briefly flicked toward me, still harboring a deep, silent wariness after witnessing my absolute dismantling of the Exorcist and Fallen Angels.
“We need to get her back to the Occult Research Club,” Rias commanded softly, her regal composure returning now that the crisis had passed. “The transition into a Devil is taxing on a human soul. She needs a proper bath, clean clothes, and uninterrupted rest within a demonic layline to stabilize her new core.”
“Right,” Issei nodded furiously, wiping his tear-stained face with the back of his sleeve. “I’ve got you, Asia. You’re safe now. You’re coming home with us.”
As they turned toward the stairs, I stepped forward, the sound of my shoes echoing sharply against the cold stone floor.
“Issei,” I called out.
He stopped and looked back at me. His expression was a complicated mess of profound gratitude, lingering adrenaline, and absolute bewilderment regarding who and what I actually was.
“Take care of her tonight,” I said, my voice projecting a calm, grounded normalcy that sharply contrasted with the slaughterhouse we were standing in. “But tomorrow, you need to decompress. You’re taking a break. Meet me at the arcade by the station at noon. Just us, Matsuda, and Motohama. We’ll hit the games, grab some atrocious fast food, and act like normal idiots for a few hours.”
Issei blinked, momentarily pulled out of the supernatural underworld and thrust back into the mundane reality of being a high school student.
“Just the guys?” Issei asked, glancing protectively at Asia.
“She needs to sleep, and the others need to monitor her vitals,” I replied smoothly, nodding toward Rias and Kiba. “Besides, you just fought a war. If you don’t ground yourself, your nervous system is going to fry. My treat. Bring your appetite.”
A small, genuine smile finally broke through Issei’s exhaustion. It was a lifeline to the life he used to know. “Yeah. Yeah, okay, Fajar. You’re paying for all the crane games, though.”
“Deal. Get out of here.”
Issei, Kiba, and Koneko carefully guided Asia up the stone steps, their footsteps fading into the ruins of the church above.
The silence that fell over the subterranean chamber was immediate and crushing.
I was now entirely alone with Rias Gremory and Akeno Himejima. Without the lower-class Devils to soften the atmosphere, the ambient pressure in the room skyrocketed. The air grew dense, practically vibrating with lethal intent. Rias turned to face me, her azure eyes narrowed into chilling, calculating slits. Beside her, Akeno dropped her usual gentle facade; violent blue sparks of lightning began to arc silently between her fingertips, her violet eyes utterly devoid of warmth.
“Now,” Rias said, her voice dropping an octave, echoing with the absolute authority of a high-ranking aristocrat of the Underworld. “Let us address the anomaly in the room. You were supposed to be a mundane human bystander. I wiped your memories of the Fallen Angel attack in the park myself.”
I didn’t flinch. I kept my breathing regulated, maintaining the perfect, slow rhythm of the Physiological Sigh to keep my heart rate undetectable.
“I remember everything, Rias,” I answered plainly. “The park. The spear of light. The memory magic. I remember all of it.”
Rias’s crimson aura flared, casting long, demonic shadows against the stone walls. “Clearly. A human wielding a holy Exorcist sword with flawless, lethal precision. A human who can bypass my mind-alteration magic. You are either a spy from the Church, an agent of the Grigori, or something far more dangerous. Who sent you?”
“No one sent me. I am exactly what my file says I am. A normal human.”
Akeno giggled, a dark, dangerous sound. “Oh, my. A normal human who beats Exorcists to a bloody pulp with his bare hands? You must think us very foolish, Fajar-kun.”
“I think you underestimate what the human vessel is capable of when pushed to its biological absolute,” I countered calmly. “But I understand your paranoia. A ruler cannot allow an unknown variable to wander freely in her territory. You think your spell failed because you rushed it in the park?” I stepped forward, closing the distance between us, offering myself without a defensive stance. “Try again. Properly this time. I won’t resist.”
Rias stared at me, searching my face for a trap. Finding none, her pride as a Gremory took over.
“Very well. Do not move.”
She stepped up to me, raising her hand. A complex, multi-layered crimson magic circle materialized directly in front of my face. The sheer density of the demonic energy made the air taste like copper.
“I command the mind of this human to shatter and rebuild,” Rias chanted, her eyes glowing with absolute power. “Forget the darkness. Forget the supernatural. Obliviate.”
The crimson light blasted directly into my eyes, surging straight toward my prefrontal cortex.
Internal Protocol Engaged: 8. Upper Dantian Bio-Feedback. I grounded my stance and forcefully directed all my internal thermal energy into my pineal gland. I didn’t use magic to fight her magic. I used sheer, overwhelming neurological density. As Rias’s spell attempted to sever and rewrite my synapses, my hyper-oxygenated, densely packed neural pathways acted like a physical firewall of static electricity. The magic found no purchase. It was like trying to carve a sculpture out of rushing water. The spell violently dispersed, shattering into harmless red sparks that cascaded over my shoulders.
I blinked once, completely unaffected.
Rias stumbled back a half-step, her eyes widening in absolute shock. She looked at her hand, then back to my face, completely bewildered.
“Impossible…” she breathed. “I poured enough energy into that circle to rewrite the mind of a high-ranking Devil. It simply… vanished. It didn’t bounce back, it didn’t reflect. Your mind just absorbed and completely neutralized it.”
Akeno’s lightning crackled louder, her posture shifting into an offensive stance. “Buchou… this boy is entirely immune to our magic. He is a profound threat to the peerage.”
I raised my hands slowly, palms open, a universal gesture of surrender.
“You don’t need to worry about me, Akeno. And you don’t need to view me as a threat to your ORC family, Rias,” I said, my tone shifting to something quieter, tinged with a strange, heavy melancholy.
Rias frowned, her guard still raised. “Explain yourself. Why shouldn’t I eliminate an immune, combat-lethal anomaly right here and now?”
“Because the board is already resetting,” I replied, looking up at the broken ceiling of the chamber. “My exchange student period in Kuoh is over. I’ve accomplished what I needed to do here. I will be leaving the day after tomorrow.”
Rias and Akeno exchanged a swift, calculating glance. To them, the phrasing was obvious. Exchange student. Leaving. They processed it through the lens of human geopolitics. He was returning to his home country. An international transfer. If he left Kuoh, he left Gremory territory, immediately ceasing to be their problem.
“You are returning home?” Rias asked, the intense crimson aura around her slowly receding as the immediate threat level downgraded.
“I am moving on,” I corrected softly, the double-meaning entirely lost on them. “Issei is a good kid. He has a good heart, even if he hides it behind his idiocy. And Asia deserves a second chance at life. Keep them safe, Rias Gremory. They belong to your world now.”
I turned my back on the two most dangerous women in Kuoh Town and began walking toward the stairs. They didn’t stop me. The tactical advantage of letting an un-wipeable, magically immune martial artist peacefully deport himself far outweighed the risks of engaging him in a death match.
Internal Monologue: I climbed the stone steps into the cool night air. The lie of omission had worked perfectly. They thought I was catching a flight out of Narita. They didn’t know that ‘leaving’ meant my physical avatar was nearing its expiration date in this dimension. The system countdown was ticking in my peripheral vision. Just a little over 24 hours left. Tomorrow, I would give Issei one last normal day. And then, the anomaly known as Fajar would vanish from this reality entirely.
The cool night air of Kuoh Town was a stark contrast to the suffocating aura of the underground ritual room.
As I walked down the overgrown stone steps leading away from the abandoned church, I heard the crunch of gravel behind me. I stopped and glanced over my shoulder.
Rias and Akeno were following me. The oppressive, lethal pressure they had projected in the basement was completely gone. Instead, Rias’s expression had softened into a look of profound, respectful curiosity, while Akeno walked with a graceful, composed stride, her violet eyes studying me not as a threat, but as an enigma.
“The night is late, Fajar-kun,” Rias said gently, stepping up beside me. “And despite our… misunderstanding down there, you protected Issei. You fought for Asia when you had no obligation to do so. The least we can do as the administrators of this territory is escort you back to your apartment.”
“Ara ara,” Akeno smiled, her tone losing its sadistic edge, replaced by genuine warmth. “It is only proper. Besides, it is not every day we get to have a civilized conversation with a human who can casually break mind-magic.”
I looked at them for a moment. My heart rate was completely stable. I gave a small nod. “Alright. I’d appreciate the company.”
We walked in silence for a few minutes, descending the hill and entering the quiet, paved streets of the residential district. The streetlights cast long shadows on the asphalt.
“Fajar,” Rias finally broke the silence, her tone thoughtful. “What you did tonight… it defies everything I know about the human realm. You possess no Sacred Gear. I sensed no demonic, angelic, or draconic energy inside you. Yet you dismantled an elite Exorcist and four Fallen Angels using nothing but physical biomechanics and a borrowed sword. How is that possible?”
I kept my gaze forward, matching my breathing to my footsteps.
“Humans are not born with wings of light, Rias. We are not born with the Power of Destruction, or immense reserves of magical energy,” I replied evenly. “Most humans look at the supernatural world and believe they are fundamentally inferior. But humans can be as strong as anyone else. The difference is that almost all of us are not born with it. We are born empty.”
“Empty?” Akeno repeated softly, tilting her head.
“Yes. But emptiness isn’t a flaw. It’s a vessel waiting to be filled,” I explained. “Because we are not given strength at birth, we are forced to seek out knowledge. We have to understand the mechanics of the body, the rhythm of the breath, the geometry of leverage and momentum. We train until the muscle fibers tear and rebuild denser. We train the nervous system to ignore panic. You cast magic by instinct. I had to build my strength, cell by cell, through sheer, unyielding discipline.”
Rias’s azure eyes widened slightly, a profound realization dawning on her face. She looked down at the pavement, a nostalgic, slightly somber smile touching her lips.
“You remind me of someone very dear to me,” Rias said softly. “My cousin… Sairaorg Bael.”
“A Devil?” I asked, though I already knew the lore.
Rias nodded. “Yes. The Bael clan is famous for inheriting the Power of Destruction. But Sairaorg was born without it. In the Underworld, that made him a failure. He was mocked, bullied, and cast aside by his own family. But instead of giving up, he pushed his physical body to the absolute extreme. He trained in martial arts until his pure physical strength could shatter ultimate-class magic. You and he… you are very much alike.”
I considered her words, the streetlights reflecting in my eyes.
“I can respect his journey,” I said quietly. “But it is similar, not entirely the same. Sairaorg was born a Devil. Even without his clan’s specific magic, his biological ceiling—his lifespan, his natural durability—was already set far above a human’s. He built a mansion on a foundation of concrete. Humans are trying to build skyscrapers on sand.”
I paused, turning my head to look Rias in the eye.
“But the core principle is the same. Being ‘not gifted’ is not a permanent state, Rias. It just means your starting line is further back than everyone else’s. It means you cannot rely on talent. You must seek further, endure more pain, and work exponentially harder than those who were handed their strength on a silver platter. That is how a human survives.”
Akeno looked at me, her eyes shimmering with deep, unmasked respect. “That is a heavy burden to carry, Fajar-kun. To work so hard, knowing the world favors those born with power.”
“It’s not a burden, Akeno. It’s freedom,” I replied.
We reached the front of my small apartment complex. I stopped and turned to face them. The two beautiful, high-ranking Devils stood under the flickering light of the streetlamp, looking at me with an entirely new perspective.
“This is me,” I said, gesturing to the stairs. “Thank you for the walk.”
Rias placed a hand over her heart and offered a small, formal bow—a gesture of respect rarely given by a Gremory to a human.
“The House of Gremory owes you a debt, Fajar,” Rias said sincerely. “If you are truly leaving Kuoh the day after tomorrow… I wish you safe travels. Wherever you go, whatever you seek, I have no doubt you will achieve it.”
“Take care, Fajar-kun,” Akeno added, offering a warm, genuine smile. “Do not forget us.”
“I won’t,” I said, slipping my hands into my pockets. “Take care of Issei and Asia. They’re going to need your guidance.”
I turned and walked up the stairs to my apartment. I didn’t look back, but through my overclocked hearing, I could hear them standing there for a long time, watching my door, before finally turning away to return to their world.
I unlocked my door and stepped into the dark, quiet room. I closed the door behind me and leaned against it, letting out a long, slow breath.
System Countdown: 1 Day, 8 Hours, 14 Minutes remaining.
Tomorrow was Friday. The final day. Just a normal day with Issei, Matsuda, and Motohama. One last anchor of humanity for the Red Dragon Emperor before I disappeared from this reality entirely.
Day 19
Date: Friday (Week 3) Location: Kuoh Academy & Kuoh Town Status: Normal Human (Method Acting) / The Final Anchor
🌅 Morning: The Calm
08:00 AM - Kuoh Academy Classroom
The atmosphere in the classroom was remarkably ordinary. The sun filtered through the windows, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the air.
When Issei walked through the sliding door, he looked completely exhausted, carrying dark bags under his eyes. Yet, the crushing, frantic anxiety that had plagued him for the past week was gone. He caught my eye across the room and gave a small, genuine nod. Asia was safe. The Gremory peerage had successfully stabilized her overnight.
I nodded back and turned my attention to the chalkboard. I didn’t engage any intense Bio-Feedback protocols today. I simply sat there, letting the ambient noise of a normal high school wash over me. Today wasn’t about martial cultivation or dimensional survival. It was about preserving the mundane.
🍱 Lunch: The Perverted Trio
12:30 PM - School Courtyard
I sat on a bench with Issei, Matsuda, and Motohama. The latter two were practically vibrating with jealous rage, glaring at Issei while aggressively chewing their bread.
“Explain yourself, Hyoudou,” Motohama demanded, pushing up his glasses. “Rumors are circulating. Witnesses saw you walking into the old school building with the Prince of Kuoh, Kiba Yuuto. And yesterday, you were seen talking to Rias-senpai and Akeno-senpai.”
“Spill it!” Matsuda grabbed Issei by the collar, shaking him comically. “Are you betraying the pact?! Have you awakened some kind of secret pretty-boy aura?!”
“I-It’s not what it looks like!” Issei stammered, sweating profusely as he tried to navigate a minefield he couldn’t possibly explain to humans. “I’m just… doing chores! For the club! It’s manual labor, I swear!”
“He’s their new errand boy,” I interjected smoothly, taking a bite of my sandwich. “I saw him carrying boxes of old occult books. It looked miserable. He’s definitely not living the dream.”
Matsuda slowly released Issei’s collar, looking at him with deep pity. “Errand boy? That’s brutal, man. To be so close to the angels of Kuoh, yet treated like a pack mule…”
“Yeah, well,” Issei let out a nervous laugh, shooting me a grateful look. “It’s tough work.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said, standing up and tossing my wrapper into the trash. “Like I promised yesterday, we’re blowing off steam after school. Arcade and burgers. My treat. Don’t make me wait at the gates.”
🕹️ Afternoon: The Final Hangout
15:30 PM - Kuoh Station Arcade & Fast Food
We hit the arcade like a wrecking ball of teenage idiocy.
For three hours, Issei, Matsuda, and Motohama forgot about school, rumors, and in Issei’s case, Fallen Angels and underworld politics. They were just dumb kids yelling at screens.
I kept my promise. I funded their disastrous attempts at the crane games. When they ran out of luck, I stepped up. By applying basic geometry and calculating the exact hydraulic grip-strength failure rate of the claw machines, I cleared out four plushies in five minutes, tossing them to the cheering trio.
Next was the fighting games. Motohama challenged me, claiming to be the undisputed king of the cabinet. I dismantled him in three consecutive rounds. I didn’t use any cheap tricks; I simply applied my real-world understanding of frames, spacing, and reaction time to the digital fighters, punishing every single mistake he made until he dropped to his knees in theatrical despair.
“He’s a monster!” Motohama wailed, pointing at me as Issei and Matsuda laughed hysterically.
By 18:00 PM, we were sitting in a cheap fast-food restaurant, entirely surrounded by empty burger wrappers and half-empty soda cups. Issei was smiling—a wide, carefree smile that had been completely absent since his fateful date with Raynare.
“Man, this was the best,” Matsuda groaned, leaning back and patting his stomach. “Thanks for the grub, Fajar. You’re actually a pretty cool guy for a transfer student.”
“Yeah,” Motohama agreed, adjusting his glasses. “You’re an honorary member of the brotherhood now.”
I looked at the three of them. They were loud, obnoxious, and utterly normal. They were the perfect anchor.
“I’m glad we did this,” I said, wiping my hands with a napkin and leaning forward. “Because I needed to tell you guys something before tomorrow.”
The tone of my voice shifted just enough to cut through their post-meal lethargy. Issei looked up, his smile fading slightly as he noticed the finality in my expression.
“My exchange program period is officially up,” I said plainly. “I’m leaving Kuoh tomorrow.”
“What?!” Matsuda and Motohama yelled in unison.
“Tomorrow? Bro, that’s so sudden!” Matsuda said, looking genuinely bummed out. “Where are you going? Back to your home country?”
“Something like that,” I replied smoothly. “My flight leaves early. All the paperwork is already done.”
Motohama sighed, shaking his head. “Just when we trained you in the ways of the Kuoh gentlemen. Well, man… it was a good run.”
I turned my eyes to Issei. He was staring at me in stunned silence. Matsuda and Motohama thought I was just a friend moving away. But Issei knew exactly what I was leaving him to face. I was the only normal human who knew his secret, who had stood beside him against monsters, and who had grounded him in reality. And now, I was checking out.
“Fajar…” Issei started, his voice thick with unsaid words. Who is going to help me? What if they come back?
“You’re going to be fine, Issei,” I said, locking eyes with him. I projected absolute, unwavering certainty. “You have a good crew watching your back now. You have people to protect, and you have the strength to do it. Just don’t forget where you came from, and don’t let them change who you are at your core.”
Issei swallowed hard, his eyes shining just a little in the harsh fluorescent light of the restaurant. He nodded slowly, understanding the weight of the torch being passed. “I won’t. I promise.”
I stood up, tossing some yen onto the table to cover the final drinks.
“It was fun being with you idiots,” I said, offering a rare, faint smile. “Stay out of trouble.”
“Safe travels, man!” Matsuda called out. “Don’t forget us!” Motohama waved. “Thank you, Fajar,” Issei said quietly. “For everything.”
I raised a hand in a lazy wave and walked out of the restaurant, stepping into the cool evening air.
🌙 Night: The Departure Prep
20:00 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
The apartment was quiet. I didn’t turn on the lights. I walked into the bedroom and looked at the digital countdown hovering in the corner of my vision.
System Countdown: 12 Hours, 00 Minutes remaining.
I packed nothing, because there was nothing to take. I sat in the center of the living room floor one last time.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind). I closed my eyes and summoned the blackboard. I erased the loud arcade. I erased the smell of cheap burgers. I erased the image of Rias Gremory’s crimson magic circle, and the sight of Raynare’s black wings.
I wiped the board completely clean. Tomorrow is Saturday. The end of Week 3. The end of the Route. I exhaled, and waited for the morning.
Day 20
Date: Saturday (Week 3) Location: Kuoh Town (Complete Perimeter) Status: The Observer (Awaiting Departure)
🌅 Morning: Shedding the Avatar
07:00 AM - Fajar’s Apartment
I did not execute the Tier 1 Foundation protocols today. The physical conditioning of this mortal vessel had reached its peak for the required parameters of this reality, and the time for cultivation was over.
My departure was scheduled for tomorrow, Sunday. Today was the buffer—a day of complete detachment.
I opened the closet and bypassed the neatly hung Kuoh Academy uniform and the casual civilian clothes. Reaching into the back, I pulled out my original attire. I dressed methodically: a tailored dark shirt, long dark tactical pants, and finally, my heavy, long dark coat. The fabric settled over my shoulders with a familiar, grounding weight.
I looked in the mirror. The high school exchange student was gone. The wanderer of the Infinite Reality had returned to the surface.
☀️ Midday: The Silent Watcher
11:30 AM - Kuoh Town Commercial District
I engaged 12. The Art of Invisibility (Stealth) and 5. Sensory Overclocking simultaneously. I did not suppress my presence to ambush an enemy; I suppressed it to erase myself from the world’s canvas. I walked through the crowded weekend streets of Kuoh as a complete ghost. Pedestrians subconsciously parted around me without ever registering my face.
From the vantage point of a shaded alleyway, I observed the town plaza.
I saw Issei and Asia. They were walking together, carrying grocery bags. Asia was wearing a simple, bright outfit, pointing at a crepe stand with wide-eyed fascination. Issei was laughing, a completely carefree, genuine sound. The heavy, suffocating trauma of her death and his grief had been seamlessly paved over by the resilience of youth and the safety of the Gremory clan.
I watched them buy their food. I did not step out of the shadows. I did not say hello. My farewells had been finalized yesterday. To them, Fajar was already a ghost packing his bags.
🏙️ Afternoon: The Supernatural Perimeter
15:00 PM - Kuoh Academy Rooftop
I bypassed the locked doors of the weekend campus and stood on the highest roof of the old school building. The wind caught the hem of my dark coat, snapping it around my legs.
Below, through a window on the second floor, I could sense the dense, organized demonic signatures of Rias Gremory and Akeno Himejima. They were reviewing territory maps, undoubtedly securing the town’s leylines after the violent disruption caused by the Fallen Angels.
Rias briefly paused, her azure eyes glancing toward the window, sensing a faint shift in the atmospheric pressure. But my biometric and magical signatures were absolutely zero. To her demonic senses, there was nothing on the roof but the wind. She returned to her paperwork.
The ecosystem was stabilizing. The variables I had disrupted—the survival of Freed, the brutalization of Raynare’s squad—had been absorbed and corrected by the narrative’s immune system. Kuoh Town would survive without my intervention.
🌆 Evening: The Final Sunset
18:30 PM - The Hill of the Abandoned Church
As the sun began its descent, painting the sky in deep, bruised shades of violet and orange, I stood on the hill overlooking the ruined church.
The area had been cordoned off by local authorities—likely mind-controlled by the Gremory peerage to view the destruction as a gas leak or structural collapse. The lingering stench of Exorcist holy magic and Fallen Angel ozone was slowly being scrubbed away by the evening breeze.
I looked down at my hands. The grip tape was gone. The calluses on my knuckles from striking Freed Sellzen were already fading. The “Normal Human” restriction had been a fascinating experiment. I had felt the burn of lactic acid, the terrifying limitations of human bone density, and the necessity of flawless biomechanical technique over raw, conceptual power. It was a good exercise in humility.
System Countdown: 14 Hours, 22 Minutes remaining.
🌙 Night: The Empty Room
21:00 PM - Fajar’s Apartment
I returned to my apartment and stood in the center of the living room.
There was nothing left to pack. There were no loose ends to tie. The rent was paid through an untraceable, automated account. Tomorrow, when the landlord eventually checked the room, it would look as though no one had ever lived here at all.
I did not sleep on the mattress. I sat cross-legged on the bare wooden floor, my long dark coat pooling around me.
4. Mental Reset (Meditation & Empty Mind).
I brought up the mental blackboard. It was already completely clean. I closed my eyes, syncing my breathing to the quiet, rhythmic ticking of the cosmic clock, and waited in total silence for Sunday to arrive.
Day 21
Date: Sunday (Week 3) Location: Kuoh Town (Isolated Alleyway) Status: Infinite Reality Concept (Unsealing)
The countdown reached its final hour.
I stood in a narrow, shadowed alleyway on the outskirts of Kuoh Town, wrapped in my long dark coat. The ambient noise of the human world felt distant, muted by the thinning veil between this dimension and the Void. It was time to initiate the departure sequence.
Suddenly, a violent, jagged spike of agony shot through my central nervous system. I staggered forward, bracing one hand against the brick wall. The bricks beneath my palm instantly spider-webbed, cracking under a sudden, terrifying density.
I had made a critical miscalculation.
By skipping my physical cultivation routines yesterday to act as a silent observer, I had forgotten to initiate the gradual, staged removal of the “Normal Human” restriction. The metaphysical seal binding my Infinite Reality status into a mortal vessel was now defaulting to an automatic, violent purge. My true cosmic weight was aggressively expanding, trying to forcibly cram a localized sun into a fragile, human-sized jar.
The violent fluctuation of my unsealing caused a massive tear in my stealth camouflage. For a fraction of a second, I blipped on the radar.
The atmospheric pressure above the alley plummeted.
A dozen black feathers drifted down into the shadows. Then, the sky fractured. Over twenty Fallen Angels descended, blocking both exits of the alley and lining the fire escapes above.
At their center hovered Raynare, flanked by Mittelt, Dohnaseek, and Kalawarner. The four of them looked battered but thoroughly vengeful, surrounded by a heavily armed strike team of their peers.
“Thought you could just slip away, human?” Raynare sneered, a massive spear of light already crackling in her hand. “We’ve had eyes on your pathetic little apartment since you humiliated us at the park. You disappeared yesterday, but that little energy spike just now painted a target right on your back.”
I fell to one knee, gripping my chest. The air around me was beginning to warp, the spatial fabric groaning under the sheer, uncompressed mass of my returning existence.
“Do not… come any closer,” I ground out, my voice vibrating with a frequency that shattered the glass of a nearby streetlight. “My seal is breaking. If you cross this threshold… your physical vessels will not survive.”
Raynare laughed, a shrill, arrogant sound. Because my true power was entirely beyond the conceptual parameters of this dimension, their demonic senses couldn’t perceive it. To them, the spatial distortion just looked like a human struggling with a failing magic trick.
“Still playing the arrogant hero?” Dohnaseek spat, readying his own weapon.
“Tear him apart!” Raynare shrieked, pointing her spear at me. “I want his head!”
Six Fallen Angel vanguard troops dove from the fire escapes, their light weapons drawn, intending to impale me to the asphalt.
They crossed the ten-foot radius around my body.
They didn’t even have time to scream. The passive, crushing existential weight of my unsealing hit them like a falling skyscraper. The sudden, incomprehensible atmospheric pressure caused the veins in their necks, arms, and sclera to violently rupture in unison. Blood sprayed into the air as a mist. Their light weapons instantly extinguished, and their bodies slammed into the concrete, instantly unconscious, their nervous systems completely short-circuiting to prevent their souls from being crushed into dust.
The Fallen Angels behind them charged blindly, stepping into the radius. Pop. Crack. Four more collapsed like marionettes with cut strings, blood weeping from their noses and eyes as they hit the ground in a dead faint.
Raynare’s triumphant smirk dissolved into absolute, paralyzing horror. “W-What is this?! What is he doing?!”
“He’s not casting anything!” Kalawarner screamed, backing away in terror as the invisible, crushing gravity expanded outward by another meter. “His sheer presence is destroying their bodies!”
The remaining Fallen Angels in the rear guard panicked. Realizing that closing the distance meant instantaneous, brutal incapacitation, they completely abandoned their assassination attempt. Frantically, they cast long-range tethers of magical light, lassoing the ankles and wrists of their unconscious, bleeding comrades. Dragging the vanguard roughly across the asphalt, they manifested teleportation circles and launched themselves into the sky, fleeing the alley as if they were escaping a localized black hole.
I remained on the ground, gritting my teeth as the final barrier of the mortal restriction shattered.
CRACK.
A silent shockwave rippled out, wiping the alley completely clean of dust, debris, and the lingering scent of Fallen Angel ozone.
And then… perfect, absolute stillness.
The violent storm of pressure vanished instantly. My power stabilized, folding back into my core. I stood up, smoothing the front of my dark coat. To the mundane world, and to any supernatural entity that might try to look, I was no longer a threat. I was no longer anything at all. My existence had become completely unperceivable, returned to its true, boundless state.
System Countdown: 00:00:00.
The space in front of me seamlessly unzipped, revealing the sprawling, starry expanse of the Void. I stepped through the rift without looking back, leaving the world of Devils and Dragons behind. The tear closed silently behind me, sealing Kuoh Town away in its own isolated reality.
Epilogue
The morning sun filtered through the curtains of Issei Hyoudou’s bedroom, signaling the start of a brand new, miraculously peaceful week. Issei groaned, slowly waking from a deep, exhausting sleep. As his consciousness returned, he realized two things: first, both of his arms were pinned down; second, the sensation pressing against him on both sides was incredibly, undeniably soft.
He opened his eyes, blinking away the sleep. To his left, snuggled comfortably against his side beneath the blankets, was a completely naked Rias Gremory, her crimson hair sprawled across the pillows.
Issei’s brain short-circuited. “B-Buchou?!”
But before he could even process the sensory overload of his club president sleeping in his bed, a soft murmur came from his right side. He slowly turned his head. Sleeping peacefully against his other shoulder, clutching his arm with a gentle smile, was a completely naked Asia Argento.
“W-W-What is happening?!” Issei shrieked internally, his face turning the color of a ripe tomato. His teenage heart hammered against his ribs at supersonic speeds. It was a chaotic, embarrassing, and thoroughly miraculous morning—a stark contrast to the blood and death they had faced just days prior. Asia was alive, safe, and somehow… sleeping naked in his bed.
A few hours later, the chaos shifted from Issei’s bedroom to the Kuoh Academy Year 2 homeroom.
“Listen up, everyone,” the homeroom teacher announced, tapping the chalkboard. “We have a new transfer student joining us today. Please make her feel welcome.”
The sliding door opened, and Asia walked in, wearing the standard Kuoh Academy girls’ uniform. She looked nervous but incredibly radiant. The collective jaw of the male student body dropped. She looked like a literal angel.
“U-Um, hello,” Asia bowed politely, her blonde hair shimmering in the sunlight. “My name is Asia Argento. I’m very happy to meet you all. Please take care of me.”
The boys immediately erupted into cheers, completely smitten. But Asia wasn’t done. She turned her bright green eyes toward Issei’s desk and smiled warmly. “I’m still very new to Japan, but thankfully, Issei-san has been helping me since I am currently living under the same roof as him!”
The entire classroom froze. The silence was deafening.
Slowly, every male student turned their heads toward Issei. Their eyes were devoid of light, radiating pure, unadulterated murderous intent. The comedy of Issei’s suffering had officially resumed.
By lunch break, Issei had miraculously survived the interrogation of his classmates and managed to escape to the courtyard with Matsuda, Motohama, and Asia.
“H-Hello, Matsuda-san, Motohama-san,” Asia smiled, bowing to the two boys. “Issei-san has told me you are his best friends.”
Matsuda and Motohama stood perfectly still, their hands trembling. Slowly, thick, manly tears began to stream down their faces.
“She spoke to us,” Matsuda sobbed, falling to his knees. “An angel actually spoke to us without calling us creeping trash…”
“The springtime of our youth has finally arrived, Matsuda,” Motohama wept, pushing up his glasses as tears completely fogged the lenses. He then let out a heavy sigh, looking up at the sky. “Man… it’s too bad Fajar isn’t here to see this. He would have been proud of us. Our brotherhood finally has a girl who willingly talks to us.”
Asia tilted her head, her ahoge twitching in confusion. “Fajar-san? Oh! I know him! Actually, before I transferred here, I met Fajar-san and Issei-san in town. Is he in a different class? I would love to see him again!”
Matsuda and Motohama exchanged a confused look, then turned to Issei.
“Wait, you didn’t know?” Issei said, his smile fading into a softer, slightly melancholic expression. “Fajar left, Asia. His exchange program ended. He went back to his home country yesterday.”
Asia’s bright smile immediately fell. Her green eyes widened in shock. “He… he left? Already?”
She gripped the fabric of her skirt, a deep sadness washing over her. Fajar had been there when she was wandering lost in the town. He had fought through the church to save her. He had been a quiet, steady pillar of strength, and she hadn’t even gotten the chance to say a simple ‘thank you’ or ‘goodbye’.
“I… I didn’t get to thank him properly,” Asia murmured, looking down.
Motohama, unable to bear the sight of the sweet girl looking sad, suddenly snapped his fingers. “Wait a minute! He was an international transfer student, right? The Student Council handles all the international transfer paperwork and forwarding addresses!”
Matsuda jumped up, slamming his fist into his palm. “You’re a genius, Motohama! If we ask the Student Council President, maybe we can get his international contact info! An email, a phone number, a mailing address—something!”
Asia’s face immediately lit up with hope. “Really? We could do that?”
“Hell yeah we can!” Issei grinned, slamming his fist against his chest. Fajar had left without a trace, but Issei wanted to reach out to his friend too. “Come on! Let’s go see the Student Council President right now!”
Determined to track down the contact information of the anomaly known as Fajar, the newly formed quartet marched confidently through the halls of Kuoh Academy, heading straight for the domain of Sona Sitri.
The Student Council room was usually a place of absolute order, but today, the rhythmic tapping of Sona Sitri’s keyboard had slowed to a hesitant, confused halt.
“Nothing,” Sona muttered, adjusting her glasses as she stared at the glowing monitor. “I have searched the international transfer database, the localized Kuoh Academy registry, and the tuition ledgers. There is zero data matching the name ‘Fajar’.”
Issei leaned over the desk, panic creeping into his voice. “That’s impossible, Kaichou! He was literally in our homeroom for three weeks! He sat right in the back row!”
“I am aware of your claim, Hyoudou,” Sona said, her sharp eyes narrowing in suspicion. She stood up from her desk. “Wait here. I will speak to the headmaster and the faculty directly. A paper trail must exist.”
Ten minutes later, the Student Council President returned. For the first time since Issei had known her, Sona Sitri looked genuinely, profoundly rattled.
“They have no memory of him,” Sona announced, her voice echoing in the quiet room. “The headmaster, the homeroom teachers, the administrative staff—none of them recall processing or teaching an international exchange student named Fajar.”
“What?!” Matsuda yelled, grabbing his hair. “Are they pranking us?! We literally ate burgers with the guy on Friday!”
Tsubaki Shinra, the Student Council Vice President, frowned deeply. “President, even among the council members present, none of us recall this student. If he had been attending for three weeks, we would have interacted with him during uniform inspections or morning greetings. It is as if he never existed.”
“This is freaking me out,” Motohama shivered, his glasses fogging up. “Issei, let’s go back to the classroom. The other guys have to remember him!”
With Sona quietly following behind them, her analytical mind racing, the group sprinted back to the Year 2 homeroom. They burst through the sliding doors, immediately cornering their classmates.
“Kiryuu!” Issei slammed his hands on his classmate’s desk. “Tell me you remember Fajar! The tall guy with the dark hair who sat in the back row!”
Aika Kiryuu blinked, looking at Issei as if he had lost his mind. “Hyoudou, did you hit your head? There’s nobody named Fajar in this class. That desk in the back has been empty since the semester started.”
Matsuda aggressively interrogated two other students, only to receive the exact same bewildered responses. “There’s no transfer student.” “You guys are imagining things.” “That seat is vacant.”
Asia stood in the center of the room, her hands clasped together, looking incredibly distressed. “But… we saw him. He helped me in the town. He saved me…”
Issei stared at the empty desk at the back of the classroom. The chair was perfectly tucked in. There were no scratches on the wood, no forgotten textbooks inside the cubby. The physical space was completely void of any human warmth or history. It wasn’t just that Fajar had left; it was as if reality itself had smoothed over the space where he used to be, aggressively correcting an anomaly.
Sona Sitri walked slowly down the aisle, her sharp gaze analyzing the empty desk. As a high-class Devil and the heir to the Sitri clan, she was intimately familiar with memory-altering magic. But this was different. To erase a physical entity from international databases, local paper trails, and the minds of hundreds of mundane humans simultaneously required a scale of conceptual manipulation that bordered on the divine.
Sona pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose, a rare, thrilled spark of absolute mystery igniting in her eyes.
“Hyoudou,” Sona said calmly, turning to the bewildered trio. “The Occult Research Club was established in this school primarily as a front to manage the supernatural affairs of the Gremory territory. But it appears the illusion has finally become reality.”
Issei looked at her, entirely lost. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Sona replied, her tone laced with serious, intellectual gravity, “that a student you clearly remember has been conceptually erased from the fabric of this town. We finally have a genuine occult case on our hands. Gather your friends. We are going to the old school building to see Rias.”
The heavy oak doors of the Occult Research Club were violently thrown open, slamming against the walls with a thunderous crack that made Kiba reach for his sword and Akeno spill her tea.
“Buchou!” Issei screamed, his chest heaving as he stumbled into the room, his face pale with absolute terror. Behind him, Matsuda and Motohama were practically hyperventilating, clutching their heads, while Asia looked on the verge of tears. Sona Sitri stepped in last, her face a mask of cold, uncharacteristic alarm.
Rias stood up immediately from her desk, her crimson aura flaring in response to Issei’s panic. “Issei, what is it? Are we under attack? Where is the enemy?”
“It’s Fajar!” Issei yelled, his voice cracking violently. “He’s gone, Buchou! Not just gone—he’s completely erased! The teachers don’t know him! Kiryuu doesn’t know him! His desk has been completely empty all semester according to everyone else! It’s like he never existed!”
“What are you babbling about?” Rias demanded, stepping forward. “Fajar left for his home country. We escorted him to his apartment ourselves just days ago.”
“That is exactly the problem, Rias,” Sona interrupted, her sharp voice cutting through the hysteria. Sona walked to the center of the room, adjusting her glasses with a trembling hand. “I scoured the student council archives. I checked the international transfer databases. I interrogated the headmaster and the faculty. There is absolutely zero paper trail, digital footprint, or memory of a student named Fajar ever enrolling in Kuoh Academy. Someone, or something, has retroactively deleted his entire existence from the human world.”
Akeno’s teacup shattered on the saucer. Her perpetual, sadistic smile vanished instantly, replaced by a look of profound, creeping dread. “That… that is impossible. To rewrite the memories of an entire town and alter physical records simultaneously? That requires a scale of conceptual manipulation that even ultimate-class Devils cannot easily achieve.”
“But he was just a normal guy!” Matsuda wailed, dropping to his knees and clutching his hair. “He won us crane game prizes! He beat Motohama at fighting games! How can a guy who eats cheap hamburgers just get deleted from reality?!”
“I… I wanted to say goodbye to him,” Asia sobbed quietly, clutching Issei’s sleeve. “He saved me at the church. Why doesn’t anyone remember him?”
Rias’s azure eyes widened as the sheer gravity of the situation crashed down on her. The human who had casually absorbed her mind-alteration magic, who had wielded an Exorcist’s sword with lethal perfection without a shred of holy energy, had now vanished from the fabric of reality itself.
“This is not a simple spell,” Rias declared, her voice dropping to a terrifyingly serious octave. “This is a dimensional anomaly. We need to lock down this territory and investigate every single place he ever stepped foot in.” She turned to the room, issuing rapid-fire orders. “Issei, Asia, Kiba—retrace his steps through the town. Matsuda, Motohama, you two go back to the places you hung out with him. Sona, continue sweeping the school grounds. Akeno, go directly to his apartment. Koneko, interrogate the student body. Find out if anyone besides us remembers him.”
“And you, Buchou?” Issei asked frantically.
“I am going to the Underworld,” Rias said, a crimson teleportation circle already materializing beneath her feet. “I am going to ask my brother. If the Maou Lucifer does not know what kind of entity can bypass reality’s immune system like this, then no one does.”
In a flash of crimson light, Rias vanished. The remaining members of the Occult Research Club and the Student Council immediately scattered, treating the mystery as a high-level supernatural crisis.
The Investigations
Akeno materialized in the quiet residential district, sprinting up the stairs to the apartment complex where she and Rias had dropped Fajar off. She bypassed the lock with a surge of demonic energy and threw the door open. She froze. The apartment was completely devoid of life. There was no furniture, no lingering scent, and a thick layer of undisturbed dust coated the floorboards. She traced her fingers along the window sill; the dust hadn’t been moved in months. It was a space that had been eternally empty.
Across town, Matsuda and Motohama burst into the arcade, sweating profusely and startling the manager. “Old man!” Motohama yelled, slamming his hands on the counter. “Friday! The four of us were here! The tall guy with dark hair cleared out your crane machines! You have to remember him!”
The manager recoiled, looking at them like they were insane. “What four of you? It was just you three perverts! You guys were screaming at the fighting cabinets for three hours and making a complete nuisance of yourselves. Nobody won the crane games that day. The plushies are still in there!” Matsuda and Motohama stared at the fully stocked machines, their blood running completely cold.
Issei, Asia, and Kiba sprinted through the commercial district, hitting every convenience store and cafe they could think of. They stormed into the family restaurant where Raynare had ambushed them. Issei grabbed the waitress who had been working that shift. “Please! A few days ago, the creepy goth girl appeared here! Fajar was sitting right across from me, he grabbed my shoulder to stop me from fighting her! Do you remember him?!”
The waitress looked unnerved but shook her head. “I remember the scary girl in the black dress, and I remember you looking like you were going to have a panic attack… but you were only sitting with the blonde girl and your two loud friends. There was no one holding your shoulder, kid.” Issei stumbled back. Even at the ruined church on the hill, there were no footprints, no residual traces of a human wielding a holy sword.
Meanwhile, Koneko Toujou walked silently toward the Kendo Club dojo. She approached Katase and Murayama, the two fierce captains who regularly tormented the perverted trio.
“Excuse me,” Koneko said softly, her golden eyes unblinking. “Do you remember a transfer student named Fajar? He hung around Hyoudou.”
Katase sighed, rolling her eyes. “Oh, that quiet guy? Yeah, I remember him. It’s a shame he hung out with the perverted trio. Murayama and I actually beat him up along with Hyoudou and his idiot friends a couple of weeks ago for peeping near the changing rooms. He just took the hits and didn’t say a word.”
Koneko’s eyes widened a fraction of a millimeter. A positive ID.
“Hey, Sasaki,” Murayama called out to a first-year kendo girl practicing nearby. “You remember that day we completely trashed the perverted trio and that transfer student, right?”
The first-year paused, lowering her shinai with a puzzled expression. “What transfer student, Murayama-senpai? I watched you beat up Hyoudou, Matsuda, and Motohama. There were only three of them. You hit Matsuda so hard he cried. But there was absolutely no fourth person.”
Katase and Murayama froze, the color completely draining from their faces. “What are you talking about?” Katase snapped, her voice trembling slightly. “I literally hit him with my bamboo sword! I felt the impact!” She looked around at the other girls in the dojo, who were all shaking their heads in utter confusion. The two kendo captains looked at their own hands, suddenly doubting their own sanity, a profound sense of vertigo washing over them. Koneko didn’t stay to comfort them; she turned on her heel and sprinted back to the old school building, her mind racing with a chilling hypothesis.
The Gathering
By the time the sun began to set, casting long, bloody shadows across the Occult Research Club room, the investigation teams had reconvened. The atmosphere was completely suffocating.
Issei was sitting on the couch, staring blankly at the floor, while Asia sat beside him, holding his hand as she quietly wept. Matsuda and Motohama were huddled in the corner, traumatized and shivering, entirely stripped of their usual comedic bravado.
“The apartment was a complete void,” Akeno reported, her voice hollow, lacking any of its usual teasing warmth. “There was no residual heat, no displaced dust, no magical residue. The physical space actively rejects the idea that he ever inhabited it.”
“The town is the same,” Kiba added grimly, his fists clenched. “No one at the cafes or the arcades recalls seeing him. Even in the exact moments where he physically altered our actions, the bystanders’ memories have completely overwritten him with a different sequence of events.”
Sona Sitri stood by the window, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. “The school’s physical and digital architecture is completely pristine. To the structural reality of Kuoh Town, Fajar is less than a ghost. A ghost at least leaves a legend. He left absolute zero.”
Koneko stepped forward into the center of the room, her golden eyes dark and serious.
“I found a discrepancy,” Koneko said quietly, drawing every terrified eye in the room toward her. “Katase and Murayama from the Kendo Club remember him. They remember physically striking him. But the girls standing right next to them, watching the exact same event, remember only Issei, Matsuda, and Motohama.”
A heavy, terrifying silence fell over the room.
“I cross-referenced all of our findings,” Koneko continued, delivering the chilling conclusion of her investigation. “The teachers didn’t teach him. The arcade manager didn’t serve him. Kiryuu never spoke to him. Only those who directly interacted with him—physically fought him, touched him, or held a direct, reciprocal conversation with his vessel—retain his existence in their minds. To everyone else, and to the very fabric of the world itself, he was never here at all.”
Issei looked up, his eyes wide with a mixture of awe and absolute terror. The boy who had bought them burgers, who had held Raynare at sword-point, wasn’t just a mysterious transfer student. He was an entity so completely alien to their dimension that reality itself was actively purging his footprints the moment he left.
The door to the clubroom remained closed. Rias had not yet returned from the Underworld, leaving them alone in the gathering dark to grapple with the terrifying truth of the anomaly they had called a friend.
The silver magic circle of the Lucifuge clan erupted violently in the center of the Occult Research Club. Grayfia stepped through, her expression uncharacteristically tense. Without a single word of greeting, her magic flared, engulfing Issei, Asia, the remaining peerage, Sona Sitri, and the utterly terrified Matsuda and Motohama.
In a blinding flash, they were pulled across dimensions, materializing directly inside the grand, cavernous office of the Maou Lucifer in the Underworld.
Rias Gremory stood trembling slightly by a massive mahogany desk. Beside her stood Sirzechs Lucifer, the Crimson Satan, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“My brother utilized the deepest archives of the Underworld, tapping into the sensory networks of the Maou themselves,” Rias announced, her voice hollow. “Nothing. There is no biological, magical, or conceptual trace of Fajar in any dimension we can perceive.”
Sirzechs looked at the bewildered group, his usual easygoing demeanor entirely replaced by the grave authority of a ruler. “He is a complete ghost. However, our intelligence within the Grigori intercepted a highly classified report just hours ago. Four rogue Fallen Angels—Raynare, Mittelt, Dohnaseek, and Kalawarner—were recovered by Azazel’s vanguard. They have completely lost their minds.”
Issei stepped forward, his breath catching. “What happened to them?”
“They are raving lunatics now, repeating the same terrifying story on an endless loop,” Sirzechs explained, his tone dark. “According to their fractured minds, they cornered your Fajar in an isolated alleyway in Kuoh yesterday evening with a twenty-man elite strike team. They claim he didn’t use a single weapon or cast a single spell. Instead, they say his ‘seal’ broke. The sheer, passive weight of his existence expanding into the space caused the vanguard’s veins to instantaneously rupture. Their men dropped like flies, their nervous systems completely crushed by an invisible gravity. And then… they claim reality simply unzipped, and he stepped into the void.”
The sheer scale of the terror described paralyzed the room. Grayfia raised her hand, instantly teleporting the entire group back to the human world, dropping them directly into the exact coordinates of the alleyway Sirzechs had described.
They frantically scoured the narrow path. They searched for residual ozone, cracked asphalt, or blood. They found absolutely nothing. The alley was perfectly mundane, aggressively scrubbed clean by reality itself.
Asia stood in the center of the concrete path, clutching the fabric over her heart. Tears welled in her bright green eyes, spilling softly down her cheeks.
“He’s really gone,” Asia sobbed, her voice trembling with profound grief. “He saved me from the dark. He showed me the town. And I… I never even got to say goodbye. I never got to say thank you.”
As the tears fell, Asia suddenly gasped. Her eyes widened, losing focus. Without a sound, her knees buckled.
“Asia!” Issei screamed, diving forward to catch her fragile body before she hit the concrete.
But as Issei pulled her into his arms, his panic froze. Asia wasn’t seizing or pale. Instead, her eyes were closed, and a breathtakingly beautiful, serene smile was painted across her lips.
They rushed her back to the old school building, laying her gently on the clubroom sofa. Ten agonizing minutes later, Asia’s eyelashes fluttered. She slowly sat up, looking at the incredibly worried faces surrounding her.
“Asia! Are you okay?!” Issei hovered over her frantically.
Asia blinked, bringing her hands to her chest. The heavy, suffocating sadness that had crushed her in the alleyway was completely gone. She looked around the room, her smile returning—softer, warmer, and radiating an impossible, boundless peace.
“I’m okay, Issei-san,” she whispered, her voice steady and light. “I don’t feel sad anymore. It’s the strangest thing… I feel so incredibly peaceful. It felt like a warm wind wrapped around my heart.” She looked toward the window, gazing up at the blue Kuoh sky. “It feels like… I finally managed to say thank you. And I know, wherever he is, he heard me.”
The space in front of me seamlessly unzipped, revealing the sprawling, starry expanse of the Void, and I stepped through the rift without looking back, leaving the world of Devils and Dragons behind and sealing Kuoh Town away in its own isolated reality. The violent spatial pressure of my unsealing vanished the moment the dimensional threshold closed behind me.
I was no longer in the human world. I had returned to my domain, an empty, infinite realm where I possess the absolute power to bind my soul and live forever as an immortal creator. This was the culmination of my existence—the realm I claimed after my “Fiction to Reality” syndicate successfully discovered multiversal theory.
As I walked through the endless, pristine white expanse of the White Void, the physical vessel of the average Japanese high school exchange student began to dissolve. The youthful, unblemished skin and the lightweight skeletal structure of a teenager melted away, replaced by the crushing, absolute gravity of my true form. I felt the familiar weight of my broad shoulders and the coarse texture of a thick, full beard framing my jaw. I was a forty-year-old man again. I was Fajar Purnama, the Lord of Infinite Realities.
I stood in the center of this infinity, observing the expanse with the calm, absolute authority of a creator.
I looked down at my calloused hands, hands that had casually absorbed mind-alteration magic and wielded an Exorcist’s sword with lethal perfection without a shred of holy energy. Route 0 was officially concluded. The experiment was over.
I had initiated this descent into Kuoh Town because I possessed a singular, deeply human motivation: I wanted to experience the vibrant, chaotic peak of youth that I felt I had missed. I wanted the illusion of a normal high school life. But looking back at the fractured timeline I had just abandoned, the failure of the premise was glaringly obvious.
I could not be a normal high school student because I could not seal my own memory. My godhood was permanently imprinted onto my soul. I had attempted to restrict myself with Phase I: Reality, attempting to build a body and mind through skill, instinct, and biology alone. I had utilized the Mental Reset module to clear my mind and lower my heart rate. But human high school academics and mundane dramas were utterly trivial to a mind that already held the cosmic blueprints of infinite realities. My brain was perpetually processing the equations that governed the fabric of space and time.
Even when I tried to act the part of a passive observer, I moved on my own. My sensory domains and combat instincts—honed to the absolute peak of martial combat across multiversal deployments—overrode my mortal shell. When I saw a threat, I neutralized it with mathematical precision. When an anomaly presented itself, I dismantled it. I was an active, un-wiped anomaly. The very fabric of reality aggressively corrected itself around me, ultimately retroactively deleting my entire existence from the human world the moment my seal broke.
I raised my head, watching the distant, shifting horizons of my empty realm.
If I truly wanted to experience a story from the beginning—to feel the genuine thrill of growth, the terror of mortality, and the raw, unfiltered essence of a narrative—I could not be the one to walk the path. An omnipotent multiversal deity masquerading as a mortal only breaks the board.
The conclusion was absolute. For the next route, the avatar cannot be me. It has to be a fresh soul—someone who truly starts from the beginning, without the unbearable, crushing weight of absolute cosmic authority already wired into their nervous system.
I folded my arms across my heavy, dark coat, the silence of eternity wrapping around me. I watched the infinite horizon, preparing the cosmic framework for Route 1.