Steam drifted lazily across the bathing area, creating a warm haze through which the members of the Occult Research Club moved quietly. Rias had insisted everyone wash up before departing for the Gremory territory—"a clear body, a clear mind"—and although the sentiment sounded simple, the group felt anything but clear.
Issei slipped into the men's side, exhaling as the heat wrapped around him. Azazel was already there, leaning against the edge, wings half-spread and relaxed. His one visible eye glided over Issei, studying him with the precision of a surgeon.
"…You feel different."
Issei blinked. "It's just the bath temperature—"
Azazel snorted. "As if temperature changes your aura. I'm asking what happened after that fight with the mage."
For a moment Issei considered telling him—about the dream, the man drenched in the blood of millions, the staring red eyes, the heads, the impaled corpses, the suffocating pressure. The way he felt watched every time he woke. But the words stuck in his throat.
"It's nothing," he said finally.
Azazel didn't buy it, but he didn't press either. "Fine. But don't mistake my silence for ignorance. You're shifting in ways you shouldn't." His gaze narrowed. "Just remember—power that changes without your permission is never harmless."
On the other side of the dividing wall, the girls bathed in equal silence.
Koneko sat on a stone ledge, water lapping at her legs, her expression unusually serious. Her golden eyes were unfocused, lost in thought.
(Senpai… changed.)
She clenched her hands under the water. The instinctive part of her—her yokai senses—felt it clearly. Something dark, coiled, and ancient clung to Issei now, even more strongly than the aura she'd sensed after his fight with Vali.
She bit her lip. Was it dangerous? Or… was it something he was trying to protect them from?
Nearby, Rias sank into the water up to her shoulders, her crimson hair floating around her like a shadow. She looked exhausted.
Azazel's words from earlier kept replaying in her mind:
"You rely too much on luck. On emotion. And you treat everyone around you with too much gentle restraint, afraid to let them fight their own battles."
She had no immediate rebuttal. Everything he said had struck a raw nerve.Rias pulled her knees to her chest, steam blurring her eyes.
Am I really failing them? Is Koneko afraid because of me? …Is Issei changing because I've pushed him too hard?
Warm water splashed softly as Akeno approached with a calm smile. "President, you're scrubbing the same strand for the third time."
Rias flinched. "I—I'm fine."
Akeno didn't argue. She merely stayed close, a steadying presence, as Koneko's quiet thoughts churned beside them.
Far away—though not far enough—another conversation unfolded under moonlight.
Bikou stood atop a tiled rooftop, arms folded behind his head while a pair of golden-eyed pupils bored into him. The woman before him was breathtaking and dangerous, her black kimono fluttering with the breeze, exposing the smooth slope of her shoulders. Her posture carried the elegance of a shrine maiden… yet the aura of a predator.
"You really don't care what Loki's doing?" Bikou asked, tapping his staff against the roof tiles.
Her lips curved, but it was not a smile. "Loki can scheme, rage, threaten—all of it is irrelevant to me."
Her voice was soft, but beneath it simmered an unmistakable hunger. She stepped closer, beads around her neck glinting.
"There is only one thing I want," she murmured, each word laced with intent. "My sister."
Bikou swallowed. "Kuroka… you're really set on this?"
The woman—Kuroka, the infamous Nekoshou—closed her eyes briefly. When they opened again, the gentle hazel-gold had sharpened.
"Shirone," she whispered, almost reverently. "I will take her back. No matter who stands in my way."
Her shadow stretched across the roof, merging with the night—dark, elegant, and lethal.
Back in the bathhouse, a faint tremor ran through Koneko's body.
~~~
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