Game of Monsters - 193

Feel the Hungry Staring

‘Is that Rossweisse?’ was the first thought that went through Joshua’s mind when he entered the meeting room where Agnes was apparently waiting with whoever “the Norse” were supposed to be. Elizabeth herself had been called just as urgently as him, it seemed and she hadn’t been able to tell him much.

He thought that reaction was justified though, but then again, he rather doubted Rossweisse was the only silver-haired valkyrie in Asgard. The fact that Odin himself wasn’t there lended credibility to the theory that maybe this was someone else too. So, with that in mind, Joshua prepared himself to deal with the situation as if he knew nothing. Which wasn’t too far from the truth, he didn’t remember much about Rossweisse other than some silly trivia and the fact that she was Odin’s guard before being dropped with Rias.

Interestingly, when he pulled on his spells to focus more on them, three of the women seemed to shift in place. The oldest one was the sharpest reaction, eyes narrowed and back straightened. The woman that made him think of Rossweisse, for her part, tilted her head and another one frowned a little bit, as if confused.

“Joshua,” Agnes greeted, a perfect political smile on her face. He could already tell that it was going to be an annoying meeting. Surely he could dump it all on Ravel, right? Although, checking on her through his senses and spells – would probably be rude to look at her while Agnes was introducing the valkyries in the room –, he got the idea that no, this was one of the instances where he had to deal with it himself.

None of the names Agnes was telling him ran any bells in his mind, at least. There were around ten of those too, which-

“This is Rossweisse,” he was told and he tried really hard to pretend like he wasn’t surprised. Despite that being his first guess, that was only because she was the only Norse character he knew with silver hair. What were the chances? “And last, but certainly not least,” Agnes continued, signalling to a stern looking, noticeably older woman. He didn’t know if he’d go as far as calling her elderly, but if she wasn’t, then she was almost there. “This is Göndul,” Agnes said, and he got the impression that the name was supposed to mean something to him.

Which it did not, at all.

“Everyone, this is Joshua Davis, the latest of Egypt’s Pharaohs,” Agnes finished with, turning towards the valkyries and gesturing towards him.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you all,” he said, plastering his best smile on his face. Dating the people that he was, Joshua was bound to pick up a thing or two about politicking, for sure. He still hated it with a passion, but he could play the game if he had to. He wouldn’t be the best at it, but he could do it.

“Mr. Davis, or should I call you Lord Davis?” Gondul asked to start with, walking up to him with her back straight.

“Joshua, Mr. Davis if you must,” he replied, smile still in place despite her intensely serious expression. “Titles are only useful when one is trying to make a point, don’t you think?” he added, trying to soothe any issues the woman might have with his “informality”.

“Mr. Davis, then,” she said and he let out a mental sigh. Alas, he couldn’t actually express that. “I have to say, I’ve known about you for some time and I’m very impressed, both with your prowess and your progress,” she added and apparently that was a big deal, because all the valkyries seemed shocked with that statement. Agnes looked incredibly smug too. “It’s not always that a magician raises in such a manner, not even those of us that aren’t completely human. Furthermore, to do so with branches of magic that are decidedly not what one thinks of when they think about the strongest of magics, it deserves its own recognition.”

Well, socially awkward and not at all politically inclined, Joshua still wasn’t completely immune to praise. However, there was the fact that he’d gotten plenty of that from plenty of magicians in his classes, or around House of Water in general. Not only that, but everyone loved saying how good he was and so on, so… Yeah, he was kind of used to the effects that would have normally had on him.

It did feel nice though.

“Thank you for the kind words, Mrs. Göndul, or should I call you Lady Göndul?” he replied, delivering the words right back at her. She seemed to notice, if the slightly amused tug at her lips was any indication.

“Göndul, Lady Göndul if you must,” she added and his grin turned the smallest bit more honest at that. “Now,” the valkyrie started then, standing even straighter, which he didn’t know was possible. “We were here to schedule a lecture with you for my students. Ms. Waterhouse said it’d be better to speak with you directly,” she said and he nodded, finally getting the last piece of the puzzle. Or, at least, the last important one.

“I’m sure we can arrange something, Göndul,” he replied with a smile before gesturing to his side. “This is Ravel Phenex. She’s my personal assistant. She helps make sure I don’t forget important things while I work on my magic,” he added, drawing a giggle from the valkyrie.

If anything, that seemed to take aback her students even more.

“Oh do I know what you mean, Joshua,” she said, some of her stern exterior melting and making her seem much more approachable. Joshua was very grateful for that. “Tell me, Joshua, I imagine you work with circles?”

“I do, but I did look into the Norse runes quite a bit for a project some time ago,” he answered and the woman turned decidedly giddy. “I never quite got into actually using it, but it’s fascinating, especially the specialized branches, even if I didn’t get to look into those.”

“I can teach you about those, if that’d be sufficient pay for the lecture, Joshua,” she offered and he grinned even wider. “I’ll take that as a yes,” she said, grinning right back.

“Göndul, I think I’ll love dealing with you,” he replied.

[}-o-{]

Sure enough, he did love dealing with Göndul.

“So, you’re saying Norse runes work kind of like wards, hexes and boons, all languages can do more or less the same things, but they have things they are better at than the others,” Joshua summarized, running his fingers through his hair. “That’s… actually very neat,” he commented, leaning back and processing the very long talk he’d just had with the former valkyrie. Apparently valkyries could retire. “So, if I could switch from circles to runes and mix that with my spells, I could make extra-specialized versions, which would be-”

“I’m sorry to sink your boat before it departs, but it’s not easy to switch magic systems, Joshua,” Göndul told him dryly, but his mind was already running a mile a minute. He’d studied runes for the projects that lead to Friday, but he’d ended up not using any of those alternative magic systems.

Now though, now he had a reason to delve into those once more, especially the Norse one. Maybe…

[Old Norse - Lvl 3/50

Determines the user’s ability to understand Old Norse.]

‘Gotta level this thing up, but-’

“Mr. Davis,” Ravel called, as she usually had to, and he blinked back to the present.

“You’re actually considering doing that, aren’t you?” Göndul asked, equal parts disturbed and disbelieving.

“It’ll take a bit, but just thinking about the possibilities… Yes, I’m definitely going to be working on that. Ugh, as if I didn’t have enough projects already,” he answered, groaning and running his fingers through his hair. Despite his words though, he was more excited than bothered by the new idea. To be fair, it sounded like the most fun project he could have at the moment. And if he could crack how to use runes on top of his spell repertoire, then that might push all his projects a step further too.

“Suddenly, a lot of things make a lot more sense,” Göndul commented, an unreadable expression on his face. She’d kind of spiralled together with him during the magic talk, but now it seemed that she had thoroughly snapped out of that. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted, he supposed.

“Hm, anyway, we can definitely schedule a lecture for your students,” he said, but he was nowhere near done. Now he had motivation instead of vague political power or favors. Now he had something that he actually wanted for a deal, which was a rarity. “Tell you what though, how about I set up a proper class for them, I’ll teach them whatever you want,” he said and everyone in the room sat a little straighter, he noticed.

“That’s very generous, Mr. Davis,” Göndul started, reverting back to more formal speech, evidently. “But I’m afraid-”

“In exchange,” he interrupted, leaning forward with interest almost shining in his eyes. “You’ll teach me runes,” he suggested, grinning widely.

“... That can be arranged, but I can only teach basic runes. Anything more and I’d need permission from people higher up in my Pantheon,” Göndul replied and that was more than a little disappointing. However, he could work with that. He’d need the basic rune knowledge to go further anyway, so he could start with that.

“Ravel,” he said, but he didn’t even need to add any more words after that.

“I’ll see what I can do to get you access to further rune knowledge, Mr. Davis. I’m sure House of Water and the other associations can help,” the devil replied dutifully and he could have kissed her. Instead, he settled for making a mental note to be extra nice to her, make her more phoenix and fire cards for their game and maybe throw the Phenex family a bone. “Aren’t you happy you’ve cultivated so much favor, Mr. Davis?” Ravel added, rather cheekily if he did say so himself.

He just grinned at her, reaching with his hand to ruffle her hair. She protested, but didn’t pull away from him. Yes, it was all coming together. The day had turned out to be much more productive than he’d thought. And he was so excited that he’d forgotten about his weary soul, so that was neat.

“It’s been lovely, Göndul, everyone,” he added, very aware that he’d forgotten about everyone else in the room for the most part, but not really having it in him to care. Rossweisse was neat to meet, as a fairly important character from canon, but Göndul? Göndul was a top tier magician, and he didn’t even need to be told as much. She could engage him in talks that he hardly had a chance to and he hadn’t even realized he wanted to be engaged into.

He’d have to check with Agnes to see if there were other people he could chat with. Hell, he probably could have similar conversations with her and Elizabeth. They were supposed to be really good, right? They might not have been around for as long as Göndul, but surely they knew a thing or two that he might be interested in.

It’d suck to have to be social and all, but he could survive that… probably.

“However,” he continued. “I have a class I had to leave and should at least see off,” he explained and he’d barely make it to see them all off, but at least he’d be able to give them their homework. No way he was letting them off the hook.

Besides, he’d have to ask Levi for help preparing for his new class and for his own runes classes.

“I think we’ve taken up enough of House of Water’s time, yes,” Göndul commented as she stood up, looking straight Joshua all the time despite what she said. Even if he was officially a member of House of Water, Agnes was the leader and she was right there. “We look forward to working with you, Mr. Davis.”

“Same, Göndul. Very much the same. I already can’t wait,” he replied, a wide grin that drew odd looks from everyone around.

[}-o-{]

[Agnes Waterhouse]

She felt like she’d gotten to know Joshua Davis plenty through the time since he’d agreed to teach at her association.

Granted, she hesitated to call it friendship, but it was also difficult to call it just them co-workers or any other professional type of relationship. The man really didn’t lend himself to that, what with his casual approach to most things. All the same though, they talked plenty and she kind of had to know him to best try to do anything that revolved around him, especially since he was basically most of House of Water’s power in any regard those days.

So, Agnes felt like she knew him. Joshua was laidback about most things, a comfort creature if one would. He liked to keep things simple and to the point, which was why he seemed to dislike politics and their convoluted ways. All around, he generally seemed bored or like he was barely scrapping enough care to do whatever he was doing. Most of the time, he couldn’t be bothered to get out of his head or his notebooks, too focused on ideas and concepts that probably eluded most people if not everyone.

At that moment though, she was seeing something completely different from him.

“So, just to be clear, you can pull this off?” he asked her, leaning forward on his seat and staring rather intently at her. It was so unexpected, even though she’d seen him keep the change of attitude for a bit already. Coming from a man that always draped himself wherever he was and couldn’t muster the will to look at anyone with half-focus, that was a huge change.

“With Ms. Phenex’s help, yes. I don’t see why we couldn’t get enough to make the Norse teach you runes, Joshua,” she said and she would have felt as giddy as Davis looked if not for how shocked she still was at the series of events of the day. Not only were the Norse valkyries incredibly elitist, but the bigger Pantheons didn’t really bother with anyone that wasn’t on their same level, generally.

So, Göndul, the Rune Mistress herself, one of the most – if not the most – accomplished rune-based magicians of the world, dropping by her association to chat was a shock. However, hearing that she wanted to talk to Joshua was less surprising, admittedly.

The man had made enough of a name for himself that Agnes wouldn’t have been surprised if someone had approached them sooner than that, really. Then again, most of his feats didn’t really become public in a bombastic manner. They went under the radar and even when they popped up, they were discreet enough that it almost took from them.

Almost, but not quite, Agnes made sure of that.

“All the runes?” Joshua asked and that complicated matters. House of Water owed him enough to pay for those, certainly, but the pull necessary to get that done would burn a lot of her newly amassed power. She’d likely have to go into a bit of depth to pull that off, actually. Joshua was worth it, certainly, considering the absurdly fast growth of the man, but still…

“It might be tricky,” the Phenex devil answered, frowning down at her notebook as if it had failed to give her the answers she wanted. “House of Water might be able to pull that off, but their resources will be stretched thin.”

“I can make up for that, right? Me and the Stars, we can work on that. They insist they owe me, after all, so this might work for that,” Joshua replied immediately and Agnes could see his mind working in real time, trying to find a path to get what he wanted. She wondered when it had been the last time he’d actually been so passionate about getting something. Considering the infamy he’d earned through his “deals” though, she couldn’t imagine there were a lot of instances of that.

“Yes, but I think I can come up with a way to do so without needing to take up your time, Mr. Davis,” the girl said and even Agnes gave her an intense look at that. Did Joshua have an ace up his sleeve that she didn’t know about? “We could leverage more Phoenix Spells for the Norse faction or access to better spells or arrays,” she offered and Agnes blinked.

Especially because the girl was looking straight at her as she spoke, instead of at Davis.

What did she mean by that? Even if Joshua had helped them make the spell, it was still their… ‘Or is it?’ a corner of her mind whispered and she paused. Because she knew a lot better those days. Back when the spell came out, she’d been impressed that Joshua had made that happen. She had also, however, easily bought the story that he had worked with the Phenex to make it happen.

However, with a better idea… it didn’t sound so crazy to think that maybe Joshua had made it all on his own and then thoroughly put the Phenex under his thumb. It certainly gave a good explanation for why one of the Phenex was basically playing secretary for him. No matter how much Ravel seemed to enjoy her job, Agnes couldn’t imagine the Phenex were happy with that arrangement.

But if Joshua had them by the balls…

“It won’t mess with things too much?” Joshua asked, as if that were a natural thing to suggest. And Agnes realized that this was all Ravel’s doing, revealing that little tidbit to her. Joshua wasn’t even thinking about it, with how focused he was on the possibility of new magic things to study and work with.

What was the clever little devil trying to accomplish though?

“Not at all, Mr. Davis. I’ll handle my family and you just have to do what you do best,” Phenex answered, turning away from Agnes and beaming at the man. “Leave it to the two of us. We’ll get you those classes, I promise.”

“I know you will,” Joshua replied, as if there was truly no doubt that would happen. He either had a lot of faith in the two of them or he didn't realize how hard getting a faction to reveal stuff like that was. Then again, this was the man that had gotten Boon Magic knowledge from Heaven itself.

Agnes was truly getting used to the surprises, evidently.

[}-o-{]

[Ravel Phenex]

Maybe she’d been impulsive, revealing the deal with the Phoenix Spell to Agnes.

However, she didn’t think that was the case. For one, the woman was firmly in Joshua’s pocket. If he so much as looked her way, Agnes was likely to start sweating if she didn’t know why. She really didn’t want to mess with Joshua and for good reason. He was most of the reason she was as important as she was at the moment. For another, she really thought it’d help them in the long run.

It’d show the woman that there was a lot she didn’t know about Joshua, which would prevent her from making wrong decisions. They would also need to work together a lot, not only for the Norse Runes project, but also because she was Joshua’s main contact with the magician community. Ravel had just learned that the only thing he seemed to care about other than mundane, simple things was magic and furthering his capabilities in the area.

‘The world is going to run out of magic to offer him and then it’ll truly be the end of it for everyone,’ she thought, amusing herself with that idea. After all, once that happened, who would ever be able to repay any of their debt with the man? That was far in the future, for sure, but it was an entertaining daydream to humor in her mind.

“The chicken is in a good mood.”

“I’m not a chicken!” she exclaimed immediately, almost on reflex by that point. She glared at the infuriating nekoshou sitting across from her, who was looking flatly at her with her golden eyes. Why did she have to spend time with the likes of her anyway-?

“It’s your turn, Ravel,” Kunou pointed out and she blinked, looking at the board and checking what Koneko’s last play had been. ‘Hm, only a face down. That’s a trap for sure,’ she noted to herself. The nekoshou and her older sister loved to use trap cards, after all.

“Right,” she mumbled.

She could be working on getting Joshua what he wanted, discussing things with Agnes and communicating with the Norse. Alas, Joshua seemed to think playing around with his daughter and the stray cat he’d picked up was just as important. She disagreed, but not enough to actually voice that out to the man himself.

And, privately, in a very deep corner of her mind, Ravel acknowledged that she liked spending time with the two.

Sure, Kunou was childish and Koneko was annoying, but it was much better than being home. Most of her family was too old, too busy and too used to being around devils just as old as them. Riser and her were the closest in age and… Well, she loved her brother, she really did, but she couldn’t stand to be with him.

It had been a close thing once upon a time, but after the whole Joshua and Phoenix Spell debacle? He’d become intolerable. Ravel just couldn’t stand being around him when all he wanted to do was complain about and insult a man that she’d come to respect a lot.

“Having fun?” a new voice asked, once more breaking her out of her thoughts. This time though, she made sure not to get lost in her thoughts immediately afterwards once more. She really needed to stop that habit before it became even more of a problem. “Oh, even match,” the cause of her terrible new habit commented before taking a sip from his cup of tea.

“You had fun on your outing?” Ravel asked, more to be polite than anything, as she set down her own card and made Koneko narrow her eyes. “I heard that play was good.”

“It was fun, I don’t think Serafall and I are much for plays, but it was funny to run commentary on the thing to each other,” he answered and Ravel almost sighed. Was he allergic to all things noble and befitting his station? Not that she was surprised, but there was only so much she could take of that before it turned into disappointment.

She’d grown thinking everyone of importance was… Well, like the devil nobles. Poised and deliberate, proud and careful, powerful and controlled, all that and more was what she’d come to expect of people in power. Serafall Leviathan was a rather public deviation from that, but she’d thought her an exception to the rule.

Ravel was starting to think she was more like the norm and what she’d come to expect was the exception. At least, when it came to those truly in power. Everyone she knew was a step below the likes of Serafall and Joshua, as far as she was aware.

“Are you interested in watching it though? We could all go. It wasn’t bad and I promise not to ruin it for you,” the man offered and she paused, trying to calm down the giddy feeling in her chest. She was above the kind of open display she felt the urge to put on. She was not Kunou. “We can get one of those big popcorn buckets and all.”

“...”

“Pretty sure they don’t sell those at plays,” Koneko pointed out, crushing her hopes and dreams mercilessly.

“You saying that like I can’t get one or ten of those inside anyway,” Joshua shot back and Ravel tried very hard not to perk up. She failed miserably, if the smile the man sent her way was anything to go by. “So, is that a yes?”

“... With extra butter?”

“Sure thing,” he answered with a wider grin as he ruffled her hair.

She tried very hard not to smile.

Once more, however, she failed.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

The world’s not ready. They think they’ve found the way and that now that they know what to pay Joshua with, it’ll help. It will not. This is only the beginning. Prophecies long forgotten foresaw this chain of events and warned of doom, but-

Ahem.

Er… No idea what all that is about, guys, I swear.

Hm, uh… I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter?

Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: How was your weekend? I went on a spending spree to turn a desktop computer I no longer used into a pseudo-console to play games with my family. Played plenty of Horizon Chase Turbo and a bit of Pummel Party. It was a bit much for my anti-social ass, but it was still fun.

See you.