"And here's the last one. Whew!" I dropped the box with a heavy thump and wiped my brow of the sweat. It has been a long time coming, but I finally had enough to pay back the officers with spare change for my rent. The only thing left to do was to pay back the doctors from the hospital and I will be cleared of my debt.
That meant another four odd months of work. Oh Joy.
"Ah, so you are done." I turned around to find the bar owner come over with some bottles. He looked at the neat piles of crates with an approving nod. "You even categorized them in their expiration dates and their weights. I don't often do that myself."
"Well, I figured that you might want to get the most perishable gone before they go bad." I wiped my hands on the apron to rid of the bits of dust. "And some of these boxes are ridiculously heavy, so I decided to place the lightest one at the top and you can work your way to the bottom, Kano-san."
"Ah! Why can't the other guys be like you?" He let out a sigh as he handed me one of the bottles to drink. "The other assistants are at least 2 years older than you, yet you act older and more mature than them!"
'Well, that is only natural since I am older and more mature than them.'
"Boys, are the two of you done with your work!" The sound of the owner's wife echoed through the back door. We proceeded to return to the bar where the greyed-haired lady was cleaning the glass cups with a cloth. "So is Shirou-kun done with the boxes?"
"Yup, sure did, Kawako-san." I replied back with a smile.
"That's nice." She nodded gratefully. "Hah, if only our sons were here to learn from you. Those two boys seemed to have forgotten about us after they left, and they don't do much!"
"I'm sorry." I automatically bowed my head before getting a light knock on it. I raised my head slightly to find the old man with a light frown on his face and his hand in the air. "Don't blame yourself, it's not your fault you know."
I merely scratched my cheek in slight embarrassment as I looked at them. During my time here, these two had become as close to family as I got back home with Sakura, Fuji-nee and Illya. Every so often, the owner's wife would just knock on my head with her ladle when I made a mistake or did something worrisome, and I could not help but wonder if that was the feeling one would associate having a mother care for you. And the bar owner's attitude towards business and private life made me think he was a cross of Raiga, my dad and oddly enough, Lancer.
Better step up your game Fuji-nee, because at this rate, I was thinking of having them as my custodians for this world.
A light vibration in my pocket broke my musings for a moment, stopping to place the apron and bottle down before reaching to grab the phone and opening the text message. Man I loved technology like this, it makes life so much easier. It was a shame the Association never put much emphasis on it, and Rin was extremely reluctant to have phones and televisions at her place.
Though I believe her aversions stemmed from her annoyances that she could not use said smart phones and televisions without breaking them after a few times due to her lack of understanding even the basic features.
I took a moment to read the message, before letting out an almost resigned sigh and an amused smile. That attracted the attention of the two elders as they paused in the affairs to gaze at me.
"Something turned up for you kid?" The old man asked as he placed the bottle on the bar top.
"You could say that." I let out a wry smile as I pocketed the phone. "It's just a notification about my other job. Apparently they could use a little help tonight and I was the only one available."
"Oh dear, I hope those people are not overworking you." Kawako placed her hands on her cheeks while looking worried. "I know you are in need of money because of your hospital bills and rent, but you shouldn't need to take up every job that comes."
"I agree with her, those people better not be pushing their workload on you because they are lazy." Kano gave a very angry frown at the prospect of me getting overworked by supposedly lazy people.
"Oh, don't worry." I let out a reassuring smile at them. "It is an easy side-job, and it is one totally up my area of expertise."
...
"STABH!"
"GAGH!" A pained scream pierced the silence of the night as a devil dropped to the ground with a Black Key stabbed into its heart, before its clothes and body darken and burst into ashes, leaving behind a few bits of scorched clothing and my blade on the ground. I took a quick glance around me before dispelling my projection and set ablaze the last traces of its existence.
Roughly a month and a half had passed since the Raynare incident that introduced me to the supernatural inhabitants of this world, and so far we had gotten along quite well. That said, I still did not trust them fully since I had known in the past that there were always going to be some bad apples hidden among the good ones. Furthermore, there was the whole 'resurrecting someone on their deathbed' aspect that I was still a little leery about.
Perhaps that was why Sona and Rias had occasionally asked for my help to track and hunt down these 'Stray Devils' that occasionally come into their area of supervision. These strays were apparently reincarnated devils who rebelled against their masters and became uncontrollable without their masters' supervision.
Evidently these types were quite a danger to both the Devils and the humans, since these creatures would not care to do anything to cure their thirst for destruction. Some were worse than the others due to the Sacred Gears they had before they were reincarnated, and based on what little I had been told about them, each one of them was bad enough to warrant a team of Devils or priests to go and take them out.
The first time I was offered by Sona to participate in such a hunt, it was me being an observer to understand what they meant by the Peerage system and the Stray Devils. It was somewhat enlightening seeing them trying to protect their town from these creatures. At the same time, I was feeling a little underwhelmed at their hunting sessions. I did not mean to be rude, but it just felt so… so… 'Juvenile'. It did not have the same sense of urgency or threat as with my hunts with the Dead Apostles, and at the same time, seeing them use certain tactics at inappropriate times was a little mind-cringing to me.
And if half the stories I heard from Ise were true, the creatures being hunted were more of the type that came out of Zelretch's weird closet than monsters from the darkness. I mean, who the heck ever heard of a Lamia that shoots Freaking Lasers out of its breasts?!
It got to the point that by the third hunt, I was actively throwing in my own weight just so I could avoid seeing the type of creatures that were offending my limited sanity left in this world. For their part, the devils were grateful for the assistance and were willing to pay for my work. Not that they really needed my help, most of them were way too weak, so I pretty much got paid really quickly. Good thing too since I could use the cash to pay off my debt faster.
So yeah, it was just a simple side-job which I had no problems dealing with.
"Nice work Emiya-kun." I lightly turned my head to find Momo Hanakai walking alongside Yura Tsubasa. She looked around with a quick glance and gave a light nod of approval. "You are really good for this type of work. Most of the time, we have difficulty with the tracking and disposal of the target in question. Even the easier targets tend to make our job a lot more difficult."
"I have a lot of practice." I gave a shrug as I moved slowly to them. "I assume you have completed your end of the search?"
"Yup, we were able to find and take down the other targets, though we did have a bit more destruction on our end." Tsubasa shrugged as she replied. "Also, Emiya-kun. I have been wanting to ask but…" She paused as she pointed at me. "Do you always wear those type of clothes?"
I could detect slight confusion, curiosity and a hint of trepidation regarding my current attire and I could not fault her on that. Since my old one got messed up from my fight with Julius and my current form needed a new wardrobe to fit, I had to use a different set of clothes.
I was currently wearing dark jeans with runes taken from the Holy Scriptures sewn along the length of it with silver threads, held together with a simple belt that had a few shield charms attached to it. I wore a simple black jacket with shades of dark grey to complement the white polo shirt I had, with runes sewn on the sleeves. Finally I had dark red battle gloves that cover the lower part of my arm, adorned with barrier charms and strengthening runes.
This was the 'Enforcer Battle Suit – Civilian Type' altered to my current size. Due to my unique fighting style, this version had to be custom-fitted to my specs, making me one of the few Enforcers in the Association to be given special clothes for my work habits. In a way, this set of clothes were quite suitable for the occasion, keeping up the masquerade of normalcy by taking out dangerous individuals.
Still, I preferred my old clothes since that was a product of mine, Rin's and Luvia's combined efforts, so I have been trying to repair and alter them to my size for future use.
"It's one set of my battle clothes." I dismissed my blades and pulled out a cloak from the dimensional pocket to cover my body and reduce the effects of the runes affecting them. "You might want to watch where you touch me to avoid getting hurt."
"I'll keep that in mind." Tsubasa tilted her head as she contemplated my looks. "But aside from the holy runes, I will say that the look suits you. A rather rough and tough feel to it, if I may say so myself." She let out a light smile as she looked me up and down.
I blinked before absentmindedly scratched my cheek. "Erm, thanks for the compliment?" I wasn't used to getting praises about my look, not to mention feeling this embarrassed at getting them from a girl. I chalked it up to my current teenage form as being the cause for my confusion.
"Right, if there's nothing else…" Momo made a few strokes in the air, before a blue circle with a big crest appeared on the ground underneath their feet. The two girls moved into the circle and turned to face me. "You coming?"
"… Err, think I will just take the long route." I replied while warily looking at the magic circle.
"That would take at least half an hour given the distance, this would be faster." Tsubasa raised an eyebrow as she watched me deliberate at the far end. "Come on now."
I moved up to the edge of the circle and stopped, mentally feeling a little irritated that we had to use this method to get back to the school. What was wrong with good old fashioned walking?
"You don't like teleportation?" Momo asked with a hint of amusement in her tone that reminded me of Rin when she has found a weakness to tease me with.
"I have some experience with such spells, none of them were good." I replied with a grimace as I recalled the memories where I got involved with teleportation spells. Three-quarters of the time, I got involved with some mad magus whose spell transported me to some dark hellhole with some type of hellish spawn intent on eating me alive.
The remainder of the time, Zelretch used the spell to send me to a location so outrageous, I actually welcomed the hell spawn. And on occasions, some people I knew would get into small mishaps with the spells, making them lose an eyebrow at the least, and losing their entire innards at the worst.
Wasn't it sad?
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