By this point, I had wandered my way back to the park I had been at earlier.
I couldn't help but feel somewhat amused.
It seemed as if I always had incredibly fateful encounters here
Getting killed by Yuuma, getting revived by Sera-tan, meeting the nice Sister Asia, all of that.
I was filled with a strange happy feeling. It was weird. Maybe I didn't mind becoming a Devil all that much…
"Well well, about time I hunted you down, shitty Devil-kun!" sang a familiar and obnoxious voice.
Like that, the happy feeling was gone.
I looked behind me to see a familiar blonde-haired girl dressed in a gothic lolita style.
I sighed. "Oh, it's you."
"What's with that half-assed reaction, you loser!?" She shrieked, swinging her fists about as she threw a small tantrum. "You should be shaking with fear, remembering how I almost killed you yesterday! You should be all like 'Ooh! Oh no! It's Mittelt-sama! She's here to kill me again! I'm sooooo scared! What ever will I do?!—'"
"Alright! I get it!" I shouted finally. "Geez, you don't have to be a dick about it. Besides, you forgot to emphasize ALMOST, as in, you DIDN'T kill me yesterday. Last I recall, you got crushed under a dumpster and I escaped. So who's the REAL loser here, you pervert?"
Mittelt (as I assumed her name was) narrowed her eyes, her left eye twitching with what I assumed to be suppressed rage.
"I TOLD YOU: I'M NOT A PERVERT!" The Fallen Angel became so enraged that her wings actually sprouted from her back due to her explosion of emotion. "And I'll be sure as hell to repay you for tossing that dumpster at me!"
I raised my hand. "Actually, that was—"
"I DON'T CARE!" Wow. What a temper. "I've had it up to HERE!" Mittelt actually used her wings to fly up in the air, raising her hand to a point about twenty feet into the air. After she expressed how much she has had it, Mittelt lowered herself to a distance closer to the ground. "Enough of this nonsense! Die!"
The Fallen Angel then manifested a light spear. Then she threw it.
It was weird…
It might've been my imagination, but I could swear the light spear was moving slower than it had been going before.
No…it was that my reflexes and speed had gotten faster… ever since I first utilized that enhanced speed yesterday, it's started to come more naturally than it had before.
Before the light spear could come close to hitting me, I dodged out of the way with ease.
I glared. "Sorry, but I do believe we've covered this: I have NO intention of dying."
Mittelt's eyes widened in shock. "No way! How did you—" Then she clenched her cheek. "You little—Stay still!"
"Hey!" I barked. "If anyone's little here, it's you, midget!"
Apparently that was sore subject for her, because she let out an incredibly loud shriek.
"FUCKING MOTHERFUCKING ASSHOOOOOOLE!" She started to launch more and more light spears, materializing more, one after another.
It's lucky her rage was screwing up her aim. Otherwise, even with my enhanced speed, I probably would've gotten speared at least eight or nine times. But no. Thanks to my impressive and surprising speed, I managed to avoid getting killed.
After a few dozen or so light spears, Mittelt started panting, ceasing her barrage-style attack.
"Screw it! I'll do this the old fashion way!" She materialized a light spear and performed an old-fashioned dive-bomb, charging at me full-speed ahead in attempt to spear me from the air.
Really, I don't see why she thought THIS would work if her intense barrage of light spears didn't work.
But her speed was faster than I initially thought it was.
Even with my impressive reflexes, I only possessed enough speed to dodge her powerful charge by a single inch.
Then I noticed the blonde-haired girl's smirk.
My danger senses tingled before my instincts did. I was already in mid-movement so I wasn't able to react.
Before I could react, Mittelt lashed out with one leg, catching me right in the chest. I ended up being knocked a few feet away by the force of the blow, but I managed to avoid being knocked down. That didn't stop me from having the wind knocked out of me though. For a girl so small, she packed one helluva kick.
"Ha! You're so cocky, but where's that confidence now, Mr. Bigshot!?" Mittelt screamed at me. "See!? You ain't so special! I'm ten times better than you, bleeeeeeh!"
Geez. It was one hit. You act like you killed freaking God.
I smirked as I remembered something. "Actually, you just sealed your doom."
Mittelt returned to levitating in the air, raising an eyebrow. "The hell you talking 'bout, kid?"
My smirk became a full-fledged grin. "How about I show you?! Let's go!" I raised one hand high in the air. "Sacred Gear!"
I felt a faint warmth from inside me as my Sacred Gear manifested on my back.
Divine Dividing wasn't any less impressive the second time I saw it.
Mittelt's eyes went wide. "What?! No way! You manifested your Sacred Gear!?"
"That's right! And it's all I need to take you down!" I breathed in and out. Like demonic power, Sacred Gears respond to the user's emotions. That's what Senpai told me. Even though its primary ability is to divide an opponent's power, Divine Dividing also possesses one more ability… I just have to imagine it with all of my might.
FLY!
I kicked off the ground with all my might. A small, pessimistic side of me was certain I would just fall back to the Earth and then get speared by a Fallen Angel.
But that is not what happened.
Despite the odds that in any normal situation (which this was not) I would fall face first onto the ground, I did not. Instead, I found myself floating a few feet off of the ground.
I stared in wonder.
"Whoa… AWESOME!" I was flying! I was doing something that fairy tales were made of!
"You can fly?!" Mittelt exclaimed, her face paling a little.
I smirked. "Damn straight! Wanna know what else?" I closed my eyes and focused, tapping into the ability of my Sacred Gear.
[Divide!]
And then there was the strange rush I felt. Like someone had spiked my Red Bull with a mix of coffee and a hundred pounds of sugar. I felt energized.
And, as opposed to my increase in strength, Mittelt seemed to stumble a bit, no doubt out of shock due to the sudden large amount of energy she lost.
She bared her teeth, glaring at me. "Fuck this, I'm finishing you now!" She summoned another light spear and flew at me in a dangerous charge.
This was starting to feel repetitive.
I felt oddly stronger than I did before, not even feeling threatened. I mean, I didn't feel like Hercules or anything, but it was now that I realized the half of power I absorbed from Mittelt…was puny.
I finally realized what Senpai meant when she called these guys "smallfry". Yuuma was probably the strongest of their group. Mittelt… I can't believe she actually got the better of me yesterday. If this was HALF of her power, than her full power was probably incredibly insignificant.
The moment Mittelt got close to me, within spearing range, I did the only thing I could think of doing at that time.
"BITCH SLAP!" Honestly, I think I slapped her harder across the face than I meant to. I meant to like knock her away, but at the last second, it felt like I was tapping into some hidden strength. This strength far exceeded my own and made me feel embarrassed about it by comparison.
SLAP
I ended up slapping Mittelt right across the face with immense strength, causing her to be swatted out of the air like a fly.
Whether she was knocked away by the force of the slap or that shock had made her temporarily unable to use her wings, my hit sent the blonde Fallen Angel spiraling downward, falling face-first into the fountain below.
I winced at the harsh splash I heard on impact. I imagine the pain she felt would be something along the lines of doing a belly flop… in a kiddie pool… with your face…
Ouch.
Feeling the threat had subsided, I gently lowered myself to the ground, staring blankly at the fountain.
After a few seconds, a familiar figure emerged from the water, sopping wet.
The blonde Fallen Angel was a mess. Her hair had been knocked out of its pony tails, she was soaked to the bone, and what I suspected to be eye make-up dripped down the sides of her face, staining her cheeks black.
Feeling cold, wet, and humiliated, the Fallen Angel Mittelt would do something sudden and unexpected… That is what I thought.
I was… kind of right.
Her lips started trembling and her eyes were watering. Then all of pitiable hell broke loose.
"Waaaaaaaaaah!"
...eh?
Tears exploded from the Fallen Angel's eyes as she let out a sad, wailing screech. Apparently the thought of her humiliating defeat mixed with how hard I hit her had driven her to tears.
Her pride apparently destroyed at the thought she couldn't defeat me, all she had left was to cry like a little baby. She was saying words, but they were so slurred by her sobs that I had no idea what she was saying… wow… I feel so bad now. Even though ten seconds had passed and I was able to use my power again, dividing her power now when she was pretty much already beaten seemed like kicking someone while they were down. I feel enough like a dick as it is.
Even though she was trying to kill me just LITERALLY a few seconds ago, making her cry made me feel so icky inside. It wasn't a pleasant feeling. Friend or foe, I didn't like making a girl cry or seeing them in tears. It's not in my nature. I flirt and sometimes tease, but I never do anything that I know for a fact would hurt a girl (enemies are an exclusion to this part) or make them cry (enemies are NOT an exclusion to this part).
"Waaaaaaaah!"
I covered my ears as Mittelt's shrieks became almost deafening. It was so heart-breaking.
How severely tempting it was to run away before she came to her senses and tried to attack again…
...Goddammit.
Before my sanity could finally check in and ask me "What the HELL are you doing?!", I made my way forward, strolling calmly and slowly so as not to startle her.
Even if she was a part of the same group that murdered both me and Ise, it was still unman-like to just leave a girl crying like this.
I stood in front of the freezing, shivering girl, putting on a pleasant face.
"Hey there…" I said assuringly as if speaking to a child.
Mittelt glared at me, tears still streaming from her eyes.
OK, so far, not so good.
"Come to gloat, you asshole?" OK, so she's cursing at me, but at least she's talking. A minor victory at least.
But then she went back to balling her eyes out. Dammit! Think, Haruto!
I patted her on the head. "There there. It's OK. Everything's alright."
Mittelt started choking as she tried to suppress her sobs long enough to speak. "No—*sob*—it's—*sob*—not! I-I failed again and n-now I'm gonna get made f-fun of by the others! I've—*sob*
—always been the—*sob*—weakest a-and now I-I'm even more of a loser! Waaaaaah!"
I sighed. To think I would go so far for someone who should be my enemy.
I held out my hand towards hers with a pleasant, bishounen-like smile on my face. "Come on. You'll catch your death if you just keep sitting in there. What say we go get something sweet to eat? Ice cream maybe?"
Mittelt managed to halt her tears, sniffling slightly as she stared with her bloodshot eyes at my hand with suspicion.
She seemed to weigh her options. I was probably at my most vulnerable. Even with Divine Dividing's power, there was a fair chance she could spear me from this close distance. However, it was the same vice versa. The moment she tried something, I could finish this with one blow. How she responds to my gesture could definitely change everything.
She paused, averting her gaze downward as her face flushed pink. "... What…what kind of ice cream?"
I couldn't help but smile as her cute expression. Now if only she could have this expression all the time, it would be perfect.
Mittelt slowly reached out and grabbed my hand. With a small pull, I pulled her dripping-wet body from the fountain.
She shivered slightly, but she seemed fairly alright despite the fact I bitch-slapped her face-first into a fountain from several feet into the air. She was clearly freezing though. It was getting slightly cooler out. There was a bit of wind too.
Before I even realized it, I was handing over my jacket to the freezing Fallen Angel.
"Here. You should put this on."
Mittelt shot me yet another suspicion-filled look, still distrusting.
I rolled my eyes out of disbelief. "Oh come on. It's not like I'm gonna kill you with a jacket. Just take it."
Mittelt turned away, but she accepted the jacket, carefully putting it on her.
She rubbed her arms to warm herself, but she seemed better than she was before.
She stared at me, but her gaze seemed different. Softer than it was before. And for once, her words were NOT stained with hostility.
"...Ice cream?" She asked it with such a cute expression that I almost had a nosebleed.