Life 01: Bloody Valentine

Issei's POV

"Suu... Suu..."

"Ise-kun..."

"Nya..."

It's around six in the morning when I first woke up in my bed and noticed something weighing down both my arms and felt something on my chest. When my vision became clear, I saw a redhead girl dressed in a pink night gown resting her head on my right arm, a black hair girl with dressed in a white loose yukata resting her head on my left arm, and a small white hair cat girl who can be easily mistake as a toddler dressed in a white footie pajamas with black cat's head design all over it.

I quickly recognized these three girls sleeping on me. The redhead girl is none other than Rias, the black hair is Akeno-san, and lastly the white hair girl is none other than... Koneko-chan.

"Hmm...?" The toddler sized Koneko-chan began to tighten her grip on me as she began to have trouble face like she's having a nightmare. "Nee-sama... Don't go..." Her body began to shake as if the nightmare she's having is getting worse. I quickly slid my arms from the girls sleeping next to me and wrapped around Koneko-chan. I began to cradle her and spoke softly.

"Shhh... It's alright now..." I began to stroke Koneko-chan's head and gently tighten my grip on her. Koneko-chan seemed to calm down as her body was no longer shaking and her grip around me got lightened. I let out a sigh of relief after knowing that Koneko-chan was no longer having a nightmare. I carefully slipped out of bed without waking the girls on my bed and put Koneko-chan in between Rias and Akeno-san.I tip toed towards the door, where I opened it and walked into the hallway.

"Oh? Did you just woke up?" Ophis was already in front of my door when I opened it.

"Yeah," I whispered quietly with a nod. "I just woke up to see that all the girls sleeping on my bed. It's kind of nostalgic now that I think about it." It really was nostalgic. It's been so long that I slept in the same bed with Rias and the other girls that I almost forgot the feeling of sleeping together in the same bed with the woman that I love.

Lately whenever Rias and Akeno-san stay over in my house, they ended up sneaking into my bed whenever it's time to go to bed. I don't understand how Rias is allowed to come into a different devil's territory without speaking with the devil in charge of it. Speaking of head devil, after my fight with Thanatos, I came in touch with the devil who's currently in charge of the Kuoh Town. Her name is Cleria Belial. I quickly realized that she was none other than relative of the current Rating Game Champion, Diehauser Belial.

I was surprised at first of learning the truth about of how the territory owner was the cousin at champion. But after spending some time with the territory owner, the thought and tension of her being relative of the champion disappeared. After spending some time with the territory owner, I realized that the house of Belial are just has nice as the members as the house of Gremory.

A thought occurred to me now that I think about the current head. What exactly happens to the former owner of this territory before Rias took it. Rias never spoken at all about the former devil who use to own this territory except that the information regarding about a church being here, which is still activate at this point. The question about the status of the church is also a food for thought. It became abandoned sometime before Rias and Sona arrived. Right now its kind of active, which is run by a young man named Yaegaki Masaomi.

Hmm... I need to learn more what happen to the Cleria Belial and Yaegaki Masaomi. I need to speak to Father Time-sama about these issues the next time I visit him.

"Oh by the way I found this on my bed." Ophis pulled out an envelope from her PJ's pocket and passed it to me. "I think it you'll probably know who send this."

Someone that I know?

An imagine of Father Time-sama and his maid came to my mind as I opened the envelope. There was a single page letter within the envelope, passports, and a credit card? I began to read it the letter to figure out why there was a credit card and passports in the envelope.

'Dear Oppai Dragon,

'If you're reading this, then I ,Father Time-sama, got bored of training you and decided its time for you to train yourself by having self experience. In this envelope, I give an unlimited credit card and passports for you and the Infinite to travel around the world to gain experience with other cultures and learn from other material arts mentors and magicians. In the back of this letter are coordinators multiple coordinates and dates, where i want you arrive at the specific time. Don't worry, if you ever forget or get lost, I'll send you a little help on the way. I won't miss you, love Father Time~'

I became so stupefied from reading this letter that I remain completely expressionless. The feeling eventually kicked in and I first felt completely shock and then offend that Father Time-sama is no longer training me. Shit! What the hell is this? I was so enraged that I felt that I wanted to tear the letter, but stopped myself till I realized that I needed this shitty letter because I needed to coordinates and date.

"Ise?" All of my anger disappeared the moment I heard Rias's voice coming from my room. I quickly folded the letter and passed it back to Ophis before walking back inside.

"Good Morning." I said the moment I walked back in my room to see a sleepy-gazed Rias waking up on my bed.

"Morning." She greeted me back with a gentle smile. She got out of the bed and came to me with her arms widen. Wrapped her arms around me as she leaned herself on me. She stood on her toes and moved her lips towards my cheek. Her lips pressed on my right check. My cheeks began to flush as I realized that Rias gave me a good morning kiss. Rias pulled her head back and her cheeks turned slight red as well.

"Rias..."

"Ise..."

There was a nostalgic atmosphere between Rias and I use to have in my past life. Ah yes, this must be the romantic atmosphere we shared together during our short time as a couple. No, the romantic atmosphere was already there the moment I saved Rias from Riser. I just didn't noticed it since I was blinded by Raynare's curse she placed on my heart.

"I don't want to ruin the mood, but weren't you and Koneko-chan supposed to be sleeping in the guest room?" I asked. I really don't want to ruin the mood from the bottom of my heart, but there is always times to develop the relationship I have with Rias in the future. Right now I'm more concern with Koneko-chan. Reason why I say this is because just last week, Kuorka, Koneko-chan's older sister, killed her master and now she's currently under the custody of Rias.

"Yes." Rias answered agreed with a nod. "She was sleeping with me in the guest room last night, but she sneaked out during the middle of the night. By the time I noticed she was gone from my sight, I came here to see her sleeping on top of you with Akeno." Her sound of her tone was bitter with a bit of envy when she said the part of Koneko-chan and Akeno-san sleeping with me on the same bed.

"So you decided to join in right?" I assumed, which Rias confirmed with a nod.

So Koneko-chan has became greatly attached to me in short time. It kind of amazed me really. I just meet the Koneko-chan the day before when Rias and Akeno-san came for their monthly stay over. If I remember correctly, Koneko-chan was a very insecure and didn't want to open up to anybody. Rias, Akeno-san, and I became shocked that Koneko-chan quickly became fond of me in matter of minutes to the point she wanted to sit on my lap.

None of the girls couldn't figured out why Koneko-chan was so comfortable being with me, but I have a theory that might be too crazy to be true. Many mammals marked their territories for ownership, including cats. I thought it was dumb at first, but could it be possible that Koneko-chan could've "marked" on me before in my past life? I know it seems to be a bit far fetched, but I couldn't figure out any other possibility why she's close to me, right?

One week later

A hidden institution in Italy

New 1st POV

What kind of torture are they going to put us through today? It was the first thought that comes to me as I woke up in the dark, freezing cold jail cell where my brothers, sisters, and I share together.

Within this jail cell that we shared, we don't have blankets. Everyone are force to bundle up together for warmth. Food for us is also scarce. The people of this institution rarely feed us. I find it ironic that these god-worship freaks can act so cruel to their own kind. It's so funny that I want to laugh. I actually did.

"Why are you laughing?" My twin brother, Izaiya, who's leaning next to me on the brick wall, asked.

"It's nothing," I lied to him. Izaiya is a worry wort. I don't want his head to be filled with unnecessary thoughts.

"You know that some of our siblings didn't came back with us for a while," Izaiya said, trying to begin a conversation with me. "What do you think has happened to them?"

Died, is what I wanted to really wanted to say. But I don't want to cause a commotion among with our siblings. The last kid who tried to tell the truth of what this place is doing got killed for it. I should know. I saw it with my two eyes when it happened.

It happened a couple weeks ago. It was a day before we had health physical, where one of our brothers had a nervous breakdown from all the excruciating pain from the experiments we suffered to and he had to go away since he wasn't able to handle to stress from his job that our so call God gave to us. Or is what we were told by the members of the institution. I probably the only one who know what really happened that day.

Despite what the members of the this institution told us, it was true he had a nervous breakdown. But caused of it wasn't because of the harsh experiment the institution. No what caused it was week a before the health physical. This brother and I were just finished our experiments and we were last ones tested before heading the heading towards our next testing location. On the way towards the next testing location, we stumble upon a door that is barely opened on the hall.

We heard voices from the that room. But to be more specifically, we heard the Archbishop Valper Galilei, the supervisor of the Holy sword project. We overheard him talking with some of the facility members regarding the church project and our progress regarding to wield a holy sword. Unfortunately, it was not what we wanted to hear. What we heard was inform regarding how none of us were making in progress to wield the holy sword fragment Excalibur, albeit there was something about some sort of "light" he "collected" from us. I didn't understood what was this "light" this man was referring to, but some of the facility members knew what the Archbishop was talking about. It was then we heard the the words coming from the Archbishop's mouth.

"Let's dispose of them," the Archbishop said. "Let's keep this project running a bit longer. I have other experiments I wanted to test on the children, and if it doesn't succeed, then we'll dispose of them." We were shocked of course of what he was planning to do with us if we can't succeed in the experiment, but that wasn't the worst part. He continued talking about the rest of the siblings that were dismissed from the experiment earlier due to the harshness of the experiments they went through. Those siblings... were killed. Each of everyone of them were killed without a second thought and without mercy. The siblings we cherished were disposed like nothing more than worthless child.

That's when the nervous breakdown happened to that brother of mine. As soon we heard every heinous crime that the Archbishop has done to us, we quickly flee before the Archbishop or the facility members realized we were eavesdropping and head back to the rest of our siblings, who were at the cafeteria eating some slob that none of us wanted to eat.

I talked to my brother about we need to stay quiet regarding what we heard from the Archbishop. If the Archbishop or the facility found out that we heard everything, we're goners. I originally thought I was able to persuade him to keep quiet about what he just heard, but I was wrong. The guy snapped later that night. The next thing I knew, that brother who heard the news began to freak out back to our cells. We began to sweat like crazy and also hyperventilating like he was suffocating. It looked like he was going to have a stroke or some seizure.

I tried to calm him down, but...

"They're going to kill us!" He snapped on the moment the guards left the cell room. He began running everywhere and scream on of his lungs that the Archbishop was going to kill us and how we're useless to us. The guards came back in after hearing the commotion from our jail cell. They quickly took the snapped brother out of our cell. A sister came into our cell and told us that the excuse regarding the brother that snapped was due to the mental stressed from the experiments and he was force to get out of it.

After the sister told her excuse for that brother, we did a quick pray for his recovery and continued the rest of our day in our cell like nothing happened. The next day, on the day of the health physical, where I was waiting in the doctor's office of in the insinuation for the doctor to come. There was a window in his room and out of the feeling inside my heart, I decided to look through the window and see what was outside.

It was there I saw it. Through the window I saw two men who were part of the facility of the institution. One of them had a shovel while the other carried a body bag. I realized who was in the body bag and what those men were going to do.

After seeing that experience, I began to realize that there is no such thing as a God in this world. If there was a God in this world, then he wouldn't allow this kind of torture to his followers. He wouldn't allow this kind of torture to his children. He wouldn't allow people like the Archbishop Valper Galilei or the people to the institution to deliver such cruelty to us. He wouldn't take his children future... He wouldn't...

"Alright children." A chill went down my spine when the Archbishop Valper Galilei came by with a suspicious grin on his face. "I have good news to share with you all. We're on our final experiment."

We're all going to die. I knew it because the Archbishop never comes by and visit us personally in our cell once. I wanted to run, but if I acted heedless I might end up dead a lot sooner than I wanted to be.

We were quickly gathered at one room. Everyone is confused of what's going on when men with gas masked appeared in the same location as we were. For a moment I thought these were the masked men that were going to kill us, but I was kind of wrong. They weren't going to kill us directly. I knew this because there was dark, venomous gas coming in through the walls and ceiling. For a moment there I thought this was some sort of conditional experiment that my siblings and I were supposed to endure. But no...

After a minute being with the mist of the gas, my hands became paralyzed, my legs stopped moving, and my body went through intense pain as if I had my nervous system slashed. There were many liquids including my tears and blood coming out from my body, and only pain conquers my my consciousness weakens—and I was about to die.

Many of my siblings die while suffering in front of me. This wasn't an experiment after all. These bastards are trying to kill all of us! No! I won't die! I refuse to die in a place like this! They're not going to kill me!

I quickly decided it was time to fight back. I decided to use my only trump card that I should have used a long time ago. I decided to use my... Sacred Gear. Sacred Gear, also known as God's Artifacts, are items with powerful abilities bestowed upon humans by the original God from the Bible. Many of my siblings, including my brother Izaiya and myself, possessed these Sacred Gears. Archbishop Galilei thought that the key to wield the Excalibur was the used of specific type of Sacred Gear that possessed the power of light.

I possessed this light-based Sacred Gear that creates sword, but not anymore. The light in my Sacred Gear has darken just like my soul has.

One of the gas masked men walked over to me, who's covering my mouth and nose from inhaling the venomous gas. It was there I decided to make my move. I quickly summoned the sword the moment the mask man tried to pulled my hands from mouth and nose. The mask man became off-guarded the moment he saw the blade in my hand. I quickly made my move and stabbed him right on the lower part of his body and ran towards the exit.

"Onee-chan!" I stopped when I heard Izaiya's cry for help. I turned around and saw my brother being pinned down to the ground by other masked men.

"Let him go!" I shouted, summoning more swords from my hands. The masked men who pinned down my brother realized I was coming for them, and quickly let go of him to stop me. One of them tried to grab their the blade of my sword, which was a bad idea. The moment he grabbed on the blade of the sword, blade of the sword turn to ice and hand of the mask man holding the blade had his entire arm was completely frozen from the ice of my blade.

"Argh! My hand!" The mask man screamed in shock from what happened to hand. I took the opportunity and used my other sword to stabbed him to his gut. More guards began to noticed the commotion I was doing and stopped what they were doing to the other siblings and went after me.

"Let's go!" I quickly grabbed Izaiya's hand and ran towards the only exit in the room. I quickly barricaded of swords appear in front of the exit door to prevent none of the masked men to follow us.

"Our comrades!" Without even taking a glance towards my brother, I could tell he's looking back towards room where the rest of our brothers and sisters are being held to their deaths.

"Stop!"

"Don't let them escape!"

Other guards began to follow us through out the facility. The poison in my body began to take its toll now. There is no way I can get out of here alive with my little brother by my side. So by the time we talked out of the facility and into the forest, I did something I couldn't believe it.

"We have to split!"

"What? You got to be kidding." My brother couldn't believe what I just told him. He made a face of disbelief and was total against.

"They're going to catch up to us a lot sooner if they we're together!" I argued. I could hear facility members foot steps following us. "If we split up, they won't be able to find us!"

"B-But!" Izaiya still is being hesitant. There was no time before they're going to catch up to us if you don't make up your mind!

"I'll find you! I promise!" I told him before I made my escape.

"Onee-chan!" I heard Izaiya's screamed from behind. I didn't stop though, I continued running as fast as I could before I gave out to the poison. By the time my body gave into the poison, I collapsed on the cold snow. I couldn't feel the coldness of the snow. It must have been the poison I guess.

I wondered what happened to Izaiya. Did he escape? Or did he got caught? Well it doesn't matter anymore. I felt that the poison has made it through all of my body. It looks like that I'm going to die after all.

-I don't want to die.

Everything I've done... I took someone's life... I've abandoned my friends that I knew for so long like it was nothing... I've even abandoned my brother to save myself... Despite all the crimes I've done, I still want to live...

I what else do I have to do? Do I have to sell my own soul to live? I'm willing to do it if I live... I'm willing... to... sell myself... to live...

My vision began to turn blurry as I began to lose conscious. My life slowly began to flashed in my eyes. All the good memories I had with my friends came to me and my brother... Izaiya...

Before everything became black in my eyes, I saw something coming my way. I couldn't see clearly, but I saw a red figure coming my way. Was it per chance Satan here to claim my soul for the sins I committed?

Issei POV

I didn't realized what I where I was going till I saw the institution that belong to the church a few miles back. By the time I arrived, I saw two children running from the institution like their lives depending on it. By the time the guards came out, I stepped in and took out every guard with only with my Dyrnwyn. After finishing off the guards I got into my scale mail and chased after the children that left the institution in the air.

I couldn't see them so I decided to use Bilingual to see if one of those kids were a girl and I was able to track her with breast. Fortunately I was able to find the girl that did belong from the institution, but what I heard from her breast...

Looks like I'm going to have my hands full.

Hey everybody! Sorry it took so long!

If you couldn't tell from my writing, it was kind of force and rushed. Due to school, work, and seeing the anime Shinmai Maou no Testament, Gundam Build Fighters Try, Seiken Tsukai no World Breaker, and Tokyo Ghoul Season 2, I was kind of busy and couldn't have time write as much as I want to.

Okay before I go, I have two things I have to say. First off the Holy Sword Project Arc (Which will focus on you know who if you read A Second Chance) will be the last arc before we reached on the the canon and the chapter will only last for two to three chapters. After that we'll go into the canon which each volume will last to three to four chapter each.

Now let's talk about new stories that I'm going to publish in the Highschool DxD Archive. First off, the Rise of Stardom story is going to be abandon only reason why is because it was early project that was rushed to fast, so I had to delete it. Secondly, the first chapter of Transcendent is almost over, and you won't believe what I have store in it.

Also I'm also stopping Awakening of the Red Saviors story because it's not working as well as I wanted and I'm busy as it is. I decided to use the Horseman of the Apocalypse in a new story, which will come out in the start of late March/early April, or may when I finished the semester. The story will take place during the canon of the story and there will be sequel that will connect with Issei and DxD team.

Now the preview of next chapter:

After rescuing the girl from the Holy Sword Project, Issei has a big responsibility to raising this girl as his apprentice but there is a problem, she isn't going to listen to him. How will Issei going to coop with this girl, who won't listen to a word he said.

Next time in A New Opportunity: Here comes Patsu-Girl!

Issei: This isn't how we doing things!