It's True Love 74

"We are being followed." Akiha suddenly stopped. "It is quite obvious as well." It certainly was.

Even a completely untrained person like Yuta had noticed. Still, at first he did imagine it could be just a coincidence, which is why he had yet to call out his stalker. Clearly thing had reached a point where they couldn't be ignored anymore however.

Ciel sighed. "Sorry about that..." She was trying to keep her tone down, so their stalker wouldn't hear anything. "I did figure she was strange, and Yuta and I discussed this on the past, but I've been putting off handling her."

Akiha rolled her eyes. "It's fine. Just... do something about her. The girl could get herself killed by following us." Ah, that was very true.

Yuta chuckled. "I'll go confront her." He had to protect Shiki's daugher!

Wasn't that a crazy thing to think... He could also end Shiki's life at any moment. All it would take was telling the truth to Akiha, and his friend would cease to exist. And so would Japan of course, as collateral damage.

As soon as he turned around, and stared at the stalker, she completely froze.

That stalker was Satsuki Yumizuka, of course.

She wanted to stalk Yuta back home, but her priorities had changed to stalking Akiha instead. So naturally, when Yuta along with Ciel started walking with the new student, Satsuki saw an opportunity she could not miss.

Well, she could have tried going after the maids instead, but she didn't see much to gain in that.

The high schooler had actually been under the belief that she was doing a fine job. These past few days she had constantly been glaring at Yuta and she had seemingly gone unnoticed after all. Which is why his sudden movements came as... quite the shock.

The girl began wondering if perhaps he wasn't about to confront her, if perhaps he just happened to turn back at the right time.

His eyes told a different story however. "Yo, Sacchin." Yuta didn't really know how to go about this.

First of all, he was just kind of assuming she might have gotten her memories back, but for all he knew, it could be something completely different. He wouldn't be exactly surprised at someone deciding to stalk him for no reason at this point.

Second of all, assuming she did remember... Should he just erase her memories with Ciel's help again and go on with his day? That felt like a solution that wouldn't last. What if she just got her memories back again? Did Arihiko remember too?

Naturally, if she didn't remember, he couldn't just blindly try to mess with her memories. He doubted Ciel would mess up and hurt the girl, but it would be a pretty messed thing to do nonetheless.

So it was probably better to have a talk with her before trying anything crazy.

She awkwardly waved at him. "Hello! I-I guess we happen to take the same path home today, huh?" The girl tried deflecting his suspicions.

Yuta would have none of it however. "Nope, you're following me for some reason." He wasn't exactly scared of confronting her directly like this, which is why he wasn't holding back his words at all. "Why?" She better have a good excuse.

Ciel was taking things in stride, but Akiha was glaring at her with enough strength to end her life. Honestly, it would probably be safer for her if she really was doing this for memory reasons.

Satsuki flinched. "Um..." She didn't expect him to call her out like that! "I just..." What should she even say!?

He was definitely gonna mess with her memories again, and this time there might be no coming back. So she started thinking of how she could avoid such a fate, even if she had to do something stupid.

"I was following you... um... Tohno... because I was worried about her!" This had to work. "I mean, I saw her leaving with you, and she's pretty young and you're kind of a womanizer so..."

Yuta raised an eyebrow. "I'm best friends with her brother." Which admittedly didn't confirm anything. "Also, Senpai is with us, it's not like she's coming back alone with a guy." What Akiha said made no sense.

Which meant...

"I actually like Shiki!" Those words from Sacchin quickly interrupted his thoughts. "And I was worried about him, so I wanted to visit him!" Her face had exploded with embarrassment at this point.

But she couldn't just stop. "I don't know where he lives though, so I had to... I had to follow his sister..." Even she felt bad while saying it. Without a doubt she came off as a massive creep.

But a massive creep wouldn't get their memories erased. Probably. Besides, the fact that some amount of truth was present in her story probably helped her case, didn't it?

Yuta gasped. "You like Shiki...?" That wasn't good.

He knew that was a possibility, but the confirmation of it shocked him enough that he even almost forgot was his mission here was. So in a way, Satsuki's desperate pleas had more or less worked.

The girl quickly nodded. "Yes! Please don't tell him!" He sure as fuck wouldn't.

How would... how would Shiki even live with such information? Actually, the bastard might become a little bit smug, but his inevitable rejection of Satsuki would definitely break the girl far more than what some measly magecraft could.

And also...

He glanced back at Akiha.

The girl was scowling as her whole body trembled with rage. Since she was a brocon, she naturally wanted to protect Shiki, and since Satsuki came off as a creepy stalker, Akiha's levels of power had risen to a whole new level.

Yuta sighed. "Is that... really it?" If she was smart, she would confess to something else.

Though even if she didn't, he was still suspecting her. He didn't think of Satsuki as the type of girl who stalked someone back to their home simply to learn where their crush lived, and then to see if he was okay or not. He could be wrong of course, he didn't truly know her that well, but she just didn't seem like the type.

Now that Satsuki had found a way of escape, she wouldn't let it go, even if it was embarassing. "Yes! Really!" Her desperation only made Yuta believe in her less, but...

Ciel was using all her strength to hold Akiha back at this point, so...

Yuta waved the girl off. "Right, just... just leave then, before things get ugly." As far as he was concerned, things had already gotten ugly.

The fact that she was going as far as stalking him was dangerous. There was always a chance of something like the spider ghoul attacking him, and Satsuki being accidentally killed by it. Souya was a dangerous place right now, so dangerous that he had even asked Arcueid to scort the twins back to Ciel's apartment.

That is to say, Sacchin was putting herself in danger, and he wasn't even talking about Akiha... to a certain extent.

The girl ran off. "Okay! Please don't tell Shiki about this!" He was going to tell Shiki about this.

He turned around to confront the monster. "Akiha, everything is alright. Please stop fuming..." They had more important business to deal with. It was part of why he had let Sacchin go without much of a fuss.

"I will not!" She finally freed herself from Ciel's grasp. "You may live a life of debauchery, but I shall not allow such a curse to reach my brother!" And she was also planning to eventually put an end to his debauchery.

Yuta sighed. "Okay, it didn't reach him, so let's go..." They had a vampire to hunt.

Also, Akiha may not know this, but Shiki was no innocent little flower!

Akiha crossed her arms. "Fine, but I'll remember this... and that girl." They did attend the same school now.

Sacchin's days were numbered.



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He was probably being pessimistic, but he had been expecting another night of nothing crazy happening.

That was just how things were most of the time, especially in a city filled with monsters like his adorable girlfriends. No vampire would announce himself and make a big mess when Arcueid could show up and destroy them in a second, but...

Surprisingly, they had pretty easily found a couple of blood suckers, even if they were fodder.

"Man, what is that vampire thinking?" At this point Yuta felt comfortable enough to discuss something even as he cut down a corpse. He didn't know if that was a good thing or not.

Rika began laughing. "He probably isn't thinking! His brains could have rotted off." That was... possible. Honestly. Dead Apostles were constantly degrading.

Ciel sighed. "Just focus on the fight for now." Surprisingly she was not scolding Yuta, but Rika.

At this point he had learned to never lower his concentration even while talking. Meanwhile Rika, possibly due to her overwhelming power, never learned such a thing. Which didn't matter against ghouls, but it could matter against a real vampire.

Still, they quickly cleaned off the warehouse. There were no big shots to be found.

Yuta grimaced. "Did that guy just... leave dead people here?" Why?

Building an army of undead was natural for a Dead Apostle, but typically they just wandered around more or less aimlessly. Going back and forth between the streets and their master's lair. This was definitely not a vampire's lair though.

Ciel put a hand to her chin. "He's probably trying to build an army in a more discrete manner." Discrete huh? That made sense.

Typically a Dead Apostle built their army like building a snowball. A few undead made more undead until a city's defenses completely fell and they took over everything. It was typically a pretty overwhelming tactic too...

For a city that was unaware of their presence that is.

Since that wasn't the case with Souya, and dangerous people such as Ciel lived here, trying to pull something like that off would just attract even more trouble, and possibly reveal the vampire's location. So instead they were building up forces in secret, and possibly in many different locations.

That way when the snowball showed up, it would already be huge... Even so, the vampire would probably still die. He just would cause a lot more chaos when he went down. How problematic.

Ciel scowled. "Yuta, Rika, Akiha, I will work throughout the night finding more places like this with Noel, you all can go home and sleep." It was a good thing they had found out about this.

Rika immediately sent her a thumbs up. "Alright then, Rabbit." She trusted Ciel well enough. The executor knew what she was doing.

Yuta trusted her too of course, but... "Are you sure Senpai? What if you stumble onto the big bad? Wouldn't it be better to have me around?" He had certain extra worries since she was his girlfriend.

And then there was Akiha. "Yes! And I'm still very capable of fighting!" The girl had insecurity all over her face.

She had done pretty much nothing during this whole skirmish. Not because she was weak, or because she froze out of fear, but because she got overwhelmed. Once the fight had started, she quickly realized she herself didn't know where to start.

Should she support someone? Or attack someone by herself? Since she didn't have combat experience, at least not when compared to Yuta and Ciel, she ended up doing pretty much nothing.

Unacceptable, that was not how the heir of the Tohnos should conduct herself when in combat.

Ciel didn't see things like they did, of course. "Ah, why is it that Rika of all people isn't the trouble child?" Then again, the ghost could be quite reasonable when Yuta was not directly involved.

The cursed giggled. "I'm a polite girl. It's part of my charm." As if. Even Rika herself did not buy that.

Yuta stayed silent and simply accepted Ciel's scolding. He knew he was more or less worrying for no reason. Ciel was immortal, and Noel had survived for a long time. They would be just fine. It's just that he couldn't help but worry nonetheless.

And as for Akiha... "Who are you calling a problem child!?" There was a healthy blush on her face, and her poor performance during the fight wasn't helping.

Normally Ciel would immediately take back her words, and apologize. Right now she was in business mode, however. "You. Go rest, I can handle this." Not that she was against having help, but...

It was better to have heavy hitters like Akiha rested for when the real fight came.

The girl may not have showed her abilities well during the fight, but Ciel was experienced, she could tell when someone had potential. She could also tell when someone had confidence in their abilities, without being overly arrogant. Akiha had that, and it was most likely a good sign.

Akiha grit her teeth... but did not argue further. She knew it would only make her look worse. "Very well, but I shall be ready to help at anytime." And next time she would definitely show off!

She had seen what these three could do, and she was confident she could do better! Nothing they had shown was quite as impressive as her abilities of absorption!

Ciel nodded. "Good." And with a leap, disappeared, jumping through a window.

Yuta smiled. "Man, she really is crazy fast." He could only hope he would one day match up to her. Well, that was what training was for.

Akiha huffed. "She's nothing special. Not that I had high expectations of a member of the Holy Church anyways." So far Akiha had yet to see anything ludicrous from her. She was a far cry from the supposed monsters of the burial agency.

Rika snorted. "You're the type to talk trash when you're falling behind huh?" It was a good thing... or maybe a bad thing that Kohaku had not introduced the heiress to video games.

Akiha sputtered. "N-no! That would be disrespectful of me! I was simply stating a fact!" She raised a finger. "Everybody always talks about how members of the Burial Agency are walking disaster, but all that girl had going for her was above average reinforcement!"

Her words only made Rika grin even more. "Embarrassment can lead people to crazy places, huh?" It was almost cute.

Yuta chuckled. "Rika, please stop teasing her before she throws a tantrum." Also, it was his jon to tease cute girls! Even if Akiha wasn't exactly a challenge even for an amateur.

The girl glared at him. "Oh, do not start...!" She bit her lip. "I... am sorry for my performance today." There, she said it. "It was a bit more chaotic than I was expecting." Having multiple targets to focus on was certainly a different experience from when she was given the opportunity to face off against Touko Aozaki.

Yuta walked closer to her, and began patting her shoulder. "It's fine, everyone makes mistakes at the beginning. Hell, I make mistakes even now!" Still, he could not forgive any Senpai slander! He would remember this!

Rika was quick to jump at an opportunity to tease him. "His first loss happened when he was tricked into inhaling a bunch of smoke by the way." It was funny how something that had been so scary for her had faded into becoming a funny story.

Akiha smiled. "Oh my, that is indeed embarrassing." And not something someone with demon blood really needed to worry about. They were more resistant than your normal human.

Yes, she was superior!

Yuta put a hand on his hip. "Wow, Rika is totally right about you." It was like making someone feel bad had completely healed her spirit! That crossed the line and went straight to terrifying instead of being cute!

His terrifyingly cute girlfriend nodded. "I tend to be right." Could he even deny that at this point? Did he even want to do that?

Akiha rolled her eyes. "Ugh, I'm doing as Ciel ordered and going back home." Now that her mood had recovered, it was like she had become invincible to any teasing.

Sometimes she worked like that. She had a wall, but once that wall cracked she could be embarrassed for quite a while until the wall was rebuilt. Although people such as her brother and Yuta could easily bypass the wall, attacking her directly. Which is what made them so dangerous.

Yuta raised a hand. "Hey, let me walk you back. Like last time." Just in case.

Akiha lightly bowed. "Very well, I suppose I should incentivize any gentleman behavior coming from you. Hopefully it will kill your worst traits eventually." While letting the ones she liked the most survive, of course.

It was a strang thing. She wanted him to stop being perverted for example, but at the sametime she wished he could keep being perverted, while aiming that solely at her.

Rika sighed. "If those traits could die, they would have died at this point. With time you just learn how to love them and accept Yuta is as perfect as someone can be." Ah, the power of delusion.

She was right though. If not even a superheroine like his Senpai could completely fix him, nothing could.

But Akiha was just as delusional as Rika. "We'll see." Why did he have a feeling she would still be going about this even on the day of her marriage? "I can be quite persistent when I want something. Please do remember I will crush you eventually." Possibly when the vampire was gone.

"Speaking of crushing however, I need to hear more about that... girl who covets my brother's affection." Yuta had a feeling he would regret offering to walk her home.



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AN: I wanted to play something with X-Men in it, but found nothing good and interesting, so back to good ol' reliable Marvel Vs Capcom I go.