DxD: Gambling With Fate

"So when are you going to send the complaint?"

Noa asked Dulio.

"...Well I'm planning to send it right now, before the tournament actually starts." Seeing as the three decided that Noa would win the tournament if he could, it would be better to send out the complaint before.

Lavinia nodded in approval. "Don't forget to add some food recommendations."

Noa and Dulio looked at her with a deadpan. Says the person who eats the fastest...

"So are you looking forward to fighting anyone?" Dulio asked Noa. Unlike Noa, who didn't care for anyone who he didn't already know, Dulio at least made some effort to get some information about their future opponents.

Noa shrugged, not particularly hyped about this entire event.

"I don't really know. What's the point if they're all fodder?"

"...I see." While Noa was one of Dulio's only and best friends, it was hard to believe that Noa even saw others as real, living beings...

Sometimes Dulio wondered if Noa was just trying to act cool because of novels or references he didn't know about, but looking at Noa's eyes, it was hard to know if it was him acting, or if he even cared.

Remembering back to his apathetic gaze when looking at strangers who walked up to them after the Sword Selection Ceremony and his comments on 'looking cool' when walking to Jeanne, while Dulio would like to point it out, he didn't want to strain the relationship with one of his only friends.

And Lavinia mostly followed Noa's actions regarding people, so it wasn't like he could ask Lavinia.

"The tournament is early tomorrow, right?" Noa had to make sure, because unlike the other exorcists where they had temporary accommodations at the Vatican, the Church had decided that the Vatican was 'close enough' to the Institute of Virtue, so instead of staying at the Vatican, they had to take a car all the way back to the Training Center.

A whole 2 hours later, they finally arrived.

"Yeah. They said they'll pick us up pretty early," Lavinia affirmed.

"Then let's just sleep early." Noa proposed. 

"Sure." Dulio responded.

"Should we pray one more time the complaint works...?" Lavinia added.

"...Sure." Noa nodded.

--+--

"Did they set this up or something..." Noa mumbled, looking at the tournament bracket.

"It seems like it..." Lavinia agreed.

Noa and Dulio were on completely opposite sides of the bracket, so if both of them won all their matches, the finals would be once again, Noa vs. Dulio.

That was if they were being optimistic. While Dulio with his Longinus was unmatched amongst his peers with the exception of Noa, being 9 years old against older teens and trainees who only focused on Swordsmanship meant that the chances of him losing were much higher.

It seems the higher ups in the Church were confident that despite the age gap between the average teen Youth Exorcists and experienced Exorcist Trainees that had nothing to do but train in swords would still lose to Dulio and Noa.

Such confidence.

The Youth Tournament allowed anyone the age of 17 and under to participate, and the prize that the Church gave to the winner was... prestige and a medal!

...Cheap bastards.

The weapons that were given were wooden, and the conditions for victory were disarming the opponent, preventing the opponent from moving, or a surrender from the opponent.

Excessive harm was prohibited and resulted in disqualification, but if the judges had determined that damage was purposefully taken in order to result in disqualification, it was looked over.

That was just breeding grounds for corruption, but who cared?

Like always, Noa went into the competition with unwavering confidence. With both physicality and intuition on his side, unless the opponent was cheating it was near impossible for him to lose.

Even then, he still had Furthest Earth.

Not that it was particularly necessary.

In order for the Tournament to not last the entire day, the preliminaries were done separately until there were 16 people remaining. This meant that there wasn't much of an audience until after Noa had defeated 3 competitors.

Well, that's how it was supposed to go, but entering Noa's designated 'arena' against his chosen opponent, there was a large number of spectators.

Hmm...

Noa's opponent looked to be an older male, probably around his teens.

In terms of appearance, Noa looked to be significantly smaller in both physique and height.

His opponent looked at him with a cocky expression... why? Noa didn't particularly understand why someone would have so much confidence facing him even if he wasn't using his Sacred Gear, but Noa just shrugged.

He looked at his opponent with a plain expression, holding a wooden sword almost the same size as him in his hand. Seeing as it was the same length of Proto Excalibur, getting used to the Sword's length was an easy way for him to be able to use Invisible Air properly in battle.

Regarding the Flaming Sword, despite the moniker of 'Sword', the handle was around the same length as it's blade, so it felt more like a lance but even with the unusual proportions, the actual weapon handle and all was around 160 cm while Excalibur Proto was 130 cm, an average Bastard Sword.

It had unusual proportions, so asking for a practice weapon in that style would be weird. He'd wait until he was better with a standard bastard sword first.

As the weapon had biblical significance, there was a decently high chance that Gabriel could recognize it, or rather the DxD version of the weapon if it existed. Not that Noa hated Gabriel, but it was already a pain to explain Protection of the Faith.

Not that Noa ever had the opportunity to use the Flaming Sword in the Training Institute in the first place.

The actual battle ground was sound proof, allowing the competitors to converse privately without spectators being able to listen in.

Noa's opponent took the opportunity to jab at him.

"Do you think just because you have a Sacred Gear, you'll also be good at Swordsmanship?" He asked. "I hope you know I have 6 years of experience over you." He gloated.

"Wow, people actually say that? Wait. I guess this is an Anime World..." Noa trailed off, mumbling the last part.

The opponent's expression darkened.

"You-!" Just as his opponent registered what Noa had said, the countdown finished, and Noa cocked his sword holding arm back.

Noa's blessings bestowed through Protection of the Faith just in combat were numerous, having over 1000 Blessings regarding Combat alone.

While he already had general large scoped Blessings like [Increased Flexibility], the longer he trained in swordsmanship, the more specific the blessings were.

A normal [Increased Flexibility] could be boosted through word play and conditionals.

[Increased Flexibility while holding a [Sword]]

[Increased Flexibility while holding a [Bladed] Weapon]

[Increased Flexibility while holding a [Bladed] Weapon during the [Day]]

[Increased Flexibility while holding a [Bladed] Weapon during the [Day] wearing predominately [White] clothing]

[Increased Flexibility while holding a [Bladed] Weapon in [Right] hand during the [Day] wearing predominately [White] clothing]

[Increased Flexibility while holding a [Bladed] Weapon in [Right] hand during the [Day] wearing predominately [White] clothing against [Older] Entities]

A simple [Increased Flexibility] could theoretically be stacked infinitely.

And with 6 Months to stack a large number of [Blessings] through [Protection of the Faith] even if the blessings were weaker the more specific they were, with such large number of blessings generated each day, Noa was constantly growing.

Noa moved one step forward, exhibiting his core strength and flexibility by matrix ducking a slash and using his naturally smaller physique to go between his enemy's legs, hitting the back of their knees in the process.

As the opponent grunted in pain and fell to his knees, Noa turned around and kicked him in the back, using it as leverage to launch himself into the air, hitting an unnecessary backflip and holding his sword in a reverse grip, landing on his opponent, who was laying flat out.

Stabbing his practice sword next to his opponent's head, the guy froze at the near death experience.

"So are you going to surrender?"

Noa said with his characteristic carefree voice. As if he never considered his opponent as a threat in the first place.

Such a nonchalant tone despite threatening him caused cold sweat to build up on the teen.

The teen turned his head to Noa's face, locking eye contact with Noa's expression. Despite the youthful face, it looked as if Noa's eyes didn't even consider him as a real living being. Like he was in the line of sight of a man who only saw his life as a game or even a story.

Chills ran down the teen's back as he rapidly nodded.

What kind of courage did he have when the match started to jab at this... this... kid?

Was he really human?

"I-I surrender!"

He yelled with desperate fervor. Who cared if he lost to a child if he didn't even see him as human?

Noa looked to the judges, who nodded. Noa nodded satisfactorily and got off his opponent and walked out of the arena without looking back at his opponent.

Well, that was unsurprisingly easy.

It seems his time at the Training Institute wasn't for naught. Noa had expected an Achievement, seeing as he had an achievement for his friends, but it seems the System hadn't deigned his opponent important enough.

Well, it wasn't like he was going to be friends with every important person that comes up. All he really needed as his current friends.

And maybe Gabriel.

--+--

A/N: It seems that his 'dependence' on Protection of the Faith increased... If you're wondering about Lavinia, it's cause it was before he depended more on Protection of the Faith and his current situation. Noa's had no real connections till now so he isn't experienced. Using that trust he feels when seeing the criteria by Protection of the Faith all the time to create connections isn't good, but who knows. Character development?

This is the first time that Noa is around a lot of people and interacts with them more than just trying to scam shit off them.

I deleted the announcement.

Also, my grandma's fine. She just tripped and cracked a bone. While yeah it's serious it ain't as serious as death. But I had to celebrate a birthday soon after. Was going to update tmr but with so little novels that interest me right now just decided to write instead. Still got 2 extra chaps from last week to write too.

--+--

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Extra chapters will be released the day after the goal is reached, from 2:00 PM to 6:00 PM KST cause that's when I'm free. They'll also be generally shorter than normal chapters.

Normal Chapters will be released every day during the times from 8:00 PM to 2:00 AM KST cause I normally get inspo throughout the day.

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