Rise of the Strongest Exorcist (DxD parody)

Despite his initial concerns, the next few days had been peaceful. 

Each morning, he'd had a good breakfast prepared by a beautiful woman. It often ended with her teasing him about letting her bathe him. Of course, he couldn't be sure she was teasing him. Lucy offered these embarrassing suggestions in the same calm voice she always used, and with an emotionless face. 

But it never escalated beyond his brusque refusals.

Once he was done with breakfast and getting ready for school, he enjoyed the short walk to school. Spartanburg was a beautiful and peaceful city—though it was almost too small to call a city. And though he hadn't explored much of it, he planned to do so soon.

When he entered school, his day would continue with few interruptions. Kira and Maria acted distant and would only wave to him when he said hello, seemingly out of politeness.

Then after classes, since he didn't have a club, he would go back home and have a good dinner with another round of 'monotone' teasing.

Everything was peaceful, with no ripples in the gentle flow of his day. After making a big splash in his first class at the new school, things had settled down for Leo into a routine. The only other surprise was how much he found he enjoyed his World History course with Professor Dillard. Maybe because the professor was less than a decade older than his students, but the man's laid back teaching style made what Leo had previously thought was dry old facts interesting again. 

Well, that, and the friendship he'd sparked with Asa.

They'd met three more times that first week—twice more in Chemistry, and once for a study session in the library. The cute blonde had been quick to memorize the pneumonic Leo used to remember the periodic table. She had such a good memory that when he was forced to look up an element's atomic weight, she was halfway through the problem.

"Hey!" he'd joked. "I thought I was the tutor, here… not the other way around!"

Asa had giggled, then finished her homework several minutes before him. She'd playfully pretended to fall asleep, snoring softly, while he caught up. He had been able to help her understand the two problems she'd done wrong when they went back over things together.

The normally shy girl had been shocked at the 'A' she'd gotten on their quiz, though Leo had expected her to do really well. She was smart, funny, and great to hang around with. That's why he'd started looking forward to their studying sessions in the middle of the week.

Probably because there were so few guys at the school, but in no time at all, everyone seemed to at least know of Leo. So much for laying low and staying under the radar. Wherever he went, girls would wave or call out a greeting. The few guys he passed would give a nod.

A tall, dark-haired boy in a blue blazer that he'd seen around several times nodded when Leo looked over at him on his way to the library. He was meeting with Asa again to go over what she could expect in Biology tomorrow. The syllabus had noted they were starting a genetics section, but today's lesson had been much more in depth than Leo was expecting. 

Fortunately for her, Leo could prep Asa for a rough class tomorrow—one that was likely to end with a pop quiz like his professor had given his class. Leo had struggled to get a low 'B' but had sworn to himself he would ensure Asa aced it. 

He was halfway up the library steps when a figure coming down them bumped into him. Given his strength, Leo had no trouble keeping hold of the books he carried under one arm, but it was clear the other person had expected him to drop them. 

Scowling, Leo turned and growled, "What where you are going!"

The person who bumped into him, a lanky twenty-something in black jeans and a gray t-shirt with a buzz-cut on the sides nearly hidden by the mop of dark curls on top, sneered back at him, "You should recognize your betters and get out of the way, fool."

Leo rolled his eyes. 

'Is this guy trying to pick a fight?' he wondered.

"Still a free country, last time I checked," he told the man. "I wasn't in your way—you went out of your way to bump into me."

The sneer hadn't left the other man's face. "All of you college twits are the same. You think you're smarter than everyone else, when it's really the other way around. You don't even understand the world you live in!"

Leo carefully extended his senses until they wrapped around the man. He didn't push hard—the last thing he wanted to do was expose himself to this idiot. But given the man's sneer and superiority complex, he had to be something other than human. The only thing he knew for sure was that the man wasn't a devil. 

He wondered what he was? Leo didn't want to tangle with an outsider, but his curiosity had been piqued. That's why he pushed gently with his senses to get a 'glimpse' of what the man was.

His senses returned a color for the man's aura: white. 

The man was an angelic, though not a pure breed. His aura was white, though a sickly white tarnished by streaks of gray. Most likely he was a Nephilim—the bastard child of an angelic and a human. The streaks of gray indicated the man was a real piece of work. 

Leo suppressed a shudder, wondering what he had done to streak his soul. He hadn't murdered anyone—not yet, at least—as that would have created a black streak in the man's soul. The gray streaks were a clear warning to avoid any trouble, though. This guy was clearly an asshole.

"Whatever, dude." Leo snorted. "Just watch where you are going next time." 

He turned and went up the last few stairs without looking back at the man, even when the man came back up several steps after Leo. Leo heard the man's gloating, "thought so… punk!" but ignored it.

Leo said hello to the librarian. She was a surprisingly young and pretty woman. Miss Fosse certainly nailed the 'naughty librarian' look in her black stockings, tight pencil skirt and white blouse with its top two buttons undone to expose a tantalizing amount of cleavage. 

Miss Fosse returned his greeting, leaning over just enough to ensure Leo acknowledged the cleavage on display. "Is there anything I can help you with, Leo? Anything at all?"

He didn't take the bait. "I don't need any help right now. Just going to study and tutor a friend. Thanks for the offer, though." Leo was polite and friendly to the staff, though he thought Miss Fosse and Miss Hastings were birds of a feather. He wouldn't be surprised if they were best friends.

Leo found Asa at a table towards the back on the second floor, where she sat facing away from him. The blonde had her head down on the table, nestled in her folded arms. Beside her, on the table, was her water bottle and a stack of three books—including her biology text.

That Asa had tired of waiting for him and had put her head down wasn't a surprise. What was a surprise, was when Leo saw her shoulders shaking. With his extra-human perception, he heard her sobbing softly. Hitching his backpack up on one shoulder, he hurried over to his friend.

"Hey there, Asa… is everything okay?" he asked. 

Leo wanted to reach out to her, to set a hand on her shoulder, or otherwise offer her some comfort. He considered her a friend, but they'd only known each other for just over a week and he didn't want to assume too much. 

"Leo?" 

When Asa raised her head from her arms on the table, the first thing he saw was her puffy eyes and the streaks of tears on her face. The next thing he noticed, as she wiped at her face with the sleeve of her blouse, was the red mark on her wrist.

Leo couldn't stop himself. Gently, he took her arm and pulled back the sleeve to see the angry red mark on her skin. "What happened, Asa?" Though he tried to stamp it down, a bit of a growl came through, turning his question into more of a demand.

Asa jerked her arm back and pulled down her sleeve. "It's nothing for you to worry about, Leo. Just one of the jerks who calls himself my brother hassling me about school."

 He frowned. "Tall, kind of lanky? With dark hair and a perpetual sneer on his face?" Leo asked.

Asa's bark of a laugh wasn't pretty, and her hand shot up to cover her mouth. "That's about as accurate a description of the idiot as you could get. How do you know what Duane looks like?"

"The idiot bumped into me on my way into the library. He called me a 'college twit' and claimed I didn't understand the world we live in." Leo looked out the window, as if he could see the idiot from here. 

Dropping the scowl that had formed, he turned back to Asa. "What did he do to you?"

The blonde buried her face in her hands. "It's not your problem, okay?" she mumbled from behind them.

"Tell me." Leo scrubbed one hand through his hair. "Look, I'm not mad at you or anything, and although I won't promise not to do something stupid, I'll try to be reasonable. Please tell me why you were crying and why your wrist is all red."

"The idiot tried to drag me out of here. He said I was getting too full of myself, playing at being a real college student. Like I could ever…" Her voice trailed off as she scrubbed at her face.

"Sounds like he's just jealous of how smart you are. He certainly didn't seem to be a genius." Leo eyed his friend. "If he keeps giving you trouble, just let me know. I'm sure I can get him to back off and leave you alone."

Asa stared at him for a long moment, before offering Leo a wan smile and shaking her head. "Like I said, it's nothing you need to worry about."

While she said this, a green glow underneath the table lit up the shadows around them. It happened so quickly that Leo wondered if he'd imagined it. If he didn't know better, it had looked like a celestial Power.

His friend held up her hand, letting the sleeve fall back. "See? He didn't hurt me—he can't hurt me. At most, he'll yell at me when I get home for not helping him out this afternoon. We're wasting time… why'd you text me you had something important about tomorrow's Biology class?" 

Leo had his suspicions, but wasn't going to call Asa out on them—not yet. While he explained about the new genetics section and the pop-quiz, he extended his senses around Asa. If her brother was a nephilim—or, as he recalled her exact wording… 'one of the jerks who calls himself my brother'—she might be one, too.

He tried to be discrete about it, but he didn't expect the blinding brilliant white his senses returned. If it weren't for the brown border around it, Leo would have sworn she was an angel. The brown border was that of a mortal, though, and not the gold border of an angelic. He'd never seen a mortal's soul so pure.

She obviously had some healing ability—though how a human could heal without being at least part-angelic or part-devil was a real puzzle. He would ask if she had Divine Gear, if that wouldn't give too much away about his own situation. 

Leo pushed these thoughts down and tried to focus on explaining his notes from today's Biology class. It wasn't that the material was all that difficult, just that it hadn't been covered in the reading, and he hadn't paid as much attention as he should have to the professor's presentation. 

He ended up handing his notes over to Asa, ready to explain what he'd written if she had trouble deciphering his sloppy handwriting. Leo couldn't help but notice the dimple that appeared when his friend chewed on the inside of her cheek. In such unguarded moments, he was struck again at how pretty the petite blonde was—without even trying. 

Leo normally ignored what most considered 'beauty'. Having a mom who put the world's hottest models and actresses to shame could do that. Maybe because Asa had never made any effort whatsoever to flirt with him or how she didn't even try to highlight her delicate features with makeup, he kept noticing how pretty she was.

Or maybe it was the beauty of her soul coming out through her exterior appearance that made her so attractive. He couldn't stop thinking about it.

It didn't make sense. Why would sweet Asa be hanging around with a jerk like this idiot? Maybe he was her brother—step-brother or half-brother, at best. And what was a townie like him doing on campus trying to haul a student off against her will? Maybe he'd have a word with security… anonymously registering a complaint. 

Asa might have to deal with him at home, but she should be able to study and attend school without interference. If Leo ever saw the idiot again, he'd tell the fool straight up to keep his hands to himself—that if Asa got hurt, even a little, Leo would hunt him down and pay back the pain tenfold.