“No,” Rias said.
“The wards around that castle are impressive, and while I might be able to get through them, I doubt that I could do so without being detected.”
“But Grayfia…” Harry went to say, confused.
“Grayfia is significantly better at that than I am,” Rias said, cutting him off.
“I’ll be able to get out on my own, as few wards are ever used to keep people in, and they wouldn’t have set any up to specifically keep devils in, but I will need to be summoned inside.”
“Hmm,” Harry said, not wanting to voice how annoying that would be.
It wasn’t like seeing her wouldn’t be worth it.
Just then, another thought occurred to him, and he said, “What if it was a spot outside the wards?”
“I don’t know how far the wards go,” Rias said.
“I’ll have to ask Grayfia where she began before she started carefully opening a hole she could teleport through.”
“No, I mean the chamber,” Harry said.
“It’s a complete unknown to everyone who’s ever worked on the wards.
It might be outside them.”
“Hmm,” Rias said.
“That was where we wanted to go anyway, so it would be convenient.”
“Exactly,” Harry said.
Reaching out, Rias summoned a small sheet of paper with a red magic circle on it, much like the one she had appeared inside before, and handed it to him.
“Hold this out and call my name once you’re in the chamber,” she said.
“If your theory is correct, then I’ll appear.
Otherwise, you’ll have to summon me properly.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Harry said, pocketing the paper.
She had sent him on his way not long after that.
Holding out the page, he said, “Rias Gremory.”
Just like before, a circle of glowing crimson light appeared on the ground in front of him and she materialized in it.
“Hey,” Harry said, feeling giddy to be with her again.
It had only been a few hours, and he had already missed her.
“I guess it worked.”
“How’s Akeno?” Harry asked.
“Sleeping it off,” Rias laughed.
“We’ll have to work on her stamina.”
“I’m happy to help,” Harry said, his voice low and rumbling.
“I bet,” Rias smirked, walking up to him.
“She does taste good, doesn’t she?”
Before he could reply, she kissed him, and he wrapped his arms around her.
As she broke the kiss for air, she finally looked around to see where she was.
“You know, as far as first date locales go, this is pretty unconventional,” she said.
“Date?” Harry asked, and Rias just grinned at him before wandering into the chamber.
He caught up with her quickly and took her hand.
She looked at him in surprise for a second before smiling and blushing slightly.
“So where is this…” Rias cut herself off as they stumbled across one of the shed skins.
“What in the world?”
“That’s one of the basilisk’s shed skins,” Harry replied.
“It’s a bit smaller than the actual beast was.”
“This is smaller than the thing you killed?” Rias asked, sounding distinctly impressed.
“Mmhmm,” Harry said, touching the shed skin.
It crumbled under his touch, turning to dust.
“This was shed a while before you killed it, I’d guess,” Rias said, “and its inherent magic wouldn’t have preserved a simple shed skin that much anyway.”
“Well, the whole thing is just ahead,” Harry said, and they continued onward.
“Ah, right,” Harry said as they reached the caved-in part of the tunnel.
“I’m going to need to fix this.”
“No, I can do it,” Rias said, waving her hand in front of her. Read this novel at g.com for the best experience.
Harry watched as the wall that Lockhart’s backfired spell had broken almost knitted itself back together, looking like nothing had ever happened.
“There,” Rias said before they continued on.
When they reached the final door before the main chamber, he saw that it had closed itself since he last left and hissed a quick command for it to open.
Rias shivered, and he looked over at her, cocking an eyebrow.
“Just memories,” Rias said, giving him a lustful grin.
Harry returned it, and the two went inside, only to stop dead in their tracks.
They were both shocked for different reasons.
In Harry’s case, while he had no particular reason to doubt Rias, he still couldn’t quite fathom that a creature wouldn’t have rotted a year and a half after its death.
Nonetheless, the basilisk lay there, looking just as it had the day Harry killed it.
In Rias’ case.
“Fuck me!” she exclaimed, tugging her hand out of his grip and walking towards the dead basilisk as though in a trance.
“This is seriously impressive.”
“I just did what I had to,” Harry said.
“Humility isn’t as attractive to devils as it is to humans,” Rias said archly.
“Killing something this dangerous, especially in the way that you did, at the age that you did, would get you serious recognition among my people if you were a devil.
To pull it off as a human is remarkable.”
Harry flushed slightly under her praise and then furrowed her brow as she pulled out another one of those papers.
Seeing his confused look, she said, “I need to summon my mother for this.
Harvesting creatures isn’t my thing, but she’s been doing it for some time.”
“You told your mother about the basilisk?” Harry asked.
“I told her that you were sitting on a potential goldmine and that she would want to check it out,” Rias smirked.
“I wanted to see the look on her face when she found out what specifically I was talking about here.
Venelana Gremory.”
Harry was about to comment on that when a purple magic circle appeared between them, and the basilisk’s corpse and Venelana materialized inside it.
“Well, Rias, what is this opportunity you’ve been so tight-lipped about?” she asked.
“Hello, Ve…er, Mrs.
Gremory,” Harry said.