Disclaimer - I don't own any of the characters appearing in High School DXD or the Anime or the manga whatsoever.
–Magdaran Bael–
As the train began picking up speed, his eyebrows rose as he felt a dense energy barrier coat the entire cabin, or more likely, the entire train. A few seconds after that, the scenery outside of the window changed. From the barren lands of the underworld, and the giant city of New Lilith in the distance, it blurred to become a kaleidoscope of colours. The train gained speed as well, but his focus was not on that.
His focus was on the white film that kept the kaleidoscope of colors at bay. The colors made him feel a slight pressure just by looking at them.
The Dimensional Gap.
He realised that they were travelling through the Dimensional Gap or rather, a corridor built in it, judging by the thin white film that manifested at a distance that probably kept the worst of the Dimensional Gap at bay.
“Huh,” he quietly vocalised to himself as he realised the dangers of this train. While it was clearly secured using whatever Ajuka could come up with, it was the Dimensional Gap! Home of the Great Red and former home of the physical representation of Infinity. No wonder most devils didn’t travel using this.
It was both something they considered beneath them and also far more dangerous than just using a teleportation spell.
Thankfully, they were quickly out of the Dimensional Gap and inside a railway station, with the train quickly slowing down, once again, without any jolt whatsoever. The inertial dampening installed in the train was a nice touch, even if the means of travel left a lot to be desired.
He shuddered to think about the dangers these devils were putting themselves in, if they were traveling regularly using the train, and they most probably were. There were multiple Devil properties in the world, staffed by low and mid class devils, who made the backbone of the Devil race’s workforce, inside and outside of the Underworld.
He supposed that the devils considered this just as part and parcel with the paycheck. Sighing, he got up as the door was opened from the outside, a nervous attendant with clean clothes ready to escort him out if need be. He was very young too. Before he could take a step forward, the man spoke, “Um, sir, I believe it would be best if you could wait for a bit.”
At his confused look, he practically fell over himself to explain, “I-It’s just that everyone else is leaving right now, so the exit points are full of people trying to leave at the same time. It is…crowded, sir.” He finished and then bowed his head.
“That’s fine.” The bowed head snapped right back up at that. He shrugged, and began walking towards the door, the man taking two steps back as he looked outside the window, and indeed, the exit point was jammed, but it was not like that bothered him.
Turning to the man, he said, “Let’s go.”
He had taken multiple steps forward before the man caught up to him and brought him to the exit. Exiting the train, he clearly felt the atmospheric bubble around the train and the station as well. It was warded as well, but nowhere near as secure as it could be.
Did they just not see the need for this or was it a compromise they had to make due to the Shinto Gods’ permission being required for this whole endeavour? Either way, it worked for him as he could use the lax wards to freely teleport out of the place, without raising any alarms about it.
Turning around, he uttered a simple thank you before disappearing from the spot, appearing just outside the hidden railway station, cloaked and hidden from the humans walking below. He was surprised to find that the Devil railway station was completely hidden underground, and the above ground entrance to it was just a building that looked completely normal. They were using underground tunnels to avoid drawing attention to a large group of people exiting a normal building all at once.
He rotated on the spot, taking in all the sights, finding the stereotypical small town Japanese skyline everywhere. No skyscrapers as far as he could see, with mostly single family homes everywhere. Grid roads and as he flew a little bit higher, canals passing through the city, with grass on both sides, bridges above the water crossings.
All in all, it was just like he expected. He looked up at the sun and didn’t find it bothering him. Most low class and even newly reincarnated devils would find it a bit unpleasant and draining, but for stronger devils, it was a non issue, not unless the Sun Goddess herself came down on him.
Then, he might be in trouble.
Shaking his head, he slowly flew around, taking his time to find an appropriate alley to land into to emerge out of disguised and ready to mingle with the local population, only to pause and turn around, a dot in the distance rapidly gaining ground(or sky?) before the familiar visage of Cleria Belial reached him.
Now, he was cloaked, yes, but not for the likes of her. She was a strong High Class Devil, not to mention she must have been contacted by the people at the station about him. After that, all she had to do was track the strong Demonic Energy signature that he hadn’t cloaked on purpose.
“Hello, Ms.Overseer,” he joked a bit, his banter skills rusty from over a decade of disuse.
To her, he was a Peak High Class Devil. Someone roughly within the same level of standing, in terms of strength anyway so she should not be too stiff with him. Hopefully, Serafall hadn’t told her everything.
Keeping his Demonic Energy leaks restrained to just High Class was very taxing. There was only so much suppression he could do before he literally felt like bursting from within. This was definitely not sustainable long term, but for now? It was fine. He could use something that they both had in common to build a friendship, from her perspective anyway.
“Heir Bael. Welcome to Kuoh City. You should have informed me beforehand. I would have been there to receive you at the station.”
He waved her off casually, flying towards the train lines in the distance at a speed Cleria could follow with ease, “That’s fine. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing anyway. I hope I am not intruding.”
“No! No, you are most definitely not intruding. In fact, why don’t you come with me? I’ll give you a tour of the town?”
She offered, and he nodded, following her as she showed him the most touristy things.
The Aquarium. The biggest canal. The fish in the canal. The trains that emerged and entered the city from all sides. The farms just outside the city. The zoo and even the parks. The park was smack dab in the middle of the city, lush green and much larger on the inside than it suggested from the outside.
When asked about it, she confessed that it was a private park that was open to the public, but only a small portion of it. Most of it was hidden under spells that hid the true size of the park. It was used by her peerage and also had a small guesthouse if she had to house any passing member of the supernatural community.
She also told him that it worked for the city’s benefit as well. The pocket dimension was not completely isolated from the city. In fact, it shared the city’s air, which meant that the much higher concentration of trees here helped the city’s air pollution levels as well, not that it was that polluted to begin with.
The lack of cars and loud Internal combustion engines was especially telling because of his enhanced senses. The train tracks were all electrified so even that one was non polluting, and even if it was, it would be negligible because of the sheer amount of people it would carry.
By the time the tour was done, they were both sitting on the nearby hill and looking at the sunset, containers of food lying around them.
This was nice. Just companionable silence, he thought to himself, looking at the sunset with a smile on his face. A genuine one, too, which was a rare occurrence. It would seem that devils and humans both need constant change and movement to make sure their minds don't stagnate and become their own worst enemies.
“You’re not what I expected you to be, Magdaran.” She said out of the blue. He’d told her to call him by his name and not Heir Bael because that was tedious to listen to, let alone speak.
He nodded, eyes never leaving the sunset, “Let me guess, you expected someone who threw around their power and expected everyone around them to bow?”
She flushed, clearly not ready for his blunt explanation, and tried to save herself, “N-No. Not like that! You are just so relaxed?”
She then changed the topic, “Why are you here anyway? Not that I am asking in my capacity as the overseer. You are more than welcome to stay here for as long as you want, provided you don’t break too many things.”
“Is that for everyone?” He turned to her with a raised eyebrow, wondering if this was preferential treatment.
She shook her head, “Standard policy for Pillar Devils and their families. That includes Heirs. The same for the train journey as well. It’s just that–”
“No Pillar Devil bothers using it, and even if they did come here, they don’t stay here.” He finished her thoughts for her.
“Exactly!” She shouted, her voice echoing in the dense forest behind them.
“I just got my Evil Pieces.” He said, his gaze back on the now almost set sun, “I just wanted to see what the fuss was about reincarnating every race aside from the Devils.”
Seriously. It was like a contest. Even utterly useless races were reincarnated into Devils, just so Devils could show off their exoticness. It was a downright malicious use of the Evil Pieces, as most of the time, consent was not taken, and once they were in the Peerage, exit was very difficult and most of the time, impossible without outside intervention.
Theoretically, there was the option of becoming a High Class devil on your own, but that was just a theory. No King is going to let his pet(ugh) become strong enough to take the exam, and even if they were that strong, Pillar Devils had more than one way of manipulating the High Class Exams, even though technically that was entirely within the domain of Sirzechs Lucifer and Ajuka Belzebub.
She tensed beside him as he sighed internally. And it was going so well, too! She probably thought he was just like other devils, here to collect interesting humans like candy.
She remained silent for a moment before she spoke up, voice noticeably colder than before, “It is getting late, Magdaran. Let’s get you settled for the night, or do you wish to go back?”
“No,” He denied her offer of a teleport back home, “I think I’ll stay. I have a lot of confectionery left to try.”
She smiled at that, the tension from the implication of force Reincarnation lessening a bit.
"Sure."