"You can still be in my peerage without being my wife Lily," I said trying to undo the problem Serafall caused.
"No, I'm going to be your wife and in your peerage too."
"You should only say you want to marry someone if you love them."
"Hmmm, I don't know if I love you yet but I like you, you saved me after all."
"Then—"
"But you do not know this Latia person, and you're going to marry her. You know me better, so you can't say no to me."
I couldn't deny that.
I really wanted to but I couldn't fault her logic.
"Ouch!"
Instead, I just flicked Serafall's forehead for starting this mess.
"That's mean Kay-chan," she pouted.
"Are you done with your comedy routine?" Ajuka interrupted me as I was about to say she deserved it.
At some point, he had collected a black box from somewhere.
Setting it down on a table he opened it up showing a set of Evil Pieces.
The most important innovation in the history of the devil race, Evil Pieces, was created by Ajuka to combat the steadily declining number of devils caused by their low birth rate and the loss of a large number of their species in the Great War and Civil War.
The Evil Pieces allowed the king to reincarnate other beings into devils becoming the king's servant in the process. Naturally, there were limitations such as being unable to reincarnate Gods and Buddhas or beings stronger than the king bearing special circumstances.
The pieces were based on the game chess and granted a permanent buff to the reincarnated devil. Queen's gained a buff in magic, endurance, and speed; the two bishops, magic; the two rooks, endurance; the two knights, speed; and the eight pawns, a lesser version of the queen buff but could gain the buff of any other piece when in enemy territory.
-----
"Typically Evil Pieces wouldn't be given to a devil until after their social debut as they would be too immature beforehand." Ajuka began. "However since you're mentally an adult I will give them to you as soon as Lillian's problem is fixed."
"I presume she will be your queen?"
I nodded in agreement. She would be capable of utilizing all three components of the queen piece buff, provided she trained, due to her bloodline. Additionally, we would be able to form a strong bond as we will be growing up together.
Forming a bond with each member of a peerage is important but this is especially so for the queen. Queens often act as the second in command and the king's confidant so trust between king and queen is often vital for a peerage to function to its full effectiveness.
"The evil pieces are made of Argares Crystal, a unique mineral that I discovered to have the capability to store and emulate the properties of magic energy passed through it. The set of evil pieces is formed by having the pieces resonate with the king's monument whilst the new peerage's king channels their demonic power through it.
"This resonance allows the evil piece set to gain the attributes of the king's energy whilst forming a dependent link to the energy signature. When these pieces are used to reincarnate someone, the reincarnated devil may gain some watered-down characteristics of their king."
"For example reincarnated devils in a peerage with a Phenex as king may gain minor regeneration; increased fire affinity; or fire resistance."
Obviously the evil pieces were far more complex than Ajuka described but he wouldn't go sharing all their secrets and we probably wouldn't understand them anyway.
"I plan to have you, Cain, bleed on a raw lump of crystal and Lillian on the queen piece of this set so that they can be perfectly aligned with your energy signatures. This will have a greater effect than simply channeling power into them. Then I will need to spend some time, maybe a few weeks, looking through the data from your scans earlier and analyzing the crystals."
"If using that data, I can figure out a way to form a link between them that can transfer memories rather than power, I will reshape the crystal with your blood into a piece for you to use. Naturally, it won't come with any enhancement like the king pieces."
"It will take a couple of weeks huh?" I asked after Ajuka finished explaining his plan.
"Well, it may take far longer or be impossible entirely, a few weeks is just the minimum. Whilst it's theoretically possible, I've never tried to form a link between pieces that can share memories."
I fell into thought.
While I wanted to fix Lily's problem immediately, it naturally wasn't possible.
Ajuka may be a genius but even geniuses need to learn in order to do something new and he wouldn't spend all his time on this bit of research, he has his duties as a Satan to do and his own research.
I began trying to come up with a way to speed up the process whilst discussing my thoughts with Raphael.
'It's possible right?'
[Affirmative.]
"Ajuka," I began having come up with a plan Raphael agreed with, "what if you had Raphael's help?"
"It would help a lot with its calculation speed."
"Then I will leave it here to help."
"Wait, Kay-chan." Serafall interrupted. "Raph-chan is part of you, you can't stay here we have stuff to do."
"Yeh, but there's a way I can leave Raphael here, or at least allow its awareness to remain here. Raphael is connected to everything that is a part of 'me' and can extend its connection to anything connected to any part of 'me'."
"Since Argares Crystals take on the characteristics of any energy that it absorbs, I can channel my demonic power into a blank crystal so, according to Raphael, it can be considered a part of 'me'."
"So long as Ajuka can come up with a way to recharge the crystal without overwriting my signature, that crystal can become a terminal for Raphael. Once connected to Ajuka's computers it can do all the tedious analysis and calculation."
I finished my explanation and waited for Ajuka to consider it.
"It's possible but if we do that Raphael will gain access to my systems and will be able to collect data from there."
Ajuka's concerns were valid, it was essentially the same as allowing a virus into your computer.
"That's right but well make it a deal. A terminal for Raphael will stay here and act as your assistant permanently and it will be able to collect data from your system and experiments. In exchange, I will set up a spy network across the underworld using Raphael and give you and the other Satans unlimited access."
"I'll do this by setting up terminals with my demonic power in the different clan territories. Raphael can then use this power to spread an undetectable layer of my demonic power through various clan estates to gather information."
"Kay-chan, that's a very dangerous idea. But also could be super duper helpful to get some dirt on those old guys on the council." Serafall seemed conflicted over my idea.
"That's right, it would help you gain an advantage over the Great King faction."
"You're going to do this anyway right?" Ajuka asked.
I nodded, this was something I would need considering the plan was for me to eventually revive the Zagan house given it was extinct.
Since I would be involved in the underworld's politics, I would need to create my own information network and Raphael is the perfect spymaster.
It could spread my power so thin it couldn't be detected by beings who hadn't reached super-class strength. Additionally, I wouldn't need to employ people to infiltrate.
"Fine, I'll accept your deal. I don't keep any confidential things on my main system anyway and given Raphael's display of abilities it would be able to figure the contents out eventually as you learn more about magic." Ajuka explained.
"Juka-chan, if you're gonna make a terminal for Raph-chan I want one too. That way I can always talk to Kay-chan." Serafall demanded.
"You can just use a phone or communication magic for that though?" He pointed out in confusion.
"But if Kay-chan doesn't want to talk he can just decline the call or communique, this way he can't be a meanie and ignore me." She replied.
"Fine," he said, just accepting her antics. It was just another lump of crystal to him after all.
He then grabbed the queen piece and passed it to Lillian before grabbing a fist-sized chunk of crystal from one of the shelves and giving it to me.
"Hold out your free hand both of you, this might hurt a bit."
I extended my hand, not too worried about the pain a small cut would cause considering I spent most of my time at the research facility in some kind of pain even if it was mostly dull.
Lillian on the other hand was naturally very hesitant.
Serafall quickly rushed behind her and wrapped her up in a hug to reassure her whilst whispering that it would be quick.
Ajuka waved one of his hands over both of ours and I detected a small fluctuation in magic before a thin cut appeared. It had been so quick and smooth that it felt like a paper cut.
I transferred the crystal from one hand to the other as small bubbles of blood began seeping out of the thin cut. Raphael had followed my desire and allowed Ajuka's magic to harm me and now was compressing as much of my demonic power as it could into my blood.
The crystal I was holding slowly lost its pale green hue and slowly started to turn dark purple. The color spread from the area in contact with my wound and slowly infected the rest of the crystal whilst I watched in fascination.
Once the crystal had been completely colored I looked up and saw the queen piece in Lily's hand slowly being converted into a pale pink color.
The color showed in the Argares Crystal is the colour of our magic. In Highschool DxD, Rias' evil pieces glowed a bright crimson as that was the color of her magic, influenced by Gremory clan trait and Bael's power of destruction.
I already knew the color of my magic, having practiced with it in the human world, but I didn't know Lily's color since she only focused on learning how to use light spears. Since she had two distinct magic energy pools, holy power, and mana, her light spears were still yellowy-white like the color of holy power.
Once the queen piece had turned fully pink Ajuka healed Lily's wound before taking the piece from her and crystal chunk from me.
Raphael had already healed my wound once the crystal chunk had fully turned purple.
Ajuka put the evil piece set them down on the table before disappearing into the storage room connected to the lab.
Whilst Ajuka was gone for a few minutes, Serafall was praising Lily for being brave and strong through the pain of being cut. Although, she was comparing her bravery to that of a magical girl which confused Lillian a bit.
Once Ajuka returned he asked me to pour as much of my demonic power as possible into the much larger chunk of Argares Crystal he had brought.
It took a couple of minutes to complete the transfer of demonic power into the now purple crystal and Raphael only stopped me once I began feeling dizzy from mana loss.
Ajuka and I then began a series of tests to make sure Raphael could still operate through the crystal and once that was confirmed I walked back over to Serafall and Lily who were having a whispered conversation in the corner of the room.
"All done Kay-chan, Juka-chan?" Serafall asked.
"Yeah, you can take them away now," Ajuka replied without looking up from the computer he was working with.
"The connection with Raph-chan won't get cut off by the barriers around Juka-chan's lab when we leave right Kay-chan?"
"It's fine, we tested that. Since Raphael is a sort of conceptual ability its existence is spread to every part of me, thus there isn't a connection per se more like Raphael existing in multiple places at once. You'd essentially need a barrier that separates two regions on a conceptual level to cut Raphael off and Ajuka says that the barriers around this building arn't that strong." I explained the conclusion we had come to during our testing.
"Ohhh, Raph-chan is so super strong," Serafall exclaimed.
"Juka-chan, we're done here right."
"Yeah, you can go."
"Bye-bye then Juka-chan, I'll set up a meeting in a few days with the other two to discuss Kay-chan."
"That's fine, just let me know when."
"Cool cool," Serafall then turned back towards us, pointed towards a wall, and declared, "Let's go, onwards to the Sitri estate."
"Huh, I thought we were going to your house," Lily asked the question for us.
"We can go there anytime, the most important thing is to introduce you to So-tan you know. She is the most cutest, best little sister ever, Lily-chan can be her best friend and Kay-chan can act like her big brother. Oh its going to be so cute."
We disappeared from Ajuka's lab in a flash of teleportation light midway through Serafall's spiel about 'So-tan'.
I believed Ajuka had gotten fed up with the rambling distraction and cast the teleport for us.