Opening Notes: I must admit it is surprisingly fun writing a character who is inherently evil...

Also, when I first wrote this chapter, it was far shorter. My co-author (who has requested his name be withheld since he no longer has a profile) came in and added a lot of stuff.

And finally, this chapter starts out in a way I haven't used yet...

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Issei had no idea where he was. He looked around, trying to get a grasp on the situation. From what he could tell, he had somehow gotten himself stranded in a purple wasteland. It was all like the set of a post-apocalyptic movie. Half-destroyed buildings everywhere and overturned statues surrounded him. It all had a very ominous feeling to it. He felt uncomfortable and cold.

In the back of his mind, he knew he should move, find a way back to where he belonged, but his legs refused to move.

The wind was the only source of noise, and it too was chilling; Issei could have sworn he heard screams.

Suddenly, he felt something cold grab him by the throat, and yet nothing was in front of him. It was as if a ghost was starting to strangle him. The howling wind began to increase in strength as a mist rolled in. It swirled around him, faster and faster with every lap, and the more it gained speed, the more volume the screams got. Gradually, it went from a soft grayish white to an inky black.

Just as the screams in the wind came close to deafening, everything stopped dead in the tracks. The pitch black mist began to dissipate. The grip on his throat loosened. It still had him, but now he could breathe.

As the nightmarish fog vanished, from within it Issei saw who had wrapped their cold fingers around him. It was a person who, judging by his looks, was only a few years older than his prey. He had red eyes that belonged on a snake instead of a person and long smooth black hair that had a white streak in the middle. He was wearing a suit of black armor that had gold linings on it; that explained why the grip on Issei's neck had initially been cold as ice. He looked at Issei with a curious expression. He slowly rotated his wrist, making Issei's neck bend with it in a very painful manner.

The stranger apparently came to be satisfied with whatever he had been doing and gave a shove while also letting go of Issei, making him fall to the ground on his back. Gasping for air, he tried to stand up, but his assailant planted an armored foot on his stomach, pinning him to the ground. The two males locked eyes on each other, staring. Slowly, the armored one smiled wickedly at him and held out a hand, showing Issei his palm, as if expecting a high five.

"If there is one thing that makes you Earthrealmers worthy of the space you take up, it's how tasty your souls feel..."

It was at that instant Issei's eyes shot wide open. He felt a scream in his throat, but it died at his lips when he realized he was in his room, safe in his bed. The entire surreal experience had been a dream. Despite that fact, he still found himself to be in a cold sweat and breathing deeply. As he calmed himself down, he could not help but wonder who that person was.

Was he just a projection of my imagination? Issei asked himself in thought. Or was he real?

If he was, Issei never wanted to meet him in the flesh.

Suddenly, he felt something move against him...

The heir of Outworld found himself in the sitting room of an old school house surrounded by Devils; three were on a couch and two others, along with himself, were sitting in separate chairs. His seat was positioned so that all of the others could observe him, and they were taking full advantage of that fact. Three females and two males, one of which was the human he had unintentionally saved last night, who also had been looking at him with fear since first sight, were all looking at him, not bothering to observe anything else in the room. Zharo didn't know what caused it, but while he usually basked in being the center of attention, this felt uncomfortable. In response, when he had just begun tell his tale, he summoned the Wrath Hammer, which was now resting in his lap. One of his hands was on the handle, fingers wrapped around it in a vice, and the other hand was resting on the chair's arm.

He was now silent. A very ample amount of his background had be told, and now he was allowing the audience to process all of it.

"Nine thousand years old..." Rias wouldn't have believed it if it were not for what she had seen what he could do. What really stuck in her mind was the fact that he had very nearly killed a Fallen Angel on his own, and he hadn't even known what he was fighting.

"More or less," Zharo responded. "Eventually, we all stop bothering with keeping count."

"How have you managed to live so long?" Yuuto asked.

"My heiritage," Zharo explained. "As I've said, my mother was Edenian, and my father is of Outworld. Natives of both Realms have exceedingly long lifespans. Of course I suppose magic plays a part as well..."

"What sort of magic?" Rias inquired.

"To put it in terms you can comprehend, soul consumption."

"So, you can steal people's souls," Koneko concluded in her usual stoic tone.

"Correct," Zharo gave a single metalic clap before again curling his digits around the hammer's handle; while most Seidan armor suits neglected to cover the fingers, he had taken the liberty to make a small addition to the one he had more or less stolen from a Guardsman known as Hotaru in the form of metal gloves with fingers that ended in sharp points, like talons. Now even when he threw a simple punch, it was far more damaging.

Curiosity came to Akeno and she asked, "what else can you do?"

Zharo paused for a moment before answering. "Energy constructs, discharge powerful beams, teleportation via portal, and a few other tricks."

"Like summoning that trusty hammer of yours?" Akeno chimed with a smile.

"Actually... To be honest I don't know why I'm able to do that." He looked down at the oversized maul across his legs, and back up to the Devils. "It's not even mine. It is my father's. And I am fairly certain that if, or when, he finds out I have it, he is going to cave my skull in."

"Parent of the Year," Akeno said with potent sarcasm.

With the information that was revealed to her on the visitor's abilities, a thought came to the Devil leader. "If you can open portals, why are you still here?" Rias wondered aloud. "Why not just go back home?"

"It's not that simple," Zharo growled. She had indirectly reminded him that he was inferior to the treacherous Quan Chi. "After you departed last night, I attempted to open a portal several times-"

"He did," Akeno confirmed

Zharo paused and took a deep breath; he did not like being interrupted. "Yes, anyway, my efforts were fruitless."

"So can you only use all of your magic while you're in your own Realm?" Rias was trying to piece this together. Devils too had the ability to travel instantaneously with portals, but it seemed Zharo had to meet different conditions to do so with his own.

Zharo simply stared at her for what seemed like an hour. "How should I explain this in a way your mortal minds can understand..." he spoke mostly to himself. He got an answer on his own. With a flash of green, the Wrath Hammer vanished and returned to... wherever it went when it was not needed, and he stood up. Walking over to the wall, he prepared his lecture.

Using his armored finger, he carved a circle about a foot in diameter into the wall.

"Imagine this is your Realm, Earth."

He took a step to the right and carved a triangle about as big as the circle into the wall so that there was about three inches of space between the two shapes.

"And this is Outworld. Now, if I were here..." he drew a small X near the top of the triangle. "... And wanted to go here..." he did the same at the bottom of the polygon. "It would be no issue." To emphasize his point, he drew a straight line connecting the two X's.

"It goes the same for other Realms, and in this case, it is Earthrealm." In the circle, he carved two more X's, one on the left and one on the right. "Getting from here to anywhere within the Realm would be as simple as focusing on where you want to end up, channeling the energy, and twirling the wrist. But when comes to traveling from one Realm to another, well... It gets difficult and complicated." To illustrate his point, he drew a vertical line in between the crude representation of the two Realms. "When one wants to go from one to a different one, they must traipse into very heavily observed territory. The spaces between Realms are guarded by the Elder Gods." Foresight told him that they didn't know who the Elder Gods were. "Don't ask, I'll explain later. Only supremely powerful free-roaming Sorcerers, beings with extremely magical artifacts, or Gods themselves can travel from Realm to Realm. And seeing as I am none of those..."

"You're stuck here."

"For the time being it would seem, you see..."

As he began to rant about portals and amulets, Rias and Akeno, who had been sitting next to each other on a couch, leaned close to one another and began to whisper.

"I like him," Akeno said. "He's tough and loud."

"He's also arrogant and impatient," Rias added. "And I'm pretty sure he doesn't care what you think."

"Then I'll make him care," she spoke with a very mischievous voice.

Rias could not help but smile at her dear friend's possible intentions. Zharo would receive either a kiss or a kick before the day was out. Maybe both...

"So what should we do with him? We can't just let him run rampant. And it might be a bad idea to try and fight him..."

"I'll tell school I'm sick," Akeno answered. "I'll keep an eye on him. And if he steps out of line, I'll teach him a sharp lesson." Every word she spoke contained excitement.

Rias looked back to Zharo, who was apparently wrapping up his lecture.

"... ate his heart and strangled him with his own guts." With a very satisfied look on his face, the Prince gave a stiff wave of the arm. When the limb returned to his side, swirling vortex of black and green opened behind him. "Thank you all for wasting valuable time that could have been spent far more productively. Have a nice fifty years."

With that, he turned his back to them and began walking.

Akeno's smile widened. "Or you'll have to tell them for me!" She pushed herself up from her seat and ran towards the portal.

Zharo was inside the vortex, ready to step out of the other side, when he felt something slam against him in the back. Most impacts of the sort wouldn't affect him much, but since this one came from behind while he was off guard, he was falling forward. For a moment he thought it wouldn't be so bad. He'd simply land on his chest, no big deal. This assumption was destroyed when he, while still falling, exited the portal and saw that it had led him to a steep, albeit grassy hill.

He tumbled down, rolling and bouncing. Each time he collided with the green on the hill, he let out either a groan or a short shout. The world was spinning. Sky, then ground, then sky again. Blue, green, blue, green.

He was beginning to feel dizzy. In all the commotion, heard a girl's laughter. He shrugged it off; it hardly mattered.

Finally, after a good two minutes of tumbling, rolling, and spinning, he reached the bottom of the hill and slowly came to a fine stop. As he lay there for a moment, recollecting himself, he again heard that strangely enticing laughter. He pushed himself up to a standing position and saw that the black-haired Devil girl had followed him, and was more likely than not the reason he had lost his balance. She to rolled down the incline and came to a rest about five feet from him. She was still laughing as she stood herself up and looked at him. Grass stains were riddled all over her uniform.

"You sure do know how to show a girl a good time."

Zharo stared at her. He was now half-convinced she was completely insane. Rather than question her about her mental stability, he walked away, in no particular direction.

Akeno brushed herself off and followed.

"Hey, you mind telling me where we're going?"

"We? There is no 'we'!" He didn't bother stopping or even looking over his shoulder. "I'm searching for a portal. If Shang Tsung can find it, I surely can!" He very much wanted to punch her. Or even flatten her with the Wrath Hammer. But he found himself unable to do so...

He shook his head vigorously, expelling the thoughts of hesitation from his mind. He looked around; there were only hills and mountains as far as the naked eye could see; not a single other living being to be found. This was going to take awhile...

"What's the matter?" Akeno asked with false concern. "Do you have a headache?"

"Yes, and you're causing it!"

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Closing notes: I would personally like to thank Phen0m20, a close friend of mine (both on this sight and in real life) for helping me with the ending of this chapter. I was stuck on it for days before I finally asked for his assistance. My goal in this chapter was to:

1. Get all the backstory nonsense out of the way

2. Set up for next time

3. Reveal a decent slice of Zharo's overall personality.