Notes at the end
***
In another timeline, Kenji is fortunate enough to meet one of his predecessors… to the absolute horror and amusement of those watching.
/ --- /
Kenji
"Have fun, and don't come back to the dorm until you've actually relaxed!"
Mei's voice was firm, leaving absolutely no room for argument as she dropped him off. Kenji sighed, watching her walk away before looking down at the fishing rod in his hand.
He knew he was supposed to be recovering, but being forcefully banished to a secluded pier at the edge of nowhere felt like overkill.
Still, the water was calm, and the afternoon sun was comfortably warm. He set up his foldable chair, cast his line, and settled in.
'I guess this isn't so bad,' he thought. 'Beats getting dogwalked by Fu Hua.'
Ten minutes later, he could see his own breath.
A terrifyingly strong presence made itself known, and Kenji was frozen by both the cold and the immense pressure.
The ambient temperature plummeted violently. Kenji shivered uncontrollably, zipping his jacket all the way up.
The warm afternoon sun suddenly felt entirely useless. It was as if a blizzard had just spawned directly behind him.
He turned his head and froze.
A massive, incredibly intimidating man with pale skin and stark white hair had silently walked onto the pier.
He wasn't wearing heavy winter gear, but he radiated an aura of absolute, crushing cold. The man didn't say a word as he set up a sleek, high-tech fishing rod and sat down on a cooler a few feet away.
Kenji swallowed hard. The guy looked like he ripped Honkai beasts in half for breakfast.
He flinched when the man suddenly turned his head towards him.
"Hmm. So you are my successor… You still have room to grow," he said simply, before turning his head away.
'What?'
"Uh... sorry, but who are you?" Kenji asked, completely befuddled by the man's comment.
The man didn't look at him again. His piercing, ice-blue eyes remained locked dead ahead on the water.
"I am Kevin," he stated. His voice was completely flat, devoid of any inflection or warmth.
Kenji blinked.
The name echoed in his head, bouncing against the mountain of Previous Era lore Vill-V had shoved into his brain. White hair. Apocalyptic ice powers. The hilarious name Kevin.
Wait.
Kenji's posture completely shifted. The nervous tension vanished instantly. He completely ignored the fact that the wooden planks beneath the man's boots were literally starting to frost over.
"Wait... Kevin?" Kenji gasped, leaning forward so fast his foldable chair wobbled. "As in, the Kevin? The First? The strongest Flame-Chaser?!"
Kevin slowly turned his head. He stared at the teenager for a long, unblinking moment before giving a single nod.
Instead of cowering in terror before the most dangerous man on the planet, Kenji's face lit up with pure, unadulterated awe.
'No way,' Kenji thought, shaking with joy in his seat. 'I'm fishing with my predecessor!'
Kenji didn't wait another second. He immediately dragged his foldable chair three feet closer to the human blizzard, not caring at all about the cold.
If Kevin was uncomfortable with his presence, then he didn't show it. Kenji took that as a good enough signal that he didn't mind.
"So wait, does the Parvati gene just make you immune to the cold, or is it constantly venting out of you?" Kenji asked, his eyes literally sparkling. "Because this is incredible! You don't even need bait. You're just freeze-stunning the fish! That is genius!"
Kevin didn't blink. He kept his eyes locked on the rippling surface of the water, which was now rapidly becoming a non-rippling surface of solid ice.
"It vents," Kevin stated simply.
"Amazing," Kenji whispered, leaning in closer to watch the frost spread across the wooden planks.
He touched the frozen planks, surprised to not feel even the slightest bit cold. "Huh, I don't feel cold at all. Probably because of the other Flame-Chasers."
"Hmm," Kevin grunted. And the two watched in silence for a bite on the fishing rod. Both not fully knowing if any fish could even bite before being frozen.
Not far away, buried deep inside a thick cluster of trees, Theresa Apocalypse was bordering on having a panic attack, viciously hyperventilating.
"He's going to kill him," Theresa hissed, her knuckles turning white as she gripped her binoculars. "He's going to turn him into a popsicle and shatter him into a million pieces. Why is Kenji smiling?! Why is he moving closer?!"
"Peace, my dear granddaughter," a voice whispered from the branch directly above her.
"Why are you even here?!"
Theresa glared upward. Otto Apocalypse was hanging upside down from the tree like a bat, wearing a bright yellow Hawaiian shirt, aviator sunglasses, and a spectacularly fake mustache.
"The boy seems to have initiated a diplomatic dialogue," Otto observed, adjusting his mustache. "Fascinating. The anomaly shows absolutely no self-preservation instincts in the presence of an apex predator."
"The Sire's patience is absolute," a metallic voice rasped from the left side of the bush.
"What the fuck?!"
Theresa nearly jumped out of her skin. Gray Serpent was crouched in the dirt next to her, his cybernetic eye whirring as it zoomed in on the pier. "He subjects himself to the mundane, incessant chatter of a child. His methods are truly beyond our comprehension."
"How did both of you even get here?!" Theresa whisper-yelled, but she immediately scrambled back to her binoculars as Kenji reached into his bag. "Wait, what is he doing? Oh no. No, Kenji, don't provoke him!"
Down on the pier, Kenji pulled out a large, metallic cylinder.
"Mei made me pack a thermos of hot cocoa," Kenji said cheerfully, unscrewing the lid. A plume of warm, inviting steam wafted into the freezing air. "It's freezing out here. You want a cup?"
Kevin slowly turned his head. He looked at the steaming cup Kenji was holding out to him. For a moment, the Lord of the World Serpent just stared at it.
Then, he reached out and took the cup.
The exact millisecond Kevin's pale fingers brushed the plastic, a sharp CRACKLE echoed across the pier.
The steam instantly vanished. The boiling hot liquid inside crystallized in a fraction of a second, turning into a rock-solid, dark brown block of ice.
In the bushes, Theresa let out a high-pitched whimper of terror.
On the pier, Kenji just stared at the frozen cup in awe. "Whoa..."
Kevin looked down at the solid block of frozen cocoa. His expression remained completely unchanged.
Slowly, he raised the cup, tipped the solid ice block out of it, and bit directly into it like an apple.
CRUNCH.
"Fascinating," Otto whispered in the bushes, furiously scribbling notes on a small pad. "He has accepted the chocolate offering."
"I'm going to pass out," Theresa muttered in disdain.
/ — /
Suddenly, the surface of the frozen lake groaned. A loud CRACK echoed through the crisp air as the ice around Kevin's fishing line violently shattered.
Kevin stood up.
To Kenji, it looked like the man was preparing to face down a Herrscher. The air temperature dropped even further, frosting over Kenji's eyelashes. With a swift, terrifyingly precise motion, Kevin yanked the high-tech rod upward.
A massive chunk of solid ice flew out of the water, sailing through the air before landing on the wooden planks with a heavy, resounding THUD.
Kenji leaned over to look. Encased perfectly within the center of the crystal-clear ice block was a completely frozen, wide-eyed bass.
"Whoa..." Kenji breathed out, clapping his hands together in genuine excitement. "Your technique is flawless, Uncle Kevin!"
Kenji had said that automatically. Elysia and Pardofelis had told him to refer to the other Flame-Chasers as his Aunts and Uncles, so the habit was brought over even in the real world.
Kevin Kaslana froze.
But it wasn't because of his Parvati genes. For a fraction of a second, the Lord of the World Serpent physically stopped functioning.
His ice-blue eyes slowly shifted from the frozen bass to the beaming teenager sitting next to him.
Uncle Kevin.
In the bushes fifty yards away, Theresa dropped to her knees and covered her face, groaning in absolute despair.
"He called him Uncle," Theresa whispered into her hands. "He's dead. My student is going to be erased from existence."
"Incredible," Otto murmured, clicking his pen rapidly. "Familial bonding as a survival tactic. The anomaly is attempting to integrate himself into the Kaslana bloodline to bypass the Sire's hostility."
He hummed a cheery tune. "Perhaps I should see how his genes would interact with a Kaslana's."
Theresa snapped her head towards her grandfather. "Don't you dare—!"
"A bold gambit," Gray Serpent rasped, his cybernetic eye whirring, not paying any attention to the bickering duo. "Let us see if the Sire executes him for his insolence."
Back on the pier, the silence stretched for an uncomfortably long time. Kevin just stared at Kenji, the word echoing somewhere deep within his 50,000-year-old memory.
Then, Kevin looked down at the block of ice. He raised his boot and casually nudged the frozen fish across the frosted planks until it bumped against Kenji's shoe.
"A bountiful harvest," Kevin stated, his voice completely flat. "Keep it."
Before Kenji could even thank him, Kevin turned around. He didn't say goodbye. He just started walking, his dark coat billowing slightly as he disappeared into the afternoon mist, leaving a trail of frost in his wake.
Kenji watched him go, a massive grin on his face.
"KENJI!"
The teenager jumped as Theresa burst out of the trees, sprinting toward the pier. She practically tackled him, frantically patting him down and checking for frostbite, missing limbs, or fatal stab wounds.
"Principal? What are you doing here?" Kenji asked, completely bewildered by the sudden ambush. "And why do you have leaves in your hair?"
"Are you alive?!" Theresa yelled, grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him. "Did he curse you?! Are your internal organs frozen?!"
"What? No, I'm fine!" Kenji laughed, gently prying her hands off him. He reached down and proudly hoisted the heavy block of ice into the air. "Look! I just met my predecessor! He's a little quiet, but he's actually super nice!"
Theresa stared at the frozen fish. She stared at Kenji's beaming, oblivious smile. And then, she looked back at the bushes, where an upside-down Otto gave her a cheerful thumbs-up.
Theresa closed her eyes and let out a long, exhausted sigh.
"I'm going to need a vacation after this vacation," she muttered.
***
Author Notes:
Hey there, hope you enjoyed the little chapter. I know I said I would post side stories/what-if's/omakes in another book, but I find it hard to do that on this website specifically.
So from now on, side stories will be posted in this fic, and that book for side stories will be deleted.
But do let me know if you'd like me to repost the already existing side-stories and what-ifs into this fic.
That's all, thanks for reading!