Chapter Text
Grand and majestic trees. Wide and dark caverns. Inspiring plateaus and ethereal plains.
In the world’s greatest pit of the wilderness, several pumas are laying lazily on the harsh stone ground, basking in the sun, a bountiful mount of food lying at their feet. The zenith peaks at its highest, and the time for a nap has come for the entire clan. Calm and serenity are the watchwords of the hour, as all members make their way to the entrance of their lair.
All, but one.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
One of the mother pumas was still taking care of one of her new babies. Its fur is still not in the right place, something she desperately tries to correct. Unfortunately, the licking technique they employ in order to get their fur silky has no effect on that remaining strand that refuses to get down. In spite of all her efforts, the act was completely futile. And though its cries of undoubtedly horror at his fur’s state pierce her ears due to their high pitched-ness, the puma mother pushes through nonetheless.
A true miracle of nature at work.
…
“ONI-CHAN! WAIT! WE’RE GONNA GET YOU OUT OF HERE!”
On the other side of the cage's railing, a panicked Komaru Naegi screams at her brother. Sooner or later, security to see what on earth has happened to make people to scream so loudly.
“Shit. Is that a kid down there?”
“How the hell are we gonna get him out of there?”
“Is that puma mothering him?”
“I mean the color does match.”
Seeing none of his colleagues would be useful, one of the security agents approaches Komaru with the intension of figuring this mess out.
“Do you know how he got in there, miss?”
“Um, well…”
The day had started pretty well for the entire Naegi family. Summer vacation had just started, and they had planned an outing for Makoto’s seventh birthday.
“Really?!” Komaru is undoubtedly excited by the announcement. “We’re gonna be there all day?!”
“As long as we want, dear.” Yutaka Naegi smiles warmly at her daughter.
“Are we gonna see DEVAS?!” Komaru’s new enthusiasm for the small mammalians came from a new manga she had just red the week prior. It was an epic adventure about a demon who wanted to take over the world and how three friends time traveled back in time to defeat him using mega—
“I’m pretty sure they don’t have hamsters at the zoo.” Reisei Naegi chuckles at his daughter’s exuberance.
The whole family had gone together, and went to visit every section. Fishes, pandas, zebras, and bears! To her despair, Komaru could not find any hamsters around. She even tried to hide in the bushes to see if they were hiding from her!
The clock struck twelve when she hears a stomach growling. She turns to the source of the sound, only to see her brother looking away.
“Makoto dear. Are you hungry?”
“NO! ‘m not!”
“It IS that time of the day, it shouldn’t be too surprising.”
His stomach growls a second time, and they all give him a knowing smile. He only blushes in embarrassment, before conceding defeat.
“… Yes.”
Bot his parents chuckle at the poor boy’s expense, something which makes Makoto retreat in his already and ever-present hoodie.
“Don’t worry, we’re gonna grab something to eat. Would you two mind keeping this bench for us please?”
“Sure thing! Oni-chan keeps the bench, while I keep the bears from thinking he is one of their babies!”
They took Makoto’s grumble as an okay.
As their parents fade in the crowd, both kids take a seat onto the bench. After a few seconds of silence…
“Hey! Why do you always keep the hood on your head?”
Makoto sighs heavily at her question, before giving her an exasperated look.
“Because it hides that strand of hair.”
Komaru blinks at his answer. “Why? I have one too.”
“But it looks stupid!” Her older brother pouts. “And yours doesn’t point to the sky, so it’s not the same.”
“C’mon! Take it off!” She eggs him on. “I swear it won’t kill you.”
“You don’t know that!” Makoto huffs away from his sister. “With my luck, it just might!”
She playfully shoves her brother to the side of the bench, making his hood drop down from his head.
“Hey! What’s the big idea?!”
“Ah!” Komaru smirks in victory. “See? Nobody cares!”
And indeed, nobody in the crowd even batted an eye at the two kids.
“… ’m still mad—”
He couldn’t finish that sentence. The crowd may not have cared, but the pumas in the cage behind them very much did. In less than half a second, Makoto is swept off the bench above the railing. He yelps and screams in surprise, but no one even has the time to react before the puma already dragged the haggard kid deeper into their lair.
The security guard is stunned by the story, as are both her parents who had joined them halfway through.
“W-What…?”
But while she was telling back this story, two other guards had already set up the sniper to shoot the mother puma a tranquilizer.
“What are you waiting for?! Shoot that damn puma!”
“Hey! I’m no marksman! If I hit the kid, it might be lethal!”
“Shit. You’re right. Wait I’m gonna get—”
“YAAAAAH!”
Another kid gets over the barrier. He jumps down on one of the still-outside pumas in an earth-shattering entrance, knocking it unconscious, despite physics stating this should be impossible. At the cavern's entrance, five other pumas wake up in alarm.
But the mother? She wraps Makoto in her tail, standing protectively before him.
The kid rises from his crouched position in front of his impromptu landing pad, standing taller than every single living entity in the cage.
“My name is Gundham Tanaka, the Supreme Overlord of Ice, and—!”
Without waiting for him to finish, one of the five beasts lunges for him. The crowd stares horrified at boy’s the incoming doom. But it was unnecessary.
With strength and dexterity that nobody expected him to have, he strikes two fingers to the back of the beast’s neck, and bops its muzzle with the other hand. In less than a tenth of a second, the puma crumbles at Gundham’s feet, knocked out cold.
The audience, including the other felines and Makoto, stare at him in complete bewilderment, while he puts one foot over the puma’s head.
“HOW DARE YOU INTERRUPT ME, FOUL DEMONS?! WHAT DARK PIT OF THE NETHERWORLD INSTRUCTED YOU TO CUT OFF AN OVERLORD’S SPEECH?!”
He surveils the gathering of terrified animals haughtily, before his gaze finally lands on the baffled Makoto. His small eyes widen in shock, his smile and entire body freezing suit.
“Impossible… Another Fiend tamer? But there shouldn’t exist any in this dimension other than myself! Tell me your name, Chosen One!”
“Fiewhat?” Makoto’s brain fails to catch up with Gundham’s pace. And this doesn’t get better, when the black haired kid notices the tail currently trapping him in place, as well as the mother’s wary glare.
“You already have a spell-bound familiar?!” The overlord grits his teeth. “So you’re the one causing this singularity! Release it at once, or face the consequences!”
Makoto gapes at the now hostile kid like a fish, ready to absorb the information as nonsensical to him as the rest of his life would become.
“I-I-I— What are even talking about?!”
“I see.” Gundham’s eyes narrow in caution. “So you do not hold control over your powers yet.”
His left arm move to stand straight parallel to the ground at a peak twelve centimeter length and a meter height, leaving his cape to flutter in the non-existent wind. This motion is interpreted as aggressive, as the remaining pumas take a step back, growling.
“Very well then!” A boyish smirk appears on his face. “I shall take you as my apprentice! Be grateful, Chosen One!”
He cackles a small laugh with his arms crossed, still one foot on the downed puma’s head.
“I— What even— Can you get me out of here, please?” Makoto pleads, desperate for the universe to make sense again.
Gundham humphs, before looking over the pumas disdainfully. He lets out a small high-pitched whistle. The felines cower at first, whimpering slightly, before kneeling on ground to their new alpha in respect.
“That was… anticlimactic.” Makoto mutters, before squirting off from the puma mother’s grasp. An action that warranted him panicked looks from the rest of the group, for trying to go against their overlord.
“Phew. That was too close.” He sighs in relief, trying to gain his breath and a smudge of sanity back. “Umm… Thank you for saving me. But, uhm… how do we get up now?”
Makoto points to the now four-meter tall wall barring them from even accessing the metal bars of the cage. The kid blinks, before blushing, as—
“Up?”
He crosses his arms together, and starts laughing maniacally, as though the entire act had been part of his evil plan.
“THE OVERLORD OF ICE NEVER GOES UP! Not when the seventh depth of hell awaits!”
The guards -as well as the crowd for that matter-, having finally rebooted from seeing an eight-year-old subduing seven adult pumas all on his own without a single scratch, finally threw them down a ladder.
After an overly tearful, happy and logical family reunion, Makoto goes to see his new… friend? Teacher?
Of course, he was already surrounded by dozens of fretters and admirers for his so-called courage, despite how uncomfortable he seemed. When he notices Makoto trying to get to him, he cuts the path open to join him.
“Ah! My apprentice has finally come! Tell me, when will you—?”
He frowns when he notices both his parents and Komaru.
“Ah, um. This is Reisei, my dad, Yutaka, my mom, and this is Komaru. She’s my little sis—”
He is interrupted when Komaru gives him an elbow nudge to his side the moment the word ‘little’ leave his mouth.
“I see. Both your mortal progenitors, and your blood-sharing sibling. VERY WELL THEN!”
Gundham nods, before crossing his arms, ready for his introduction.
Ignoring the fact that everyone already heard him the first time, “I am Gundham Tanaka, the Supreme Overlord of Ice, and…”
Two hamsters peak from beneath his scarf.
“These are my companions, THE TWO DARK—!”
“Are they DEVAS?!” Komaru interrupts him, her eyes sparkling in hope.
And she’s not the only one. Under any other circumstance, Gundham would have been peeved to have his speech stopped in the middle, but for once…
“At long last, someone from this world finally recognizes the true form of this world’s most powerful—!”
“THEY’RE SO CUTE!”
“… U-Uhm…” He blushes, looks away, and hides his face in his small scarf. “T-Thank you.”
He coughs, trying to rid his cheeks of their redness, before sizing Makoto up.
“So tell me, Chosen One. What true name do you go by?”
“I’m Makoto Naegi!” Makoto answers in good cheer, finally emotionally stable from his ordeal. “A pleasure to meet you, Gundham.”
“I see. An honest name.” Gundham nods approvingly. “Perfect for any student of mine—!”
“GUNDHAM!” A loud, worried shout echoes in the ‘Carnivorous Animal’ square of the zoo.
A petite, black haired, and rustically dressed woman makes her way through the crowd straight for the black-haired boy, only to wrap him in a tight hug.
“There you are! I was so worried! I heard that you went in the hyenas’ cage and you were fighting them and you were bleeding and being eaten—!”
“M-Mom! Not right now!” Red had completely overtaken his cheeks again, erasing any potential trace of pale from his face.
Noticing the surrounding crowd, she blinks at the Naegi family. She deftly brings the entire family over to a more secluded building in the area. Fortunately, the guards dispersed the crowd (and incidentally, the journalists that were starting to ask questions about the security of cages that could children enter carnivorous animal zone), granting them some breathing space.
“My name is Hairyo Tanaka, Gundham’s mother. I’m sorry if he caused you any trouble. I know how he can be sometimes, but I swear he’s a real sweetheart—!”
“MOTHER!” Gundham’s eyes are wide and panicked. “I am the Overlord of Ice, the ultimate demon from the underworld! I am the opposite of sweet!”
“Please.” Reisei waves her hands disarmingly. “You don’t have to apologize. If anything, he’s the one that got our son out of trouble.”
“Yeah!” Komaru chimes in. “Weird stuff happens to him all the time! It’s annoying! And yours has cute devas! Can we switch, please?”
“WHAT?! It’s your fault the pumas noticed my hair!”
“SO!” Yutaka cuts them. “Uhm… You two came here to the zoo together, I take it? Spending family time together?”
“Well, it’s a nice added bonus—” Hairyo starts sweating the moment she can feel Gundham tensing beside herself.
But Gundham only shakes his head, face contorted in frustration and anger. “This place is an example of the raw cruelty humanity can demonstrate. How self-centered and insecure must these humans be to chain down others as though they stand below them?! To which level have they stooped to rip some of my subjects from their lair and residence?!”
His unexpected rant met the stunned Naegi family. His mother on the other hand only looks deeply regretful. “… Gundham, please… You know this is important for him.”
“No. I do NOT care for what this foul injury of an individual believes to be important. Even as far as humans go, his lack of respect for life and self-determination is truly bottomless! Especially when it comes—!”
He is cut by an annoyingly catchy jingle coming from a stand a solid two hundreds meter away.
“From the aaaairwaaaaaaaaves to you~, here they are! Tanaka's Amazing Commodities are now LIVE on yooooooooouuur TV!”
Their sight wander over to a nearby stand, packed to the brim with lights and cameras. In the middle, a shady-looking black haired businessman in a gray suit with a red tie looks straight to one of the cameras. Behind him, is a big cage full of zebras, fascinated by the commotion.
“Welcome, everyone, to Tanaka's Amazing Commodities! Now, remember the rules: first come, first served! If you want one of our wears, call quickly to our number, or we’ll be out of stock!”
A small tray comes in the view of the camera.
“Here is our fist batch! For the low price of seven hundred yen each, you can get yourself one of our amazing bear fur AND skin patch!”
He waves his small fifteen centimeter square rectangle of fur in front of the camera.
“This fine wear makes for a perfect mouse pad, chair armrest… The possibilities are limitless! But remember folks: we’ve only got ten of them! Call NOW if you want one!”
“Seven hundred yen only?!” A middle-aged man seated at a nearby table exclaims in shock. “That’s a steal! Two of those will be perfect as a doormat! Quick pass me over the phone—!”
His arm is caught by a positively murderous looking Gundham, who looks pissed at the very thought even ONE person would want to purchase something from that show.
“What are you doing kid?! Get lost! I have something very important I need to do, and right now, you’re in the way—!”
“HOW DARE YOU MAKE A MOCKERY OF LIFE IN SUCH A WAY! AND FOR WHAT?! WHAT VANITY STRUCK YOU—?!”
“Gundham, WAIT!” His mother cries out after him.
He freezes the moment realizing what he was doing. Deftly, he makes a break for it toward one of the other sections of the zoo. When his out of breath mother reaches for the man he had offended, Gundham was already long gone.
She makes a quick bow to the man, “I’m sorry sir. We’ll get out of your hair.” But as she tries to run after him, she quickly realizes she won’t be won’t be able to catch up to him.
Both Reisei and Yutaka catch her before she falls to the ground. “Miss, you’ve been running for the past hour. You need to take a breather.”
“B-But—!”
“No buts!” Komaru pouts. “You can’t catch him if you’re like that. You need to take a break!”
“And don’t worry. I’ll go look for him.” Makoto assures her. “I kinda feel responsible, and I have to pay him back for saving me in that cage.”
“And we’re OUT!” The presenter announces. “Thank you everyone! Now, onto our next gear, we have this great claw! Perfect for…”
“WAIT! WAIT! WAIT!” Ryouko stops Makoto’s retelling of the story. “Are you telling me he’s the son of President Tanaka?! That Tanaka?!”
“Uhm, yes.” He stops, rubbing his arm a little. “He… doesn’t really like to talk about him though. Why do you ask?”
“No reason in particular.” She lies through her teeth with Junko’s trademark Cheshire grin. “Anyway, was it really a good idea to go look for him by yourself?”
“My luck only acts up once a day at most -trust me, I’ve tried-. If anything, I should have gotten good luck by that point.”
Makoto finds Gundham seated alone on one of the cage’s low walls. His expression is hidden due his scarf covering the lower half of his face. The two hamsters are out, desperately trying to comfort him, while he sits himself next to his sulking friend.
“Not a big fan of your dad, huh?”
“That would be an understatement, apprentice.” His face remains buried in his scarf.
His curt response finds Makoto at a loss. He doesn’t really know what Gundham’s really going through, considering he always got along well with his family. Both his parents were always nice, and for all he bickered with his sister, they really cared for one another.
But, as would become his motto later down the line, Optimism is my only strong suit.
“Hey, at least you have your mom. She’s really worried about you.”
“My… mother.” His gaze wanders to the side.
“And now you’ve got me! And I’m sure Komaru would love to help you as well!”
As Makoto tries to tap his shoulder in comfort, Tanaka only stiffens at the action, sending him a withering glare.
“A-Alright!” Makoto pulls his hand out immediately. “I won’t do that anymore!”
“No… I apologize. That was an overreaction.”
Makoto could feel Gundham retreat more and more onto his shell, when he felt a tug on one of his hoodies’ sleeve. One of Gundham’s hamsters, the white one, had fallen below his scarf and is trying to climb him up. Realizing it may be the only one able to get Gundham out of his gloomy state, Makoto helps it up on his hand.
The hamster’s stare is more serious and determined than one would expect a hamster to be capable of. Giving Makoto surprisingly clear and easy instructions of where to get it to, it places a paw onto his master— overlord’s jaw.
“… Jum-D?”
“What kinda name is that?”
Komaru shrugs at her surprise. “It’s Gundham. That’s just the way he is.” She slides her a photo of the three of them, after finally meeting back up at the zoo’s entrance.
Makoto stands on the left side of the picture, looking slightly abashed with his finger scraping his jaw and his eyes closed in embarrassed mirth. Opposite to him, Komaru is fessing on the orange hamster, currently playing with a strand of her hair. And in the middle, is Gundham Tanaka, in all of his glory.
The dark long blazer that could be mistaken for a cape that covers his white shirt looks far too big for someone his size, and gives him a sense of overdone dramatics. Between that, his pale skin, his over-sized undercut hairstyle, and the chains leaking from his pants, he could easily be mistaken him for a Dracula cosplayer. Unfortunately, such an aura is ruined by just how utterly terrified and worried he looks that one of his hamsters is out of his scarf to play with one of his new friends.
“I don’t know what I expected.”
“Yeah.” Komaru sighs wistfully. “San-P was the best.”
Makoto pats his sister’s back in comfort. “Yeah I miss them too. For what it’s worth, five years is exceptional for a hamster.”
He shakes his head, continuing his story. “After the zoo incident, we became fast friends. He brought me over to so many animal daycares I could almost recognize the race of each animal by their smell.” He winces in remembrance. “Until that day, near the end of summer, where he brought me for ‘training’.”
Makoto makes quotation marks with his fingers for that last word, drained of any energy he might have had prior.
And while Junko had a good idea of what ‘training’ involved, Ryouko couldn’t help but ask.
“How did it
go?”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!”
“Now that’s about what I expected.”
Ryouko tries, and fails to hold back a snicker, while Junko stands equally baffled and fascinated that something so predictable somehow manages to ease her boredom.
“Yeah, yeah.” Makoto pouts. “Laugh it up. It really WAS scary though.”
“Do not falter, apprentice! We shall begin your training with a demon apt for your current level of control and aptitude.”
That’s what Gundham told him before telling to come to the port near the end of the afternoon. In any ‘normal’ port, there would be plenty of merchants, and ships unloading their goods. Today, however, in this special section of the port dedicated to cargo deposit, it was nearly deserted. Who knows why that would be, but Makoto decides that some questions are better left unanswered.
“With its complete lack of demonic strength, this one barely even qualifies for the title of ‘lap pet’. It is, however, deserving of life, and respect.”
So, upon meeting Gundham, he had a few expectations. A mouse, maybe? Wait, no. They were at a port. So, a fish? No, Gundham despises fishing. But how would he get one otherwise? Did he need to go swimming?
Shoot. I knew I should have brought my swimming trunks.
“Ah! There you are, my apprentice! Are you finally ready to begin your training, and meet your testing subject for today?”
Gundham had already been waiting for him in a small square devoid of any actual cargo.
“Sure am!” Because his optimism is his best strong suit, Makoto answers cheerfully.
A big knowing smile enters Gundham’s face. “Good answer! Now then…” He snaps his fingers. “This is Teddy. Today you will learn how to—”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!”
He had a few expectations, and all of them went completely out of the window the moment a fully grown adult bear jumped down from one of the cargos about five meters away. His complete state of mind can be summarized in his two anticipations about what will happen in the next two seconds:
I’m gonna die.
I’m gonna pee my pants.
He isn’t exactly sure which one he’d prefer to try first.
“GET A HOLD OF YOURSELF!” Gundham orders, making Makoto straighten out of his panic for a moment. “How do you expect to make it as one of my apprentices if you can’t control yourself in front of lower demon?!”
His words help Makoto steady his breath.
I’m alright.
I’m alright.
I’m alright…
Gundham wouldn’t have brought it if wasn’t safe for me to—
He yelps and almost screams in surprise the moment the bear makes a rush for them, or more precisely, to his teacher. His words, however get completely caught in his throat the moment he sees the bear rolling flat on the ground at Gundham’s feet. Something which only elicited a small reaction him: a small, fond and pitying sigh.
“Hmph. I should have expected you to do such a thing, Teddy. But today, your Overlord is not your partner.”
The bear makes a small, wimpy noise, while showing his belly.
Gundham, however, does not give in.
“Apprentice. To subdue this demon, you need to create a pact with him.”
Makoto’s brain, having finally recovered from the shock and awe entrance of the bear, answers his prompt.
“A-a-and how w-w-would I do that?”
Gunhams nods solemnly. “You need to partake in an ancient ritual with it. It’s a sign of absolute trust from both parties, that would lead to the correct functioning of this unbalanced relation. In your world, I believe such a pact bears the name of ‘Belly rubs’.”
Makoto’s jaw -who had somehow managed to stay in place insofar- drops to the floor.
“You want me to what?”
“To make a pact with Teddy, using the ‘Belly rubs’ ritual.” Gundham repeats, miffed, but understanding of his disbelief. “Though if it’s an example you need…”
He puts his hand up high, a manic grin on his face. “THEN I, THE SUPREME OVERLORD OF ICE, WILL BE HAPPY TO PROVIDE!”
And he starts rubbing the belly of the now giggling bear.
In truth, this scene is… sort of sad. He can understand why Gundham would feel pity on the bear. It’s likely it fell out off a circus’ club, and was left here, all alone. Its instincts had been beaten out of him to become… entertainment. Nothing more.
At the very least, seeing the bear being so completely submissive, Makoto tentatively reaches his hand to rub the bear’s neck. It looks slightly weary at first, but gives in happiness before long, something to which Gundham nods approvingly.
But suddenly, Teddie stands up and jumps away from them, still giggling.
“Hm. It would appear Teddie’s energy shifted. Demons are unpredictable, it is part of their charm.” Gundham looks thoughtful. “I believe it seeks something akin to a ‘play’ time.”
“Uh, ‘play’? I mean not the eating kind of play, right?”
“Obviously not.” Gundham rolls his eyes. “I do not believe it’s anything dangerous—”
As though providence had heard him, the bear slams his two fists down on the ground. The stone pavement cracks under the strength of the blow, making it’s way all to Makoto in a fraction of a second.
“Uh oh.” Makoto sighs, resigning himself to his fate.
“Does this sort of thing happen to you often?”
“Oh you have no idea.” Komaru grins, making Makoto sighs heavily.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
He is definitely scared. Not of falling down in an indeterminate underground, no. But to lose his all-time favorite hoodie, which would stand as his only source of protection for his inevitable landing.
Eventually, he falls down on something rock solid— No, actually, this is worse. What he fell onto is the backbreaking equivalent of stepping on a lego. It’s already a miracle his spine didn’t break, that he doesn’t seem to have any external wound, and that he didn’t fall unconscious. It would -and should- be perfectly be within his rights to scream out in pain, but…
More than fifty pairs of eyes look at him in disbelief.
“… Oh my…”