This idea has been percolating in the back of my head for the past few months until finally I had a sudden urge to write something a few days ago and managed to get the first two thirds of a chapter written.
***
Not for the first time in her life did Louise Francoise le Blanc de la Valliere find herself sucking fumes and gagging on a cloud of smoke. Such was not a new experience to her, nor was the acrid taste of failure that came with it. Soul-crushing despair, on the other hand, that was a new one.
The smoke cleared to reveal the empty summoning circle she had expected, and as if on cue the mocking laughter of her classmates sounded behind her. Had it been any other spell that had quite literally blown up in her face, Louise might have simply gritted her teeth and returned to her textbooks to look again for where she might have gone wrong. But this was no ordinary spell: it was the Springtime Familiar Summoning ritual, a pivotal moment in every young mage's life. If she failed here she would never bounce back, she would simply be expelled from Tristain Academy and her life as a mage would be over.
She turned to Professor Colbert, imploring the old teacher for one more chance to prove herself. He gave it with a nod, and Louise turned back to the runes inscribed into the earth. This was it. Beyond this point there were no more chances.
Louise raised her wand and began the incantation.
"I beg of you… My slave who lives somewhere in the universe!"
But unseen and unnoticed by the young mage, the summoning circle suddenly pulsed a bright blue, and the runes began to shift and warp...
***
"Etna!"
If there was one lesson that any intelligent demon learned quickly upon achieving self-awareness in Laharl's netherworld, that lesson was that you Do Not Mess With Etna's Sweets. Never ever, under any circumstances, on pain of a fate most unspeakably horrendous. It was said in hushed whispers by many that only stealing the succubus queen's panties would invite a more horrific fate than getting between Etna and her snacks. Naturally, it was a lesson that the resident Overlord violated as frequently as he pleased.
"ETNA! OPEN THE DOOR!"
Though not without consequence.
This time the victim had been a tub of ice cream that the succubus had been saving for a special occasion, though what sort of special occasion involved ice cream, various toppings, Flonne, and sixteen feet of rope Laharl wasn't quite sure about. Etna had been rather incoherent with rage while she'd been trying to throttle him earlier and he still didn't completely get his girlfr -- consort -- his consort's thought processes even after just over five hundred years together, though he could at least hazard a guess. At the moment though, he just wasn't in the mood for contemplating his consort's odd kinks.
Nobody, not even Etna in the throes of a sweets-induced rage, locks the Overlord out of his own bedroom!
Laharl reared back before slamming his shoulder against the door to the master bedroom, the broken-off handle in his hand evidence of his earlier failures. At 1820 years and nearly six feet in height, the Overlord didn't bear much resemblance to the bratty half-pint he'd been when he'd first claimed his father's throne, but the extra weight that came with his larger frame did no good against the solid wooden door.
"ETNA! FOR BAAL'S SAKE, OPEN THE FRAKKING DOOR!"
"Not a chance, PRINCE!" Etna snarled back, using her old nickname for him like a curse. "You made your bed, now you're damn well gonna sleep in it! It's the coffin for you tonight, buster!"
Laharl growled in frustration and tossed the bent and broken door handle aside. It would be easy enough to just blast the door down or blow a hole in the walls to get in, but netherworld architecture was specifically built with housing rambunctious and massively-powerful demons in mind, and the amount of power it would take to blow through the door or walls to his bedroom stood a good chance of wrecking all his stuff as a side effect. With a snort, he turned and started to walk away, the problem of Etna's temper tantrums not worthy of his attention any more.
"Fine! I'll just go find Flonne and you can sleep by yourself tonight!"
"Good luck with that sweety," Etna called back in a sickly-sweet voice, "she's in here with me!"
Laharl stopped cold, considered this for a moment, and then raised his voice again.
"Flonne, are you in there too?"
"Yes I am Laharl", came the fallen angel's voice, "and I'm not letting you in either! That was a very rude thing you did, eating all of Etna's ice cream like that! This is what you get for not sharing any with me! ...I mean her!"
Laharl groaned. If Flonne was in there backing up the door with her defensive magics there was no way he was getting in without vaporizing his stuff and probably hurting both of his consorts. This problem was now officially too much trouble to bother with.
"Fine, you two have fun then. I can sleep by myself just fine" he spat at the closed door, then turned on his heel and left, punting aside a particularly unfortunate prinny as he stormed back to his old room.
It was the last time he'd speak to either of his lovers for quite a while.
***
"Answer to my guidance!"
Had Louise not kept her eyes closed for the duration of the spell, she might have noticed the shifting runes and blue glow of the summoning circle, neither of which had happened for any of the previous summons. She might have noticed the flashes of lightning-like light and the pillar of energy that burst up from the circle and erupted into the sky. She might have heard her professor call her name in warning and seen him move to stop the spell. But she didn't.
What she did see the moment she opened her eyes was a brilliant flash of blue light and an explosion of purple fire as the ritual came to an end. This was not one of her explosions, which as a rule were all concussive force and smoke with nothing in the way of an incendiary component, much less purple fire, but Louise had no time to ponder this before the summoning circle erupted with force, bowling her over into her professor and scattering birds from their nests in trees halfway across campus. Then came the smoke.
When Louise could see again she did not immediately understand what exactly she was looking at. Resting in the center of the circle, unperturbed by either the flames or the explosion was some sort of box. Her heart dropped into her stomach as that thought registered. Some manner of object, then. Not a familiar at all.
Bitter, angry tears welled in her eyes but she refused to let them fall. She was Valliere, and she would face her failure with the dignity her name required of her. With that thought in mind, she pushed herself away from her professor and approached the summoning circle.
At a closer angle it was easier to determine what exactly the box was. To Louise's disgust, it was a coffin of some sort, a very elaborate one made of some sort of very dark wood. That would be just her luck, to summon a corpse for her familiar. Perhaps it would become a zombie if she bound it to her? The thought was both disgusting and darkly amusing. Distantly she heard her classmates approach the circle behind her. In a moment they would know the extent of her failure. Best not to delay any longer then. She gripped the lid of the coffin and heaved it open as best she could, pushing the lid off to one side.
To her great surprise, there was no corpse in the coffin, but a living breathing person, a man with bright blue hair dressed in long black pants and a black... half-coat of some sort with long sleeves and a high collar. His upper torso was otherwise completely uncovered, however, for he wore no shirt at all. His only other garment was a red scarf loosely entwined around his neck. He was reclined in a very relaxed position with his hands clasped behind his head.
And his head... well, the first thing that Louise couldn't help but notice were the pointed ears that made her heart skip a beat. Founder help her, she couldn't possibly have summoned an elf of all things, could she?
The second thing she noticed was the wine-red color of his eyes. Which were looking right at her.
Louise did not 'eep' in a manner unbecoming of a Valliere and recoil like she'd been burned, and she swore she would smite anyone who ever said otherwise. She did take a hasty step back as the figure sat up and looked around, however. There was a collective startled inhalation from behind her as her classmates got their first look at the coffin's occupant, his ears especially. Then the stranger looked back to Louise.
"Human! Where the hell am I?!"
***
For reference purposes, I'm using this as a mental reference of the older Disgaea crew.