Riley nodded very fast and held his hands up like a toddler asking to be carried.
The threatening glare on Van Hellsing's face melted away for a second and he became confused mumbling out something like "Seriously...."
Riley immediately exploded with laughter at the monster hunter's reaction wiping tears from the corner of his eyes before jumping up casually and landing perfectly on the back of the horse.
.....
After almost two days on the road , most of which Riley spent taking in the sights and asking -or more like pestering Van Hellsing about all sorts of Monsters- , they finally arrived at the Vatican.
"Honestly though , couldn't we have taken the train because it was right there." said Riley with clear exasperation at Van Hellsing's stubbornness.
The monster hunter just sighed and continued walking through the hall of the surprisingly gloomy looking church completely ignoring Riley's complaints.
Riley noticed that his steps seemed more subdued though and almost faintly relaxed unlike his usual alert and stiff walk.
It had taken alot of tests from the monster hunter and teasing from Riley , but he got Van Hellsing to atleast drop enough of his gaurd to let him come along up to the church.
Besides , Riley had kept watch alot of times during their journey and nothing went wrong so that helped too.
The fact that their journey had been smooth was actually very suprising to Riley but he didn't bother himself with the details , after all, the fun stuff would start here.
"HALT!!!!"
From the shadows , a group of fully armored knights marched out surrounding both Riley and Van Hellsing then the priest who Riley remembered was supposed to recieve Van Hellsing walked out of the confession booth.
"Van Hellsing , explain why you have brought a child here." asked the priest with suspicion and confusion both written all over his face.
Stepping forward Riley grabbed Van Hellsing's hat from his hands and ,with childish excitement , put it on saying "Riley , Van Hellsing's temporary assistant and monster hunting expert , at your service. Lovely to meet you father."
That froze everyone in the room and they looked at the child giving the priest a deferential bow with an oversized hat on his head.
Standing behind Riley , Van Hellsing sighed and groaned at the same time then plucked his hat from Riley's head and turned to explain to the Father ignoring the pouting Riley.
When Van Hellsing explained some of Riley's abilities , the father immediately moved their discussion to the confession booth away from the gaurds , Riley and any prying ears.
"Do you believe he is trustworthy?" Asked the father after Van Hellsing finished explaining the situation.
They had already argued at length about what exactly Riley could be and if his light based powers could be related to any monsters , but they couldn't find anything.
And meanwhile , Riley had been left in the huge open hall with the knights still forming a loose encirclement around him but that barely mattered given he could hear everything they were saying inside.
Still , his mind wasn't even fully in their conversation and he was more interested in his latest ideas for developing his light abilities.
Along the way , Riley had thought up different designs for different techniques he wanted to develop for his light , but most couldn't actually be implemented yet.
The issue was less - if he could develop them and more of how dangerous they were because his combination of already destructive light , Divine Energy and Solar energy was no joke honestly.
Even Riley's elementalized form and light speed travel was incredibly dangerous if he fully utilized it.
Moving a short distance while elementalising his skin with his weakest intensity light to boost speed as he had been doing since he arrived here was still safe and the closest to the devil fruit's original flight capabilities.
However , the Pika Pika No mi's light allowed Riley to fly because light has less weight and density than air , but Riley's new fusion light was infact abit heavier and could now even become semi solid.
In exchange for the weightless light , Riley got better control and flexibility in his light , such as the ability to bend it into angles even without a platform , meaning he no longer even needed the Yata no Kagami technique and could just shoot forward as a beam of light that changed directions in midair.
So using this control , he could elementalize and control his light particles to simply remain static and float or he could control them to push him forward or shoot forward entirely.
It was the same trick he used when Van Hellsing tried to carry him away and when he floated in air and to move like a beam of light through the air.
He was basically elementalising at his weakest intensity and doing it only externally to the outermost layer of his skin then he would control that much heavier light to remain in place or push him forward.
Obviously it was limited and depended on his base speed and control as a determinant for his speed in the partial elementalisation state , but considering his base speed , that was already impressive.
Additionally , in that state , Riley generated weaker and less destructive shockwaves plus he didn't require a surface to move so it was really only positive improvement.
Meanwhile , in full elementalisation form , Riley predicted that he would be constantly releasing enough heat to ignite anything within a 2 metre radius.
His light was generally hotter , more explosive and exhibited much denser properties which made practicing and developing of any techniques particularly dangerous.
'So all I need is a practice ground that no one will mind me destroying...hmmm.....'
As Riley wondered where he could train his island erasing techniques , Van Hellsing came out of the confession booth.
Apparently , Riley had made much more of an impression than he thought because throughout the discussion they had about him , Van Hellsing was totally on Riley's side.
It actually got to the point where Van Hellsing refused to shoot or kill Riley as the father ordered then he threatened to walk away just like he was supposed to in the original scene.
"I will ignore this new curiosity of yours for the time being , but the time will come for you to kill that child.
Let him live for now however , I will not allow him into the Order's dwelling." Said the father with finality before strolling into the hidden tunnel.
It was just as Riley expected , they wouldn't let him in.
That was to be expected since it would be dumb to let a mysterious stranger with supernatural abilities into the secret base of an organization that hunted supernatural entities.
When Van Hellsing came out to tell Riley , he realized almost immediately that Riley had heard them and knew already so Riley decided that he would just roam around for abit.
So they decided that Riley should be back in 30 minutes and he would walk around with the guards.
But obviously he didn't plan on walking with a security detail so he lost them in the first 30 seconds and roamed through Rome occasionally flying around in a streak of light and looking for anything interesting to do.
The only thing particularly memorable though , was that the food was way less flavourful but tasted far more natural and healthy. And people here seemed unnaturally kind to children , to the point of randomly giving them food.
Exactly when the thirty minutes ended , Riley landed at the entrance of the church beside Van Hellsing and the anxious guards.
"So , where are we going to next." He asked Van Hellsing innocently as if he hadn't just dropped from the sky.
The Monster hunter also ignored his entrance and explained the mission to Transylvania then leaned back in expectation, it seemed that he though Riley would be scared or hesitant to go if he heard about blood sucking Vampires.
"Well what are you waiting for then , let's go. I want to see how strong a Vampire is."
Riley didn't waste time and directly tugged on Van Hellsing's Cloak telling him to hurry up and start walking.