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The night on the mountain was cold, but the silence inside the Gremory mansion was what truly felt overwhelming.
Yugo Hano opened his eyes abruptly in the dimness of his room. His forehead was soaked in cold sweat and his breathing was agitated. He had not awakened because of a magical attack or the presence of an enemy. It had been something much worse.
The screams.
Those distorted cries for mercy, the desperate pleas of the exorcists, street devils, and innocents his hands had massacred during his ten years of ruthless survival in this world. Voices from a bloody past that his mind refused to forget. At Saturn, sleeping near Asia or having Mittelt snoring in the corner like a noisy plush toy was usually the perfect anchor to keep his nightmares at bay. But tonight, in the vastness of someone else's mansion, Jose's ghosts had found a crack through which to slip in.
Yugo sat on the edge of the bed, running a hand over his face. He let out a long, weary sigh, stretching his arm to take his glasses from the nightstand. He needed water. The taste of ash in his mouth was unbearable.
He put on a light shirt and stepped into the polished wooden hallway, walking without making the slightest sound. He descended the stairs toward the main kitchen, guided only by the faint moonlight entering through the large windows.
However, when he reached the grand hall, he stopped.
Sitting beside the window overlooking the rear garden, wearing a crimson silk nightgown that contrasted with the darkness, was Rias Gremory. The Princess of Ruin hugged her knees against her chest, her gaze fixed on the starry sky.
At the faintest creak of wood, Rias quickly turned her head. Upon seeing the professor, her shoulders relaxed.
"Hano-sensei..." Rias murmured, her voice soft and stripped of its usual aristocratic pride. "You can't sleep either?"
Yugo continued his path to the kitchen counter, took a glass, and filled it with cold water before approaching her by a few steps.
"I have the bad habit of waking up when the environment is too quiet," Yugo replied in his usual flat tone, taking a sip from the glass. "What are you doing awake, Gremory? Tomorrow is the last day before the game. You should be resting."
Rias let out a bitter laugh, turning her gaze back toward the garden.
"I'm trying. But every time I close my eyes, I can only think about what will happen the day after tomorrow. About Riser. About the board." Rias tightened her grip around her legs. "A few days ago, I was ready to throw my own dignity into the trash just to escape. I was so scared... But seeing how my servants have broken their bones these past few days to improve, seeing how Ise gets up again and again even though Humungousaur nearly crushes him... it makes me feel like I don't have the right to be afraid."
Yugo observed her in silence. The moonlight outlined her face, showing a leader who was finally maturing under pressure. In this world's original canon, Rias would have spent this night trying to give herself to Issei in an act of romantic and tragic desperation. But the destructive reality Yugo had shown them had changed her priorities.
"Hyoudou sleeps like a rock in the east wing," Yugo commented, leaning against a column. "Koneko dragged him to his bed after he collapsed. A meteorite could fall on the mansion and that idiot wouldn't wake up until noon."
Rias smiled genuinely for a second. "Yes, I know. Ise is... stubborn. He fights with his heart. To tell the truth, before you burst into my room that night... I thought about going to find him. I thought giving my first time to my Pawn would be a fair form of rebellion."
Yugo did not react, taking another sip of his water. "It would have been stupidity. Riser would have incinerated him before the referee even started the game."
"I know. You told me." Rias looked up, fixing her blue eyes on the professor's gray wells. There was deep seriousness in her gaze. "That's why I came to find you. And I still don't understand why you agreed to help us, Hano-sensei. You are Sona's Pawn. You had no obligation to get involved in a war against a Pure-Blood House for me. You said it was because of Asia's favor, but... you put your life and your secret at stake."
Yugo lowered the glass, leaving it on a nearby table. He crossed his arms, looking toward the dark forest through the glass.
"I operate under a transactional system, Gremory. I hate debts," Jose replied, and for the first time that night, his monotone voice acquired a rough and somber shade. "But if you want the raw truth... I despise guys like Riser Phenex. Spoiled idiots who believe the world belongs to them because they were born with an important surname or inherited power. People who use their strength to drag others into hell just on a whim."
Yugo clenched his left fist, where the Omnitrix rested hidden under his sleeve.
"I spent ten years in the true hell of this world," he continued, with a coldness that made Rias straighten her back. "I had to become a monster. I had to listen to people beg for their lives while I ripped out their hearts just to secure my next day of survival. I know perfectly well what it feels like to have no choice. I know what it is to be cornered in the dark. And when I saw you in that shower, ready to destroy yourself... I saw the same stupid, desperate boy I used to be."
Rias held her breath. Yugo's words were cutting, stripped of any chivalry, but the brutal honesty they conveyed was purer than any noble promise. She finally understood. He was not saving her out of love, lust, or politics. He was saving her because his own story prevented him from allowing Riser Phenex to extinguish another life.
Slowly, Rias stood up. The silk nightgown moved slightly with the mansion's nighttime breeze. She walked until she was one meter away from him, extending a hand that trembled slightly before resting on Yugo's forearm, right beside the watch.
"Then... make sure you don't hold back the day after tomorrow," Rias said, with a fierce and determined smile, the true heiress of Ruin awakening in her eyes. "Tear him to pieces, Yugo. Pluck the Phoenix. Show the Underworld what happens when they try to cage us."
Yugo looked at her hand on his arm, then returned his gaze to those blue eyes that no longer held any trace of tears. The dry, sadistic half-smile returned to the retired assassin's face.
"You don't have to ask me twice, President," Yugo replied, turning around to pick up his glass. "Now go to bed. Tomorrow is the last day of training, and if I see your spheres of destruction lose power due to lack of sleep, I'll make you run with Humungousaur chasing your heels."
Rias let out a small laugh, withdrawing her hand and giving an elegant bow. "Understood, Sensei. Good night."
The redhead walked back toward the stairs with a much lighter and firmer step. The shadow of the arranged marriage no longer felt like a death sentence; it felt like the stage where the "Demon of Discipline" was going to rewrite the rules of the game.
Yugo Hano finished his glass of water in the solitude of the hall. The screams of his past were still there, in some corner of his mind, but the weight of blue plasma and the promise of the coming battle were enough to silence them for today. He adjusted his glasses and began the walk back to his room. The ninth day had ended, and the Phoenix was already smelling like burnt firewood.
...
The tenth day dawned with a dense, freezing mist descending from the peaks, wrapping the Gremory mansion's training courtyard in an atmosphere of calm before the storm.
Less than twenty-four hours remained before the Rating Game. The preparation truce had run out.
Rias Gremory, Akeno Himejima, Kiba Yuuto, Koneko Toujou, and Issei Hyoudou were lined up in a straight row. Their school uniforms were worn, their faces had dark circles under their eyes, and their bodies carried the weight of ten days of physical and mental torture no devil their age had ever experienced. But there were no complaints. Their postures were firm, their eyes reflected a spark of steel, and their mystical auras vibrated with contained intensity, ready to explode.
In front of them, with his hands tucked into the pockets of his dress pants and his tie perfectly aligned, stood Yugo Hano. The professor's glasses reflected the pale light of the morning sun.
"Today is the last day," Yugo announced, his monotone voice cutting through the mist like a razor. "No more weights. No more push-ups. No more tactical theory. Your bodies have assimilated what it means to survive, and your minds understand that tomorrow there will be no second chances."
The professor pulled his left hand out of his pocket, revealing the dark Omnitrix. The dial began to spin, emitting an electronic hum that made the instincts of everyone present bristle by reflex.
"As a final exam, today's training is simple," Yugo declared, fixing his cold gray wells on each of them. "All of you against me. At the same time. Without holding back, without mercy, and with the genuine intention of killing me. If you manage to make me take a single step back before the watch times out, I'll consider you ready to humiliate House Phenex."
Issei Hyoudou clenched his fist, and the red gauntlet of the Boosted Gear materialized on his left arm, the emerald gem shining with accumulated power that no longer trembled.
"We've spent ten days chewing dirt, Sensei..." Issei murmured, a fierce smile forming on his face. "Don't expect us to make it easy for you."
"I hope not, Hyoudou. Because I won't go easy either."
Yugo slammed down on the core.
FLASH!
The explosion of emerald light swept the mist from the courtyard in a millisecond. The gravitational pressure in the area skyrocketed, cracking the packed earth beneath them. When the glow faded, the history professor was gone.
In his place, the four-armed titan with crimson-red skin rose to a height of three and a half meters. His four green eyes shone with lethal focus, and his four massive arms opened, cracking his knuckles in a symphony of rock and muscle.
"COME!" Four Arms roared, his cavernous voice making the mansion windows tremble.
"Kiba, Koneko, flank him! Ise, build power! Akeno, covering fire!" Rias ordered instantly, her tactical mind reacting with the speed Yugo had drilled into them.
The battle erupted.
Kiba Yuuto became a blur of speed. Using the counter-flow learned from XLR8, he did not run in a straight line; he zigzagged through the shadows of the mist, summoning three swords of light and shadow simultaneously at the giant's sides. At the same time, Koneko Toujou made an acrobatic ten-meter leap, descending directly toward Four Arms' head with both fists wrapped in an aura of white chakra, concentrating all her Rook strength into a single critical point.
Four Arms did not even move from his position. With his two upper hands, he caught Kiba's sword blades in midair, breaking the magical steel with the simple pressure of his textured fingers. With his two lower hands, he blocked Koneko's descending impact, crossing his forearms.
BOOM!
The kinetic shockwave sank the Tetramand's heavy boots ten centimeters into the earth, but his arms did not give way.
"Too predictable!" the red colossus bellowed. With a twist of his torso, he used Koneko as a projectile, launching her toward Kiba and forcing the Knight to abort his next thrust in order to catch his companion in the air.
At that very instant, the sky was dyed yellow and crimson.
"Ara, ara... receive this, Master!" Akeno sang, descending from the clouds surrounded by a torrent of holy lightning combined with Rias's Power of Ruin.
A colossal spear of destructive energy and electricity descended directly toward Four Arms' chest. The giant, demonstrating absurd agility for his size, struck the Omnitrix symbol on his chest with one of his free hands before the attack landed.
FLASH!
Chromastone emerged from the light. The magenta crystalline rock colossus raised his right arm and received the direct impact of the Gremory magic. The entire field lit up with flashes of color as the stones of his body absorbed the tremendous discharge from Akeno and Rias, channeling it through his own alien biology.
"Good try, but this energy is mine now," Chromastone's deep voice buzzed.
The Crystalsapien pointed his hand toward the sky and fired a multicolored plasma beam that exploded just above Rias and Akeno, creating a shockwave of hot wind that forced them to fold their wings and descend sharply to the ground, losing the aerial advantage.
"NOW, ISE!" Rias shouted from the ground, her breathing ragged.
"BOOST!! BOOST!! BOOST!!" Issei's gauntlet roared, having accumulated the dragon's power during the first exchanges of the battle.
The brown-haired boy appeared from within the thick smoke, eyes bloodshot and his left fist wrapped in a blaze of crimson draconic aura. He propelled himself with all his strength toward Chromastone's face, unleashing a Dragon Shot at point-blank range.
The crystal alien, anticipating the impact, struck the Omnitrix again in a fraction of a second.
FLASH!
A wall of green, armored flesh appeared in front of Issei. Humungousaur received Issei's Dragon Shot squarely in the chest. The explosion of crimson energy scorched his reptilian scales and pushed him two meters backward, leaving two deep furrows in the courtyard soil.
The giant had stepped back!
"I did it!" Issei shouted, but his celebration did not last long.
The Vaxasaurian's enormous tail swept across the ground in a lethal whip-like motion, striking Issei's legs and sending him rolling across the grass. Humungousaur straightened, exhaling a puff of smoke from his nostrils, looking at the slight scrape on his chest with a spark of genuine approval in his dinosaur eyes.
Rias, Akeno, Kiba, and Koneko immediately regrouped around the fallen Issei, panting, their uniforms covered in dirt and sweat. In front of them, the immense five-meter dinosaur exhaled heavily, and with one final emerald flash, Yugo Hano returned to his human form.
The silence of the mountain reigned over the courtyard once more. The Omnitrix beeped, entering recharge mode.
Yugo adjusted his glasses, evaluating the crater in the ground and the scrape on the scales now hidden beneath his clothes. The five devils stared at him, waiting for the executioner's verdict, fearing they had failed at the final second.
The professor pulled his hands out of his pockets and, for the first time in ten days, a fierce, dry, and completely satisfied smile formed on his lips.
"You made me step back two meters, Hyoudou. And my chest is still warm from your attack," Yugo said, his voice losing its monotony and taking on the tone of a veteran acknowledging his warriors. "Your coordination was flawless, your reaction timing was correct, and you no longer fight like spoiled children. You have learned how to bleed."
Rias Gremory felt a shiver of pure pride run down her spine. Her servants smiled, exhausted but with their chests swollen with confidence. They had passed the monster's exam.
Yugo turned around, walking toward the mansion entrance, leaving them with his final words before the true hell.
"Training is over," Sitri's Pawn declared without looking back. "Rest for what remains of the day and clean your uniforms. Tomorrow night, we enter that board... and we'll show Riser Phenex that the flames of a phoenix are nothing when you face the owner of the damn watch."