The emergency lights of the National Dome cast long, jagged shadows across the center stage.
For the first time since he had stepped off the boat from his family's private island, Ryu O'Hara was smiling. It wasn't a polite, practiced expression. It was a fierce, entirely unfiltered manifestation of pure adrenaline. It reached his mismatched pink and grey eyes, lighting them up with a terrifying, absolute clarity.
Up in the stands, Rantaro Kiyama dropped his paper fan. It clattered against the concrete steps.
"He's smiling," Rantaro whispered, his voice trembling slightly. He grabbed Daigo's shoulder. "Daigo, that guy is smiling. I think the world is actually ending."
Daigo didn't brush Rantaro's hand away. He was staring at the stage, his dark eyes wide. "It's not just a smile, Honcho. Look at the air around him."
It wasn't a trick of the dim lighting. The air around Ryu was physically warping, shimmering with a dense, dark violet heat. The resonance that had been buried under years had completely shattered its cage.
On the stage, Valt Aoi wiped the sweat from his chin. His chest was heaving, his muscles burning from the sheer exertion of the first round. But seeing Ryu smile didn't terrify him. It acted like gasoline on an open flame.
Valt threw his head back and laughed, a bright, booming sound that cut through the heavy tension of the arena.
"That's it, Ryu!" Valt yelled, locking his reassembled Valkyrie onto his cracked carbon-fiber grip. "That's the face of a real blader! Don't you dare hold back!"
"I have no intention of doing so," Ryu replied. His voice was rich, resonant, and entirely alive.
*VZZZT.*
The main stadium lights violently hummed back to life, flooding the plastic basin with blinding white light. The crowd, snapped out of their paralyzed silence by the sudden brightness, erupted into a chaotic, deafening roar.
The stage referee swallowed hard, taking two deliberate steps backward. He didn't want to be anywhere near the plastic basin.
"Second Battle!" the referee shouted into his headset, his voice booming over the PA system. "Ready... Set!"
Ryu dropped into his stance. He didn't just bend his knees. He sank his weight entirely into the stage floor, his boots squeaking against the polished surface. He brought his heavy aluminum launcher up, aiming it at the basin with the precision of a sniper, but gripping it with the raw, brutal strength of a heavyweight fighter.
"Three!" Valt screamed, the blue aura of his knight flaring to life.
"Two," Ryu commanded, his voice dropping into a dangerous, heavy rumble.
"One!"
"Go Shoot!"
Valt ripped his cord. The plastic housing of his grip visibly splintered, unable to handle the sheer, absurd torque Valt was generating. Valkyrie hit the slope like a blue meteor, the rubber driver screaming in protest as it gripped the plastic.
Ryu pulled his ripcord.
The heavy internal gears of his custom launcher sparked. A literal shower of magnesium sparks flew from the aluminum casing as the ripcord tore through the teeth.
Eclipse Nidhogg hit the stadium.
It didn't make its usual, quiet, heavy hum. Because the outer white layer had been chipped in the first round, the Bey's perfect aerodynamics were compromised. The exposed polycarbonate ...the glowing, jagged eye of the dragon—caught the air resistance.
Nidhogg snarled.
"Take the center!" Valt roared. "Rush Shoot!"
Valkyrie banked off the rim, diving inward.
"We are not waiting in the center," Ryu said. His eyes tracked the blue blur.
Nidhogg didn't drop to the bottom of the basin. The dark violet Bey caught the mid-slope and accelerated. The chipped layer wasn't just a visual flaw; it had created a microscopic imbalance that gave Nidhogg an aggressive, erratic edge it had never possessed before.
Nidhogg chased .
It intercepted Valkyrie halfway down the slope. The collision was brutal.
Instead of an immovable wall, Valkyrie hit a moving, high-speed buzzsaw. The jagged edge of Nidhogg's chipped layer caught Valkyrie's wing perfectly.
*Clack!*
Valkyrie was violently thrown off its trajectory, sparking wildly as it was deflected toward the wall.
"Don't let it push you!" Valt yelled, throwing his arm out. "Bounce back!"
Valkyrie hit the wall and rebounded, launching a second strike.
Ryu didn't even blink. He leaned forward.
Nidhogg was already there. It met Valkyrie mid-rebound, delivering a secondary, crushing blow that sent a shockwave through the plastic basin.
*Clash!*
"He's not playing defense!" Xander Shakadera yelled from the VIP balcony, his eyes wide with absolute awe. "Nidhogg is attacking!"
Lui Shirasagijo gripped the glass railing, his knuckles white. "He's weaponized his own mass. It's a slaughter."
Down in the basin, Valt was suffocating under the pressure. Every time Valkyrie tried to build momentum, Nidhogg was there, suffocating the blue Bey with heavy, aggressive strikes. The dark violet shadow dragon materialized over the stadium, no longer chained, its massive jaws snapping at the blue knight.
"Push through!" Valt screamed, his voice raw. He refused to yield. The passion radiating from him was a physical force. "We don't give up! Use the slope! Flash Shoot!"
Valkyrie, bleeding stamina rapidly, intentionally dropped lower on the slope, trying to slip underneath Nidhogg's guard just like it had done against Wakiya and Xander. It accelerated with a jagged, desperate burst of speed, aiming for the absolute lowest point of Nidhogg's forge disc.
It was a flawless, terrifyingly fast maneuver born purely out of Valt's survival instinct.
Ryu watched the blue Bey drop. He watched Valt giving absolutely everything he had, pushing his body and his Beyblade past every logical limit they possessed.
Ryu didn't calculate a counter. He didn't run his usual calculations .
Time seemed to slow down in the center of the stadium.
Ryu looked across the arena at Valt. The boy was covered in sweat, his eyes wide and burning, his arm still outstretched in the follow-through of his command. He was a chaotic, beautiful anomaly that had single-handedly dragged Ryu out of the dark, sterile tomb of the island.
The heavy, vibrating resonance of Nidhogg pulsed in Ryu's chest.
Ryu's fierce, unhinged smile softened, just for a fraction of a second, into an expression of absolute, profound respect.
"Stand proud, Valt," Ryu said. His voice was quiet, but the acoustics of the stadium carried the heavy, undeniable sincerity to every corner of the dome. "You are strong."
Valt's eyes widened.
"But this match belongs to me," Ryu finished, his pink and grey eyes flashing with absolute authority.
"Awaken. Eclipse Sever."
Nidhogg didn't try to dodge the upward strike. The internal metal weights snapped violently to the outer edge. But because of the chipped layer, the weight distribution was asymmetrical.
Nidhogg dropped all of its immense, crushing mass directly onto Valkyrie just as the blue Bey swung upward.
The dark violet dragon clamped its jaws directly onto the blue knight's sword.
The resulting collision wasn't a spark.
The sheer downward force of Nidhogg, combined with the raw, upward velocity of Valkyrie, created an impact so severe that a loud, sickening *CRACK* echoed through the stadium.
A spiderweb fracture literally spread across the center of the WBBA-certified plastic basin.
*BURST.*
Valkyrie didn't just separate. The locking mechanism screamed as the Beyblade was catastrophically blown apart. The three pieces of blue polycarbonate and metal were launched out of the stadium with the velocity of a gunshot.
The energy layer hit the bulletproof glass of the camera rig above the stage, cracking the lens before clattering to the floor. The forge disc slammed into the padded barricade.
Nidhogg hit the cracked center of the stadium. It didn't wobble. It spun perfectly on its sharp tip, the jagged, glowing eye of the dragon facing upward, humming with dominance.
The National Dome was completely, utterly dead silent.
Fifty thousand people were paralyzed. The cameras stopped panning. The referee stood frozen, his hand halfway in the air, his eyes darting between the cracked stadium floor and the silver-haired boy standing over it.
Valt Aoi stood perfectly still. His arm slowly dropped to his side.
He looked at the empty basin. He looked at the pieces of his Bey scattered across the stage.
He didn't cry. He didn't drop to his knees. He took a slow, deep breath, walking around the cracked stadium to collect the pieces of his partner. He locked Valkyrie back together, the blue plastic heavily scuffed but still structurally intact.
Valt looked up at Ryu. His chest was heaving, but the fierce, unwavering fire in his brown eyes hadn't been extinguished. It had just been tempered.
"You're amazing, Ryu," Valt said, his voice quiet but carrying clearly in the silent arena. "I gave it everything. And you still completely crushed me."
Ryu slowly stood up from his stance. The dark violet aura faded, leaving only the cool, conditioned air of the stadium. He walked over, picking Nidhogg out of the cracked basin. The metal was scalding, but it felt perfect in his palm.
"Your output exceeded my calculations," Ryu replied. He didn't deadpan. He spoke with genuine respect. "If your equipment was forged from denser materials, the outcome of that collision would have been a coin toss. Repair your locking mechanism."
Valt beamed, a massive, exhausted smile breaking across his face. He held his fist out over the stadium. "I will! And next time, I'm not going to burst!"
Ryu looked at the outstretched fist.
He didn't hesitate. He reached out, his knuckles lightly bumping against Valt's.
"I will hold you to that," Ryu said.
The referee finally recovered his voice. He practically lunged toward his microphone, throwing his arm forcefully toward Ryu.
"B-Burst Finish! Two points! Ryu O'Hara wins the match and advances to the Semi-Finals!"
The stadium finally broke. The roar was so loud it shook the concrete pillars of the dome. It wasn't just the fanclub screaming his name anymore ,it was the entire arena acknowledging the absolute, undeniable power they had just witnessed.
Ryu turned away from the crowd. He didn't wave. He looked up, past the blinding stage lights, directly at the VIP balcony overlooking the arena.
Shu Kurenai was standing at the glass, his hands shoved into his pockets, his red eyes burning with intensity.
Zac the Sunrise had dropped his theatrical posture entirely.
Xander was grinning, but the giant's arms were crossed tightly over his chest.
And Lui Shirasagijo was leaning completely over the railing, his jagged teeth bared in a look of pure, unadulterated madness, staring down at Ryu like a starving animal.
Ryu didn't look away. He slipped Nidhogg into his jacket pocket.
He raised his right hand, pointing a single, steady finger directly at the balcony of the Supreme Four.
He didn't need a microphone. He didn't need to shout. The cameras immediately zoomed in on his face, broadcasting his cold, awakened expression to every screen in the country.
His voice a quiet, lethal promise that the microphones barely picked up, but the entire world felt. "I am going to warp this entire board. Prepare yourselves."
Ryu lowered his hand, turned his back on the Supreme Four, and walked into the shadows of the competitor tunnel.
The Wild Card had officially taken the stage. And the National Tournament was entirely out of control.