Ch.42
Grayfia set up the scrying display in the villa's main room at eight in the morning.
It was a silver mirror, flat, about three feet across, propped on the dining table at an angle. Devil craftsmanship. The surface was liquid-smooth and showed nothing until Grayfia pressed her palm to the frame and spoke a word in old Demonic and the mirror lit up with a wide aerial view of Kuoh Academy. Except it wasn't Kuoh Academy. It was a dimensional replica, a pocket universe shaped to match the school grounds down to the cracks in the sidewalk, and Rias's peerage was about to walk into it.
Grayfia stood by the door. Silver hair, maid uniform, an expression that could have been carved from marble. She'd arrived at dawn with the mirror and a set of instructions and exactly zero small talk. She was Sirzechs's Queen and Rias's sister-in-law and she was here in an official capacity and her face gave away nothing.
"The Rating Game will commence in twenty minutes," she said. "You may observe. You may not interfere."
Then she left.
Asia and I sat at the table.
The mirror showed the replica school from above. The buildings, the sports field, the forest behind the gym. Two magic circles glowed at opposite ends of the campus. Blue for Rias. Orange for Riser. In twenty minutes, both teams would teleport in and the game would start and I would sit here and watch.
Asia was next to me. Close. Her shoulder was against my arm and her hands were in her lap and she was looking at the mirror with wide green eyes. She was wearing the Kuoh uniform because nobody had told her not to and her blonde hair was loose and she looked like a student watching a sports broadcast except her hands were trembling.
"They'll be okay," she said. Quiet.
I didn't answer. I knew the script.
Grayfia's voice came through the mirror. Calm, measured, carrying the formal cadence of a referee. "The Rating Game between Rias Gremory and Riser Phenex will now begin. Both teams, enter the field."
The circles flashed. Rias's peerage appeared in the Old School Building. Riser's peerage appeared in the New School Building on the far side of campus. The mirror's view shifted, splitting between both bases, and I saw Rias standing in the ORC room with her crimson hair tied back and her face set and Akeno beside her and Kiba and Koneko flanking.
Four of them. On the other side: Riser with his full fifteen.
Rias spoke. I couldn't hear the words through the scrying display but her mouth moved and she was pointing at a map and her peerage was nodding and then they moved. Kiba went first, vanishing through the window toward the forest. Koneko went toward the gym. Akeno ascended, her shrine maiden outfit catching the air, heading for the rooftop.
Rias stayed.
The first fight happened in the gym.
The scrying display shifted to follow Koneko. She walked through the gym doors and three of Riser's Pawns were waiting. They came at her in a group and Koneko put all three on the floor in about forty seconds. Rook-class punches that cratered the gym floor. One Pawn tried to flank and Koneko caught her fist without looking and threw her through the wall. The retirement announcements came through the mirror's audio: "Three of Riser Phenex-sama's Pawns, retired."
Asia exhaled beside me. Her hand found mine on the table. Her fingers laced through mine and squeezed.
Then Xuelan came through the gym's side entrance.
Riser's Rook. Chinese fighting dress, long black hair, fire-enhanced martial arts. She was fast and she hit hard and the first exchange made Koneko skid backward across the gym floor, her shoes tearing grooves in the wood. Koneko set her feet and came back in. The fight was brutal. Close-range, body shots, both of them trading hits that would have killed a human. Xuelan's kicks trailed fire. Koneko blocked with her forearms and the flames licked her skin and she didn't flinch.
My jaw was tight. Asia's grip on my hand tightened with each hit Koneko took.
Koneko won. It took three minutes and she won by eating a flaming roundhouse kick to the ribs and using the impact's momentum to drive a Rook-class uppercut straight through Xuelan's guard. Xuelan went up, hit the ceiling, came down. "Riser Phenex-sama's Rook, retired."
Koneko stood in the ruined gym. Burns on her forearms and her side. One eye swelling shut. Blood from a cut above her hairline running down her face. She wiped it with the back of her hand and walked out of the gym.
Asia's Twilight Healing was glowing. Faint green light from her rings, pulsing, reaching toward the mirror. She was trying to heal Koneko through the scrying link. It wasn't how the Sacred Gear worked. The healing couldn't pass through a dimensional display. Asia knew that. Her rings glowed anyway.
The forest was Kiba's.
The scrying display followed him through the trees. Sword Birth active, demonic swords sprouting from the ground to block and redirect as he moved. Riser had sent four Pawns into the forest to establish a perimeter. Kiba cut through them in under two minutes. Efficient. Controlled. Each takedown was clean. One swing, one retirement announcement. He was a Knight doing Knight work and he was very good at it.
"Four of Riser Phenex-sama's Pawns, retired."
Seven of Riser's pieces down. Eight remaining plus Riser himself. The math was improving. For a moment.
Akeno found Yubelluna above the school.
The mirror's view pulled back to show the rooftop battle from a distance. Lightning against explosions. Akeno's holy lightning crackled across the sky in brilliant yellow arcs and Yubelluna's bombs detonated in cascading purple blasts and the dimensional replica's atmosphere lit up like a storm. Akeno was winning. Her power output was higher than Yubelluna's and her lightning was faster and more precise and each bolt stripped through Yubelluna's defensive barriers.
I watched Akeno fight. She was smiling. The battle smile, the one that made her eyes bright and her mouth curve and her whole body vibrate with the joy of hurting someone. She was magnificent up there, her ponytail whipping in the wind from her own power, her shrine maiden outfit billowing, her lightning turning the sky white.
She was going to lose.
I knew it. I'd watched it happen on a screen that was smaller than this mirror in a room that smelled like microwave popcorn. Yubelluna had a Phenex Tear. A small bottle of healing liquid that would restore her completely. Akeno was burning through her reserves to overwhelm Yubelluna fast, and it was working, and it wouldn't matter because Yubelluna would use the Tear and come back fresh against an Akeno who had nothing left.
Asia pressed closer to my side. Her hand in mine was squeezing hard enough that her knuckles were white. Her other hand was on my forearm, the Twilight Healing glow still pulsing, still reaching toward the mirror. Still trying.
"She's winning," Asia said. "Akeno-san is winning."
My teeth were together. My jaw ached from clenching.