Ex-Rank Awakening: My Attacks Make Me Stronger

Leon stepped into the command center and immediately slowed. The vast space, usually alive with the hum of operators and flickering displays, was empty. Screens glowed softly in the half-light, but the control stations stood unmanned, their chairs pushed in neatly as though abandoned hours ago.

He took another step, his boots echoing faintly. "Where is everyone?"

Then, without warning, someone was there.

The Governor stood in the center of the room, his back turned. Leon’s eyes narrowed. It wasn’t that Akira had entered without him noticing; it was as if his very mind had been unable to perceive the man until now, like permission had only just been granted to see him.

Leon’s voice, when he spoke, was measured and respectful. "You wanted to see me?"

Akira didn’t answer right away. The silence stretched, heavy as the still air. When he finally turned, his gaze carried the weight of a storm.

"Leon," the Governor said, his tone grave. "We no longer have enough time."

Leon’s brow furrowed. "I don’t understand."

Akira exhaled slowly, his jaw tight. "The time in my vision, it’s been brought forward. From the original ten years..." He stopped, as though saying it aloud still felt unreal.

Leon’s impatience cut through the pause.

"How long do we have left?"

The Governor’s eyes met his.

"Only one year."

Akira expected anger, or at least the tight shock of realization. Instead, Leon’s shoulders eased as he muttered, "Thank the stars. By the way you were acting, I thought we only had a few days. Luckily, I was wrong."

Akira blinked once. "...."

After regaining his composure, the Governor asked, "And how do you plan to handle it?"

Leon tilted his head. "You said yourself that for me to become the next Governor, I have to reach S-rank, right?"

Akira nodded, not yet seeing where this was going.

"Why don’t we change the conditions?" Leon said.

The Governor’s brow arched in curiosity. "What do you want to change it to?"

That smile appeared, the same infuriating, cocky grin that made even those closest to him want to smack him. "SSS-rank."

For a moment, Akira thought he’d misheard.

"...Come again?"

Leon’s eyes gleamed. "Before one year elapses, I will reach SSS-rank."

The Governor, a man who had seen visions of futures and fought beings beyond mortal comprehension, found himself utterly floored by the audacity of that declaration.

****

That feeling again.

It had been gnawing at Leon’s nerves for weeks now; a heavy, unshakable sensation, like a shadow standing just behind him, waiting. He knew it well. It was the same one he’d woken up with when he first gained consciousness in this world, the same one that had driven him to train until his body nearly broke. Back then, he had clawed his way forward, desperate to outrun it. But when he awakened his EX-rank talent, Attack, the feeling had finally receded, like a storm passing out to sea.

But storms always return.

The first warning came in the cave, when Eleanor had tried to take them all with her in that self-detonation. If not for the Governor rewinding time, he and Elizabeth would have been ash in an instant. The second came during the display, when he realized, with a sick clarity, that protecting the people he cared about would require far more strength than he currently possessed.

And now... now the Governor had told him the world had only a single year left. That familiar weight in his chest spiked, swelling until it felt like his pulse was drumming out a countdown.

But Leon wasn’t the type to flinch at the edge of a cliff.

’The only path to real power...’ His mind locked on the thought. ’...is the Trial World.’ He’d been thinking about it for some time, but this was no longer something to put off. The time had come.

The Governor, having recovered from the shock of Leon’s SSS-rank declaration, an achievement that had taken him a century, finally spoke. "How do you plan to reach SSS-rank?"

Leon didn’t hesitate.

"By going to the Trial World. I believe the challenges there will be enough to give me the push I need."

Akira studied him for a long moment. He understood the logic. The Trial World was a strange, ancient boon that appeared only to worlds on the brink of disaster, granting its chosen a place to grow stronger at terrifying speeds. Even now, no one had mapped its true limits.

’Still... why is he so certain it would give him what he needed in time?’

The Governor shook his head faintly. There was no reason to doubt him, not after all the times Leon had shattered his expectations. And besides, when you’d been watching the same vision of annihilation for three hundred years, you learned to cling to hope where you could find it. For Akira Yakomoto, that hope had a name.

Leon.

"Alright," the Governor said at last. "I’ll help you with whatever you need. When do you plan to go?"

"In a day’s time," Leon answered without pause.

"Good." Akira’s gaze sharpened slightly. "But before that... I’ll need your help with something."

Leon’s brow furrowed. "What kind of help?"

****

There was one more thing the Governor hadn’t said, something he’d been holding back, waiting for the right moment. His gaze lingered on Leon, sharp yet unreadable, as if weighing whether to reveal it now.

’I was saving this for last,’ the Governor thought, his mind drifting to Eleanor. When he had tried to extract more information from her, something inside her had pushed back. Not the demon she’d bound herself to, no, this presence was deeper, older, and far stronger. It had resisted him with a force that even he couldn’t simply brush aside.

That was when he realized the truth: Demon Lords and those above them held knowledge; knowledge so vital it was worth guarding with their very essence.

And Bal’ark... Bal’ark was different.

The first Demon Lord ever captured alive. The first one that hadn’t been obliterated in battle or annihilated before it could speak. That alone made him a treasure trove of potential answers, and the Governor knew ’that’ information locked inside him could shift the Federation’s fate.

But there was a problem.

The restriction woven into Bal’ark’s being was not something the Governor could remove alone. His eyes moved back to Leon, steady and measuring.

"I’ll need your help... one more time," he said at last.

Leon tilted his head slightly, curiosity sharpening. Whatever this was, it clearly wasn’t going to be simple.

****

A/N: I really need Inspiration *sigh* Anyway thanks for reading.