Everyone, at least once in their life, dreams of waking up to terrible weather and realizing they don't have to go to school.
Heavy rain is flooding the streets so badly that trains stop running.
A blizzard blanketed everything in white, transforming the whole city into a frozen, chaotic scene.
An earthquake shook buildings just enough to cancel classes.
A power outage plunged everything into darkness.
Anything—anything—that lets you roll over in bed, pull the blanket over your head, and think:
Nice.
Free holiday.
Some people even joke about it, usually while staring at the ceiling the night before a big test.
"Man, imagine if a meteor hit the school."
Nobody actually expects that to happen.
Zevion, unfortunately, lived in a world that took jokes as suggestions.
Because this time, it wasn't just his school.
It was every school.
Across the entire planet.
And instead of a normal meteor, it was a bizarre comet phenomenon that lit up the sky, rewrote physics, and casually turned Beyblades into walking natural disasters.
So yes.
He got a free holiday.
Several days' worth, actually.
Zevion lay on his bed, staring at the TV mounted across the room, blanket pulled up to his chest, hair a complete mess, eyes half-lidded from a lack of proper sleep.
The news anchor's voice blended into the background as footage replayed again and again.
"…I guess I can finally cross 'school cancelled because of meteor' off my bucket list," he muttered.
He paused for a moment, frowning slightly.
"…Does it count if the meteor didn't actually hit the building? And it wasn't even really a meteor but comet shards?"
He shifted under the blanket and shrugged into his pillow.
"Close enough."
The news had been running nonstop since last night.
Different channels.
Different countries.
Different languages.
Same chaos.
Ever since the comet shards fell, Beyblades all over the world had begun awakening something inside them.
Spirits.
Entities.
Manifestations of power.
Nobody knew what to call them at first.
Some called them monsters.
Others said avatars.
A few scientists insisted on calling them "energy projections," which sounded boring and wrong.
But somehow—and Zevion only noticed this after watching the news for hours with increasingly jealous, bitter eyes—the entire world had collectively settled on the same term.
Bit Beasts.
Zevion slowly sat up, brow twitching.
"…Bit Beasts?"
He stared harder at the screen, as if the word itself might change if he glared at it long enough.
That wasn't a thing in this world.
Before yesterday, Beyblade was all about physics, structure, technique, and optimization.
Launch angles.
Weight distribution.
Spin efficiency.
No spirits.
No souls.
No giant glowing monsters screaming their names at the sky.
And yet here they were, casually calling them Bit Beasts like it was the most natural term in the universe.
Like G-Revolution had always existed.
Like, Metal Fury was common knowledge.
Zevion frowned.
"That's… actually creepy."
Another clip played.
A dragon-shaped spirit bursting out of a Beyblade, with scales made of fire and light.
A massive bear of energy roaring over an arena, its presence alone cracking the floor.
A wolf of lightning was tearing through a test boulder like it was made of cardboard.
The reporters didn't even question the terminology anymore.
They just used it.
Bit Beasts.
Bit Beasts.
Bit Beasts.
"…This world is way too comfortable accepting nonsense," Zevion muttered.
Then again—
They called Beyblades Beyblades.
Humans humans.
Japan Japan.
Earth Earth.
Comparing worlds too hard usually just made your brain hurt.
So he let it go.
The good news?
Not every Beyblade awakened a Bit Beast.
Only the good ones.
Well-designed ones.
Beyblades with strong concepts.
Unique builds.
Original ideas.
Mass-produced Beyblades had much lower chances, and even when they did awaken something, the results were… underwhelming.
Weak spirits.
Low output.
Barely useful in real combat.
The kind of enemies you'd see in an anime just to pad out the runtime.
Grunts.
Mobs.
Experience fodder.
The annoying kind that exists purely to waste your time and give you nothing in return.
Scientists had already figured out a rough pattern.
A Beyblade didn't need raw strength to awaken a Bit Beast.
It needed to be conceptually sound.
A clear purpose.
A cohesive design philosophy.
Something that meant something.
Original Beyblades had far higher success rates.
Custom builds.
Personal creations.
The kind people poured obsession into.
Zevion snorted softly.
"Of course."
Even in an apocalyptic comet scenario, originality still mattered.
The scary part?
The world adapted frighteningly fast.
Within a single day, research institutes were already testing new metals formed by the strange energy.
Most of them were useless for construction.
Too brittle.
Too unstable.
Too reactive.
But as Beyblade components?
Absolute miracles.
Lightweight.
Durable.
Energy-conductive.
Perfect.
And while the world scrambled to understand the phenomenon…
The strong got stronger.
Way stronger.
Top bladers weren't just athletes anymore.
They were weapons.
There were reports—unconfirmed, but terrifying—of a single Beyblader wiping out an entire military unit.
One person.
One Beyblade.
One nation brought to its knees.
Sure, it was a small country.
But a country was still a country.
Zevion stared at the screen, expression flat.
"…That escalated fast."
Governments changed their tone overnight.
Beybladers were no longer "sports prodigies."
They were strategic assets.
Recruitment offers exploded.
Money.
Status.
Protection.
Political backing.
If anyone asked what age humanity had entered, every Beyblader would give the same answer:
The Golden Era of Beyblade.
And it had only just begun.
Zevion turned off the TV.
The room fell quiet.
Soon after, he left his home and stepped out onto the street.
Which brought up an important question.
With the world undergoing a full genre shift…
What was Zevion doing right now?
"DAMN IT! WHY DO I STILL HAVE TO COME HERE?!"
CRACK!
A rock skidded violently across the pavement as Zevion kicked it with more force than strictly necessary.
His expression was sour.
Annoyed.
Deeply, spiritually irritated.
Because despite everything—
Despite the school being closed.
Despite society teetering on the edge of Beyblade-based warfare.
Despite literal Bit Beasts walking the Earth—
He still had to show up.
Because today wasn't school.
It was his second regional match.
The WBBA, being the WBBA, had wasted no time.
While everyone else postponed events, delayed schedules, and panicked…
They leaned in.
Hard.
This phenomenon was perfect for them.
Public interest was skyrocketing.
New bladers were emerging.
Power levels were exploding.
What better time to promote Beyblade?
What better time to expand their influence?
What better time to tighten their grip on the world?
And so, tournaments continued.
No delays.
No mercy.
No excuses.
Which meant Zevion—one of their newest and most inconvenient assets—was being dragged back into the spotlight.
Again.
He adjusted his jacket as he walked, Apeiron Sof pulsing faintly in his pocket like a smug reminder.
"Unbelievable," he muttered.
"I survive a fantasy event, and my reward is… more work."
He sighed deeply.
"I just wanted to finish that new anime."
His eyes hardened slightly as the tournament building came into view.
"…Guess I'll end this quickly."
Because if the world was going to spiral into chaos—
He had no intention of being late to his own peace.
By the time Zevion reached the arena, the atmosphere had changed completely.
Yesterday, this place had felt like a sports venue.
Today?
It felt like the center of the world.
The WBBA arena buzzed with restless energy, voices overlapping, the air thick with excitement and tension.
The massive structure gleamed under artificial lights, banners fluttering proudly as if announcing a new age rather than a simple tournament.
Zevion stopped just inside the entrance and scanned the crowd.
"…Yeah," he muttered, "this place definitely caught the apocalypse fever."
It didn't take a genius to tell who had awakened a Bit Beast and who hadn't.
Those who had?
They looked like kids who'd just discovered fire.
Eyes shining.
Postures too straight.
Hands constantly hovering near their Beyblades, itching to launch them at literally anything that moved.
They talked loudly, bragged shamelessly, reenacted their awakenings with dramatic gestures, and radiated an unbearable aura of main-character syndrome.
Those who hadn't awakened anything?
They looked like someone had just had their birthday cancelled.
Slumped shoulders.
Forced smiles.
Murmurs.
Some stared at the ground.
Others stared at the awakened bladers with thinly veiled envy.
It was painfully obvious who had gotten lucky and who hadn't.
Zevion's gaze drifted almost automatically to Valt.
The blue-haired energy bomb was bouncing around the waiting area like gravity was optional, arms flailing as he loudly explained his awakening for the fifth time in ten minutes.
"And then—BOOM!—it just happened! My Bey glowed, and then—WHAM!—I could FEEL it, you know?!"
Zevion watched him for three seconds.
"…I regret having ears."
Then he looked toward Shu.
Shu stood slightly apart from the others, calm as ever, posture relaxed, eyes half-lidded as if the world hadn't just rewritten its rules overnight.
No bragging.
No excitement.
No visible reaction at all.
Zevion narrowed his eyes slightly.
"…Honestly, he's impossible to read."
He couldn't tell if Shu had awakened a Bit Beast already, hadn't yet, or didn't care.
Which somehow made him even more unsettling.
Zevion turned away.
Whatever.
Not his problem.
Soon, it was his turn.
He walked toward his assigned side of the arena with his hands in his pockets, expression neutral.
Truthfully, he had been hoping for a non-awakened opponent.
Not because he was afraid.
But because awakened bladers tended to be loud.
And dramatic.
And exhausting.
Still, he hadn't bothered checking his opponent beforehand.
Why would he?
Looking up opponent data was for people who doubted their victory.
And Zevion had Apeiron Sof.
Awakened Bit Beast or not, nothing here posed a real threat to him.
At worst, he'd lose another launcher.
At best, a lazy hand-spin would still get the job done.
It would just take a bit of time.
Thirty seconds.
Forty, maybe.
A minute if he felt generous.
Even at its weakest state, Apeiron Sof was a monster.
No normal Beyblade—awakened or otherwise—should be able to defeat it.
At least, that's what logic told him.
And logic had been pretty reliable so far.
The stadium lights brightened.
"Ohhh! Looks like we're ready to begin!"
The host's voice boomed through the arena, amplified to an almost aggressive level of enthusiasm.
"Welcome back, everyone! Today marks the second round of our district tournament!"
Cheers erupted.
The crowd was larger than yesterday.
Louder.
More restless.
"And as you all know," the host continued, barely containing himself, "yesterday's mysterious phenomenon has completely changed the world of Beyblade as we know it!"
Zevion sighed quietly.
Here it comes.
"This tournament just got a whole lot more interesting!" the host shouted.
"Many of our bladers have awakened their very own Bit Beasts!"
The audience roared in response.
"And today," the host added dramatically, pausing just long enough to build suspense, "we have one confirmed Bit Beast awakener competing in this match!"
Zevion blinked.
"…Wait. Confirmed?"
He frowned slightly.
He hadn't told anyone about Apeiron Sof.
Not the WBBA.
Not the officials.
Not even the nosy staff.
So, unless the Bey itself had started filling out paperwork behind his back—
"And on one side," the host announced, voice ringing with excitement, "Ken Midori! One of our newly confirmed Bit Beast awakeners! A rising star in the Beyblade world!"
The crowd exploded.
Zevion stared.
"…Oh."
So not me.
Good.
Ken Midori stepped forward, holding his launcher confidently.
He looked calm.
Focused.
And alive with the kind of thrill only people who had just unlocked a new power felt.
Zevion felt a strange, familiar frustration bubble up.
Great.
First match after the comet event… and I get matched with a Bit Beast user.
It felt unfair in a very specific way.
Like rolling for a limited five-star character in a gacha game—
And getting nothing but four-star junk—
While your opponent pulled the exact unit you wanted and immediately challenged you with it.
"…This is rigged," Zevion muttered.
"And on the other side!" the host continued.
"The unorthodox challenger who shocked us all yesterday—winning his match using only one hand!"
A ripple of murmurs ran through the crowd.
"Please welcome—ZEVION!"
The cheers came.
But they were weaker.
Less intense.
Drowned out by the excitement surrounding Bit Beasts.
Zevion stepped onto the stage calmly, eyes half-lidded.
"…Yeah," he thought, "figured as much."
Right now, Bit Beast users are the stars.
Everyone else?
Background characters.
Still, it didn't matter.
He stopped at his position, looked across the arena at Ken Midori, then down at the stadium.
"Well," Zevion thought calmly, slipping his hands into his pockets, "awakened or not…"
His gaze flicked briefly to Apeiron Sof.
"…this ends the same way."
Guaranteed victory.
The only real question was whether he'd have to sacrifice another launcher to make it quick.
And honestly?
He really hoped he wouldn't.
He was already tired.
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Author's Note:
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