The second blow arrived in the 34th minute, born from a counter-attack that looked as though Real Madrid had rehearsed it a thousand times back at Valdebebas.
Busquets attempted a sharp, vertical pass straight into Lorenzo's feet. Sergio Ramos anticipated it instantly, stepping in front of the teenager to win the ball cleanly before laying it off first-time to Modrić. The Croatian didn't hesitate. One touch to set, one touch to release, a razor-sharp diagonal switch that sent Di María sprinting down the left channel with only Dani Alves to cover him.
Di María accelerated. Alves matched him stride for stride for three breathless paces before Di María dropped his shoulder and shifted gears, leaving the Brazilian half a yard behind. Looking up across the face of the Barcelona box, the winger spotted Ronaldo launching a devastating run from the left and delivered a low, flat pass into the gap between Mascherano and Piqué.
Ronaldo met it at the edge of the area. One touch with the outside of his right boot to kill the momentum. One touch with the inside to carve out the shooting angle. He didn't even bother looking up at the goal; he already knew precisely where the corners were by pure muscle memory.
The finish was clinical. Low, hard, tucked neatly inside the far post with the lethal precision of a striker who had scored five hundred career goals. Valdés guessed the right way, but it didn't matter. The ball whistled past him before his body could reach full extension.
Fweet—!
0-2.
Camp Nou produced a sound that was less of a groan and more of a heavy, suffocating silence. Ninety-five thousand people processing the unthinkable: their team, their invincible, unbeaten team, was two goals down at home for the first time all season.
Ronaldo celebrated with raw intensity this time. He grabbed the badge on his chest, slapped it twice with an open palm, and bolted toward the Real Madrid technical area, where his substitutes swarmed him. Ancelotti stood slightly apart from the pile of players, arms tightly crossed, his gum working faster than usual. Zinedine Zidane placed a heavy hand on the manager's shoulder.
"Two more and we bury them," Zidane said.
"One more is enough," Ancelotti replied, his eyes locked on the pitch. "If we get the third, they won't recover. Nobody comes back from three-nil at this level."
Further down the Madrid bench, Raphaël Varane and Nacho were already on their feet. Jesé and Álvaro Morata, Lorenzo's former U-21 international teammates, watched from the edge of the dugout with the complicated, conflicted expressions of young players who wanted their friend to succeed but desperately needed their own club to win.
"RONALDO AGAIN!" Santiago roared into the microphone, his voice carrying genuine shock. "Two-nil! A lightning-fast counter-attack finished with breathtaking precision! Real Madrid are tearing Barcelona apart at Camp Nou!"
Inés joined in, breaking down the tactical disaster. "That's the 34th minute. Barcelona have conceded twice at home in a Clásico for the first time since 2012. Ronaldo has two goals, both world-class, both from entirely different areas of the pitch. The long-range screamer and now the clinical transition finish. This is easily the best individual Clásico performance we've seen from Ronaldo in three seasons."
The stadium fell into a heavy, unnatural quiet. Not absolute silence, but a profound hush where ninety-five thousand people sat wrestling with a single terrifying thought: is this the night the streak finally dies?
Twenty-nine matches. Unbeaten. And right now, it was slipping through their fingers.
Out on the pitch, Lorenzo stood near the center circle. Ramos was three yards to his left; Pepe was three yards to his right. He had touched the football all of nine times in thirty-four minutes.
Messi walked over, his expression grim. He didn't offer any empty motivational speeches. He simply looked at Lorenzo, gave a small, honest shrug of his shoulders.
Busquets kicked the turf in sheer frustration. Iniesta stood with his hands planted firmly on his hips, while Xavi lingered near the halfway line, staring blankly down at the grass.
On the Barcelona touchline, Pautasso leaned in close to Martino. "We have to change something, Tata. They are completely cutting through us."
Martino shook his head once, sharply. "Not yet. If I change shape now, I'm telling them I panicked. They need to find a way through this themselves first."
"And if they don't find it?"
"Then I make my changes at halftime." Martino's face remained an unreadable mask, his hands clasped firmly behind his back. Whatever storm was raging inside him, he wasn't sharing it with anyone.
Up in the stands, the Camp Nou faithful began to stir. They weren't leaving or booing, but a restless energy rippled through the tiers.
Then, from the lower tier huddled tight behind Valdés's goal, a single chant sparked to life.
It started quietly. A few hundred voices. Then a few thousand. Within seconds, it swept through the bowl of the stadium like a tidal wave, building section by section until ninety-five thousand people were roaring the exact same words in unison:
Tots units fem força.Com blaugrana al vent,un crit valent: Barça! Barça! Baaarça!
It was a commanding roar. The sound grew so intense that the concrete under the stands began to vibrate, and the players on the pitch could feel the shockwaves through the soles of their boots. Piqué raised a clenched fist toward the south end in fierce acknowledgment. Alba clapped back at the crowd, his jaw set.
In an instant, the emotional gravity of the building shifted. The scoreline was still 0-2, and nothing on the physical scoreboard had changed. But the atmosphere had just transformed from a funeral into a furnace.
Lorenzo felt the shift in his bones. He glanced up at the towering stands, then quickly checked the stadium clock: 34:22. Eleven minutes left until halftime.
He turned sharply to Neymar. "Stop swinging crosses in. Start cutting inside. I'll make the diagonal run behind the line."
Neymar frowned, wiping sweat from his forehead. "They're doubling you every time, man."
"Then one of them has to break coverage when I pull wide. The second he does, you cut inside and shoot or slide it to Leo. If neither opens up, cross it late and I'll get to the back post."
It wasn't a foolproof guarantee. But it was a plan worth trying.
You know what time it is! Drop those Power Stones to keep us climbing the ranks!
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