Issei stood before the group with his hands in his pockets. There was no trace of the red gauntlet, but his mere presence made the air feel heavy.
"Listen up," Issei began, his voice cutting through the wind. "Raiser thinks this game will be a walk in the park because he has veteran pieces and the power of immortality. But we are going to break the rules. In these ten days, you will stop being devils and fallen angels to become a single weapon of war."
"Train with them!?" Kiba exclaimed, clenching his fist. "Issei, this is too much!"
"Kiba, your speed is useless if Raiser heals before you finish your thrust," Issei cut him off coldly. "You will train with Kalawarner. Her light spears will force you to move in angles you've never known. Koneko, you and Mittelt will work on aerial impact tactics. The strength of a nekomata launched at the speed of a fallen angel is something no Rook of Raiser's will be able to stop."
Issei turned toward Rias and Akeno, who were watching him with a mixture of awe and respect.
"You two are the heavy bombardment," Issei said. "But Raiser regenerates through energy overload. Raynare, you will teach them to identify the power flow nodes in winged beings. If they learn to strike where the magic is born, his 'immortality' will fail."
"And what will you do, Issei?" Rias asked, noticing that the boy hadn't summoned any weapon. "How are you going to fight us without magic?"
Issei smiled fiercely. Suddenly, a crushing gravitational pressure emanated from his body. It wasn't magical energy; it was pure killing intent and aura control. The ground beneath his feet cracked, and everyone—devils and fallen alike—dropped a knee to the floor out of sheer survival instinct.
"I will be the obstacle," Issei declared, his eyes glowing with an intense green light without manifesting the gauntlet. "All of you against me. I'll only use my bare hands. If you can't make me take even a single step back by the end of the day, there will be no rest. I don't want to see elegant magic; I want to see instinct."
The training was brutal. Issei moved like a shadow, parrying light spears with his palm and stopping Koneko's strikes with a single finger. To every attack, Issei responded with a tactical correction or a sharp blow that left them breathless, forcing them to work as a team.
"Faster!" Issei roared while dodging a lightning bolt from Akeno. "If you can't coordinate an attack between a devil and a fallen angel, Raiser will turn you into ashes!"
By the seventh day, the change was total. Kiba and Kalawarner exchanged thrusts in a perfect dance of steel and light. Rias and Raynare combined magic circles to create hybrid barriers. Issei watched them from a rock, satisfied. No one suspected that the true power of their "master" was still sleeping beneath his skin, waiting for the moment of execution.
«You have them ready, partner,» Ddraig whispered in his mind. «And the best part is that Raiser still believes you're just a strong human. He doesn't know the Dragon is waiting for him in the shadows.»
The night before the duel, the camp was silent. Issei sat on a rock, watching the moon and mentally polishing the final details of the strategy. The calm was interrupted by the soft rustle of leaves: Rias was approaching, wearing a light robe that billowed in the night breeze.
She sat beside him, keeping silent for a long time. Issei noticed that the confidence she displayed during training had transformed into something more vulnerable, more human.
"Tomorrow is the day," Rias whispered, looking at her own hands. "For ten days, I've watched you turn us into something I never thought possible. But now that the moment is near... I'm afraid, Issei."
Issei looked at her from the corner of his eye, maintaining the serenity that had become his trademark.
"It's normal to be afraid, Rias. But you aren't afraid of defeat; you're afraid of losing the freedom you can already feel between your fingers."
Rias shook her head and turned toward him. Her blue eyes shone with a different intensity.
"It's not just that. It scares me not to be strong enough to stand by your side. These days I've realized that I don't know who you really are, where your strength comes from, or why you protect me with such determination... but I also realized that, for the first time, someone isn't looking at me as 'Rias Gremory,' the heiress, but simply as me."
Rias moved a bit closer, and the warmth of her presence enveloped Issei.
"You've given me hope when I had nothing left," she continued, her voice trembling. "Issei... if something goes wrong tomorrow, if Raiser tries to do something to you... I..."
"It's not going to go wrong," Issei interrupted, placing a hand on her cheek with a tenderness that made her shiver. "Tomorrow you're going to walk toward your freedom, and I'll be right behind you to make sure no one stops you."
Rias closed her eyes at the touch of his hand. In that moment, the barrier of "master and student" or "President and subordinate" broke completely. She leaned toward him, resting her forehead against his shoulder, seeking refuge in the solidity of his body.
"Thank you, Issei..." Rias murmured, and by the way her heart beat forcefully against his chest, Issei knew her feelings had changed forever. "Promise me that, after this is over, we'll stay together. Not as pieces in a game, but... like this."
Issei wrapped an arm around her, shielding her from the night chill.
"I promise, Rias. This is only the beginning of our true story."
«Partner, this is the flame that is truly worth protecting,» Ddraig commented with an unusually soft tone. «A phoenix burns for pride, but a dragon burns for what he loves.»
They stayed like that, in a shared silence that spoke louder than a thousand words, while the moon marked the beginning of the end of Raiser Phoenix's oppression