The combatants soon found themselves in an ancient arena made of huge crimson stones, with the corners of the arena having colossal chess pieces placed in them. The surrounding space was surreal and beautiful. It was as if they were in space, surrounded by the gas of a crimson nebula.
At one end were the Phenex brothers Ruval and Riser Phenex, while at the other end were the Dragon Emperors Uzumaki Ruto and Namikaze Haru.
The first ones to step forward were Haru and Riser, while Ruto and Ruval hung back until they were tagged in by their respective partners.
"I'm ready to go if you are Riser." Haru challenged as his crimson Scale Mail began to encase his form.
"You messed with the wrong Devil House this time Namikaze! My brothers are gonna tear you both apart." Ravel called through a sort of televised rift in the space above the arena.
Ruto glared at the youngest Phenex. "Shut it pipsqueak. I have questions for you once we're done here."
"I really wish she'd behave in a more suitable manner." Ruval said disparagingly.
"Hmm, they are quite sure of themselves, but I'll show them the difference between confidence and blind stupidity." Riser said, filled with his own confidence.
"Pot calling the kettle black, asshole!" Ruto retorted.
"Enough of this talk." Riser's wings of flame emerged and he took off from the ground. "Come Namikaze, fight me!" He flew quickly at Haru, whose Scale Mail's thrusters matched his speed.
"Alright time for a boost." he muttered hurriedly. "Promotion: Queen!" Haru felt a fresh surge of power rush through his body as he continued his charge at Riser.
"It's no use boy!" Riser shouted as he threw a torrent of flame down at the Gremory Pawn.
"Die!" Haru retorted, going in for a powerful punch.
Rias herself was shocked to the core at Haru's sheer determination to get her back. It was endearing, infuriating, worrying and downright loveable all at the same time.
"I may not have the skills with swords like Kiba. I sure as hell don't have Akeno's talent for magic. My strength pales in comparison to Koneko's, and my fortitude is like a bundle of sticks compared to Rossweisse's. I wouldn't know where to start in being a healer like Asia, and there's no way in hell that I have Ruto's mastery of strategy."
Ruto listened and was grinning like a mad man. "Good lord, he sounds anime as fuck right now."
"I might not be anything like them, but there's one thing I do have plenty of. And that's heart!" He met Riser's flight with a powerful uppercut to the stomach. Riser quickly pulled back as pain blossomed in his abdomen. However, recovery came quickly as the phoenix regeneration kicked in.
"Shine forth! Over-Booster!" Haru's left gauntlet shined brightly with green light as power flooded the gem in the back of the gauntlet.
[Welsh Dragon Over-Booster!]
A new wave of power coursed through Haru's Scale Mail and his thrusters fired out more green magic particles. He rushed at Riser again, this time creating an orb of red energy and firing it at the Phenex Devil.
"Rias doesn't belong to you!"
Riser barely dodged the orb as it sheered off his arm, which quickly regenerated in a spew of flames. He got in close and landed heavy, but extremely fast blows on Riser. He was literally punching holes through him, causing him immense pain but regenerating instantly. He then took a hold of Riser's face and charged up another orb.
"This is for Rias!" he fired it, blasting Riser into the ground of the arena, making a deep, wide crater that smoked from the heat of the orb. However, Riser wouldn't go down that easily as he was quickly back in action.
"If you thought that was enough to defeat me, then you're sadly mistaken!" flames enveloped Riser's limbs and he delivered a devastating combo of attacks that dented and burned the Scale Mail. Riser drove his knee into Haru's stomach, and blood flew from Haru's mouth.
"Your armour isn't so much armour as it is a second skin. You can still feel my attacks, boy, but the armour dampens the impact. Surely you must have known that." he snapped his view to Ruval and nodded. The elder Devil rushed in to aid Riser in whatever he was doing.
Shit, they're going for a tag-team attack! Ruto thought in alarm. He flew in just as Riser created a large ball of flames above his head and Ruval was going in for a pinwheel kick that was intended to send Haru careening into the ground below. Ruto intercepted the kick by grabbing Ruval's leg.
[Divide!]
Ruval winced as he felt his power lessen and quickly went wide eyed as he was spun around by his leg and punted into his brother. Riser's loss of control of his power from the impact of his brother hitting him caused the immense fireball to explode, engulfing them both in the destructive blast.
He placed a hand on Haru's shoulder. "Sorry, need to borrow this."
[Divide!]
Ruto's mana was now rich with Haru's heightened power, and he began to create a very large and very complex white magic circle. The circle crackled with white energy and a red tinge filtered throughout the circle.
Alright, time to let this baby loose. he smirked as he released a deadly stream of utter destruction into the hole in the wall that the two brothers were in as a result of the explosion. It won't keep them down, but it'll really knock their strength. The arena rumbled as the resulting explosion cracked the stone all around the arena and even the massive chess pieces were damaged.
Haru hovered close to Ruto and stared into the cloud of smoke and dust that billowed forth from the crater Ruto had created.
"Boost a few times Haru. They're not done yet." Ruto ordered. Like a missile, Ruval rocketed out of the crater and straight at Ruto. The two collided and exchanged blows at seemingly super sonic speed, their attacks unseen by the untrained eye.
77 blows had rocked Ruto within the span of mere seconds, he'd blocked at least two hundred, while he'd landed around 63 hits. But each hit that slipped through his defence was painful. Ruval countered a ferocious kick by grabbing Ruto's leg and letting loose a torrent of blueish-orange flames, scorching and blackening Ruto's armour.
Ruto screamed in agony as the heat was beginning to boil him alive. He decided to use one of his very dangerous magics.
Oh fuck me this is gonna hurt. Ruto thought with a pained cringe. 'But against someone this strong, I'm gonna need to use it.'
That's when Ruto use the super charged version of a forbidden magic called "Immortal Poison Cloud".
It was a spell that would drain its user of most of its life essence in exchange for power, then anything caught in the cloud of poisonous magical energy would disintegrate anything in it besides its user. Anyone with rapid regeneration would struggle to survive, and would still have a lot of trouble regenerating after the attack. If the victim survived, they would be severely weakened by the noxious mana poisoning their own reserves.
Haru saw Ruto being torched and darted for him. Riser blocked his path, but Haru had a trick up his sleeve. He uncoiled the silver cross necklace that Asia gave him and placed it in his left hand. The pain he was in just from holding it was excruciating, but luckily he had Ruto hold onto it until the fight began.
Ruto had asked why he didn't just have him use it, but Haru just told him it was personal, and that he'd use it. Haru exchanged a powerful punch to the face with Riser, him spitting out more blood and Riser going into throes of agony from being hit with a cross.
"Argh! What the… this pain, it burns! Why is it burning!?" he caught the glint of the cross in the corner of his eye and his eyes widened in horror. "Is that a cross! How can a Devil like you be holding a cross!"
He was answered by a bright white explosion that blinded almost every spectator. Up above, a cloud of white flame and energy burned and pulsated with Ruto at its core. Ruval was falling towards the ground quickly, his wounds regenerating much slower than they should. He was then followed by Ruto, who fell limply with his own Scale Mail slowly dissolving as he fell.
Damn! Ruto! Haru thought, fearing his friend's condition. I gotta hurry up and finish this. I can't keep this up for long with this kind of pain.
Sirzechs watched in awe as Ruto purposefully sacrificed his own ability to fight to take out Ruval, and placing his faith in Haru to win. Incredible. Ruto has not only defeated Ruval, but actually placed his faith in another. Do not let him down Haru. For your sake.
Grayfia also watched in awe, but her stoic expression was betrayed by the worry in her eyes. She promised herself she'd scold Ruto harshly for being so reckless.
Rias and her Peerage were also in disbelief, with Rossweisse suddenly feeling sick with the gut wrenching fear she felt for Ruto's wellbeing.
Haru, for fuck sake hurry up. You don't have long left with the Scale Mail because of your lack of experience. Ruto thought weakly as he struggled to remain conscious. He looked around wearily to see Ruval slumped against a wall panting heavily and struggling to regenerate from his extensive wounds.
Haru flew at Riser, not realising he'd gone way past his limits with all of the fighting and the armour fell apart, leaving Haru stumbling towards Riser as he tried to maintain his balance. Now the pain of holding the cross intensified to unbelievable levels. He writhed in pain and threw the cross a short distance to the side, a twinge of guilt hitting him as he did so. It was Asia's after all.
Riser smirked evilly and hoisted Haru up by the front of his shirt. "Your efforts are wasted Namikaze. You try to fight me once and lose. You try to trample on tradition and the future of Devil kind. Then you fight me again and the cycle repeats itself." he chuckled cockily.
"Oh yeah? Lost you say? Well then, try this one you fucking asshole!" he pulled a bottle of holy water from his pocket that by some miracle hadn't broken in the fight. Ruto watched with a grin of his own.
Looks like I owe you one Michael.
Haru opened the bottle and spilled the contents on Riser's face, transferring power to the liquid as he did so. Unbearable struck Riser as the flesh of his face melted and refused to regenerate.
Can't regenerate now can you, you bastard. Not when your mind is under an attack like this. You mind and body a burning Riser. Ha, you've lost. Ruto looked to the spot the cross lay. It wasn't too far away, and he could feel his strength returning, albeit very, very slowly. He began a slow crawl towards the cross.
"How do you like that Riser? Thanks to Asia, I know that Devils are vulnerable to crosses and holy water."
Riser threw another torrent of hell fire at Haru, he leapt high into the air to dodge the attack. "Kiba taught me to widen my field of vision in a battle."
Ruto made it to the cross and picked it up. He quickly made to stand, only to realise it was rather painful to move too quickly. He looked over to Haru and Riser to see Haru preparing to finish Riser off.
"Akeno taugh to to—"
"Christ Haru, stop monologuing and beat his ass!" Ruto yelled as he half sprinted half limped towards them. Riser turned a moment too late and Ruto turned him around by his shoulder, punched him in the stomach with the cross in his and then uppercut him in the chin. Riser stumbled backwards and slumped to the ground, defeated and shamed.
"Looks like we won dude." Ruto said with an exhausted smile at Haru.
"Yup."
"I hope everyone saw that. I am not doing that self-destruct bullshit again."
"Still though. Hell of a way to crash a wedding."
The two were silent for a while, but then Ruto started chuckling, and then so did Haru. The two soon found themselves laughing loudly with each other, simply glad they'd won.
"Dude, how many people can say they crashed a wedding like this? We're fucking legends dude." Ruto said still with little fits of giggling.
Rias looked at the two with tears in her eyes. They'd saved her. Saved her from a life she never wanted to live. Sure, to Ruto it was most likely a side goal, but she was grateful all the same.
Sirzechs approached Rias from behind her. He stood with her and announced "This battle is done."
Ruto and Haru suddenly panicked as the entire arena began to crumble. "Whoa, holy shit!" Ruto struggled to stay upright as any section of ground he stepped on crumbled just a little bit faster. "Dude, we gotta get the fuck outta here!"
Suddenly as the ground crumbled further, Ruval swooped over and picked up Riser. Ruto and Haru weren't so lucky as they fell as the last of the ground vanished. The two kept falling, Haru was screaming while Ruto just gave a resigned sigh of disappointment.
Haru stopped screaming once he was caught by Koneko. Ruto however, was still falling. He saw Akeno and Kiba up there, but no one came to catch him.
Dicks… he thought in mock hurt. But he suddenly felt an impact hit him as he was caught by someone, and he swore, if he didn't know this person was a Devil or Valkyrie, he'd think they were an Angel.
"Oh hey." he greeted with a tired grin. Rossweisse looked at him with a look torn between joy and anger.
"Don't 'oh hey' me. Jerk." she said with tears in her eyes. Ruto was confused.
"Huh, what're you crying for? Stop that." he said in growing concern.
"How can you be so dense you idiot? You nearly killed yourself in there." she cried. Tears rolled down her cheeks and Ruto gave her a warm smile. He wiped a tear away with his thumb and rested a hand on her cheek.
"Nearly being the operative word. I'm still kicking Rossweisse, it'll take more than my own idiocy to kill me." he said in his own comforting way. She hugged him close to her and instead of being awkward or sarcastic, he simply smiled and gave in to his exhaustion. He leaned into her and was out like a light.
Grayfia and Sirzechs stood on a balcony enjoying the sight of the night sky. The Griffon Sirzechs had prepared for them soared with Haru and Rias on its back.
"I had that ready just in case they needed to make a hasty escape." Sirzechs said.
"I'm relieved it didn't come to that. We would have had quite the mess on our hands." Grayfia replied. She truly was relieved. There were so many things Ruto and Haru couldn't have foreseen, and despite the odds stacked against them, they persevered and won in the end.
"Not to worry. My father and Lord Phenex have come to an accord. However I find it quite a shame that an engagement like this fell apart the way it did." he said with a subtle smile creeping onto his youthful face.
"Yes indeed. You look truly devastated." Grayfia said in a subtly dry way.
"Who would have thought it? That our fortune could be so great that we have both of the Dragon Emperors on our side? It's quite something."
"It seems that the encounter with the Great Red the Ouroboros was talking about will happen soon. But with those two around, with Ruto's mind and Haru's heart, we'll be in good hands." Grayfia said coolly.
Sirzechs smiled and put an arm around Grayfia's waist. "But in the meantime, we should all try to enjoy the time we have now. If anyone has earned it, it's those boys who rescued my sister."
"Indeed they have. What of the girl Ruto was searching for?"
"Don't worry about that. She's being taken care of as we speak. She'll be at Ruto's place soon."
Grayfia chuckled heartily. "You know that's just going to annoy him as usual, right?"
Sirzechs shrugged. "That's down to him, isn't it?"
With their goal accomplished and Riser defeated, Ruto and the Gremory Peerage had time to enjoy the peace they'd earned. However, like all good things, it wasn't going to last forever.