Yubelluna stopped at the edge of the training yard.
For a moment, she said nothing.
Her violet eyes swept across the empty stone field, the scorched ground, and then finally settled on Riser himself—sweat-soaked, breathing hard, shirt clinging to his body, with enough heat still rolling off him to warp the air.
There was the faintest crease between her brows.
"…Young master."
Riser glanced at her over his shoulder.
She had a tray in her hands. Water, a folded cloth, and something light to eat. Efficient, composed, and immaculate as always.
Only her expression ruined the image slightly.
She looked confused.
That made sense. He probably looked half-dead.
"Don't tell me you've been standing there long enough to watch," Riser said, straightening with more dignity than he actually felt.
"A few moments only." Her gaze shifted briefly to the blackened patches in the yard. "You began training very early."
"Mm."
That was one way to put it.
Yubelluna crossed the remaining distance and stopped close enough to offer the tray without intruding on his personal space.
Riser took the glass first.
The water was cool. Not cold—nothing in a Phenex castle ever really was—but cool enough to feel divine against the back of his throat. He drank half of it in one go, exhaled, and only then realized how thirsty he had been.
Yubelluna watched him quietly.
Her silence stretched just enough to become noticeable.
Finally, she asked, "Are you unwell?"
Riser almost laughed.
That was a polite way of asking why the third son of the Phenex clan had come out before sunrise to nearly cook himself alive doing bodyweight exercises.
"I'm fine," he said.
Yubelluna looked unconvinced.
"With respect, young master, you do not look fine."
That was fair.
His arms were still trembling slightly from the push-ups. His legs felt heavy from the squats. His pride had not recovered at all.
Riser wiped the back of his wrist across his forehead and glanced toward the training field.
"I'm training."
"…Yes," she said carefully. "I noticed."
There was something very restrained in her tone, and that made him look at her more directly.
Ah.
She wasn't mocking him. She was genuinely unsure how to respond.
Canon Riser had probably been many things. Disciplined enough to drag himself through basic conditioning before dawn was not one of them.
For an instant, he was tempted to make some dismissive joke and escape the awkwardness.
Instead, he looked away and said, "I'm weaker than I should be."
Yubelluna blinked.
The answer had clearly not been what she expected.
Riser took another drink from the glass, then handed it back to her. "That's all."
She held the tray a little more carefully, as if the balance of the world had shifted by a fraction and she did not yet trust it.
After a moment she said, "Most young devils of noble birth do not train this way."
"That explains a lot."
The words came out dry enough that Yubelluna paused.
Then, very faintly, the corner of her mouth moved.
Not quite a smile.
But close.
Riser noticed it.
He also noticed, with some irritation, that he was tired enough for that tiny expression to feel like a victory.
Once Yubelluna left, the yard was quiet again.
Riser stood in the center of it, rolling tension out of his shoulders while pulling up the status screen one more time.
The gains from the quest were small.
Painfully small.
But they were there.
That mattered.
A small increase in strength. A small increase in stamina. Better heat tolerance. It wasn't glamorous, but it was proof that this body could be changed. Improved. Dragged upward one miserable step at a time.
He dismissed the screen and stared at his own hand.
Then he ignited it.
Hellfire bloomed over his fingers and wrist, smooth at first, then wavering when his concentration slipped. He tightened his jaw and stabilized it.
The fire was part of him. It responded to thought, instinct, emotion. That had been true from the start.
What had not been true was control.
Until now, he had treated it like a weapon that naturally existed at the end of his arm. Use it. Release it. Burn whatever was in front of him.
That was childish.
What he needed was the ability to shape it, restrain it, wear it, endure it.
Not just attack with it.
Not just look noble with it.
Actually master it.
Riser lowered his hand and thought back to the outline of his future like a blade laid across his mind.
Issei Hyoudou.
Boosted Gear.
A Sacred Gear so absurd it turned patience into power. The longer a fight lasted, the more monstrous Issei became. A normal opponent would be crushed under that kind of growth curve.
Riser wasn't planning to be normal.
The only reason he had any chance at all was because he was Phenex.
A body that healed.
A body that came back.
A body that could be pushed past the point where anyone sensible would stop.
That thought settled in him slowly.
Then all at once.
He could train wrong.
Not carelessly. Not stupidly.
But harder than anyone else his age could afford to.
If his muscles tore, they would recover.
If his body burned, it would recover.
If exhaustion ruined him, then after rest—and enough demonic power—he would recover.
His regeneration wasn't just a defensive trick.
It was a method.
The moment that clicked into place, Riser's eyes sharpened.
"…Right," he murmured.
That was what immortality was for.
Not standing there smugly while someone failed to kill you.
Not relying on clan bloodline to make you arrogant.
It was for enduring what other people couldn't.
For surviving improvement at a rate that would break a normal fighter.
Riser smiled, and this time there was no humor in it.
"Let's try that."
He moved to the far side of the training ground and started running.
The first lap was manageable.
The second was not.
The training yard was larger than it had looked at a glance, built for devil bodies with more stamina than humans and enough open space for aerial maneuvers if needed. By the time he finished a third lap, his breathing had gone ragged again, and the fresh soreness from the earlier quest had settled into his limbs like iron.
He kept going.
Not because it was smart.
Because he needed to find the edge.
At five laps, his calves burned.
At seven, his lungs felt tight.
At eight, he tripped on nothing more than poor foot placement and nearly went down hard enough to lose face to an audience that thankfully did not exist.
By ten, he stopped, bent over, and laughed once under his breath.
This was ridiculous.
This body was ridiculous.
Canon Riser had walked around with a title, a clan, a peerage waiting to happen, and one of the most broken racial abilities in the underworld—and somehow still managed to build himself like this?
No wonder Issei had run him over.
No wonder the whole thing had become a humiliation ritual disguised as a rating game.
Riser straightened slowly and looked toward the distant edge of the yard, where heat haze shimmered above the stone.
Future Issei wasn't here yet.
He wasn't standing in front of him with the Boosted Gear on his arm and protagonist nonsense in his veins.
But the shadow of that fight was already pressing against everything.
And Riser hated it.
Hated that a boy he had never actually met could sit so heavily in his thoughts.
Hated that the original owner of this body had left him such a rotten foundation.
Hated that if he did nothing, the future was already written.
That anger was useful too.
He set his jaw and ignited his hellfire again, thinner this time, like a second layer of skin.
Then he began striking.
A simple sequence first.
Right straight.
Left straight.
Step.
Pivot.
Again.
He had memories of combat forms from this body—polished fragments drilled in by tutors and instructors. But memory was not mastery. The motions were there. The body behind them wasn't.
He punched until his shoulders ached.
Then kept going.
Heat rolled off him in waves. His fist movements slowed. Fire sputtered around his wrists whenever his focus slipped.
He corrected it.
Forced the shape back into place.
Again.
Again.
Again.
The rhythm built. A bad one at first, then something slightly better.
He began mixing movement into it. Advancing with strikes. Shifting weight. Rotating through the hips rather than just throwing his arms forward like an angry noble child in a tantrum.
By the time the first real crack in his stamina hit, sweat was pouring down his face and his shirt clung to him so tightly it felt like a second hide.
He threw one more right hand.
His shoulder gave a sharp, ugly protest.
Riser hissed and staggered back a half-step.
For a second he stood still, breathing hard, hand on his own shoulder.
The joint didn't feel damaged, exactly.
Strained.
Overused.
Pushed too far for the current level of conditioning.
He could stop.
That would be sensible.
He didn't.
Riser lowered his hand, rolled the shoulder once despite the discomfort, and reignited the fire around his fists.
"If it breaks," he muttered, "it heals."
That was the whole point.
He resumed.
The next ten minutes were ugly.
Nothing elegant in them. Nothing noble. No smooth, heroic montage fit for a story illustration. Just a blond devil noble on a mostly empty training field, sweating and grimacing and forcing his body through one repetition after another while hellfire licked around his knuckles and forearms.
He looked feral.
He felt worse.
But when the strain in his shoulder slowly began to fade under the influence of regeneration, something fierce and bright flared in his chest.
There.
That.
It worked.
Not instantly. Not perfectly. But enough.
If he rested intelligently, fed himself enough demonic power, and pushed without turning his own brain off, then yes—he could train beyond the usual limit. Not infinitely. Not carelessly. But further.
Much further.
A blue window flickered into existence.
[Training recognized.]Host has successfully pushed beyond standard physical limits for current level.Minor EXP gained.STR +1STM +1
Riser stared at it.
Then barked out a tired laugh.
"Minor EXP."
It sounded insulting.
It also sounded beautiful.
Because it meant the system had acknowledged what he was doing.
It meant he was no longer just flailing around inside his own panic.
He was progressing.
Slowly.
Painfully.
Almost offensively slowly.
But progressing.
He dismissed the notification and dropped down to sit on the warm stone at the edge of the field before his legs could make the decision for him.
The underworld sky above the castle had lightened by a fraction, from deep crimson-black to a duller red-gray. Morning, such as it was here, had arrived.
Riser leaned back on his hands and stared upward.
His whole body ached.
His arms were rubber.
His shoulder still throbbed faintly.
He felt disgusting.
And for the first time since waking up in this world, genuinely, unmistakably alive.
Not secure.
Not confident.
Not anywhere near ready.
But moving.
He pulled up his status screen one more time and watched the numbers with narrowed eyes.
The increases were still small.
Still embarrassing compared to where he needed to be.
Still nowhere close to enough.
But the difference between this morning and now existed.
That was enough for one day.
Not satisfying.
Not comforting.
Enough.
Riser let the screen vanish and lowered his head, breathing slowly through the lingering heat in his lungs.
Future Issei still existed.
The story still existed.
Boosted Gear still existed.
The humiliation waiting for canon Riser still existed.
But maybe—just maybe—the version of him sitting here now was not the same idiot who would walk willingly into that future and smile like he had already won.
Maybe this Riser would earn something different.
He shut his eyes for a moment.
Then opened them again, looked at the ruined patches of stone around him, and smirked despite the exhaustion.
"…Tomorrow's going to suck."
And somehow, that no longer sounded like defeat.