"I… I actually lost to a brat like this? Unacceptable!"
Winged Kuriboh LV10's ten-thousand-damage strike shattered the Sacred Beasts, and within the Shadow Game, that radiance became a purifying light enveloping Locke Slint.
When a body soaked in darkness is engulfed by light, what awaits is purification—death.
"Aaaaahhhhhh—!"
His scream within the pillar of light was more pitiful than Reigun Seth's. The bulging muscles of Locke's body, his overflowing life energy, drained away in the purifying brilliance like air leaking from a punctured balloon.
"My life… my eternal life, that I pursued for half my years!"
All he ever cared for was transcending human limits—for eternal life.
He spent the latter half of his life pursuing it, paying unimaginable costs, steeped in untold blood.
Family, clan, country, even his basic humanity… he abandoned all of it, just to live longer.
And yet, that eternity, which he had already grasped, now slipped away in an instant.
The culprit was this youth before him, one he had once scorned.
Even now, Locke Slint didn't understand how he had lost—how he had been utterly defeated by a child not even a fifth his age.
'The Millennium Puzzle?!'
As the light cracked his Millennium Eye, he glared at the Millennium Puzzle at the girl's chest.
His defeat must be because the Eye was weaker than the Puzzle.
"If only I had decided to kill you the moment we first met…"
Would things have been different?
Albeit, the Shadow Game allows no regrets. There was no time for remorse.
When the purifying glow faded, Locke's muscle-swollen body shriveled, returning to his original elderly form.
No… older still.
A skeletal husk, frail and withered, barely clinging to its last breath.
There was no sympathy to be had. This was the retribution for bloody hands stretched toward eternal life.
Aisha said, astounded, "Amazing, Miles! You really won… You defeated the Empire Marshal! Doesn't that mean you're already one of the strongest Duelists on the Spirit Continent?"
After all, he had been famous even in other nations. That victory made Aisha's excitement understandable.
But Miles's ambition reached further.
"No need for 'one of.' From the start, our goal was the strongest—the only."
And this duel had relied on countless variables. Mind games, deception, even Professor Field's sacrifice, trading himself for a light that surpassed destiny itself.
So many factors stacked together—Miles wasn't confident they could ever be repeated.
"Professor!"
As the black mist faded, Ren rushed to Professor Field.
Though defeated in the Shadow Game, his condition was better than expected—not nearly as ravaged as Reigun or Locke.
Perhaps destroying his Spirit Eyes mid-duel lessened the Shadow Game's damage.
Even so, losing the Spirit Eyes was still a heavy price.
"P-professor, it's my fault… You lost your Spirit Eyes because I wasn't strong enough."
However, the professor didn't see it that way. He ruffled Ren's red hair, and the normally stone-faced Iron Demon let out a rare, booming laugh.
"Hahahahaha!"
The sudden laughter from one who never smiled was terrifying in itself.
"Well done, Ren, and everyone! To witness my students shining so brilliantly… what more could a teacher ask for? There's nothing left to regret."
From the start, his conviction had never wavered. Since the day he joined Fusion Academy, Field had vowed to put his students' futures first.
So seeing them triumph over darkness and step onto a radiant path, his smile now was from the depths of his heart.
"The black fog… It's gone?" Kaima raised her gaze to the sky, not even sparing her dying father a glance.
When the Sacred Beasts awakened, the dark mist had spread across the capital, draining life force. But the three lights of the duels had driven it away.
And with Locke's defeat, the stolen life returned, and unconscious duelists began to wake.
Yet though the black fog had dispersed, the original thick mist still hung, keeping visibility low.
Unlike the fog born of the Sacred Beasts, this mist was from the Millennium Items themselves. To dispel it would require their power as well.
As Miles considered this, Aisha's ears twitched—she heard rapid footsteps atop the capital's rooftops. Tiles shattered as someone sprinted closer.
"Careful, something's coming!"
The figure closed in with inhuman speed. In just seconds, the golden-haired silhouette leapt past them like a gale.
If she had struck with lethal force, the battered duelists couldn't have stopped her.
Luckily, they weren't her target.
"Hand it over, old man!"
With a voice sharp and familiar, the golden figure passed straight through Locke's frail body—literally through him.
In an instant, blood sprayed. Locke Slint's Millennium Eye—and half his skull—were ripped out. The once-great Empire Marshal died on the spot.
And there, before them, stood a familiar figure.
Golden hair. A bloody Millennium Eye clutched in her hand. Like a red rose blooming in gore—Luca Slint.
"Luca… you were tied up in a tree, weren't you?" Miles demanded, instantly sensing something was wrong. "Are you really Luca?"
Not only were her earlier impossible feats beyond human, but the scar at the corner of her eye had vanished.
Her skin, flawless and pale, her face as pure as an angel's. Yet with the Millennium Eye in her grasp, she was a slaughtering angel fallen into blood.
...
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