The halftime break in the Gauntlet Grounds was not a respite; it was a fifteen-minute countdown to execution. In the stark white recovery room, the euphoria from Kairo's miraculous goal evaporated, leaving behind the cold, hard reality of their physical state. The adrenaline that had fueled their celebratory mobbing had drained away, and what remained was a collection of broken avatars on the verge of system-enforced shutdown.
Jiro's stabilizer field flickered weakly, the "Moderate Injury" now reading as "Severe Strain - Mobility Reduced by 45%." He wouldn't be a traffic cone; he'd be a pylon. Taro and Sora were slumped against the wall, their stamina bars a solid, unblinking red, indicating they had entered "Critical Fatigue." Their breathing came in ragged, virtual gasps. At this level, every sprint would feel like running through syrup, and their reaction times would be slashed. Kenji simply stared at his hands, his "Minor Joint Trauma" now upgraded to "Impaired Wrist Ligament," a direct penalty to his saving animations.
They had given everything for that one, transcendent moment. And now, they had nothing left to give.
"I… I can't feel my legs," Taro whispered, his voice a hollow echo.
"My passing accuracy is down twenty percent," Daichi reported, his tone grimly analytical. "The system is imposing a 'Fatigue Drunk' debuff. We're operating at a severe statistical disadvantage."
Despair, cold and final, began to seep into the room. They had fought so hard, achieved the impossible to equalize, only to be broken by the game's own unforgiving mechanics.
Kairo stood before them, his own body a symphony of pain. But his eyes burned with an intensity that seemed to defy the red numbers blinking next to his health bar. He looked less like a football player and more like a general surveying his troops after a Pyrrhic victory.
"Listen to me," he said, his voice raw but unwavering. "The numbers say we are finished. The stats say we have lost. But the Vanguard out there… they are not looking at our numbers. They are looking into our eyes."
He paced slowly in front of them, making eye contact with each player. "They saw that goal. They saw something that should not exist. They are not confident anymore; they are confused. They are afraid. We have planted a seed of doubt in the mind of a perfect machine. And now, we are going to water it."
He stopped at the holoboard. "The strategy for the second half is simple. It is not about football. It is about psychology. It is about will."
He erased the 5-3-2. "We are not playing a formation. We are playing a lie. We are going to form a 5-4-1 that looks like a 5-2-3. Ren, you are alone up top. Your only job is to channel your exhaustion into manic, unpredictable pressing. Make their defenders nervous to have the ball."
He pointed to the midfield. "Taro, Sora—I don't care if you can't run. I need you to look like you can run. The moment we lose possession, I want you to take two explosive steps towards their player. Just two. Then stop. It will look like the start of a press. It will make them rush their pass."
Finally, he turned to the defense. "Jiro, you are the rock. Do not move. Command. Yell. Point. Be our voice. Daichi, Yumi, you are now our only true defenders. You must cover the entire width of the pitch. Kenji," he said, locking eyes with his keeper. "You are no longer a goalkeeper. You are the last bastion of our will. You will not let a single ball past you. You will defy the system itself."
It was a strategy built not on tactics, but on theater. On sheer, unadulterated grit.
The second half began under a pall of eerie tension. The Aetherium Vanguard took the pitch with a new wariness in their eyes. They passed the ball, but their movements were hesitant, their heads on a swivel, constantly checking for the ghost of Aethelgard's press that never fully came.
Aethelgard, for their part, were a study in controlled collapse. They held their defensive shape, a compact, desperate unit camped on the edge of their own penalty area. When Taro or Sora made their two-step "bursts," the Vanguard players, expecting the frantic pressure from before, would hurriedly play the ball back or sideways, disrupting their own rhythm. They were playing not against Aethelgard's ability, but against the memory of it.
The game became a grueling, ugly stalemate. The Vanguard dominated possession, but their attacks were sterile, probing without conviction. They took long-range shots that Kenji, moving with a painful, visible stiffness, managed to parry away. They sent in crosses that Jiro, rooted to his spot, would yell for Daichi or Yumi to head clear.
The clock became Aethelgard's greatest enemy and their only ally. Every minute that ticked by was a minute they survived, a minute the Vanguard's frustration grew.
In the 65th minute, the Vanguard's playmaker, a cool-headed midfielder, finally found a seam. He played a brilliant through ball that split Aethelgard's tired defense, sending their star striker clean through on goal. It was the chance they had been waiting for. The stadium held its breath.
The striker took a touch, set himself, and fired a powerful, precise shot towards the far corner. It was a goal in any other circumstance.
But Kenji, his body screaming in protest, had read the striker's hips. He had been studying him all half. With a guttural roar that was pure willpower given sound, he launched himself sideways, his "Impaired" wrist be damned. He didn't try to catch it. He threw his entire body, his glove a clenched fist, at the ball.
THUD.
The impact was sickening. The ball ricocheted off his fist, out for a corner. Kenji landed in a heap, his health bar dipping dangerously into the red. But he had saved it. He had defied the stats.
The roar from the Aethelgard faithful was deafening. On the pitch, Daichi hauled Kenji to his feet, screaming in his face, "YES! THAT IS WHAT WE DO!"
The save was a psychological atom bomb. The Vanguard's frustration turned to palpable anxiety. They were throwing everything at a team that was, by all rights, already dead. And the dead would not lie down.
The final ten minutes were a blur of sheer, desperate defense. Aethelgard players threw their bodies in front of shots. They made clearances with their faces. They were no longer playing a game; they were engaged in a primal act of survival. Kairo was everywhere, a limping, pain-wracked specter, intercepting, blocking, and constantly barking orders, his voice the fraying thread holding the entire operation together.
The 90-minute mark arrived. The board went up. Four minutes of added time.
Four minutes in hell.
The Vanguard launched a final, desperate onslaught. A cross, a header, a miraculous save from Kenji. A rebound, a scuffed shot, a block from Jiro who simply fell and let the ball hit him. The ball pinballed around the Aethelgard penalty area, a chaotic, nightmarish scene.
In the 93rd minute, the Vanguard won a corner. This was it. The final play.
The ball sailed into the box. A Vanguard defender, unmarked, rose highest. He connected perfectly, a powerful header aimed down and towards the corner of the net. It was unstoppable.
But Ren, who had tracked back, flung himself horizontally, a human missile with no regard for his own avatar. He didn't head the ball. He took the full force of the header directly in the chest. The sound was a dull, virtual thump. The ball ballooned away. Ren lay on the ground, not moving, his health bar flashing a critical warning.
The referee's whistle blew. Once. Twice. Three times.
FULL TIME.
Aethelgard FC 1 - 1 Aetherium Vanguard.
They had done it. They had survived. The game was going to penalties.
As the Vanguard players sank to their knees in disbelief, the Aethelgard squad didn't celebrate. They couldn't. They simply collapsed where they stood, a scattered collection of broken warriors on the digital grass. They had reached the absolute limit of their endurance, and they had held the line through will alone.
But the war was not over. The most cruel, psychologically devastating test in football awaited: the penalty shootout. And they had nothing left—not legs, not stamina, and barely the spirit to stand.