His skull felt like it was splitting open.
The melodic, hollow voice of the Fallen Angel still echoed sickeningly behind his eyes. It was fighting with his own thoughts. He forced himself to focus on the girl standing over him.
The rain did not touch her.
Ren lay flat against the broken asphalt. He watched her through half-closed, blood-crusted eyes. The torrential downpour simply bent around the girl with the crimson hair. It was an unnatural, terrifying display of passive power. It made the air in the alley feel incredibly thick. It smelled heavily of old copper, wet garbage, and a sudden, cloying scent of crushed roses.
Her blue-green eyes pinned him to the ground. They held the clinical detachment of a researcher examining a dying insect.
"I asked you a question," she said. Her voice did not raise in volume. It did not need to. The sheer weight of her tone vibrated in Ren's chest. It aggravated the agonizing burn left by the light spear. "Who are you? And why is the stench of a Fallen Angel clinging to your clothes?"
Ren tried to open his mouth. A wet, ragged cough tore its way up his throat instead. More blood spilled over his lips. It slid down his chin to mix with the dirty water on the pavement.
His vision doubled. The cold was no longer just on his skin. It was creeping into his veins.
He needed leverage. He needed the System.
System, he thought. The mental command felt like dragging a heavy stone across a dry riverbed. His brain was misfiring.
The heavy scent of burning parchment flared briefly behind his eyes. The golden text flickered into existence. It was horribly unstable. It glitched in and out of focus.
[Target: Rias Gremory.][Classification: High-Class Devil. Heiress to the Gremory Clan.][Warning: Host vitality is critical. Soul capacity is at 4 percent.][Attempting to draft a Provisional Contract with a High-Class entity will result in immediate catastrophic cardiac arrest. System entering preservation mode.]
The golden text dissolved into violent static. Then, absolute nothingness. The System went completely dormant. It retreated into the dark corners of his mind to keep him from dying instantly. It left him entirely alone.
There would be no magical tethers. There would be no forced compliance. He was a broken human bleeding out in a gutter. He had to do this manually, with a brain completely deprived of oxygen.
"Local," Ren whispered. The word tasted like iron. It was a wet, pathetic rasp. "Just a... student."
Rias Gremory did not blink. She took a slow, deliberate step forward. The heel of her immaculate leather shoe clicked sharply against the wet concrete. The sound echoed painfully inside Ren's skull.
"A local student," she repeated. The velvet in her voice hardened into ice. "A normal student does not survive an encounter with a Fallen Angel. A normal student is a corpse before the spear even materializes. Yet you are breathing. Barely. But breathing."
She stopped a few feet away from him. She looked down at the horrifying, cauterized hole in the center of his chest.
"She had a spear," Rias observed. Her eyes narrowed just a fraction. "She struck you. I can feel the residual holy heat burning your organs. But she stopped. Fallen Angels do not hesitate. They do not leave loose ends. Why did she leave you alive?"
Ren forced his hands flat against the freezing asphalt. His fingers were completely numb. They felt like blocks of wood. He pushed himself backward anyway. He dragged his ruined body until his shoulders hit the rough brick wall of the alley.
He sat up. The movement tore a pathetic, stifled groan from his throat. The parasitic contract he had formed with Raynare was a quiet, thrumming weight feeding on his remaining stamina.
He rested the back of his head against the wet brick. He fought to keep his eyes focused on her face.
"We came..." Ren gasped. His chest heaved unevenly. He lost the next word. His brain simply stalled. It misfired under the heavy demonic pressure radiating from her. He swallowed thick blood. "...to an understanding."
A flicker of genuine surprise crossed Rias's perfectly composed face. It was gone in a millisecond. Devils were arrogant predators. They expected humans to beg. They did not expect cryptic defiance from a boy who could barely string two words together.
"An understanding," Rias said softly. A dangerous, beautiful smile touched the corners of her lips. "You made a deal with a Fallen Angel. You are either incredibly foolish, or you are hiding something very dangerous."
"Pragmatist," Ren choked out. His head rolled slightly to the side. He forced it back to the center. "She wanted something. Convinced her... I was useful."
Rias crouched down. She moved with a fluid, inhuman grace that made Ren's stomach turn. Her face was now level with his. The scent of crushed roses grew overwhelming. It was intoxicating. It was designed to bypass logic and disarm prey.
She reached out a pale, perfectly manicured hand. Her fingertips hovered an inch over the horrific burn on his chest.
Ren flinched. The instinctual terror of a predator being too close spiked in his blood. His heart gave a weak, erratic flutter.
"Your heart is failing," Rias stated quietly. The cold detachment in her eyes softened into a strange, proprietary warmth. "The holy energy is actively burning your internal organs. You have perhaps two minutes before your brain dies. You will expire in this mud, pragmatist."
She pulled her hand back. When she opened her palm, a small, intricate object rested there.
It was a chess piece. A pawn. It was carved from a strange, crimson material that seemed to pulse with an internal, bloody light.
The aura radiating from the piece was suffocating. It bypassed Ren's logical brain entirely. It spoke directly to his failing cells. It promised warmth. It promised incredible strength. It promised an immediate, euphoric end to the agonizing pain tearing through his chest.
"I can save you," Rias said. Her voice took on a hypnotic, layered resonance. It was the voice of a savior offering absolute salvation. "I can take away the pain right now. I can give you a new life. A life with purpose, power, and a family that will never abandon you. All you have to do is take my hand."
The temptation was absolute agony.
Ren's human instincts screamed at him to accept. The red pawn glowed like a lighthouse in a freezing storm. He wanted to live. The chaotic, primal part of his brain begged him to just say yes and sleep.
But the negotiator remained awake. He analyzed the board through the fog of pain. Cost versus cost. If he took the piece, he would be bound biologically to the King. Absolute servitude. His thoughts, his loyalties, his very identity would be permanently rewritten. He would trade a quick death in a dark alley for an eternity as a disposable chess piece.
Ren stared at the glowing red piece. Five seconds passed. Then ten.
The silence in the alley grew agonizing. His freezing body begged him to reach out. He visualized his old boardroom. He visualized a dog on a heavy steel leash.
He chose the freezing cold.
Ren closed his eyes. He gathered every ounce of spite and control he had left in his shivering body.
"No... blind contracts."
The words were broken. They were barely a whisper. But they cut through the heavy sound of the rain like a gunshot.
The hypnotic warmth radiating from the pawn vanished instantly. Ren forced his heavy eyelids open.
Rias Gremory was staring at him. Her hand was still extended. The beautiful smile had completely evaporated. For the first time, her absolute composure cracked. She looked genuinely shocked.
"You are refusing," she said. Her mind was struggling to process the data. "You are dying. Your organs are shutting down. I am offering you life. And you are refusing me."
"Don't belong... on a chessboard," Ren coughed. A fresh, thick wave of blood spilled from his lips. His head fell back hard against the wet brick. "Keep... your pawn."
A dangerous, suffocating silence fell over the alley. The power radiating from Rias flared violently. It was a heavy, demonic pressure that pressed down on Ren's chest like a physical weight. Her pride had been struck. She was offering grace to a dying human in the gutter, and he had spat on it.
"You would rather rot in the mud than serve me?" Her voice dropped an octave. It carried the faint, terrifying echo of a beast growling in the dark.
Ren opened his mouth to reply.
His brain misfired completely.
The alleyway flickered violently. The striking crimson of her hair dissolved into a sterile, fluorescent white. For one terrifying, breathless second, Ren was not looking at Rias Gremory. He was looking at Marcus, the rival corporate liquidator who had ordered his assassination. The pouring rain sounded exactly like the boardroom window shattering under gunfire.
"Marcus..." Ren mumbled. His eyes lost focus. They rolled loosely in his skull. "The offshore accounts... they don't match."
He blinked hard. A violent spasm racked his chest. The hallucination shattered like brittle glass. He was back in the filthy alley. The girl with the crimson hair was staring at him. Her brow was furrowed in cold, calculating confusion.
Hypoxia. His brain was starving for oxygen. His memories were bleeding into each other. He was losing control.
He had to play the card. The lie. He had to anchor himself to the present before his brain completely died.
"Offering a trade," Ren's voice was a wet, broken rasp. He tried to focus on her eyes. "You want to know... why she was here. The Fallen."
Rias went perfectly still. The demonic pressure receded slightly. Curiosity took over.
"Sacred Gear," Ren breathed out.
The words tasted like poison. He knew, even through the terrifying brain fog, that he was planting a bomb that would eventually blow up in his own face. It was a massive, unforgivable lie.
"Looking for... a specific one," Ren continued. His tongue felt swollen. "Building a team. If I become a Devil... I become visible to their wards. I become... useless to you."
He paused. He tried to draw a breath.
His arms gave out completely.
His elbows simply snapped under his own meager weight. His face slammed violently into the wet asphalt. Dirty rainwater and his own blood splashed into his mouth. He choked. He could not lift his head. The burning pain in his chest was gone, replaced by a terrifying, absolute cold creeping up his neck.
This was it. The absolute limit.
A hand grabbed a fistful of his wet hair.
Rias pulled his head up from the puddle. The sudden movement sent a spike of blinding white agony through his skull. She forced him to look directly into her glowing blue-green eyes. The demonic pressure radiating from her was actively crushing his lungs.
"You think I need a human spy?" Rias whispered. Her voice was pure ice. "I can extract the image of this Fallen Angel from your cold, dead brain. I can rip the memories straight from your corpse. Give me one real reason not to let you expire right now."
It was the final test. She was squeezing his dying mind. Truth or panic.
Ren choked on the blood pooling in his throat. He gave her the ugly, undeniable truth of his world.
"Memories... are static," Ren slurred. He tasted the dirty rain water on his lips. "They don't... update. You need an active feed. You need... my greed."
He watched her eyes. He watched the demonic authority clash with raw, undeniable logic.
"I want to live," Ren forced the last words out. The blackness was eating the edges of his vision rapidly. "They want me dead. Our interests align. But only... if I stay human."
Rias stared at his broken, bleeding face. She slowly, deliberately released her grip on his hair. His cheek hit the wet pavement again.
"I need a hospital," Ren murmured. The words were a senseless hum now. He could not feel his jaw. "Human hospital. No magic. Give me your word... Heiress of Gremory."
He invoked her title. It was his final gambit. A Devil could not break a vow made on their family name.
He waited for the velvet voice to accept or condemn him.
"You are a fascinating, arrogant creature," a voice echoed. It sounded like it was coming from underwater.
The physical toll finally demanded collection. The adrenaline completely evaporated. A violent spasm tore through his spine. The crimson of her hair bled into the crushing darkness. The suffocating weight of her presence dissolved.
Ren did not just fall asleep. His body violently shut itself down to protect what little life remained. The world collapsed into absolute, silent black.