Amano Rei followed Rin Seiya's bouncing steps through the underground passage beneath the Riding Duel arena, weaving beneath the track overhead until they erged into the district known as the chanical Fortress.
The mont they stepped inside, a wall of hot air hit them, engine-scorched and thick with the sll of machine oil.
"This is the support and maintenance zone for Riding Duelists," Rin Seiya said, taking on the role of tour guide as she led the way. "Sa as motorsports, the support side of Riding Dueling is just as important as the dueling itself. Good maintenance keeps a Duelist's D-Wheel in peak condition so they never lose speed points from falling behind."
"Impressive. You really know your stuff, Seiya. You co here often?"
"Hehe, I went through a bit of a phase."
Rin Seiya stopped in front of a shop. The sign above the door read: Fresh Bloom chanics.
Strange na. Every individual word made sense to Amano, but put together they ford sothing that ant absolutely nothing.
Rin Seiya poked her head through the doorway. "Fiona! I'm here, just like I said!"
"Oh, Seiya. Co on in, I'll be done in a sec."
The woman's voice from inside was muffled, like she was holding sothing between her teeth.
"Co in, Amano." Rin Seiya waved him over.
"Sorry for the intrusion," Amano said, stepping inside with a touch of caution.
The temperature inside was noticeably higher than the street, probably from the hum and clatter of machinery running on all sides. And possibly from the girl in front of him, who had a screwdriver clenched between her teeth and was currently in the middle of a welding job.
It was October in Eden Tower, and the nights had started turning cool. Amano was dressed accordingly. The chanic girl, on the other hand, looked dressed for the height of sumr. Denim shorts cut high enough to put every inch of her pale, slender legs on full display, and a black sports top that covered the bare minimum while leaving her trim waist and the line of her abs entirely exposed.
Even dressed that lightly, her skin was still sheened with sweat, catching the overhead light in a way that only made the picture more striking.
"Done." She tightened the last screw with her teeth, pulled it free, and wiped her forehead with satisfaction.
When she turned around, Amano got a proper look at her face. The sar of black grease across her cheek did nothing to hide how sharp her features were. If anything, it gave her an edge that plain prettiness wouldn't have had. A deep-yellow ponytail swayed behind her head, restless with energy.
Rin Seiya narrowed her eyes at Amano, then drove her knee lightly into his backside.
"Well? Staring? Drooling? Getting ideas?"
"No. Just hot in here."
"You forgot I told you to stop calling 'Seiya,' and you say you weren't staring. So it's the athletic type, is it? Too bad. She's taken."
Fiona twirled her wrench with practiced ease, laughing. "Seiya, where'd you find this one? He's cute."
"First-year at Synchro Academy. My junior."
"Seiya, weren't you supposed to keep students' identities quiet?" Amano murmured.
"Relax. Fiona's a Synchro Academy alumna, two years ahead of , graduated now. We're among friends. Actually, a good chunk of the people working at this Riding Duel venue went through Synchro Academy. Makes sense, really. Riding Dueling is practically the school's founding tradition."
Fair point. Compared to the other two academies, Synchro had always been the one most obsessed with Riding Duels. It went back to the ani that inspired it all. So traditions die hard.
"First-year?" Fiona said, stepping closer to get a better look at Amano. "Aren't first-years still barred from Riding Duels? Isn't it a bit early to be dragging him here, Seiya?"
The heat radiating off Fiona's skin, mixed with the lingering sll of her sweat, made Amano's head swim slightly. But by then, Rin Seiya had already casually unhooked her school blazer and hung it on the wall, then turned to Amano.
"Take your jacket off too. You'll overheat."
"Lifesaver. Thank you, Seiya."
With the jacket off, Fiona's gaze drifted to the outline of muscle visible through Amano's shirt, and sothing in her expression sharpened with interest.
"Didn't expect that. You've got a solid build on you, like soone who's used to physical work. Don't tell Seiya brought you here because I need an assistant?"
It was a fair observation. Students in the middle districts tended toward softer builds from lighter lifestyles. Amano, who had spent years doing manual labor in the lower floors, was in a different league.
"Definitely not just for odd jobs," Rin Seiya said. "Amano here is a special case. He has school dispensation to participate in Riding Duels as a first-year. We ca to buy a D-Wheel."
"Amano..." Fiona tapped the head of her wrench against her chin, thinking. "Wait. Are you the Amano Rei?"
"You know too?"
"How could I not? You've been the talk of Synchro Academy for weeks. Made Kaiba Chiha cry in their entrance duel, then went two-on-one in the joint tournant and pulled out the win for the whole school. Even we graduates have heard about you."
"The rumors are getting pretty exaggerated..."
It was "made Kaiba Chiha cry," not "beat Kaiba Chiha," though technically both were true. And the two-on-one in the joint tournant was a bit off too; he was the one who'd been outnumbered, not the other way around.
"A duelist who earns special permission as a first-year. What a sha soone like that can't co work here."
Rin Seiya's eyes narrowed. "Fiona. I distinctly rember you announcing at graduation a few months ago that you'd found soone special. Now you're eyeing my junior like that. Did you break up? Because if so, I'm taking my business elsewhere."
"Wait. Hold on, Seiya, let's be reasonable here." Fiona clearly had no intention of losing the sale. "Did I ever actually show you this person I ntioned?"
"No. You never introduced anyone."
"You've already seen them." Fiona smiled, and with a fond tap of her wrench, knocked against the D-Wheel she'd just finished working on. "Right here."
"...Your D-Wheel."
"I made up my mind. I'm devoting my life to D-Wheels and the craft of building them. That's why I went straight into chanical work the day after graduation and opened this shop."
So that's the type she is.
Amano had heard of people like this in his previous life. Gearheads so deep in love with their machines that every person they t ca second. In their world, a romantic rival couldn't even asure up to a bolt.
No wonder the affection system hadn't registered anything for her.
"Ah. That kind of partner." Rin Seiya nodded as if the explanation cleared everything up, then reached for her jacket on the wall. "In that case, I'd rather not shop here. Feels uncomfortable, like I'm competing with you."
"Seiya. Seiya, wait." Fiona caught her wrist. "For old tis' sake? Support your senior's small business? I'll give you a discount."
"How much of a discount."
Rin Seiya's ears practically perked up at the word.
"Ten percent off."
"Twenty."
"That's... that's genuinely painful..." Fiona winced.
Amano quietly realized what Rin Seiya was doing. The fake-out departure and the haggling were both for his benefit.
Standard D-Wheel prices sat between three hundred thousand and four hundred thousand Eva Points. The cheapest model at three hundred thousand, discounted to eighty percent, ca out to exactly two hundred and forty thousand, right around what he'd earned from the stream last night. If Rin Seiya hadn't watched him pull in that money with her own eyes, she wouldn't have rushed him here tonight.
"Anyway, browse first. We can figure out pricing later."
The mont the words left her mouth, the ceiling at the back of the shop split down the middle. A blue D-Wheel descended from the track above, every seam venting white steam like it had been pushed past its limits.
Amano had seen this one recently. It was the sa machine that had just taken a loss against the Riding Emperor up on the track.
"There she is." Fiona's voice softened. "Banged up again. My poor girl."
She ran a careful hand along the battered D-Wheel. The rider still on it pulled off their helt and shook out a head of pale-blond hair.
"You're not even going to ask how I'm doing?"
"You're the one who insisted on challenging the Emperor. I told you it wasn't going to work."
"I nearly had him." Fioré bit the words out through clenched teeth. "One more move. That was all I needed."
She hadn't, really. Amano had watched nearly the entire match and kept the thought firmly to himself.
"Deal with it yourself for now. I've got custors."
"Custors? You should've said so." Fioré swung herself off the D-Wheel with visible effort, then waved her sister off. "Go on, go on. Money's important. I'm fine."
She pushed Fiona away and disappeared toward the back.
Fiona led Amano and Rin Seiya further down into the underground garage below.
"Fioré hasn't given up on beating the Emperor," Rin Seiya said.
"With her personality? Even twenty years from now she won't." Fiona shrugged. "Watch."
Amano caught a distinct whiff of sothing interesting. He leaned toward Rin Seiya's ear.
"Why is Fioré's sister so set on taking him down? Is that sothing I'm allowed to ask about?"
"It's not exactly a secret," Rin Seiya said, glancing at Fiona first and receiving a small nod. Then she explained.
"The way I heard it. The deeper the love, the uglier the falling out."
"Fioré and the Emperor used to be on the sa Riding Duel team. But three years ago, the Nidhogg family pulled him in with the promise of Synchro Academy's God Card, and he disappeared without a word on the day of the championship final. The whole team lost because of it."
"The Emperor got his God Card and took the top spot in Riding Dueling. But Fioré never got over what he did."
Fiona cut in. "One more thing to add. They weren't just teammates. They were together. After the betrayal, Fioré ended it imdiately. She couldn't accept what he'd done."
"That's..." Amano exhaled slowly. "That's a very classic story."
And a painful one. It had a very specific 5D's flavor to it. Jack and Yusei, the team, the championship, the falling out. The main difference being that Jack and Yusei weren't in a relationship.
Rin Seiya caught the recognition in Amano's expression and nudged him in the ribs with her elbow.
"You thought of it too, right? But pulling off the coback from that story is going to be a lot harder. The Emperor's holding all three Synchro God Cards now. That's not just a skill gap, that's a different dinsion."
She was right. In the original 5D's, the three Signer Dragons were split among three different Signers. Here, all three cards were in one person's hands. For every other Riding Duelist, that wasn't a challenge. It was a wall.
"Alright, here we go. Pick whatever you like. For Seiya's sake, I'll make the numbers work."
The storage garage beneath Fresh Bloom chanics held eight D-Wheels in total, every one of them built by Fiona's own hands.
Amano had briefly wondered whether they should have gone to a more experienced builder. Fiona was talented, clearly, but she'd only been out of school for a year. Rin Seiya had recomnded her, and Amano knew nothing about D-Wheels. Raising doubts seed pointless.
"Wait, Seiya. Why do you need a D-Wheel in the first place? What happened to the Yusei-go? That machine was one of my best builds. It could hold its own against anything at this venue, not just school-level racing."
"The Yusei-go?" Rin Seiya said. "Gone."
"Gone how?"
"Just... gone."
She could hardly explain that it had been obliterated in a Dark Ga by a Dark Synchro Giant, leaving nothing but scrap. The Yusei-go had been one of Fiona's masterpieces, and Rin Seiya's willingness to co back here was all the endorsent that craftsmanship needed.
"Fiona, everything you sell is expensive. Everything here starts at four hundred thousand. That's already above market price."
"You get what you pay for. My D-Wheels run better than anything else out there, and you of all people know that."
"Still..." Rin Seiya kept glancing sideways at Amano as she walked the row. "Can't you go any lower? Sothing cheaper?"
"Just tell your budget."
"Around... two hundred and forty thousand."
Fiona stared at her for a long mont. "If you're going to rob , at least do it without the preamble. I don't build budget machines. At that price, try a used D-Wheel from sowhere else."
At the ntion of second-hand, Rin Seiya's eyes had already drifted to the far end of the garage. There, half-buried under a layer of dust, sat a D-Wheel clearly undisturbed for a long ti. But the gri couldn't dull what lay beneath. Silver-white panels that caught the light with a soft, luminous quality. Along both tail fins, butterfly wings spread in painted detail.
"How much for this one?"
"That one's not for sale."
"Why?"
"It's an old model. No auto-cruise system, which every modern D-Wheel has as standard. I've tried to modify it, but the internal components are machined so precisely, everything locks into everything else, and there's just no room to install one."
"No auto-cruise just ans no self-driving. I have a license. Can I at least try it?"
"If you want to, make sure you wear full protective gear."
"Safety first, always."
They rode the chanical freight elevator up, all three of them plus the D-Wheel, and surfaced on the test track above.
Rin Seiya pulled on a white protective suit, fastened her helt, and threw a leg over the silver-white machine. She fired up the engine, gave a confident thumbs-up to the two watching behind her, and took off.
Fiona pressed her hand over her mouth, holding back a laugh.
"What's so funny?"
"She won't make it two laps."
She hadn't even finished the sentence before Rin Seiya, barely a hundred ters out, hit a sudden front-wheel lift, lost control entirely, and was launched.
Amano: "She actually crashed."
Rin Seiya: "Ow, ow, ow--!"
Even through the protective suit she was shaken, staggering to her feet.
"That wasn't my fault. That thing's impossible to control. I felt the speed just spike out of nowhere midway through. There was no ti to react."
"This is exactly why I can't sell her," Fiona said, sighing with genuine regret.
"She used to belong to a legendary duelist girl from years back. The Moonlight Butterfly. But she doesn't match how anyone drives today. The raw performance is still there, but no one can use it anymore."
Moonlight Butterfly. Dangerous na, Amano thought. Though with that silver body and those butterfly-painted tail fins, it fit perfectly.
But watching Rin Seiya get thrown, sothing stirred in him.
"Can I try?"
"You want to? You don't even have a license. Stick to auto-cruise like a beginner."
"I don't have a license. But I can ride."
As for why--
[Romance Skill: Mirror of Still Water]
[D-Wheel Driving Technique acquired: Top Level. Formula Synchron unlocked in Extra Deck. Any Speed Spell unlocked for use in Riding Duels.]
The skill that ca with Rin Seiya's eighty affection points.
Top-level D-Wheel technique. He wanted to know exactly what that ant right now.
Amano suited up, pulled on the helt, and swung onto the Moonlight Butterfly.
Despite it being his first ti on a D-Wheel, the calm that settled over him was complete, the kind of stillness that belonged to soone who had done this a thousand tis. The skill had settled into him that cleanly.
He started the engine. The sound it made wasn't deafening. More composed. According to Fiona, this machine ran on semi-perpetual motion technology: it could burn fuel, or it could forgo outside energy entirely and draw power directly from the act of dueling.
He twisted the throttle.
He and the Moonlight Butterfly launched forward like a loosed arrow.
"That fast from a dead start. He's going to crash." Rin Seiya's voice went tight with alarm.
He didn't crash.
The acceleration was violent, but under the skill's guidance, Amano settled into it. The wind scread past his ears. The surroundings blurred and fell away. He felt sothing he hadn't expected. A sense of connection, as if the D-Wheel had a pulse and he'd found its rhythm. Once he crossed into that speed, the rest of the world disappeared. There was only him and the machine.
So this is Riding Dueling. This is the high-speed world.
"This is incredible!"
He shouted it without aning to. At that velocity, his voice was swallowed imdiately by the rushing air, stripped away before it could travel. But inside the High-Speed World's field during a real duel, that sa voice would echo across the entire arena.
"He actually tad the Moonlight Butterfly." Fiona watched with a stunned expression. "Amano Rei might actually beco a legend at this track soday."
"He can even ride. You're exactly what I need, Amano Rei."
Rin Seiya's hands were trembling, not from cold, but from excitent that matched anything Amano was feeling out on the track.
She'd had ulterior motives bringing him here. In fact, she'd had them from the very beginning. From the first ti she'd approached him, right through to using the shared experience of watching ani as a way to draw closer.
Everything she'd done since eting Amano had been calculated around a single goal.
At first, her plan had been to let him develop gradually. To ease him into Riding Dueling step by step, shaping him over ti into a Synchro-style duelist who could hold his own.
But then she'd watched him duel the Puppeteer. And then Yugi's AI match. And patience stopped being an option.
She didn't want a training project. She didn't need one.
Because this didn't need training at all.
Rin Seiya wanted to skip straight to the end. A Riding Duel where fate and soul collided head-on.
She was done waiting.
***
40 advance chapters at patreon/Eatinpieces
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