The air cracked as Jin stepped out of the jagged hole in space, appearing right in front of Vali. The White Dragon Emperor, descendant of Lucifer himself, had already managed to get back on his feet, and his figure radiated waves of pure, undiluted rage. To be tossed aside like a helpless doll—such humiliation could not pass without leaving a mark on his pride. Eyes beneath the helmet flashed with icy fire.
"You..." Vali snarled, every word dripping with venom.
Without waiting for an answer, he bolted from his spot. Lightning was too slow a word to describe his dash. Jin met him without visible strain. Two silhouettes merged into a mad dance of destruction, their movements so fast the human eye couldn't track them. Only blurred shadows flickered here and there, leaving trembling air and short, blinding flashes of energy in their wake. A white trail of power stretched behind Vali like a comet's tail, cutting through space.
Everyone watched this incredible duel with bated breath. The mages, who had recently been desperately trying to break through the Kuoh Academy barrier, had long ceased their futile attempts, their faces expressing a mixture of awe and horror. Nearby, on the academy grounds, Rias Gremory's group had already managed to bind the exhausted Katerea Leviathan. Serafall Sitri, one of the Four Great Satans, stood nearby, casting complex, impenetrable glances at the prisoner, in which both pity and some old pain could be read. The others—Sirzechs, Michael, Azazel, and their entourages—had left the destroyed summit hall and now stood under the open sky, their attention riveted to the fierce skirmish.
Issei Hyoudou, clenching his fists, felt a chill run down his spine. Vali's power was overwhelming; each of his lunges seemed capable of splitting mountains. But Jin's strength... it was something beyond limits. And against the backdrop of this magnificence, his own weakness was felt especially acutely. Beside him, Kiba Yuuto couldn't suppress a shocked whisper, addressed more to the void than to anyone specifically:
"Is there even a limit to his powers?.." his gaze was fixed on Jin's figure, which seemed both real and ghostly.
The other members of the Occult Research Club, though they didn't show it, silently shared the knight's amazement. Even the usually unperturbed Koneko widened her eyes.
Azazel, the Fallen Angel and expert on Sacred Gears, laughed delightedly, his eyes burning with genuine interest. He couldn't understand how a simple human, albeit with unusual abilities, was capable of such things. If earlier he only suspected Jin possessed some unknown, possibly unique Longinus, now that theory crumbled to dust. What Jin was demonstrating went beyond the understanding of known Sacred Gears. This was something else, primal, unbridled.
Archangel Michael, leader of Heaven, stood with a stony face, but pure disbelief was reflected in his eyes. He had seen the power of Gods, the might of Seraphim, the fury of Dragons, but what was happening now didn't fit into any framework known to him.
Sirzechs Lucifer, the current Devil King, was stunned. He had met Jin before, in his apartment, even allowed himself a note of threat, feeling his undeniable superiority then. But what he saw now defied comparison. Jin on the battlefield was completely different. Not just stronger or faster. He was... fiercer. In every movement of his, there was a primal fury, cold and calculating at the same time. The confidence Sirzechs felt during their last meeting now wavered, replaced by the alarming realization—he had underestimated this young man. Catastrophically underestimated. Something had awakened in Jin that made him not just more active, but a predator out on a hunt. His aura, barely perceptible before, was now felt almost physically—crushing, all-pervading, alien to this world.
Meanwhile, the battle was gaining momentum. Vali, using the full power of Divine Dividing, tried time and again to divide Jin's power, to weaken him, but his attempts shattered against an invisible barrier. Jin's energy was like poison to him—it resisted division, repelled, burned from within. With every clash, with every moment of this furious dance, Vali's reserves melted away. He felt his strength leaving him, and the usual way of replenishing—absorbing foreign energy—didn't work. 'Dangerous! His power is inaccessible to me! It rejects any attempt at division! Retreat, Vali! Use distance! Direct clashes are fatal, they only drain you and damage the armor!' roared Albion, the White Dragon sealed in his Longinus, in his consciousness. The ancient being's voice was full of alarm. 'I see!!' Vali snapped back tensely, his voice trembling with strain and rage. He roared, and streams of blinding white dragon aura poured from his body, rising to an unthinkable limit. The space around began to distort from the emanating heat. He decided to follow Albion's advice, focusing on ranged attacks, releasing concentrated charges of pure dragon might.
Those watching the fight felt a sharp increase in pressure. Those who were weaker involuntarily retreated a few steps. Azazel, Sirzechs, and Michael withstood this aura without difficulty, but even they deemed it necessary to erect additional magical barriers to protect their companions.
Jin, however, seemed not to notice either the scorching aura or the hail of energy projectiles flying at him. He moved with some inhuman grace and ease, dodging each attack as if playing. Annoyance flashed across his face.
"Tch, fast little cockroach," he muttered, and his voice, amplified by an unknown force, swept over the battlefield.
He easily intercepted one of Vali's particularly large energy spheres, enveloped it in his own barely visible aura, and spinning around, putting immense physical strength into the throw, hurled it back.
The projectile, accelerated by Jin, flew at double speed. Vali barely had time to react. Luckily for him, although the attack was incredibly powerful, the White Dragon's own energy didn't harm him, only forcefully pushed him higher into the sky, causing him to lose balance for a moment.
Jin smirked. He was trying to provoke Vali, to force him to descend lower, where the advantage in speed and maneuverability would be on his side. But Vali, though enraged, was no fool. He understood the trap.
"In close combat, I may be inferior to you, mortal," he growled from above, his voice echoing through the area. "But the air is dragon territory! You have no place here!"
"Is that so!?" Jin only grinned wider in response.
His hand plunged lightning-fast into the concrete pavement of the square in front of the destroyed academy. With incredible speed, he ran a circle several meters in diameter, his fingers literally ripping through the reinforced concrete as if it were made of cardboard. Then the second hand also plunged into the ground. A second of strain, and a huge, multi-ton chunk of concrete, torn out by the roots, rose above the ground. Dust and small stones showered down.
Everyone around, including Vali himself and Albion in his soul, shuddered simultaneously at this inhuman display of strength.
And in the next moment, Jin launched this improvised meteorite into the air. The stone projectile rushed upward with a speed that cut the wind, leaving behind a zone of rarefied air, causing a deafening clap.
Vali, despite his astonishment, dodged with ease. The throw was incredibly fast, but the size of the projectile was too large to be difficult for an experienced aerial fighter to evade. He still couldn't believe what was happening, but shock gradually gave way to cold rage. When the concrete asteroid rose high enough, reaching Vali's flight level, he instinctively looked down, expecting to see Jin. But he wasn't there. At that moment, something strange happened. The huge stone, hovering at the peak of its trajectory, suddenly shook. Deep cracks ran along its surface, and it burst with a deafening crack into several dozen smaller "islands," which, losing momentum, began to slowly crumble down. And among these fragments, as if appearing out of nowhere, Jin emerged. He lightning-fast jumped from one floating stone to another, using them as improvised springboards; each of his pushes was precise and calculated. In an instant, he was behind the stunned Vali, who completely did not expect such an attack. Before Vali could react, Jin's hands gripped his two mechanical wings—the complex structure that was part of his Balance Breaker armor—in a death grip. There was a deafening screech of tearing metal, accompanied by the piercing shriek of damaged mechanisms. Jin yanked the wings toward himself with incredible force, completely breaking and tearing them off the White Dragon's back. Shards of armor and scraps of energy cables flew in all directions.
Vali howled in pain and rage; agony pierced his body from the loss of such an important part of his combat form. Using his discouraged body as a support, Jin pushed off, jumped onto the nearest floating "island," and pushing off from it again, slammed into Vali with both feet. The blow landed precisely in the center of the back, and the White Dragon Emperor, like a cannonball, rushed down. On the way, he smashed through several already falling stone blocks and crashed into the ground with a deafening roar, leaving a deep crater in it that exactly repeated the contours of his shattered armor.
Somehow climbing out of the smoking crater, Vali raised his head. His armor was riddled with cracks; smoke poured from damaged joints. He looked up at Jin, who stood calmly on one of the slowly descending stone islands, arms crossed over his chest.
"Bastard!! Disappear!!" Vali roared, his voice hoarse with rage and pain. Gathering his last strength, he extended a hand toward Jin, trying to activate one of Divine Dividing's most powerful abilities—spatial compression. The air around Jin began to distort, thicken, as if invisible vices were trying to crush him. Some of the floating stones caught in the range of this technique began to crumble and turn to dust, as if space itself was twisting them. As soon as this phenomenon reached Jin, he merely looked at the distorting reality with mild boredom. Then he carelessly snapped his fingers. A sharp, clear sound rang out, like the ringing of breaking glass. The distorted space around Jin instantly cracked like a crystal sphere, and the effect of Vali's technique completely deactivated. Jin just smirked at him from above.
Using that very stone island as a support, he easily pushed off and, flying several dozen meters, landed softly next to Vali, who hadn't yet fully gotten to his feet. Before the White Dragon could do anything, Jin's hand, enveloped in a barely noticeable golden glow, plunged into his chest plate. The screech of punctured metal rang out, and Jin effortlessly tore from the center of the armor a round, precious orb pulsating with soft light—one of the strange trinkets on Vali's armor. In that same instant, the remains of the White Dragon Emperor's armor crumbled into myriads of glowing particles and disappeared, leaving Vali kneeling in his ordinary clothes, breathing heavily and coughing blood. Jin curiously examined the torn-out orb, tossing it above his palm.
"What a shiny trinket," he said with a mocking smirk and, carelessly shoving the artifact somewhere into the inner pocket of his uniform, jumped back a couple of steps.
Vali looked up at him with a gaze full of seething hatred, powerless rage, and… poorly concealed fear.
"Who… who the hell are you?!" he shouted, his voice cracking.
Jin grinned even wider, his eyes glinting dangerously.
"Does that interest you so much?" he tilted his head to the side. "Gods, demons, and fallen exist in the world... Just as heroes do."
At that moment, Albion's desperate cry sounded again in Vali's consciousness:
'Retreat, Vali! Immediately! Too much power spent! You can't defeat him in this state!'
"Shut up!!" Vali roared, ignoring his dragon's voice. His eyes sparkled madly. He began to recite an ancient spell, words of power falling from his lips, filling the air with sinister might.
'Fool! You ignore the one who gives you power!' Albion was clearly displeased but didn't try to stop his host. He understood how stunned and humiliated Vali was, and that in his current state, he saw no other options but to go all in. Unless this terrible, incomprehensible human let them go…
"I, who am about to awaken,
Am the Heavenly Dragon who has taken the principles of supremacy from God.
I envy the 'infinite' and pursue the 'dream'.
I shall become the White Dragon of Supremacy.
And I shall drown you in the depths of the white paradise!"
The space next to Vali suddenly tore open, and Bikou, descendant of the Monkey King, jumped out of the shimmering portal. A cheerful smirk played on his face, but seeing Vali's condition and assessing the tense atmosphere, he instantly became serious.
"Vali! We're expected elsewhere! Let's go!" he spoke quickly. But Vali seemed not to hear him. He was beside himself, feeling such all-consuming helplessness for the first time in his life. He continued to recite the transformation mantra, his body beginning to be enveloped in an increasingly dense and sinister glow.
Jin was getting thoroughly tired of this spectacle. With a sharp, almost imperceptible movement, he bolted from his spot, heading toward them.
Bikou's eyes widened in surprise at Jin's speed. He managed to react at the last moment, putting his famous extending Ruyi Jingu Bang staff out to meet the approaching fist, trying to block the blow.
Impact!
A deafening sound rang out, like a clap of thunder. Bikou's staff bent into an arc. And in the next instant, Bikou, along with Vali who was still muttering the spell (whom he managed to grab since he was standing nearby), was hurled backward, straight into the open portal behind them. They disappeared inside, and the tear in space immediately closed, leaving not a trace.
A deafening silence ensued, broken only by the crackle of burning debris and the whistle of the wind. Everyone present was tense to the limit; the scene of the incredible battle and its sudden conclusion was deeply imprinted in their hearts and minds.
From the crowd of observers, the student council president of Kuoh Academy, Sona Sitri, slowly emerged. On her usually strict and confident face was now a complex mix of emotions she was desperately trying to overcome: shock, disbelief, perhaps even a bit of fear mixed with some new feeling she herself didn't understand. She approached Jin, who stood calmly in the middle of the chaos he created, and their eyes met.
"What?" Jin simply asked, his voice level, without a shadow of emotion. Sona looked at him silently for a few seconds, as if trying to discern behind this unperturbed mask that same lazy, but occasionally surprisingly perceptive guy who spent his days in their student council. Apparently, something in his gaze or aura convinced her. She took a deep breath, bringing her feelings in order. The mask of confidence and strictness returned to her face. She gestured around at the destruction surrounding them—deep craters, blocks of concrete scattered everywhere, melted patches of earth.
"You've created a huge mess, Jin-san," she uttered in her usual business tone, though barely noticeable notes of shock could still be heard in her voice.
Jin pursed his lips slightly and looked at her with a slightly raised eyebrow, then at his handiwork.
"Seriously!?" genuine surprise mixed with light irony sounded in his voice.