The kinetic tension between the two riders reached its breaking point. Just as before, a silent, uncanny synchronization passed between them; both reached the same cold conclusion. To drag this duel out in their current states was a fruitless expenditure of time.
Tsukasa Kadoya acted first. He detached the Neo K-Touch 21 from his belt, his fingers blurring across the icons of the Heisei Riders that had defined two decades of history.
"Final Attack Ride: D-D-D-Decade!
The mechanical announcement heralded the end. With a violent shove against the scorched earth, the Magenta King launched himself into the night sky, soaring toward the moon.
"See if you can tank this, kid! Hah!"
Shimmering, oversized Rider cards manifested in a linear bridge between the heavens and the earth, pointing directly at Rin Kuga's heart.
Rin, standing amidst the swirling golden dust of the wasteland, tilted his head back. A thin, dangerous smile touched his lips beneath the Grand Zi-O visor. "If that's how it's going to be, then I'll use you to test my limit. Let's see how you handle a true King, Tsukasa!"
Rin's right hand clenched into a fist, striking the Ridewatches on his Ziku-Driver in a rapid, rhythmic cadence.
FINISH TIME! GRAND ZI-O!
The driver let out a resonant chime as Rin spun it a full three-hundred and sixty degrees. The golden reliefs on his armor flared with the intensity of a dying star. He leapt, defying gravity as he rose to meet Decade in the apex of the sky.
ALL TWENTY TIME BREAK!
The air screamed. To Rin's left and right, the golden phantoms of the nineteen Heisei Riders—Decade included—flickered into existence. They weren't mere shadows; they were the crystallized authority of time itself.
"HAAAA!" "TAKE THIS!"
The two ultimate avatars of the Rider mythos collided at the center of the sky. Rin's golden phantoms surged forward, dissolving into streaks of pure, solar energy that funneled into his extended right leg. His entire form became a localized sun, radiant and overwhelming.
Opposite him, Decade descended through the gauntlet of his cards, his body wreathed in a fierce, magenta-black aura. Each card he shattered added a new layer of destructive force to his kick, his power peaking at a terrifying, world-shattering frequency.
BOOM!
The detonation was absolute. The shockwave didn't just rattle the mountain; it scoured the heavens, instantly vaporizing every cloud in the stratosphere for miles. The sudden vacuum left the sky unnervally clear, allowing the cold, white moonlight to spill down onto the battlefield like a spotlight on a ruined stage.
Two sets of boots hit the ground simultaneously, kicking up twin plumes of dust.
As the light faded, the golden and silver regalia of the ultimate forms dissolved into shimmering mist. Both men stood in their base forms—Zi-O and Decade.
A stalemate. The King of Time and the Great Destroyer had canceled each other out, locked in a perfect, fragile equilibrium.
Tsukasa stood with his back to Rin, his shoulders rising and falling with a slow, measured breath. "Not bad," he remarked, his voice returning to its usual, cavalier drawl. "I'll call this a draw. For now, your world gets a stay of execution. But don't get comfortable... you've got a fresh set of headaches headed your way."
He reached for his belt, clicking the release on the Neo Decadriver. The magenta armor flickered into a translucent grey shadow before scattering into the wind. Tsukasa Kadoya stood there in his civilian clothes, looking more like a wandering tourist than a cosmic threat.
Rin spun around, his visor tracking the man with a flicker of suspicion. "New trouble? What are you talking about?"
He felt a surge of genuine confusion. With the Ohma power stirring in his soul, Rin found it hard to imagine anything in this converged reality that could truly threaten his reign. He hadn't even reached into the deeper, darker wells of his strength during their clash, yet he had held the Destroyer of worlds to a standstill.
Tsukasa didn't offer a direct answer. He simply raised his old twin-lens camera, framing the distant, glowing skyline of the city within the viewfinder.
Click.
"There. I've left my mark on this world too," Tsukasa muttered to himself. He lowered the camera and finally looked back at Rin. "If you decide to stop playing nice and actually use that power, then sure, maybe nothing is a 'problem' for you. But you'll see soon enough. History has a way of catching up to Kings."
A shimmering, grey Aurora—a Dimensional Wall—manifested beside him, rippling like a silk curtain in a draft. Tsukasa stepped toward it, offering a casual, two-fingered salute over his shoulder.
"Until next time... Demon King!"
With a step, he vanished into the void, leaving Rin Kuga alone in the silent.