The clinical reports out of the private wing of the Leo Corporation medical complex began to read less like trauma logs and more like a statistical anomaly. Two months after the explosion, Ryoho's condition shifted from simple survival to a rapid, mathematically baffling escalation of physical recovery. Day after day, the broken architecture of his body seemed to rewrite its own limits.
The life-support pod was permanently drained and rolled away, replaced by a specialized physical therapy suite.
The first major milestone came with his speech. The fractured mandible and damaged vocal cords, which Dr. Mira had predicted would require months of reconstructive surgery and intensive speech therapy, healed, like it was never damaged. He didn't just talk; he spoke with a terrifyingly clear precision, his voice carrying the calm, analytical tone of his father.
But it was his structural, skeletal transformation that truly stunned the rotating team of observers.
The deep compression fractures along his spinal column began to correct their alignment. The cellular regeneration worked at a pace the doctors had never recorded. His vertical framework straightened, expanding his height back to the normal baseline for a nine-year-old boy.
Every morning, the physical therapy sessions began. But one day, Ryoho demanded the braces be removed.
"The mechanical resistance is slowing down my pacing." Ryoho told Dr. Kail during a routine morning assessment, his voice perfectly steady as he adjusted the sleeves of his patient gown.
"Ryo-Sama, your right side absorbed the primary kinetic brunt of the blast." Kail replied, adjusting his round glasses while reviewing the real-time data. "The nerves in your right arm and leg require systematic retraining. Moving without structural assistance risks tearing the new muscle fiber."
"It won't tear." Ryoho said simply.
He proved it on the parallel bars. Initially, his right leg dragged, a heavy anchor mimicking the severe trauma his pelvis had sustained when slammed against the concrete barrier. But by the third week, the limp vanished. His gait stabilized into a measured, calculated stride.
He practiced his stride for hours, his eyes fixed on the reflection in the observation mirror, analyzing his own center of gravity until the movement became completely fluid.
Once his right external side was fine, okay to go same with left external side, his routine and physical therapy sessions began to consist of normal but regular. He didn't needed to have more sessions to help his right external side. He now just does his training and exercise with balance of both sides.
Even his external aesthetic began to mend. The deep, third-degree thermal burns that had turned his entire dermal layer into a scorched, charcoal color began to slough off, revealing fresh, pale tissue underneath. His body, his skin began to take form... more like transformed, as if it got evolved. His skin from every edge of his body showed that old but more lifelike pale skin.
The most visible miracle, however, was his hair.
Dr. Mira had confidently stated that the intense heat of the blast had completely destroyed his hair follicles, making a future hair-transplant the only viable option once he reached adulthood. Yet, within weeks, the charcoal baldness was entirely replaced by a thick, healthy head of hair that fell neatly over his forehead. That same spike, standing, sharp silver hair. It was a physical detail that defied the standard timeline of scar tissue formation, as if his body refused to allow a single trace of the fire to remain permanent.
He broke every universal law of biology.
From the viewing room, Himika watched his progress with an unreadable expression, her crossed arms resting against her tailored coat. Beside her, Reiji stood with his hands neatly pocketed, his young face reflecting the quiet intensity of his mother's gaze.
"His skills in the right hand have reached ninety-two percent efficiency compared to his pre-blast baseline." Himika observed, reading the digital chart. "He is already writing perfectly with his right, dominant hand again."
"He doesn't look like the person we saw in the hallway two months ago." Reiji murmured, his eyes tracking Ryoho as the boy completed a series of precise coordination exercises across the room. "The doctors called it a medical miracle beyond medical miracle."
"Miracles are simply unpredictable variables." Himika replied, her voice dropping into that familiar corporate chill. "His body is proving itself to be exactly what I calculated: a highly sophisticated, high-value asset. His cognitive processing speed hasn't dropped a single percentage point. If anything, his focus has sharpened. Thanks to that accident."
Down in the ward, Ryoho stopped his exercise. Sensing gazes through the one-way glass of the observation deck, he turned his head slightly. His hair shifted across his brow, revealing his striking, vivid red eyes. Along with his face, he did not formed any expression, nor did he felt anything. There was no pain left. Nor was there the wild, manic confusion of his awakening. Perfectly calm.
He didn't wave or acknowledge their presence with a smile. He simply looked up at the glass for a brief second, noting his observers, before turning back to his routine, his steady, perfect steps echoing softly in the quiet room. And as time passed, that soft echoes became wild and calculative. With intensity and strength. Along with power.
# Leo Corporation
The sleek black limousine slipped through the iron gates of the Akaba estate, bringing Ryoho home to the Leo Corporation's central domain. Stepping out, he looked entirely untouched by the tragedy. His charcoal-burned skin had been replaced by smooth, pale tissue, and his dark scalp same with new, silver hair stood neatly.
Inside the grand foyer, Himika and Reiji waited, with Nakajima standing like a silent shadow in the background. The air was thick with formal corporate expectation rather than familial warmth. Only Reiji showed a smile that felt brother-like.
"Welcome home, Ryoho-san." Himika said, her eyes scanning his posture for any lingering physical defects. Seeing none, she shifted smoothly to business, not even thinking to hug him. "Your enrollment protocols at the LDS primary elite track have been finalized. You will resume your studies tomorrow."
"I don't want to go back to the school. And please just call me Ryo." Ryoho replied cleanly. His voice lacked any trace of his past trauma, carrying a flat, unyielding precision.
Reiji adjusted his glasses, looking at his brother. "Your academic and Dueling classes are already ahead of schedule, Ryo. Is there a physical limitation you aren't reporting?"
"No." He replied, meeting Reiji's gaze. "The curriculum at LDS has become an inefficient use of my processing time. I know everything already what is there to learn. My time is better spent alone, utilizing Dad's private archives."
He didn't added in his words but in his thoughts. "Along with archives, his researches, files and his documents. Along with his works. I want to understand and connect all points of what Dad was creating in that lab. That caused the world as it is today. I want to see what he was creating. With that intense pressure on himself and not giving any second to his family."
Nakajima observed the exchange, noting with a silent shiver how a nine-year-old boy could effortlessly withstand command of the room's gravity.
Himika's lips thinned into a sharp, approving line. "If the institution yields a lower return on your intellect than do private research, the board will accommodate you. Very well. You will stay. But remember, Ryoho-san—validation requires results. Do not make me regret accepting your demand."
"One more demand."
"?"
"I want to do everything at Leo Corporation. I want to do things and do my private study at there. I will think about Duels and so there as well."
"Is there any special reason you want to do there?"
"I want a good place for study. With all information and digital engin. That place is best for that. And if I want to ask something I can just as with help of any employee."
"Fine," Himika validated his demand. "But it must bloom results."
She added remaining words in her thoughts. "Or else it is just wasting precious resources to a single, inexperienced child."
"Thank you," Ryo showed gratitude. "I won't let you down."
# At A Certain Place
The afternoon sun filtered softly through the massive, drooping branches of an old willow tree, casting a pattern of dancing shadows across the weathered wooden bench.
Tucked away in a quiet, the spot felt entirely disconnected from the high-pressure world Ryoho usually habituated.
Sitting on the far end of the bench was an elderly man in plain, rugged cloths, his beige flat cap pulled low against the sun, gently tossing occasional pieces of breadcrumbs to a small cluster of sparrows.
Ryoho sat on the opposite end, his hands resting in the pockets of a simple black jacket. For the first time in months, his hyper-analytical mind was doing nothing. He was just watching the ripples on a nearby pond, his vivid red eyes appearing calm under the shade of his hair.
But this situation had a short but big story behind it...
As per Himika's orders, Ryo was given a not small nor big laboratory, a work place for him.
The monitoring teams and analysts back at the Leo Corporation headquarters were growing increasingly anxious. To them, Ryoho-Sama was a machine, operating without stopping. The medical logs and security feeds over the last week painted a terrifyingly mechanical picture: the boy did not take leisure time. He refused to step away from his work unless it was for necessary washroom breaks or brief, eating intervals.
From the moment dawn broke, his private laboratory was a chaotic symphony of high-level engineering. Ryoho sat surrounded by a heavy load of mechanical equipment—disassembled card-slot mechanisms, prototype Solid Vision projectors, and exposed wiring harnesses—all buried beneath a massive, disorganized pile of research papers. Hovering directly in midair around him were glowing digital display screens, their blue light reflecting off his unblinking red eyes as he swiped through the displays with his hands time to time.
This image was a flawless, haunting mirror of his father, Leo Akaba. He worked with the exact same obsessive, all-consuming drive that had once defined the founder of the corporation.
They had relentless talks and concerns that forced Ryoho to make a tactical decision. He knew the research assistants and physicians were on the verge of panicking. If things had continued like that, they would inevitably submit a formal health complaint to Himeka and Reiji, warning them that the he might suffer a severe relapse or decline.
To stop them from worrying and keep them from interfering with him. Ryoho came up sith a solution into his daily routine: he would take a mandatory thirty-minute break at completely random times throughout the day, ensuring the staff logged his "relaxation time".
Which was exactly how he found himself here. Rather than wondering aimlessly, he just sat in a quite place, doing nothing.
He just didn't knew what to do in free time. Plus, people were monitoring him, which they were actually doing right now as per Himeka's orders, in order to check Ryo's health.
He tried his hardest to make it look like he was just relaxing around. Although, all the thoughts and things were still processing inside his head.
Most confusing thing was that Ryo himself didn't knew or remember what he used to do to play around and enjoy before that incident.
It mattered very little to current Ryo, but he just couldn't remove the thought; why does he don't remember.
He remembers everything about Leo's research, all the knowledge Ryo had on his own terms and all about mechanisms, history, geography and current world.
And yet, he don't remember what he used to play around and to enjoy his time as a child, which he still is.
He let his vision drift to the old grandpa, seeing what he was doing.
The old man threw a final crumb to the sparrows, then rested his wrinkled hands back on his cane, looking over at Ryo with a warm, slow smile.
"You look like you're carrying the weight of the world on those young shoulders, kiddo." The grandpa said, his voice a comfortable, slow. "Shouldn't you be out playing tag or causing trouble somewhere?"
Ryoho didn't tense up. The old man didn't know his name, his family. To this man, he was just a kid sitting on a park bench, not an asset executing a timed stress-relief protocol.
"I prefer the quiet," Ryoho replied, his voice soft but clear. "Running around seems... loud. And highly meaningless."
The grandpa let out a dry, wheezing chuckle, nodding his head. "Highly inefficient, huh? So you are a warrior?" He chuckled. "Though that's a mighty big phrase for a little guy. Can't argue with you on the loud part, though. The world's got too much noise these days. Everybody's running somewhere, trying to be the biggest, the best, the fastest. Me? I think the best part of the day is right here. Doing absolutely nothing."
Ryoho looked down at the grass near his shoes, his internal clock silently ticking away the first eleven minutes of his thirty-minute block. "Is it easy? Doing nothing?"
"At your age? Probably not." Old man said, looking back out at the pond as the ripples caught the sunlight. "When you're young, your brain is like a runaway train. Feels like if you stop, the whole thing will jump the tracks. But the trick is to just watch the birds for a bit. They don't worry about tomorrow's schedule. They just look for crumbs and enjoy the breeze."
Ryoho shifted his gaze to a sparrow hopping along the stone path, his mind automatically calculating the bird's behavior, will it eat? Will it fly away? Will it stole a crumb from another sparrow? Before he consciously forced the thought to stop. For a few minutes, neither of them said anything. The silence between them wasn't heavy or demanding like the quiet in the corporate labs; it was just a simple, shared moment under the shade of the willow tree, letting the rest of the busy city pass them by.
"I used to be like that." The old man murmured softly after a while, breaking the quiet without shattering it. "Always looking at screens, drawing up blueprints, talking about changing the world. My grandpa used to tell me the world changes just fine on its own, usually when you're not looking."
Ryoho kept his eyes on the sparrow. "Did you stop?"
"Eventually." Grandpa smiled gently, tapping his cane against the stone. "Life's got a way of bending you until you realize you aren't made of steel. It's better to bend on a bench like this on your own terms, before the world forces you to snap. You just don't experience until you let go, finding out world feels better when you feel good. When you let world rotate without you pushing it."
Ryoho remained still, the word snap echoing faintly against his memories of the hospital corridor. He checked his internal countdown—fifteen minutes remaining. For the first time since he had opened his eyes after the blast, he leaned back slightly against the wooden slats of the bench, allowing the warmth of the natural sun to just sit on his skin.
He closes his eyes with absolutely no thoughts or any other words. He just sat quietly. Sliding everything aside. Letting the sunlight bath on him, the cold breeze going around him, the shadows of branches danced in silent.
He slept there for around an hour.
The old grandpa chuckled. As if he was seeing something he wanted to see in a mirror.
When Ryoho opened his eyes with a yawn, grandpa smiled and laughed softly.
Ryoho felt it wasn't anything wrong, but yet, he felt awkward.
"See, relaxing a bit and just sitting somewhere is so refreshing?" Grandpa said.
"Yea. It was a good time usage." Ryo said.
"I sit here everyday. Feeling always something new. Maybe if you come here another time, we'll see each other again. You would have be probably around same age as my grandson, if he was here. If I were a grandfather."
"You aren't?" The question just escaped Ryoho's mouth.
"No. Long story, but I never married anyone."
Ryo didn't made response. Let it be good or bad it was a crossing of personal boundary. But yet again, if grandpa didn't wanted to tell than he wouldn't brought the topic in the first place. But Ryo had decided to let it pass.
He stood up and started to take step toward his workplace.
"Can I ask something? Behind, the grandpa asked.
"Yes."
"You looked like you had a very bad time." Grandpa's expression was genuinely concerning. "But you are behaving like everything is okay. Like nothing matters yet everything matters. It might just be a hunch of a old goner. Are you not thankful to God that you are okay?"
Ryo looked eye to eye to the grandpa. Both had their eyes vivid look. There was no withering from anyone.
Ryo looked up, to the cloudless, plain, blue sky.
"Universe have no obligation to help me. Nor it helped me. Nor I have any obligation or reason to give credit to anyone, anything for what they didn't did... As you said, I am just another one of runners who try to push the world which is already moving without their help. Just a mere witness. To observe and see of what makes of this world." Ryo started to walk to the same direction, where he was gonna.
"So why should I be thankful to something as meaningless as a universe, who doesn't helped me..." He looked behind again." But I had fun. Relaxation is a complete need for one. And I would really look forward to tomorrow, for our next meeting, if we ever meet again."
Ryo's image started to blurr before it completely vanished from the Grandpa's Vision.