Five people stood in front of a familiar bar. Two of them were panting as if they had just run a marathon. The other three looked down at them disappointingly.

"So why... did we run here? If there wasn't a reason, I swear I'll get you back."

"Don't worry, my auspicious gunslinging friend, I would never urge you to run so fast for no reason. That being said, we need to get inside right away if we don't want our trip to be wasted."

Ryuji mocked the panting gunslinger before pointing at the door. They walked through the entrance, and Ryuji immediately turned to where he knew the man would be.

"There he is! The damn fucker!"

Ryuji pointed at the drunkard who was currently talking to two very familiar people. Rhea's eyes hardened. With heavy footsteps, she slowly walked over to the man who was loudly and happily talking away. Rory's face contorted into a visible question mark as he felt the wild presence of a beast.

"Hey, Rory?"

"Hmm? What do you want now, Rhea?"

Rhea stood behind him, and Rory answered while looking into his drink. He did so immediately without thinking, then after swirling his glass, a slow look of understanding came over him.

"I'm so sorry, Rhea! I forgot all about it! I swear I would have remembered eventually! Hey, why are you grabbing my shoulder, AH!"

The others walked over to the table, ignoring their leader, who was currently twisting an old man's arm. Two people sat across from the man. Rosey looked at Ryuji with a face one might make if they smelled sewage water, while Jong looked at the group with a face someone might make looking at paint dry.

"Hey, Ryuji, it's our good friend Jong!" Jessy jumped up and down, pointing at Jong. Both Jong and Ryuji looked at the poor girl who was disillusioned about her relationship with this man she barely knew.

"Good friend?" They responded at the same time with the same question. Ryuji pretended to have cold shivers as if copying Jong was some kind of gateway to disease. "Anyway, how are you guys doing?"

"Pretty terrible now that you're here." Rosey responded with her head in her hand, blowing up her bangs with gusts of air. The look was one filled with angst.

"You hate me that much?"

"I prefer the sassy bitch more than you. I'll even take the weird one that talks gibberish over you."

"Gibberish? I'll show you gibberish, lady! Hold me back, Ryu! Hold me back!"

He calmly held Dot's arms while she thrashed around and continued to yell. With a "hyup." Ryuji lifted Dot and placed her on his shoulder like some kind of parent. She didn't weigh a lot, and her sitting up there was the best way to keep her both happy and out of trouble.

"I'm fine, thank you." With zero enthusiasm, Jong answered the question. Ryuji saw something odd and began leaning to make sure he was seeing right.

"Woah, are you holding her hand!?" Ryuji shouted out, and both their faces got shades redder. "Jong! I thought we were for sure going to be members of the virgin club for life! But now you found a girlfriend?"

"The world is such a cruel place, huh Ryu?"

"There, there, I'm sure you'll find the one eventually."

"If you stay a virgin for your whole life, maybe you'll awaken to some hidden power?"

One after another, the girls surrounding Ryuji managed to make him feel leagues worse about his minuscule contact with women. "So why did you leave the virgin club, huh!?"

"I-I never agreed to be in any sort of club with that weird of a name! As for why..." He looked to the girl beside him, who gave him a smile that Ryuji had never seen on her face before. It was, in a word, refreshing. She squeezed his hand harder, and Jong turned to face his pissed off club leader. "I love her."

"Oh jeez, that made even my heart 'kyun!'" Ryuji faked a heart attack, which almost caused Dot to fall off his shoulder.

"Who knew that Jong was such a romantic? I always had him pegged as the quiet guy with a huge gun."

"Even when referring to genitalia, you find a way to relate it to guns. What a weirdo. Also, you didn't have to air quote gun!"

"Does this mean even the hero might have a chance?" Queen's mouth turned into a visible 'O' as she thought of the possibility.

"Don't ask that with genuine shock in your voice! Why now of all times do you decide to show emotion?"

"Nah, there's no hope for Ryu here. I saw him humping his pillow one time. Ain't no way someone that deprived can sweet talk a lady." While hanging off his arm like it was a jungle gym, Dot trash-talked Ryuji.

Rosey looked up at the accused pillow humper with morbid curiosity. "Any clue who he was humping it to?"

"Oh yeah, he was saying Rh-"

"Shut up!"

In the middle of her sentence, Ryuji clamped his hand on top of her mouth, which only got him a wet hand. Trying to wipe off Dot spit Ryuji noticed that the other side of the table had calmed down.

"Did someone say my name?"

Rhea appeared next to him with a smile.

"Yeah, it was Ryuji while he was humping a pillow!" Rosey yelled out the only thing he didn't want her to. The entire group roared with laughter as Ryuji's face matched Rhea's hair. The only person not laughing was Rhea herself, who seemed very confused by the situation.

"I'll remember this, Rosey! Ah, Whatever! We need to start talking about why we're here."

The mood in the group shifted at Ryuji's declaration. Everyone took a seat at the table, cramming together as close as possible. Rory was the first one to speak up.

"So what did you need to say, Uhm, what was it?"

"It's Ryuji, and what I need to talk about is an upcoming threat to this city and us." Everyone looked at him, waiting for him to continue speaking. "I had a prophetic dream where the goddess Ishtar gave me some info on what's about to happen here."

"The goddess Ishtar? What a load of shit." Rosey leaned back and sighed exasperatedly.

"I believe him. He's made contact with her before in much the same manner. What she said to him back then came true as well."

Rory rubbed his stubbled chin for a bit before giving his judgment. "I choose to believe in Rhea. She is a very capable warrior and a good judge of character. If she says so, then I'm inclined to have the same opinion. Not to mention that it's rare but not impossible for gods to give people visions."

Rory gave Ryuji a nod. Jong seemed unfazed while Rosey rolled her eyes aggressively. "In a few hours, this city will be attacked from the inside by five of the seven sins." Everyone's eyes shot open, but the effect his news had on Rosey and Jong seemed even more intense. "What's wrong? Is it that scary to you?"

Rosey looked down and bit her lip before answering. "On our way here, we fought one of them. We saw Greed, and we saw him killing Gluttony. We managed to kill Greed, but it wasn't easy."

"We? It was all you. No need to make me feel better about it."

Jong and Rosey's hands gripped each other tighter as they remembered the hard-fought battle. Rory and Rhea looked concerned, meanwhile, Ryuji had a different response altogether.

"What's wrong, Ryu? Why ya crying?"

Dot attempted to comfort him with a head rub as fresh hot tears streaked down his face. "It's just that... I thought maybe the other two would show up and ruin everything. But knowing that they're gone just gives me... hope. That's all." With a refreshing smile, he wiped away the tears and affectionately pushed down Dot's hat.

"If you killed Greed, then that means..." The glass in Rory's hand shattered.

"I know what you're thinking, Commander, but that's not the case. Ishtar told me that killing the sins won't transfer their authorities. Something weird is going on, and I don't know what, but you have to trust me about that."

"What else did she tell you?"

"Their authorities and their weaknesses. Using them, I think we can come up with a pretty solid plan of attack."

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

"So what do you think of that? Not bad, right?" Ryuji smugly patted himself on the back for the almost full proof plan he came up with.

"This plan has a lot of holes in it, and we're going in with a lot of assumptions that might bite us in the ass." Rory's commentary on his plan caused Ryuji to deflate suddenly. He knew that his plan wasn't the greatest, but he had limited information and limited time.

"Yes, there's a lot of things we just have to trust in, but as I'm sure you're aware, Rory, we don't have enough time to come up with something better. If we don't go out and start preparing right now, we won't get it done." Rhea, as usual, shut him up pretty fast.

"Well, if we're all in agreement on the plan and no one has any questions, let's get this show on the road!" He expected this to be the moment that everyone threw away their fears and cheered with him as a morale booster but, instead, he got blank stares.

"Ryu, no one here knows what that means." Dot clapped him on the back as she walked away from the table.

"I wish you luck in battle, f-friend." Rhea, embarrassed by her own words, quickly rushed out the door.

"Don't die, hero." Queen followed suit.

"You'll be reading about my exploits in the papers tomorrow, pardner. You best be ready for it! I'm expecting genuine praise when I get back!" Jessy waved him goodbye with a smile that warmed his heart.

"Well, that's everyone from my group. You guys ready yet?"

Rory took a swig of his drink and sat up. This might have been the first time Ryuji saw this man not sitting in that chair. "I guess I've got an important job to attend to."

"Yours is the most important Commander." Ryuji had nothing but respect for the man in front of him. His upcoming trial was one that only a few people in the world could accomplish. Anyone else in his situation might have deserted, but Rory seemed content with his fate.

"You two! I've got just one thing to say about the job we're doing today. Only one of us is allowed to die, got that?"

"That's a stupid rule, Commander! It's not like we can help when we die or not!"

"For once, she's got a point."

"For once? And here I was about to send you off with my love! Well, guess who's not getting it now!" Rosey started pulling on Jong's cheeks. The man didn't appear too bothered by this and continued looking at Rory, who seemed happy.

"Well, we're each diving into an unknown situation. Telling you that none of us can die is pretty unrealistic. So I thought I would meet in the middle and say one of us can. It sounded like a good idea in my head."

"Whatever, old-man. No one is going to die! When you say stuff like that... it makes it sound like you plan on dying... so stop doing it! We just got back together. I won't forgive you if you don't come back!" Rosey almost had tears in her eyes as she shouted at Rory. She wiped her eyes before looking at her partner. "We need to get going. See you later, pillow humper!" Rosey and Rory walked out the door.

"See you later, knockoff!" Ryuji stuck his tongue out as the red-tipped girl waked away. Jong got up to follow them out, which reminded Ryuji of something he needed to say. "Oh, wait, Jong. There's something I couldn't tell you in front of everyone else."

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The sunset on the horizon. Night fell, and the city of Priscillaca was even quieter than a town out in the boonies. Not a single person walked its streets. Ryuji watched this sight before sitting down at the counter sipping on some high-grade juice. He had helped himself to it since he was technically saving everyone. They could spare him so juice. The door behind him opened slowly. The moment he had been waiting for had arrived.

"So you're here." Ryuji turned around to look only to see something shocking. "What the hell are you still doing here, Nyanjo!?"

His least favorite pink catgirl stood at the door wearing her idol outfit. "Is it a crime to go to my place of work?"

"It is when the city is on full lockdown! Why aren't you at the shelter? You wanna die, is that it?"

"The thing is, I only got through inspection because of you. If I go to those shelters, they'll relay that to some unsavory people. Then I'll have to move again. I would rather risk it out here than get noticed by those assholes."

"Those guys who caught us on the road? Look, I admire your courage and all, but you picked one of the worst places to lay low at! I need you to get out!"

"I agree you are not needed here."

A flat voice broke the conversation. Ryuji rushed forward and put himself in front of the girl. He didn't particularly like her, but she was pretty nice to him last time, so he was willing to deal with it.

With a face that looked like he might run away at any second, Ryuji smiled. The man in front of him was the exact person he was banking on showing up. Everything, as far as he knew, was going to plan. "I've been waiting, Furor!" The showdown between him and fate had begun.