There's no more time. The duel is about to begin. Wasteland roars with a crowd overflowing in emotion and nervousness. In the crowd, there are all the remaining teams from the World Cup. Round Hope, New Era, Ion Blue, True Brothers and Titans. Nobody wants to miss the first duel of the planet. In the human era, only two times there was a duel in a World Cup. The first time was Backfire against Tasuku. The member of the Sand Sharks won and left a deep scar in his rival. Losing a duel always meant humiliation. That's why there are so few of them in history books. The second time, Kiri faced a very agile Paladin model who no longer exists. The pickup truck was very superior.

"Remember what I told you, boy. I believe in you." Yuma says goodbye to Rouga while he watches him entering the sandy terrain of Wasteland.

Both cars go to the center of the field and Buzz's voice resounds in all the place. After a brief presentation, they split up and go to their positions. They never stop looking at each other. Buzz requests for the minute of silence that distinguishes the previous moments of a duel. A mix of concentration, nerves and anxiety floods the arena. The minute of silence begins…

The wind lifts great portions of sand to the atmosphere. The whole stadium makes no sound at all and all the looks are upon Rouga and Tasuku. Thirty seconds. Fireback looks at Yuma, who is nearer to the ground, and expresses his concern to him solely through a gaze. Tasuku looks at his teammates with confidence. Rouga, with his eyes still on the ball. Ten seconds. When the clock reaches three seconds, the countdown begins. Three. Two. One. The duel has begun.

Rouga goes full speed to the ball and, to his surprise, Tasuku doesn't move. He shoots to the right top corner and that's when his rival moves. Tasuku easily saves it and takes the ball to attack. Rouga retreats back and waits. Tasuku approaches very slowly to the goal, waiting for some misstep from Rouga. Finally, the car from Fireworks accelerates to clear the ball. Tasuku accelerates to his left, places the ball on top of his roof and propitiates a delicious lifted shot. Rouga misses and passes by. Tasuku goes to the goal but brakes just some centimeters away from the line. He waits for Rouga to comeback to push it backwards in the last moment possible. Early goal for the Sharks.

"Tasuku will try to get you out of the game just as he did it in the last one. Don't let his jokes and teases change your game style." Rouga remembers Yuma's words and contains his anger.

"Nice shot," says Rouga ironically.

"What a save," answers Tasuku.

They return to their kick off positions and the match continues. This time, both of them go towards the ball. It rolls to Rouga's right side and he tries to make the shot TK taught him in one of the trainings. He lifts the ball through the wall, barely touches it and goes with it to the goal. When Tasuku jumps to block him, Rouga activates his small amount of boost left and pushes the ball to change its trajectory. But it hits the post and doesn't enter. Rouga is still trying to recover the fall when Tasuku takes the ball, calmly, and travels to his rival's goal to make the second goal of the match.

"No! That was so close…" TK regrets Rouga's bad luck with his teammates.

While he is going to his kick off position, Rouga thinks about changing the strategy. He decides not to attack and wait for his rival to do it so he can do a counterattack. But after the kick off, Tasuku plays around with the ball and lets the time to pass by. Rouga starts to lose his temper and he panics. He does not want to lose. One last possibility appears in his mind: to do the same as Tasuku. Dirty play… When he recovers the ball, he attacks on his right side, his favorite side, and kicks the ball to the corner to center the ball to himself. The ball is going to Tasuku's area, and when he jumps to clear it, Rouga crashes him and the Tasuku flies inside of the goal. The car from Fireworks waits just two seconds for the ball to reach the area and hits the ball. Goal. Tasuku recovers from the crash and looks at him with the rage of a psychopathic murderer.

"Oh, no… You don't know what you are doing, rookie. You can't even imagine what you have just started…"

The weather is now very windy and the game turns very difficult and sloppy. There's very little sunlight and the lights of the stadium are turned on within a minute and a half left to play. From the outside, the duel can barely be seen because of the sand in the air. Both cars are playing in a very physical and violent way. With multiple crashes and pushes, no one can score. Their bodyworks degrade with each crash but they couldn't care less. The mechanics will take care of that later.

Thirty seconds to go. Venom dominates it in the center of the field. Tasuku is in the goal. The wind is hitting Rouga but he thinks of a way to use it to his favor. He hits the ball on purpose to the upper part of the goal to hit it again later, using the wind like an assistant. Unfortunately, Tasuku realizes his intentions and intercepts the ball in the middle of its trajectory. Rouga was already jumping so he aborts the play immediately and returns desperately. Fifteen seconds remaining and Tasuku can make the goal that could wrap the game. To tease his rival, Tasuku flips and puts himself upside down. He turns on his boost and advances only with its force. He is about to make the 'turtle goal', but he miscalculates the shot and Rouga has time to save it. Catching all the boosts from the ground, Rouga comes back with an incredible speed. Crashing Tasuku would be extremely dangerous and could cause him severe damage. But he makes the decision to do it. Rouga directly crashes into Tasuku in one of his sides and almost destroys him. Parts of his car are sent away as he flies away from the crash. Rouga takes the ball and has a few seconds to make it to the other side.

Tasuku wakes up from the commotion and explodes in anger. He is so mad that he accelerates and goes to chase Rouga. He takes all amount of boost possible.

Rouga is just a few meters away from the goal line. One goal and the match goes to overtime. Before he scores, he manages to look far away to the grandstands, where his teammates are, and gets happy for the tie. But instead of looking cheerful, he just hears one desperate warning: "Careful, V!" Everyone shouts at the same time but it's too late. Tasuku shows up like a beast in Rouga's periphery and demolishes him.

"Nooooooooooooo!" The pain is felt on Amaterasu's piercing scream that echoes on the whole Wasteland.

The stadium takes some time to comprehend what just happened. The surprise becomes silence. The silence becomes confusion. And the confusion becomes panic. The atmosphere is gradually filled with screams, crying and chaos. The match finishes and the goals open up. Fireworks invade the field and go straight to Tasuku at supersonic speeds. The Titans realize that and enter the field too, to prevent the disaster. Many of the Scarab assistants enter with them. Kyouya, Paruko and Zanya join the invasion. But they enter, as always, to cause trouble. Amaterasu charges full speed towards Tasuku, who crashes against Kyouya after he is hit. Amaterasu tries to attack him again but he encounters the gigantic Paruko in his way.

"Where do you think you are going?"

"Murderer! Murderer!" Amaterasu shouts to Tasuku while he wrestles with Paruko. Yuma intervenes and tries to take away Amaterasu as far as possible. The Titans arrive to the epicenter of the clash and try to separate the cars. Everything is a mess. More than thirty cars are now in the field. Finally, a couple of batmobiles escort the Sharks to the exit.

"I told you not to win! This is your fault!" Tasuku yells to the rest of Fireworks and exits with more threats. "You are next, Titans! Think about it!" The Sharks finally disappear between more insults from Kyouya and Zanya.

Yuga Mikado and Ranma Kakogawa, the most veteran cars, try to take the cars to the workshop. Leo and Gao, however, are extremely enraged.

"How could they do this, Yuga? They said it was forbidden!" complains TK with a cracked voice.

"I know, Leo. I know… I don't understand how could they do it. But we have to leave now. We have to help the team."

They manage to convince the rest of Fireworks' cars to leave and they exit through the goal between a lot of Scarabs. Yuma stays behind, comforting a broken Amaterasu.

The duel has finished. The first duel in the history of Psyonix. The first death in the history of Psyonix. Nobody can do anything about it. Injustice left its mark in Wasteland and another black chapter is written on this sport's pages. Winning now is the only choice.