My Ultimate Gacha System

He carried the ball into the central-right channel with Palace’s defenders retreating in front of him, until one center-back stepped out to close the shooting lane. Demien waited for the defender’s weight to shift onto his front foot, then slid the ball through the gap that opened, sending Garnacho clear on the opposite side.

Garnacho took one touch and drove a low shot across goal, but Johnstone got down well and pushed it around the post.

「MISSION PROGRESS」 「Clear Chances Created: 1/3」

Demien threw both hands to his head at the save, then immediately pointed toward Garnacho and clapped twice, because the run had been exactly right even if the finish hadn’t landed.

"Two Palace players around him and he still finds the pass in under three seconds," the commentator said. "That’s the problem United have just introduced."

On Palace’s next attack, Eze tried to find Mateta’s feet through the same pocket that had worked twice already. Demien read the angle before the ball left Eze’s boot, stepped across the striker’s run, and won the ball clean, absorbing a shoulder from the nearest Palace midfielder without breaking stride.

「TRAIT ACTIVATED」 「Ball Winner」 「STATS ACTIVE」 「Interceptions: 94 | Aggression: 98 | Strength: 99」

Rather than force the ball through the crowd he’d just stepped out of, he turned away from the contact, lifted his head, and struck a long diagonal pass toward Garnacho, dropping it into the space in front of him so the winger never had to break stride to collect it.

「LEGENDARY SKILL ACTIVATED」 「Toni Kroos — Metronome」 「STATS ACTIVE」 「Vision: 99 | Long Passing: 99 | Curve: 99」

Garnacho drove into the box and cut a low cross toward Martial, but Palace scrambled it clear, the ball dropping just outside the penalty area where Demien had already drifted into position, expecting exactly that.

He killed the bounce with one touch, and when a defender rushed him, he shifted the ball across his body to open the lane and struck it first time from distance.

「EPIC SKILL ACTIVATED」 「Dipping Power Shot」 「STATS ACTIVE」 「Long Shots: 98 | Shot Power: 89 | Composure: 99」

The shot climbed toward the far corner, dipped late beyond Johnstone’s fingertips, and crashed against the inside of the post before spinning across the goalmouth and out of play, refusing him a goal he’d done everything right to earn.

Demien shouted in frustration and dragged both hands down his face, glaring at the post as if it had wronged him personally. Garnacho jogged past laughing, and Demien pointed at him irritably before the corner of his own mouth gave in and curved upward despite himself.

「MISSION PROGRESS」 「Line-Breaking Actions: 2/2」

United made their final change in the seventy-second minute, sending on Højlund for Martial.

Before the striker crossed the touchline, Demien jogged over during a break in play and spoke fast, keeping it short because the ball was already coming back into play. "Their right center-back keeps stepping toward the ball, and the wing-back’s staying too high — there’s a channel behind both of them if you go early."

Højlund nodded once and looked toward the space Demien had pointed out, already picturing the run before his boots touched the grass.

Palace tried to solve their Demien problem the physical way. A midfielder clipped his ankle a half-second after he’d released a pass, late enough that there was no mistaking the intent. Demien hit the turf hard, rose with real irritation written across his face, and took two quick steps toward the player before Casemiro stepped bodily between them, a hand flat against Demien’s chest.

The referee showed a yellow card and waved play on. Demien took the free kick quickly, sending Højlund toward the same channel, but the pass ran a fraction too long and Johnstone reached it a stride ahead of the striker.

Palace pushed forward again in the seventy-eighth minute, chasing something to take into the final ten minutes. Eze carried the ball through midfield, but Casemiro forced him sideways rather than letting him turn central, and when the next pass came loose, United won it back and released the ball into Demien’s feet in the right half-space.

A Palace midfielder closed him down from the left. One center-back stepped out to cover the passing lane. On the far side, Garnacho stayed wide, dragging the rest of Palace’s defensive line with him.

Demien shaped his body toward Garnacho, his eyes flicking that way, his standing foot angled as though the switch was already decided.

The center-back opened his hips in that direction, buying it completely.

Behind him, Højlund had already begun his curved run into the channel Demien had described minutes earlier.

Demien waited until the defender’s turn was fully committed, then wrapped the outside of his right boot around the ball and bent it behind the defensive line, straight into Højlund’s stride.

「LEGENDARY SKILL ACTIVATED」 「Luka Modrić — Outside-of-Boot Laser」 「STATS ACTIVE」 「Vision: 99 | Long Passing: 99 | Curve: 99」

Højlund took the ball in stride with his first touch and drove his second low across Johnstone into the far corner.

Manchester United 4 — 0 Crystal Palace Rasmus Højlund 78’ (Assist: Demien Walter)

「MISSION PROGRESS」 「Direct Goal Contributions: 1/1」 「Clear Chances Created: 2/3」

Demien sprinted toward Højlund and grabbed him around the shoulders, pointing back toward the channel again and again, laughing when Højlund shouted something back at him that got lost under the noise of the stand behind the goal. Garnacho piled in a second later, and Demien’s smile stayed wide the whole way back to the center circle.

"He called that run before Højlund had even set foot on the pitch," the commentator said, letting the replay show the pointed instruction from minutes earlier. "That’s not luck, that’s a footballer reading a defense in real time."

Palace found one more chance before the game closed out entirely, Eze finding Mateta’s feet inside the box, Mateta turning his marker and striking hard, only for Onana to parry it away and the rebound to skid wide of the far post.

Demien spent the closing minutes helping United see the game out rather than chasing a fifth. He dropped beside Casemiro to receive under pressure, played a first-time pass away from the nearest challenge, switched play wide to the overlapping fullback, took a return pass through Casemiro, and disguised a final ball that sent Garnacho behind Palace’s line once more.

「LEGENDARY SKILL ACTIVATED」 「Andrea Pirlo — Deep-Lying Playmaker」

Garnacho’s low cross was cut out a stride before Højlund could reach it, but the chance itself counted all the same.

「MISSION PROGRESS」 「Clear Chances Created: 3/3」

When Palace settled into a deeper shape rather than keep chasing, Demien chose to keep the ball moving instead of forcing anything through a crowd that no longer had a reason to break, the decision of a player managing a scoreline rather than one still hunting a highlight.

The referee blew for full time.

Manchester United 4 — 0 Crystal Palace

Before he let himself celebrate with the rest of the team, Demien exhaled hard, glanced once toward the post he’d struck twenty minutes earlier, and shook his head with a crooked, half-annoyed smile that the assist and the scoreline hadn’t quite erased.

United walked toward the traveling supporters together to applaud them, and Demien stayed in the middle of it rather than pulling away on his own. Højlund threw an arm around him and said something about the pass that made Demien laugh outright. Garnacho brought up the post again, grinning the whole time, and Demien answered with dry irritation that couldn’t quite hide how pleased he actually was.

Casemiro took the Player of the Match award afterward, and nobody in the away end or the home stands seemed to think it was the wrong call — a goal, an assist, and ninety minutes of control from a player who’d earned every bit of it.

The broadcast cut to a graphic before the players had even reached the tunnel.

DEMIEN WALTER Minutes: 25 | Assists: 1 | Chances Created: 3 Successful Dribbles: 3/3 | Pass Completion: 94% Ball Recoveries: 2 | Shots: 2 | Woodwork: 1

The interview area sat beneath a sponsor wall lit by a single hard camera light, a handheld microphone waiting between Demien and the pitch, teammates still passing behind him toward the tunnel while Old Trafford emptied in loose streams beyond the advertising boards.

The interviewer worked through her questions in order. First, the bench decision after his Burnley hat trick — Demien admitted honestly that he understood the rotation even if he hadn’t enjoyed watching the first hour from the sideline. Then the impact off the bench, where his answer warmed considerably, crediting the platform Casemiro and Garnacho had already built before he arrived. On the outside-of-the-boot assist for Højlund, his face lit up without any effort to hide it, and he talked through the space he’d spotted before the striker had even come on. Asked about the shot against the post, he exhaled through his nose and admitted it was still bothering him, no attempt at polished detachment in the answer at all.

Ten Hag’s press conference ran shorter and stayed practical throughout. Questions covered the rotated side’s control of the match, Casemiro’s performance, Demien’s cameo off the bench, and the league fixture against the same opponent at Old Trafford four days later.

"Good performance from the group. Casemiro was excellent, control and goal," Ten Hag said. "Demien came on and made an immediate difference — good decision-making, good hunger. But this was a team performance, not one player." When a reporter pushed for his thinking on Saturday’s lineup, he shut the question down with a short shake of his head. "We focus on recovery first. I’m not discussing Saturday tonight."

Only after the cameras had moved on did the rest settle in, quiet and separate from everything that had just happened in front of a microphone.

「MATCH MISSION COMPLETE」 「Direct Goal Contributions: 1/1」 「Clear Chances Created: 3/3」 「Line-Breaking Actions: 2/2」 「Pass Completion: 94%」 「Reward: +50 MP」 「Bonus Objective Complete」 「Bonus Reward: +5 TP」

Old Trafford had thinned out considerably by the time Demien came through the players’ exit, showered and changed, his bag slung over one shoulder. Security stood near the glass doors keeping a loose corridor open, a cluster of supporters still waited behind the metal barriers with phones raised, and camera flashes caught the players crossing toward the car park one by one under the stadium’s red lights against a sky gone fully dark over Manchester.

His body carried the loose, settled feeling of a win, but he shook his head once more, unable to fully let go of the post.

His phone had filled with alerts by the time he checked it — tags, replay clips, notifications stacking on top of each other faster than he could read them. He cleared most of them without opening a single one, the kind of attention that had stopped feeling new to him weeks ago.

Then Sophia’s name appeared at the top of the screen.

His thumb hovered there for a second, and whatever irritation had still been sitting in his face eased before he even opened the message.

Left the stadium yet? Don’t drive off. I’m close.

He slowed near the exit, glancing toward the supporters still waiting and the rows of parked cars beyond them, and checked the screen again as a second message landed.

Turn around.