The scoreboard never stopped moving.
Names climbed, dropped, vanished, all in seconds. Up in the stands, the host kept shouting, the crowd kept laughing, but down in the lanes the mood had shifted.
People were getting serious.
Two candidates cut across Raizen's lane, staring at him instead of the Class 2 trying to pry a door open behind them. Another pair broke away from a Nyx fight and angled toward another candidate with a nice score.
No one said it out loud.
But it was clear.
Take a head off the leaderboard, everyone else moves up.
The host heard it in the way metal started to sound.
"Awww, sportsmanship is... Optional" he said. "Quick reminder - points for Nyxes, not for kneecapping your neighbor. Unless your neighbor is a Nyx. Which... rarely happens. I hope."
The joke didn't land.
In one corner, steel hit steel as two candidates went at each other instead of the monsters.
Feris chose her moment.
