The sun hung high over the tournament arena as **Arthur**, **Vaelis Mourne**, **Sunny**, and **Lola** crossed a stretch of shattered earth.
Sunny was quieter than usual after waking from his strange dream. Arthur noticed, but before he could ask, a sound rose from the ravine ahead.
Growling.
Then movement.
A pack of **lesser beasts** spilled over the rocks—lean, horned creatures with too many teeth and yellow, empty eyes. There were dozens at first.
Then more appeared.
Soon, nearly **a hundred** crowded the valley floor.
They did not stalk the group with strategy or caution. Lesser beasts had no discipline, no fear, and no real thought beyond their primal instinct to feed. They clawed at one another in their rush to be first.
Arthur drew his weapon.
Lola put an arm in front of him.
"Not this time."
Arthur looked at her. "Lola—there are too many."
"I know." Her expression softened for a moment. "Back at school, I couldn't protect you from those bullies. I hated that I was never strong enough when you needed someone."
The beasts snarled below, scraping their claws across the stone.
Lola's eyes hardened.
"But I am now."
She faced the rest of the group and gave a small, confident smile.
"Sit back and enjoy the show."
Lola lifted one hand.
Her **Floater** attribute answered at once.
Arthur, Vaelis, and Sunny rose gently from the ground, startled but unharmed. The three of them floated above the ravine, far beyond the lesser beasts' reach.
Sunny blinked down at the swarm. "Floating is fine. Sitting would be better."
He extended his hand.
His attribute, **the Creator**, shaped light and essence into form. Three sturdy chairs appeared beneath them—carved from pale, polished material, complete with armrests and high backs.
Vaelis sat first, composed as ever.
Arthur followed, though he kept his weapon in hand.
Sunny settled into the last chair. "Now this is a viewing platform."
Below them, Lola stepped alone into the center of the ravine.
The pack charged.
Lola spread her fingers.
Flame burst around her in a wide circle.
The first wave of lesser beasts ran directly into the fire, driven forward by hunger even as their fur ignited. Lola swept her arm to the side, and a rolling wall of flame tore through the pack. Dozens were thrown back across the rocks.
But the rest rushed in without hesitation.
Lola pivoted.
Wind exploded from beneath her feet.
A violent gust lifted dust, broken stone, and several beasts into the air. The creatures spun helplessly in the current, snapping and clawing at nothing. Lola clenched her fist, and the wind compressed into a cutting spiral that hurled them into the ravine wall.
Arthur watched in stunned silence.
"She's been training all this time," he murmured.
Vaelis's gaze stayed on Lola. "More than training. She has been preparing."
The surviving beasts spread out, circling her from every side. Their growls deepened as they prepared to rush together.
Lola exhaled.
Blue-white electricity crawled over her arms.
Sunny leaned forward in his chair. "Lightning?"
"I've only mastered the first form," Lola called without looking up. "But it's enough."
The beasts lunged.
Lola vanished.
A crack of thunder ripped across the ravine.
Lola became a streak of lightning racing through the swarm—too fast for the lesser beasts to follow. Every time she appeared, blue fire burst from her path.
One beast fell.
Then three.
Then ten.
In seconds, **Storm Chaser** tore through roughly **40 lesser beasts** in one blinding run. Their bodies struck the ground in smoking heaps as Lola reappeared at the far edge of the ravine, electricity snapping around her boots.
The remaining beasts froze.
For the first time, instinct told them something other than hunger.
Run.
Lola raised both hands.
Flames blocked one escape. A crushing gale blocked the other. Lightning flashed overhead, caging the survivors beneath a storm of her own making.
"No one leaves," she said.
The last of the pack charged anyway.
It was all they knew how to do.
Lola met them alone.
When the dust finally settled, the ravine was silent.
Nearly a hundred lesser beasts lay defeated across the scorched stone.
Lola stood in the middle of it, breathing hard, with fading embers drifting from her hands.
Lola lowered the floating chairs back to the ground.
Arthur stepped out first and approached her carefully yet still at a distance .
Lola turned to him, suddenly uncertain beneath all that strength. "Was that… enough?"
Arthur looked across the ravine, then back at her.
"It was more than enough," he said. "But you never had to prove you mattered to me."
Lola's shoulders eased.
"I know," she answered quietly. "I just needed to prove it to myself."
Vaelis looked toward the path beyond the ravine.
"The beasts were fleeing from something," he said.
Far ahead, deep within the arena, something massive answered with a roar.
Lola stood alone among the fallen lesser beasts as the last sparks of **Storm Chaser** faded from her arms.
Then her legs gave out.
She turned and ran straight to Arthur.
"Arthur!"
Before he could say anything, she threw her arms around him. Her grip was tight—almost desperate—and Arthur felt her shaking against him.
"I thought I was going to die," Lola admitted, her voice muffled against his shoulder. "There were so many of them. But I had to do it."
Arthur gently held her steady. "Lola, you didn't have to face all of that alone."
"I did," she said, pulling back just enough to look at him. Her eyes were wet, though she tried to smile. "Not because you're weak. Never because of that."
She took a breath.
"Back at school, when those people hurt you, I couldn't protect you. I was scared, and I hated myself for standing there unable to do anything."
Her hands tightened around his sleeves.
"But now you can lean on me whenever you need to. I promise I'll always watch your back."
From the separate spectator dimension, Layla watched through the shimmering barrier.
For a brief moment, jealousy crossed her face as Lola held Arthur.
Then it faded.
Layla had seen the field of scorched stone and almost a hundred dead lesser beasts. She saw how badly Lola was trembling—not showing off, not trying to claim Arthur, but trying to prove she would not fail him again.
Layla lowered her gaze, concerned.
"Please be okay, Lola," she whispered.
Sunny stepped beside Arthur and Lola. The memory of the First King's test still weighed heavily on him, but he gave Arthur a firm nod.
"I promise too," Sunny said. "Whatever comes next—beasts, this tournament, or whatever is hiding in my past—you won't be facing it by yourself."
Arthur looked to Vaelis Mourne.
Vaelis was quiet for several seconds. The wind moved through his dark hair while his eyes remained fixed on the ruined battlefield.
"I won't promise to bail you out of every bad decision," Vaelis said at last.
Sunny gave a faint, surprised smile. "That sounds like Vaelis."
Vaelis ignored him and continued.
"But I will help in the best way I can."
His gaze shifted to Arthur.
"I used to think a meaningless death was fine. My family treated me like something beneath them. Other people followed their lead. After enough of that, I stopped seeing a reason to fight them—or anyone."
His hand slowly closed into a fist.
"Not anymore. I'm not dying just to make their judgment easier. I'm going to prove them wrong."
Arthur nodded, understanding the weight behind the words.
Lola stayed close beside him. Sunny stood at his other side. Vaelis faced forward, no longer looking like someone who had given up.
For the first time since entering the arena, Arthur's group felt less like strangers forced together by a tournament—and more like people choosing to stand together.
Then the distant roar came again.
This time, it was closer.
# :mc-compass: Arthur's Calculations
Arthur walked in silence while the others moved through the sun-baked ruins.
*A week,* he calculated. *Only a week since we entered the arena.*
It felt longer.
The tournament continent was absurdly vast—large enough to rival **Africa**. They had begun in the south, travelled far west while trying to avoid danger, and still the finish line was supposed to be somewhere in the north.
Arthur frowned.
*Are we even still heading north?*
A small mechanical voice answered inside his mind.
> **"Confirmation: current route remains northbound."**
Arthur's eyes narrowed. "You can read my thoughts now?"
A second bot spoke before the first could reply.
> **"Advisory: the northern finish line cannot be reached without crossing the main city. Expect multiple corrupted entities ahead."**
Arthur looked toward the distant horizon.
"So we wasted time trying to go around it," he muttered.
He stopped himself.
The system warning returned to him: **not every bot was meant to assist them.**
He gave the unseen voices no further complaint.
Lola noticed his sudden silence. "Arthur? You've been quiet for a while."
Sunny and Vaelis looked at him too, waiting.
Arthur did not explain the bots. Instead, he studied the terrain—the sun's position, the weathered remains of roads, the shape of the distant mountains—and built a map in his mind.
*We started south. We went too far west. We're almost on the western side of the continent now.*
His gaze settled on Lola.
She had defeated nearly a hundred lesser beasts, but that victory had cost her. Her breathing had recovered, yet her posture had not. Her **aether reserves** had to be running low.
*If an enemy realizes that, Lola becomes easier to target.*
Arthur's expression hardened.
*I need a way to hide that weakness… or turn it into an advantage before they do.*
"For now," he said at last, "we go east. Another week, if the map in my head is right."
Vaelis raised an eyebrow. "East? The finish line is north."
"The capital is east of us," Arthur answered. "We need to reach it before we can continue north."
Sunny's face tightened. "The destroyed capital full of corrupted beasts?"
Arthur nodded.
The group fell quiet.
They all knew what **corrupted** meant: beasts warped beyond their natural state, intelligent enough to recognize opportunity, but still ruled by the instincts of predators.
"We infiltrate," Arthur said. "No fighting unless we have no choice."
Lola glanced at her hands, where faint traces of fire still lingered. "None of us has a stealth ability."
"That's the problem," Arthur said.
Then he remembered something he had learned while watching corrupted beasts from afar.
"They leave you alone if you don't move."
Sunny stared at him. "That is your infiltration plan?"
"Part of it," Arthur said. "They can think, but they're still beasts. Movement draws their attention. Hunger guides them. If we understand their instincts, we can make them look the wrong way."
Vaelis looked east, toward the broken skyline barely visible beyond the hills.
Far ahead, towers rose from the earth like shattered teeth.
The **capital city** waited—destroyed, silent, and crawling with corrupted beasts.
Arthur tightened his grip on his weapon.
"Rest while we can," he said. "In a week, we enter the city."
Arthur's group had barely begun moving east when the sky darkened.
Not with clouds.
With words.
A vast blue panel unfolded above the tournament continent, visible from every battlefield, ruined road, hidden camp, and spectator dimension.
> **[SYSTEM ANNOUNCEMENT]**
> **The first qualifiers have reached the northern finish line.**
> **Qualification slots: 2,000 / 50,000 participants.**
> **Remaining slots: 1,996.**
For several seconds, the world seemed to stop.
Arthur stared upward. "Already?"
Sunny's expression hardened. "We've only been here a week."
Lola looked toward the north, her earlier confidence replaced by unease. If one group had crossed a continent-sized arena, survived its beasts, and reached the finish line in that time… then they were either unbelievably powerful—or they had discovered a route nobody else knew existed.
Vaelis watched the notification fade. "Four people," he said. "A full group."
Arthur's jaw tightened.
Only **two thousand** contestants would advance. Forty-eight thousand would be eliminated before the next round even began. And now four of those places were already gone.
The ruined capital ahead no longer felt like an obstacle they could patiently work around.
It was a countdown.
---
Layla, Arthur's mother Alexi , and Kierran watched the same announcement flash across the viewing barrier.
Arthur's mother pressed a hand to the shimmering glass. "Someone made it already?"
Kierran's eyes narrowed as he studied the northern edge of the arena. "They did more than make it. They cleared the first game."
Nearby, **Aris** remained still.
For the first time, uncertainty touched his expression.
He had expected contestants to struggle through the arena for far longer. He had expected the first qualification to come after the capital forced the strongest groups into open conflict.
He had not expected anyone to reach the finish line so soon.
"Interesting," Aris said quietly.
But the word lacked its usual certainty.
Somewhere beyond the northern boundary, four unknown contestants had already passed into the next round—and Aris had no idea how.
---
Arthur looked back to his group.
"We cannot waste another week circling ruins," he said. "We head east, reach the capital, and cross it. Quietly."
Sunny nodded, though his gaze stayed fixed on the fading system panel.
Lola drew a slow breath and steadied herself.
Vaelis gave a short nod. "Then we move before the next announcement takes another four places."
Together, they turned toward the destroyed capital—toward the corrupted beasts, the northern route, and the shrinking number of chances to survive.