Sleep, wake up, eat, play. Then sleep again, wake again, eat again, play again—over and over until the days blurred together into one endless repetition.
That had been Alexander's life ten years ago, a mechanical loop of routine that left no room for choice, no room for childhood, and eventually nothing inside him but a growing weight of regret.
Everything had started the year he won the national high school checkers tournament. At only eleven years old, he had defeated countless professional players in a quiet war of strategy and patience, a child dismantling grown men with moves they never saw coming. It was a spectacle that people couldn't stop talking about, and the story spread across Japan with the speed of wildfire.
Not long after that victory, his parents finally realized what they truly had in their home.
To them, Alexander wasn't just a son anymore.
He was opportunity.
A way out of poverty.
A golden ticket disguised as a boy.
Love slowly faded from their eyes, replaced by something colder and sharper. Day after day they pushed him harder, forcing him from tournament to tournament with barely any time to rest. Sleep became a luxury, meals rushed between matches, and the pressure never stopped building. Each victory brought louder cheers from crowds and brighter smiles from strangers, yet behind every photograph and every interview, Alexander wore a smile that was carefully practiced and completely fake.
No one noticed the truth.
Little by little, the emptiness inside him grew heavier. The applause felt hollow. The praise meant nothing. At night he could hear his parents laughing together, drinking in celebration while counting the money he had earned for them, enjoying a life built entirely on the exhaustion of their child.
Eventually, the pressure became something else entirely.
It stopped being pain.
It became silence.
And then—
He snapped.
One night he took a kitchen knife and walked quietly into their bedroom while they slept. There was no hesitation in his movements, no trembling in his hands. The blade rose and fell with mechanical precision, the same calm focus he used on a checkerboard now guiding something far darker.
When it was done, blood covered his hands.
Unlike most children, he didn't panic.
He simply stood there, breathing evenly while his mind worked through the problem the same way it always did—calculating, organizing, solving. Within minutes he had constructed a believable story, a clean explanation that blamed the murders on thieves who had broken into the house during the night.
By the time the police arrived, Alexander already knew exactly what to say.
........
Now—in Midgard.
[30:00]
Heat pressed down on their bodies like a suffocating blanket. Veins bulged beneath their skin as their bodies struggled to adapt to the oppressive temperature filling the chamber. Across the room, one of their enemies casually gripped a baseball bat, its polished surface catching the dim light as he slowly rolled it across his shoulder.
A murderous smirk crept across his face.
"Kill them, boys,i've softened them up for you already."
The real fight began.
Confidence surged through the attackers the moment they saw how effective their environmental trap had been. They advanced with renewed aggression, convinced the battle was already leaning in their favor.
Jamie and Bray, however, had no intention of surrendering.
Even as the heat drained their strength and slowed their movements, they kept fighting.
Punches flew toward them, kicks snapped through the air, and the heavy bat swung in wide arcs meant to shatter bone. Yet one after another, the attacks failed to land. Their movements were slower than before, but their reaction speed hadn't truly fallen apart. Their bodies had already begun adjusting to the extreme conditions.
Their opponents noticed.
Unlike Jamie and Bray, the builders and miners had spent years carrying heavy loads deep underground while working in brutal environments. Extreme heat, suffocating air, and relentless labor were normal parts of their lives, and that experience now gave them a crucial edge in this battle.
Jamie continued weaving between attacks, his eyes locked in intense concentration as he studied every movement around him. Each swing, each step, each hesitation revealed something useful. To him the fight resembled a strategic puzzle more than a chaotic brawl, and he calmly searched for weaknesses the way a strategist searched for openings on a battlefield.
A katana sliced through the air toward his head.
Jamie dipped instantly, lowering himself just enough for the blade to whistle past his hair. The sharp strands shifted with the motion, dancing lightly as he moved.
"Another one," he thought as another opportunity presented itself.
Openings appeared again and again, each one offering him a clear path to deliver a lethal counterattack. Yet every time the chance emerged, Jamie ignored it. The memory of the plan he had made earlier still echoed in his mind, guiding his restraint.
Earlier…
Jamie had been standing beside Bray outside their broken fence. The two of them had remained there in silence, scanning the ruined battlefield for any trace that might reveal what had happened to Greg. The surrounding ground had been torn apart during the previous fight, the damage scattered everywhere like silent testimony of the violence that had unfolded.
"Infinity," Jamie murmured quietly while staring at his own arm. "This power might actually be a bug."
A faint aura shimmered around his right hand as he lifted it to examine the skin.
"If too many people learn about this… it could cause serious trouble," he continued thoughtfully.
He clenched his fist tightly.
"The safest option is to keep my powers a secret."
Aaah!
Bray lunged forward suddenly, launching himself into the fight with explosive momentum. The chain wrapped around his arms snapped forward, the knife attached to its end flashing through the air like a hunting fang. One of the enemies raised his weapon just in time to block the strike, but Bray didn't slow down. Maintaining his balance, he twisted his body and launched a powerful kick toward another attacker approaching from behind.
The blow slammed into the man's head.
He collapsed immediately.
"We need to find Alex!" Jamie shouted while slipping between two incoming attacks, his body moving from side to side in quick evasive steps.
"I know!" Bray yelled back, his voice echoing across the chamber.
"He's dead by now!" one of the attackers mocked while slowly pushing himself upright after barely avoiding a strike. Confidence dripped from his voice. "And his special skill won't save him either!"
For a brief moment the battlefield fell quiet.
Both sides stood locked in place, each fighter surrounded by two opponents who were ready to kill. They used the pause to steady their breathing and collect themselves before the next clash.
Eyes flickered between allies.
Silent signals passed without words.
Everyone understood what needed to happen next.
Jamie gradually shifted his position until his back approached the wall of the chamber.
"There's no running away, kid!" one of the miners sneered while stepping closer.
They attacked in alternating waves, trying to trap him against the wall. Even with sweat burning his eyes and his muscles aching from the heat, Jamie continued dodging with remarkable precision. Their strikes missed him repeatedly, yet the force behind each blow smashed into the wall itself.
Cracks began spreading across the cement.
Chunks of material broke loose.
One particularly heavy strike left a deep dent in the wall separating the chamber from whatever space existed beyond it.
Jamie noticed immediately.
"Finally,time isn't on my side,i need to speed this up." he thought, satisfaction flashing across his mind as he studied the damage their attacks were leaving behind.
"You're doing nothing, weaklings!" he taunted loudly.
The insult had the intended effect.
One of the men clenched his fist so tightly the veins in his arms bulged with effort. He gathered all his strength into a single devastating punch and drove it straight toward Jamie.
Pwah!
Instead of hitting its intended target, the blow smashed directly through the weakened wall.
A fist-sized hole burst open, and sand from the other side spilled across the cement floor.
The attacker staggered backward in shock, his eyes widening as he realized what had just happened. He had fallen perfectly into Jamie's trap.
Jamie smirked.
"Thanks," he murmured quietly before launching his counterattack.
His fist shot forward like a bullet and slammed into the man's jaw.
The impact lifted the attacker off his feet, sending him flying backward while saliva sprayed from his mouth. His body twitched violently in midair before crashing to the ground completely unconscious.
Silence followed for a moment as everyone processed what they had just seen.
Then the remaining miner roared in fury and rushed forward, attacking Jamie with reckless brutality. He tried to pin him down with overwhelming force, but Jamie stepped onto his opponent's legs, using the man's momentum against him.
With the attacker off balance and his eyes wide with confusion, Jamie launched himself upward and used the man's body like a springboard.
The wall shattered as Jamie burst through it in an explosion of debris.
"Get over here!" the miner shouted furiously, sprinting after him and abandoning Bray to deal with the remaining fighters alone.
Back in the original chamber, tension filled the air.
But something had changed.
Bray's breathing had stabilized.
His stance looked steadier.
His body had begun adapting to the extreme heat.
"Impressive, kid, i survived your earlier slams, so I can survive anything!"
the confident man sneered while pointing his knife forward.
Without warning, his partner charged Bray from the side, attempting to end the fight quickly.
Bray didn't retreat.
He stepped forward instead.
Punch for punch.
Blow for blow.
The confident man watched carefully as the exchange unfolded. At first he smirked, convinced his teammate would finish the job quickly. Then something strange happened.
Bray's head moved.
Not normally.
It twisted and bent with strange elasticity, slipping past strikes in ways the attacker couldn't predict.
The man pulled back and swung again.
The punch missed completely.
Bray stepped backward calmly, rotated the chain resting around his neck, and drove the knife forward in one smooth motion.
Click.
The blade pierced the man's neck.
He died instantly.
The confident man's expression changed immediately.
The balance of the fight had shifted.
Panicking, he rushed toward the wall and slammed his fist against a large red button.
A deep mechanical creak followed.
Hidden panels across the chamber walls slid open.
Thirteen vents revealed themselves at once.
Vwah!!
Thick clouds of poisonous gas erupted from the openings, spreading rapidly through the room and poisoning the air within seconds.
"We're going to die together! those pipes are releasing a toxin that will kill us all in seconds!"
"Shit!" Jamie coughed from the other side of the broken wall as the gas began reaching him.
"A perfect win condition! you and your friend will die here!"
Cough. Cough.
Jamie forced himself forward through the choking air as the burning gas filled his throat. Panic flickered across both their faces as they realized the situation had turned deadly.
In another chamber entirely, Yuno calmly continued explaining his strategy to Alexander.
Yuno's grin widened confidently.
"You think I don't know that,,that's exactly why I decided to use one of the few forces that raw strength alone can't stop."
Alexander narrowed his eyes, silently asking him to continue.
Yuno's smile grew wider.
"Poisonous gas."