Connor hit the button.
For a half second nothing happened, and then everything happened at once. A staff materialized in his hand from nowhere, dark wood, faintly glowing at the tip, heavier than it looked, and energy moved through his body like electricity finding a path, starting at his feet and rushing upward until it had nowhere left to go except out.
He fired.
Two missiles. Blue, bright, leaving trails in the grey air of Valdenmoor as they crossed the distance and hit Tiger Woods dead in the chest with two small, deeply satisfying explosions.
Diego, Andre, and Zhang all watched with their mouths open.
The Codex box updated.
TIGER WOODS HP: 15 - 2 = 13
Connor stared at it.
"Wait." His voice was very quiet. "I shot him with two missiles. And it only did one damage each." He looked at the staff. Looked back at the box. "What the heck."
Diego, still flat on the ground, started laughing. "Hahah oww hahaha ow." He couldn't stop, even though every laugh was clearly hurting his knee, which somehow made it funnier.
Zhang shook his head slowly with the expression of a man receiving very bad news. "Connor. Are we dead ass right now. Ain't no way boy."
"IT'S NOT MY FAULT," Connor yelled, gripping the staff, "THIS STUPID STAFF IS WEAK—"
"Hey." Andre held up a hand. His voice was completely calm. "No need to be disrespectful to your staff."
Connor opened his mouth. Closed it.
The Codex box flickered.
TIGER WOODS' TURN.
They all looked up.
Tiger Woods stood across from them and something was happening to it. Its stomach was expanding slowly, its whole body beginning to shudder and swell, the shadow aura around it thickening and darkening.
Diego squinted at it from the ground. "Oh my god. He's copying Zhang."
Zhang turned. Looked at the monster. Looked at its stomach. His eye twitched.
"Hey." His voice came out low and very serious. "You fat bitch. Only one person can be fat and that's me."
Tiger Woods opened its mouth and spat.
A shadow ball, dark and fast, crossed the battlefield and hit Zhang square in the stomach. The sound it made when he hit the ground was a single flat thump, the kind that made everyone nearby wince.
"ZHANG—"
All three of them yelled it at the same time.
The Codex box updated.
SOUTH KOREAN OR CHINESE HP: 10 - 3 = 7
Zhang was on the ground, both hands pressed to his stomach, curled slightly inward. His voice came out wrong. Thinner than usual.
"Oh god. I-it hurts."
Andre's body had gone very still. His hands were shaking. He looked at Connor and the fear in his voice was real, under the surface but right there. "Connor. What happens if we reach zero. D-do we die?"
Connor stood there. His staff was still in his hand. His glasses reflected the pale glow of the battle screen. He didn't say anything.
"CONNOR." Diego's voice cracked off the trees. He was up on one knee now, knee still bad, not laughing anymore. "What happens if we reach zero."
Connor gulped.
"It's game over," he said quietly. "That's how it's always been in games. Even in DnD."
Zhang's head snapped up from the ground. "WHAT. I'm going to DIE?!"
"Not if we kill this thing first," Andre said.
His voice had changed. The fear was still there but something else had moved in front of it, the way a door closes. He looked at Tiger Woods. He looked at the axe on his back, the one he hadn't touched yet, the one that was nearly as tall as Connor.
He reached back and grabbed it.
The Codex box flickered in front of Andre.
ABILITY: AXE SLAM
Andre looked at it for exactly one second. Then he pushed the button.
His body moved before his brain did. That was the only way to describe it, like something had reached inside him and taken the wheel. He was in the air before he knew he'd jumped, higher than anything nine years old had any business being, the massive axe pulled back over his head, and then he came down on Tiger Woods like a verdict.
The axe connected across its body with a sound that shook the grey trees.
TIGER WOODS HP: 13 - 3 = 10
Then Andre was back. Standing exactly where he'd been before the jump, like the world had just cut and pasted him, not even breathing hard.
Zhang raised one arm from the ground, shaking, and gave a long slow thumbs up.
"Niiiiice job."
Andre looked at him. "Not gonna lie, when you said Niii I thought you was about to call me the n-word."
The battlefield went quiet for half a second.
Then all four of them lost it. Even Zhang, from the ground, even though laughing hurt.
Connor shook his head, but he was smiling. He got it together first. "Guys. No. Stop it. We gotta lock in."
Everyone stopped. Everyone nodded.
The Codex flickered.
MEXICAN'S TURN.
Connor turned to Diego with the energy of a man who had been waiting to give this speech his entire life. "Diego, you're up. Now it's time to shine. Show Tiger Woods who the real tiger is."
It landed like a dad pep talk before a little league game. It was extremely sincere. It was a little embarrassing. It worked anyway.
Diego wobbled to his feet. His knees felt like warm spaghetti. He stood up anyway, straightened his white and gold armor, and nodded once with the gravity of someone who had made a decision about who they were.
"You're right dad, I mean Connor." He cleared his throat. "I'm a real Mexican and I'm proud. Not the rainbow proud though."
"You go queen," Andre said.
"Mmm, you ate that honey," Zhang said from the ground.
Diego looked at his Codex box.
ABILITY: HOLY SMITE
He pushed the button.
The sky cracked open.
Green, white, and red light came pouring down from somewhere above the grey clouds of Valdenmoor, sparkling and bright, landing on Diego like it had been looking for him specifically. It moved through the armor and into him and all three of them, Connor, Andre, Zhang still on the ground, felt something warm hit their chests at the same time, and Connor realized his eyes were wet, and Andre's were too, and nobody said anything about it.
Diego ran.
He hit Tiger Woods with his sword and the holy Mexican light went with him, pouring out of the blade and into the shadow creature in a burst that lit up the whole dark forest.
TIGER WOODS HP: 10 - 12 = 0
Tiger Woods' body detonated with light. Shadow blood splattered across Diego's white armor in long dark streaks.
The Codex updated one final time.
WHITE, BLACK, SOUTH KOREAN OR CHINESE, MEXICAN — LEVEL 1
EXP GAINED: 10
5 MORE TO LEVEL 2
Andre stared at the screen.
"WHAT THE HELL."
Diego turned around, blinking, still holding the sword. "I know. I didn't think I could do that either."
"Nah—" Andre pointed at the damage number, then at himself, then back at the number. "Nah I mean 12 damage?! Mine only did 3. That's some bullshit."
"3?" Connor's voice went up. "Mine did 1 per damage—"
"1?! At least you got to fight it, I did jack-shit—" Zhang said from the ground.
"WELL SORRY THAT TIGER WOODS ATTACKED ME FIRST BUT I DESERVE THAT 12 DAMAGE KILL—" Diego said.
Zhang raised his hand. "I got hit too."
Nobody acknowledged this.
"I'm just saying," Zhang said to nobody.
And so they stood in the grey forest of Valdenmoor, Tiger Woods defeated, shadow blood drying on Diego's armor, Zhang still on the ground, and argued about damage numbers like they hadn't just survived their first real battle.