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When Landen entered the courtyard, he didn't notice that his teammates and Maledic were already there. By the time Team Orvyn approached him, the others had already migrated to his side.
"What's going on?" Landen asked as they fell into step behind Elle and Ryker. "Why are they targeting me?"
"I'm surprised you don't know," Maledic said.
"Know what?"
"The Underground Rankings," Jareth said.
Landen glanced back. Jareth had moved up beside him, and behind him, Veya pumped her fist. "We got your back, Landen."
Maledic explained it as they walked. Beneath the old east wing was a basement that students called the Underground Rankings — a leaderboard run entirely by students, tracking battles and events that the academy never officially recorded. There were boards for every class: seniors, juniors, sophomores, freshmen. The freshman board had started filling since orientation began. And the moment Landen walked onto that stage in his red jumpsuit, he was placed at the top.
And until someone beat him, he would stay there.
"We'll still have our fight," Maledic said. "But right now you need to focus on who's in front of you."
"I've never fought anyone before," Landen said. "I don't even know how to throw a punch."
"It's not that kind of fight," Jareth said.
He pointed ahead. Elle and Ryker had stopped in a wide section of the courtyard. Two circular symbols were carved into the ground about six feet apart — intricate arrays etched deep into the stone. Ryker stood on one of them, arms crossed, waiting.
"A one-on-one battle arena," Maledic said.
Landen stared at it, not quite following.
Ryker clapped his hands twice, impatient. "Come on, let's go already. UR rules."
Landen turned back to Maledic, eyebrows raised — a little help here?
"Underground Ranking rules. Simple enough: either player can forfeit, or the first one to die twice loses. Alternatively, if your tier-one tower falls, the match is over."
Something clicked in Landen's head. His brow rose. He looked from the array, to Ryker, and back again.
It was a MOBA 1v1 match, just like back on Earth. He'd never lost a 1v1 in his life, and he wasn't going to let it happen today.
A smile crept onto his face, and he started slowly rubbing his hands together.
The mood shift was visible. Everyone around him caught it — that unmistakable change from confused newcomer to something else entirely. Something that looked a lot like hunger. Ryker watched Landen's expression shift and went very still. A new thought seemed to cross his face, quiet and uneasy.
Had he just made a mistake?
— — —
Landen stepped onto the array.
The symbols beneath his feet began to glow, lines tracing outward one by one until the whole thing erupted in a column of bright light. His body lifted off the ground. A bubble formed around him — around both of them — like being submerged in something liquid and luminous. A wristband materialized on his arm. A chest piece followed, fitted with a glass crystal at its center that shimmered like a mirror pressed against an open portal.
From outside the bubbles, a shared display appeared between the two of them — an overhead view of the arena rendered for spectators, alongside a scoreboard tracking hit points, total essence, gold count, item inventories, and more.
But for Landen, inside the bubbles was something else.
The courtyard faded. The crowd blurred into soft, indistinct shapes at the edge of his vision — he could still make out who was who if he looked, but barely. In front of him, the world had transformed. A spawn area materialized around him, nearly identical to the ones he'd trained in during the bot simulations. It was augmented reality, the best he could describe it — his body was still here, still real, but the environment had layered itself over everything. When he walked, the AR shifted around him. From outside, anyone watching just saw him moving his legs in place inside a glowing bubble.
Ryker had vanished from his direct view. The match had begun.
"Ten seconds before minions spawn."
Landen slapped himself across the face.
Not the time to admire the architecture. He pulled up the map.
It wasn't what he expected. No square layout, no top and bottom lanes like the tutorial bots had given him — just a single lane stretched between two bases, each with one tower standing guard. The distance from spawn to mid was long. Brutally long. If you got low out here, there was no quick recall to safety; you'd be walking most of the way home. At the center, the land dipped into a shallow river, the lowest point on the map, splitting the lane clean in half.
He filed it away and opened the shop.
He started with 1,500 gold — three times the standard opening sum. The tutorial had been clear on one thing: the weapon you entered with was the only weapon you'd have. The shop didn't sell weapons. It sold orbs — enhancements, boosters, modifiers — and there were more of them than he'd had time to properly review. He opened the inventory display above his wrist and waited.
— — —
Outside, Jareth, Veya, Elle, and Maledic stood watching the shared scoreboard float in the air between the two bubbles.
"Why is he just standing there at the shop?" Veya asked.
"What you buy depends on who you're fighting," Maledic said.
A moment later, Ryker's purchases populated the spectator display.
Landen's followed soon after: a handful of healing potions, a beginner attack orb, a courier, upgraded magic resistance boots, and an orb boosting both HP and HP regeneration.
"Landen went for magic resistance and HP instead of damage," Elle said, reading the display.
"Ryker's a mage," Maledic said. "Look at his items — he went straight for magic power."
Ryker's build showed one beginner and one intermediate Mage Orb, both stacking intelligence and essence regeneration, plus two essence potions to keep his light and dark energy topped off.
"Oh, I get it—" Jareth started.
"—Landen was waiting for Ryker to buy his items first—" Veya cut in.
"—to find out what role he was playing," Elle finished.
The three of them froze, then pointed at each other in a circle. Jareth to Veya. Veya to Elle. Elle to Jareth. Then all three spun together and slapped a triple high-five.
"TEAMWORK!"
Maledic stared at them with a straight face and said nothing.
Landen had a plan. As a melee fighter, closing the gap on a ranged mage was always the hard part—and if Ryker sat comfortably out of reach, then he had no reason to make it easy. So the plan was patience: farm safely, eat the poke damage when it came, and wait for a window to close the distance. He loaded up on defensive items and heals, already resigned to getting chipped at from afar before the real fight even started.
— — —
In the game, Landen's items dropped into his inventory, along with his courier, a small tree-shaped creature about the size of a dog. It blinked up at him with wide amber eyes.
He'd call it Sprout.
Then to equip his items, he pushed the orbs into the crystal embedded in his chest, and a jolt of energy rolled through him, sharp and electric.
"Enemy minions have spawned. Five seconds before contact."
Landen fell in behind his own wave of blue minions, walking them down the lane until they collided with Ryker's red wave at the river — the low ground, the center of the map.
"System, can you display health bars and essence levels for targets and allies?" he whispered.
"Right away."
Health bars appeared above every unit on the field — red for enemies, blue for allies. Ryker had two floating over his head: a red health bar and a yellow essence bar. Landen grinned. This was a huge advantage that only his MOBA system provided. Where others fought blind, he knew exactly when to strike.
Landen held the high ground, watching as Ryker stepped into view. He looked different than before. Now he had these large devices strapped to his forearms. They looked almost like speakers. Without hesitation, Ryker pushed past his own minion wave and went straight for Landen, triggering a skill — Resonance Pulse — that sent out a disorienting pulse of sound and damage at once. Landen's health dipped about ten percent, nothing severe, but his head spun for a second, just long enough for Ryker to land a couple more hits. From a distance, he threw punches in the air, each one rippling from his speakers, releasing pulses of soundwaves that crashed into Landen like physical blows.
"A sound mage," Ember said.
Everyone turned to look at her, surprised she was even there.
"It may not look like much," she continued, "but they're quite deadly mages."
Landen felt the hits land, but his magic resistance absorbed most of the damage.
His skill is actually quite weak. Landen thought. He should only have one skill at level one. I have to take this chance to trade hits.
Ryker moved forward, clearly expecting Landen to retreat. Instead, Landen rushed forward. With his speed boots, Landen closed the gap before Ryker could react, and he drove a punch straight into Ryker's stomach, holding the follow-through.
A massive CRITICAL popped into view above them, visible to the entire crowd.
Ryker blinked, stunned for a half-second — then started laughing. The crowd followed.
"Was that his special ability?"
"I've seen civilians hit harder."
"Triggering a crit on zero attack damage is still zero damage." The crowd laughed harder.
Damn. They're right, Landen thought. My attacks still do literally no damage.
Ryker spread his arms wide, then snapped them inward, sound devices flaring as he angled for a point-blank hit. Landen read it immediately and hopped back out of range — and Ryker relaxed, expecting him to retreat from fear.
Instead, Landen lunged forward.
"You think I'll run?" he said. "When a range fighter just lets a melee fighter sit on top of him for free?"
"Wait—" Ryker started.
Too late. Landen planted his feet, widened his stance, and cocked his fist back, his two pixie braids bouncing with the motion.
System, allocate all stats to strength.
A surge of warmth flooded through the crystal at his chest, down his arm, into his knuckles.
"Finally. I've been waiting for this moment," the system replied.
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