Allen rushed over to Ty. The Defender was hunched behind his shield while a group of ogres mindlessly wailed on him. He was slowly backing away, though only to keep the pack of monsters from forcing their way around him.

With a quick glance, Allen saw that their levels were between thirteen and seventeen. He circled around the group of about a dozen and stabbed the rear most one through the back. It roared and spun around just in time to get disemboweled.

Allen silently moved through the group of ogres, stabbing them with Assassinate and then cutting apart their stomachs or necks, whichever he could get his knife to the fastest. They were all killed with two to four well placed strikes, pinpointed by Allen’s Killer Instinct skill and guided by his higher dexterity and speed.

Ten ogres fell within the span of the next few minutes. Three were left trying in vain to bash their clubs through Ty’s shield, they were just too simple minded to try anything besides repetitive smashes.

Allen slipped up behind one of them and stabbed it in the back. The monster was at level fourteen, which was the threshold below which Allen’s Assassinate backstab would cause its heart to explode.

The ogre didn’t immediately go down, even if it was already dead. It howled in pain and swept its club at Allen’s head, though doing so only allowed him to duck under the swing and drag his knife across its exposed abdomen.

Blood and guts spilled out of the ogre as it fell. Ty shield bashed another to the ground while Allen leapt behind the remaining ogre and slammed his knife into its neck. Ty smashed the downed ogre’s face in with the bottom of his shield and Allen ripped his knife out along with the last ogre’s throat.

A few moments passed as the two mentally returned from the battle, both breathing fast as they stood around the corpses.

“Thanks m’man,” Ty started at last, chest heaving as he caught his breath. “I’m down on stamina, gimme a minute.”

Allen nodded. Looking around, the only remaining ogres he could find were still ensnared by the fire on the other side of the chieftain’s body. “Less than twenty of them left; it shouldn’t take too long,” he said, roughly estimating how many they had killed thus far.

Ty grunted in response.

Allen flicked the blood off his knife and ran at the remaining horde of braindead ogres. The monsters were flailing around, punching and biting each other. Fire burnt some of them, but they didn’t seem to care.

Allen caught a glimpse of Camila as she jumped out from behind a dilapidated tent on the other side of the mass of ogres. She rushed the nearest one and beheaded it with a powerful swing.

Amelia and Christopher emerged a moment later and the flames were promptly extinguished.

Allen rushed forward, stabbing and slashing at the frenzied monsters. With their chief gone and their minds scrambled by Christopher’s magical interference they stood absolutely no chance. Camila and Allen managed to slaughter all of them in a matter of minutes. The two each killed roughly the same amount, but Allen convinced himself that he had gotten more.

When the final ogre rushed at him, he dodged to the side and sliced open its gut. It roared in crazed defiance, but Camila quickly chopped its head off.

Except instead of falling to the floor, both the head and the spray of blood froze in place. In fact, everything other than Allen and the group was frozen as if time had stopped. The entire world had gone silent, and he knew exactly why.

“Excellent!” came the voice of their local deity, a plume of black smoke appearing in the center of the many mangled ogre corpses. The smoke absolved to reveal the dark form of Andy casually standing before them.

Amelia rolled up with Christopher, struggling somewhat to get between the ogres. Both had rather disenchanted expressions on their faces, but Allen couldn’t really blame them. The idea that they were finally done with the ogres would catch up eventually.

“Yo,” Ty said through a groan, waving a hand at the god.

“That only took you a few hours, it’s not even dusk yet,” Andy continued, his voice swelling with pride. It was the same pride a mother might have after reading over her child’s good report card.

To Allen, it certainly didn’t feel like only a few hours had gone by. He just stared back in response. Similarly, nobody else could really think of anything to say; they were all exhausted after all. Even if they could heal and recover stamina, it wasn’t the same as actual rest. Ty had a tired look in his eyes and Christopher seemed to be considering something.

Allen was itching for his present and his levels. He walked up to Amelia and the girl wordlessly started healing him. The warmth of Amelia’s healing and a job well done was enough to quell his nerves.

“So… How do you all feel?” the god continued, his tone expressing the beginnings of concern. “Don’t worry, you can all get plenty of rest after this,” he added, looking over at Camila.

The woman was standing still, yet it was very clear that she was still seething with rage from her skill. She grunted angrily in response.

“Oh, true,” Andy replied, hollow white eyes glowing in a smile.

The god snapped his fingers and Camila stumbled backwards a step. She gasped for air as the magical aura churning around her was instantly banished. It took her a few second to come to her senses as she looked around in confusion, maybe even a hint of fear.

“There you go, good as new,” Andy began. “Now that your all here, we can—"

“What the fuck!” Camila shouted suddenly, anger coming to the surface.

“Bruh.” Ty sighed.

“Indeed,” Christopher deadpanned.

“Huh, I really expected you to be less angry after cancelling your skill,” said Andy with rather extravagant sarcasm.

Camila only seemed to get angrier. “Why the hell are we doing this! Why did you take our respawns! Is this some kind of fucking game to you!”

Though he had no mouth, Allen could practically feel Andy smirking. “You’re definitely my favorite,” he said lovingly. “To answer your questions: To get stronger, because it’s the rules, and yes. I can answer any other questions you have, as long as it’s not to do with the System or me personally.”

Camila snorted in defiance but blessedly didn’t continue her tirade.

“The rules?” Christopher asked. “Explain.”

Allen wasn’t interested in ‘rules’ nearly as much as he was in presents, but he listened in regardless.

“Mhm,” Andy began and gestured firmly. “Right, so you know how I said there’s a divine… godly society of gods and such.” The god paused as if to make sure everyone was paying attention. “Well, the higher-ups make the rules and they decide how things work. The tournament of trials you all will compete in is a way to test the ability of gods to do godly stuff and manage souls and worlds.”

“Yes, you told us as much already,” Christopher replied.

“I did, yes,” Andy confirmed, “The thing is though… I’m technically, strictly, not really supposed to give you the ten-year head start with the System that I did. Also, I’m super-duper not allowed to just give you unlimited lives so you can try things out with no consequences, that’s a big no-no.”

“Wait, so you’re fucking cheating?!” Ty blurted; his eyes went wide.

Andy groaned and squirmed in place as if the accusation had hurt him. “Such a harsh word. The point of the tournament is to show that I’m a worthy god, not a push over. Besides, I doubt I’m the only one doing something like this…”

“You’re shitting me,” Camila said.

Ty buried his face in his hands while Christopher’s brow furrowed further.

Allen couldn’t help but let a chuckle escape him. "It's Andy who gets fucked if somebody finds out, not me."

“Any more questions?” Andy started again, his outline glowing brightly again. “I’m all ears.”